We can thus easily understand how, at any particular time, a savage persecution might rage in Gaul, or Africa, or Asia, while the main part of the Church was enjoying peace. But Rome was undoubtedly the place most subject to frequent outbreaks of the hostile spirit; so that it might be considered as the privilege of its pontiffs, during the first three centuries, to bear the witness of blood to the faith which they taught. To be elected pope was equivalent to being promoted to martyrdom. At the period of our narrative, the Church was in one of those longer intervals of comparative peace, which gave opportunity for great development. From the death of Valerian in 268, there had been no new formal persecutions, though the interval is glorified by many noble martyrdoms. During such periods, the Christians were able to carry out their religious system with completeness, and even with splendor. The city was divided into districts or parishes, each having its title, or church, served by priests, deacons, and inferior ministers. The poor were supported, the sick visited, catechumens instructed; the Sacraments were administered, daily worship was practised, and the penitential canons were enforced by the clergy of each title; and collections were made for those purposes, and others connected with religious charity, and its consequence, hospitality. It is recorded, that in 250, during the pontificate of Cornelius, there were in Rome forty-six priests, a hundred and fifty-four inferior ministers, who were supported by the alms of the faithful, together with fifteen hundred poor. This number of the priests pretty nearly corresponds to that of the titles which St. Optatus tells us there were in Rome. Although the tombs of the martyrs in the catacombs continued to be objects of devotion during these more peaceful intervals, and these asylums of the persecuted were kept in order and repair, they did not then serve for the ordinary places of worship. The churches to which we have already alluded were often public, large, and even splendid; and heathens used to be present at the sermons delivered in them, and such portions of the liturgy as were open to catechumens. But generally they were in private houses, probably made out of the large halls, or triclinia, which the nobler mansions contained. Thus we know that many of the titles in Rome were originally of that character. Tertullian mentions Christian cemeteries under a name and with circumstances, which show that they were above ground, for he compares them to threshing-floors, which were necessarily exposed to the air. A custom of ancient Roman life will remove any objection which may arise, as to how considerable multitudes could assemble in these places, without attracting attention, and consequently persecution. It was usual for what may be called a levée to be held every morning by the rich, attended by dependents, or clients, and messengers from their friends, either slaves or freedmen, some of whom were admitted into the inner court, to the master's presence, while others only presented themselves and were dismissed. Hundreds might thus go in and out of a great house, in addition to the crowd of domestic slaves, tradespeople, and others who had access to it, through the principal or the back entrance of the house, and little or no notice would be taken of the circumstance. There is another important phenomenon in the social life of the early Christians, which one would hardly know how to believe, were not evidence of it brought before us in the most authentic acts of the martyrs, and in ecclesiastical history. It is, the concealment which they contrived to practise. No doubt can be entertained, that persons moving in the highest society, occupying conspicuous public situations, and being near the persons of the emperors, were Christians and yet were not suspected to be such by their most intimate heathen friends. Nay, cases occurred, where the nearest relations were kept in total ignorance on this subject. No lie, no dissembling, no action especially inconsistent with Christian morality or Christian truth, was ever permitted to ensure such secrecy. But every precaution compatible with complete truth was taken to conceal Christianity from the public eye. However necessary this prudential course might be to prevent any wanton persecution, its consequences fell often heavily upon those who held it. The heathen world, the world of power, of influence, and of state, the world which made laws as best suited it, and executed them, the world that loved earthly prosperity and hated faith, felt itself surrounded, filled, compenetrated by a mysterious system, which spread, no one could see how, and exercised an influence derived no one knew whence. Families were startled at finding a son or daughter to have embraced this new law, with which they were not aware they had been in contact, and which, in their heated fancies and popular views, they considered stupid, grovelling, and anti-social. Hence the hatred of Christianity was political as well as religious; the system was considered as un-Roman, as having an interest opposed to the extension and prosperity of the empire, and as obeying an unseen and spiritual power. The Christians were pronounced irreligiosi in Caesares, "disloyal to the emperors," and that was enough. Hence their security and peace depended much upon the state of popular feeling; when any demagogue or fanatic could succeed in rousing this, neither their denial of the charges brought against them, nor their peaceful demeanor, nor the claims of civilized life, could suffice to screen them from such measures of persecution as could be safely urged against them. JAMES CLARENCE MANGAN James Clarence Mangan, clerk, journalist, and poet, was born in Dublin in 1803. He attended school for a short time at Saul's Court, but, his family being very poor, he was forced to go to work at an early age. For ten years he worked as a clerk. In 1831, however, he contributed some verses to a privately printed journal, and from that time was launched as an author. At various times he became connected, either as staff writer or as contributor, with journals like The United Irishman, The Dublin University Magazine, The Nation, Duffy's Irish Catholic Magazine, and The Irish Tribune, but every connection was inevitably terminated because of his irregular habits. His work falls into three classes: translations from the German and the Irish; grotesque critical articles and informal essays; and poetry. In all, he is said to have written some 850 poems. There is about his verse an unevenness of quality that renders a considerable portion of it almost valueless. Some of it, none the less, the Dark Rosaleen in particular, is flooded with the full spirit of romantic Ireland; the literature would be less luminous without it. He died in 1849, his intemperate life making him an easy victim of the cholera scourge which swept Dublin during that year. MY DARK ROSALEEN O MY Dark Rosaleen, Do not sigh, do not weep! The priests are on the ocean green, Upon the ocean green; And Spanish, ale shall give you hope, My own Rosaleen! Shall glad your heart, shall give you hope, Shall give you health, and help, and hope, Over hills and thro' dales, 5 IO |