




                                History of

                             European Morals

                       From Augustus to Charlemagne

                                    By

                   William Edward Hartpole Lecky, M.A.

                              Ninth Edition

                              In Two Volumes

                                 Vol. 2.

                                  London

                         Longmans, Green, And Co.

                                   1890





CONTENTS


Chapter IV. From Constantine To Charlemagne.
Chapter V. The Position Of Women.
Index.
Footnotes






CHAPTER IV. FROM CONSTANTINE TO CHARLEMAGNE.


Having in the last chapter given a brief, but I trust not altogether
indistinct, account of the causes that ensured the triumph of Christianity
in Rome, and of the character of the opposition it overcame, I proceed to
examine the nature of the moral ideal the new religion introduced, and
also the methods by which it attempted to realise it. And at the very
outset of this enquiry it is necessary to guard against a serious error.
It is common with many persons to establish a comparison between
Christianity and Paganism, by placing the teaching of the Christians in
juxtaposition with corresponding passages from the writings of Marcus
Aurelius or Seneca, and to regard the superiority of the Christian over
the philosophical teaching as a complete measure of the moral advance that
was effected by Christianity. But a moment's reflection is sufficient to
display the injustice of such a conclusion. The ethics of Paganism were
part of a philosophy. The ethics of Christianity were part of a religion.
The first were the speculations of a few highly cultivated individuals and
neither had nor could have had any direct influence upon the masses of
mankind. The second were indissolubly connected with the worship, hopes,
and fears of a vast religious system, that acts at least as powerfully on
the most ignorant as on the most educated. The chief objects of Pagan
religions were to foretell the future, to explain the universe, to avert
calamity, to obtain the assistance of the gods. They contained no
instruments of moral teaching analogous to our institution of preaching,
or to the moral preparation for the reception of the sacrament, or to
confession, or to the reading of the Bible, or to religious education, or
to united prayer for spiritual benefits. To make men virtuous was no more
the function of the priest than of the physician. On the other hand, the
philosophic expositions of duty were wholly unconnected with the religious
ceremonies of the temple. To amalgamate these two spheres, to incorporate
moral culture with religion, and thus to enlist in behalf of the former
that desire to enter, by means of ceremonial observances, into direct
communication with Heaven, which experience has shown to be one of the
most universal and powerful passions of mankind, was among the most
important achievements of Christianity. Something had, no doubt, been
already attempted in this direction. Philosophy, in the hands of the
rhetoricians, had become more popular. The Pythagoreans enjoined religious
ceremonies for the purpose of purifying the mind, and expiatory rites were
common, especially in the Oriental religions. But it was the
distinguishing characteristic of Christianity that its moral influence was
not indirect, casual, remote, or spasmodic. Unlike all Pagan religions, it
made moral teaching a main function of its clergy, moral discipline the
leading object of its services, moral dispositions the necessary condition
of the due performance of its rites. By the pulpit, by its ceremonies, by
all the agencies of power it possessed, it laboured systematically and
perseveringly for the regeneration of mankind. Under its influence,
doctrines concerning the nature of God, the immortality of the soul, and
the duties of man, which the noblest intellects of antiquity could barely
grasp, have become the truisms of the village school, the proverbs of the
cottage and of the alley.

But neither the beauty of its sacred writings, nor the perfection of its
religious services, could have achieved this great result without the
introduction of new motives to virtue. These may be either interested or
disinterested, and in both spheres the influence of Christianity was very
great. In the first, it effected a complete revolution by its teaching
concerning the future world and concerning the nature of sin. The doctrine
of a future life was far too vague among the Pagans to exercise any
powerful general influence, and among the philosophers who clung to it
most ardently it was regarded solely in the light of a consolation.
Christianity made it a deterrent influence of the strongest kind. In
addition to the doctrines of eternal suffering, and the lost condition of
the human race, the notion of a minute personal retribution must be
regarded as profoundly original. That the commission of great crimes, or
the omission of great duties, may be expiated hereafter, was indeed an
idea familiar to the Pagans, though it exercised little influence over
their lives, and seldom or never produced, even in the case of the worst
criminals, those scenes of deathbed repentance which are so conspicuous in
Christian biographies. But the Christian notion of the enormity of little
sins, the belief that all the details of life will be scrutinised
hereafter, that weaknesses of character and petty infractions of duty, of
which the historian and the biographer take no note, which have no
perceptible influence upon society, and which scarcely elicit a comment
among mankind, may be made the grounds of eternal condemnation beyond the
grave, was altogether unknown to the ancients, and, at a time when it
possessed all the freshness of novelty, it was well fitted to transform
the character. The eye of the Pagan philosopher was ever fixed upon
virtue, the eye of the Christian teacher upon sin. They first sought to
amend men by extolling the beauty of holiness; the second by awakening the
sentiment of remorse. Each method had its excellences and its defects.
Philosophy was admirably fitted to dignify and ennoble, but altogether
impotent to regenerate, mankind