Marriage lies at the basis of the family and society in church and state, and was most closely and jealously guarded by the church against facility of divorce, against mixed marriages, and marriages between near relatives. Extreme unction with prayer (first mentioned among the sacraments by a synod of Pavia in 850, and by Damiani) was the viaticum for the departure into the other world, and based on the direction of St. James 5: 14, 15 (comp. Mark 6: 13; 16: 18). At first it was applied in every sickness, by layman as well as priest, as a medical cure and as a substitute for amulets and forms of incantation; but the Latin church afterwards confined it to cases of extreme danger. The efficacy of the sacrament was defined by the scholastic term ex opere operato, that is, the sacrament has its intended effect by virtue of its institution and inherent power, independently of the moral character of the priest and of the recipient, provided only that it be performed in the prescribed manner and with the proper intention and provided that the recipient throw no obstacle in the way.' Three of the sacraments, namely baptism, confirmation, and ordination, have in addition the effect of conferring an indelible character. Once baptized always baptized, though the benefit may be forfeited for ever; once ordained always ordained, though a priest may be deposed and excommunicated. 1 Here, too, the Protestant (at least the Reformed) confessions differ from the Roman Catholic by requiring faith in active exercise as a condition of receiving the benefit of the sacrament. In the case of infant baptism the faith of the parents or responsible guardians is taken into account. Without such faith the sacrament would be wasted and profaned. 2 Character indelebilis. § 98. The Organ and the Bell. To the external auxiliaries of worship were added the organ and the bell. The ORGAN,' in the sense of a particular instrument (which dates from the time of St. Augustin), is a development of the Syrinx or Pandean pipe, and in its earliest form consisted of a small box with a row of pipes in the top, which were inflated by the performer with the mouth through means of a tube at one end. It has in the course of time undergone considerable improvements. The use of organs in churches is ascribed to Pope Vitalian (657-672). Constantine Copronymos sent an organ with other presents to King Pepin of France in 767. Charlemagne received one as a present from the Caliph Haroun al Rashid, and had it put up in the cathedral of Aix-la-Chapelle. The art of organ-building was cultivated chiefly in Germany. Pope John VIII. (872-882) requested Bishop Anno of Freising to send him an organ and an organist. The attitude of the churches towards the organ varies. It shared to some extent the fate of images, except that it never was an object of worship. The poetic legend which Raphael has immortalized by one of his master-pieces, ascribes its invention to St. Cecilia, the patron of sacred music. The Greek church disapproves the use of organs. The Latin church introduced it pretty generally, but not without the protest of eminent men, so that even in the Council of Trent a motion was made, though not carried, to prohibit the organ at least in the mass. The Lutheran church retained, the Calvinistic churches rejected it, especially in Switzerland and Scotland; but in recent times the opposition has largely ceased.2 1 Organum from the Greek öpyavov, which is used in the Septuagint for several musical terms in Hebrew, as cheli, chinor (cithara), nephel (nablium), yugab. See the passages in Trommius, Concord. Gr. V. LXX, II. 144. 'See Hopkins and Rimbault: The Organ, its History and Construction, 1855; E. de Coussemakee: Histoire des instruments de musique au moyen-age, Paris 1859; Heinrich Otte: Handbuch der kirchl. Kunstarchäologie, Leipz. 4th ed. The BELL is said to have been invented by Paulinus of Nola (d. 431) in Campania;1 but he never mentions it in his description of churches. Various sonorous instruments were used since the time of Constantine the Great for announcing the commencement of public worship. Gregory of Tours mentions a "signum" for calling monks to prayer. The Irish used chiefly hand-bells from the time of St. Patrick, who himself distributed them freely. St. Columba is reported to have gone to church when the bell rang (pulsante campana) at midnight. Bede mentions the bell for prayer at funerals. St. Sturm of Fulda ordered in his dying hours all the bells of the convent to be rung (779). In the reign of Charlemagne the use of bells was common in the empire. He encouraged the art of bellfounding, and entertained bell-founders at his court. Tancho, a monk of St. Gall, cast a fine bell, weighing from four hundred to five hundred pounds, for the cathedral at Aix-la-Chapelle. In the East, church bells are not mentioned before the end of the ninth century. Bells, like other church-furniture, were consecrated for sacred use by liturgical forms of benediction. They were sometimes even baptized; but Charlemagne, in a capitulary of 789, forbids this abuse.2 The office of bell-ringers3 was so highly esteemed in that age that even abbots and bishops coveted it. Popular 1866, p. 225 sqq. O. Wangemann: Gesch. der Orgel und der Orgelbaukunst, second ed. 1891. Comp. also Bingham, Augusti, Binterim, Siegel, Alt, and the art. Organ in Smith and Cheetham, Wetzer and Welte, and in Herzog. 1 Hence the names campanum, or campana, nola (continued in the Italian language), but it is more probable that the name is derived from Campanian brass (as campanum), which in early times furnished the material for bells. In later Latin it is called cloqua, cloccum, clocca, cloca, also tintinnabulum, English: clock; German: Glocke; French: cloche; Irish: clog (comp. the Latin clangere and the German klopfen). 2" Ut clocca non baptizentur." According to Baronius, Annal. ad a. 968, Pope John XIII. baptized the great bell of the Lateran church, and called it John. The reformers of the sixteenth century renewed the protest of Charlemagne, and abolished the baptism of bells as a profanation of the sacrament. See Siegel, Handbuch der christl. kirchlichen Alterthümer, II. 243. 3 Campanarii, campanatores. superstition ascribed to bells a magical effect in quieting storms and expelling pestilence. Special towers were built for them.1 The use of church bells is expressed in the old lines which are inscribed in many of them; "Lauda Deum verum, plebem voco, congrego clerum, 1 Called Campanile. The one on place of San Marco at Venice is especially celebrated. The literature on bells is given by Siegel, II. 239, and Otte, p. 2 and 102. We mention Nic. Eggers: De Origine et Nomine Campanarum, Jen., 1684; by the same: De Campanarum Materia et Forma, 1685; Waller: De Campanis et præcipuis earum Usibus, Holm., 1694; Eschenwecker: Circa Campanas, Hal., 1708; J. B. Thiers: Traité des Cloches, Par., 1719; Montanus: Hist. Nachricht von den Glocken, etc., Chemnitz, 1726; Chrysander: Hist. Nachricht von KirchenGlocken, Rinteln, 1755; Heinrich Otte: Glockenkunde, Leipz., 1858; comp. also his Handbuch der kirchlichen Kunst-Archäologie des deutschen Mittelalters, Leipz., 1868, 4th ed., p. 245-248 (with illustrations); and the articles Bells, Glocken, in the archeological works of Smith and Cheetham, Wetzer and Welte, and Herzog. Schiller has made the bell the subject of his greatest lyric poem, which ends with this beautiful description of its symbolic meaning: "Und diess sei fortan ihr Beruf, Wozu der Meister sie erschuf: Soll sie im blauen Himmelszelt, Wie der Gestirne helle Schaar, 99. The Worship of Saints. Comp. vol. III. 22 81-87 (p. 409–460). The Worship of Saints, handed down from the Nicene age, was a Christian substitute for heathen idolatry and heroworship, and well suited to the taste and antecedents of the barbarian races, but was equally popular among the cultivated Greeks. The scholastics made a distinction between three grades of worship: 1) adoration (λarpɛía), which belongs to God alone; 2) veneration (dovicía), which is due to the saints as those whom God himself has honored, and who reign with him in heaven; 3) special veneration (úлepdovλeía), which is due to the Virgin Mary as the mother of the Saviour and the queen of all saints. But the people did not always mind this distinction, and the priests rather encouraged the excesses of saint-worship. Prayers were freely addressed to the saints, though not as the givers of the blessings desired, but as intercessors and advocates. Hence the form: "Pray for us" (Ora pro nobis). The number of saints and their festivals multiplied very rapidly. Each nation, country, province or city chose its patron saint, as Peter and Paul in Rome, St. Ambrose in Milan, St. Martin, St. Denys (Dionysius) and St. Germain in France, St. George in England, St. Patrick in Ireland, St. Boniface in Germany, and especially the Virgin Mary, who has innumerable localities and churches under her care and protection. The fact of saintship was at first decided by the voice of the people, which was obeyed as the voice of God. Great and good men and women who lived in the odor of sanctity and did eminent service to the cause of religion as missionaries or martyrs or bishops or monks or nuns, were gratefully remembered after their death; they became patron saints of the country or province of their labors and sufferings, and their worship spread gradually over the entire church. Their relics were held sacred; |