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made a somewhat unfair selection: our readers may think that the Church of Rome is notoriously unfavourable to the domestic relations, but that, at any rate, there would not be this permission to purloin, and this general laxity, in a state which she specially approves, and stamps with the title of the Religious life. We will make a few extracts on this point from the Homo Apostolicus:

'It is doubted what quantity is grave for a monk to spend without leave? Some say that the same decision should be come to about the thefts of monks relatively to their monastery, as about the thefts of sons relatively to their parents. But Sanchez and Lugo are right in not admitting this, because sons are capable of possessing, and monks are not, and also Prelates are more unwilling in the case of their monks thieving than parents in that of their sons. The Doctors, however, say in common that a greater quantity is required for a monk's theft out of the monastery's goods to be grave, than in the case of other thefts. Opinions differ as to what it should be. Azorius, Navarrus, Castropalao, Sanchez, &c. fix on 17. for grave matter, and rather more when the convent is rich; but this seems too indulgent. Soto and Rodriguez fix on 10s. as grave matter, and Croix counts this certain. Lugo thinks that 2s. 6d. is grave matter, and 3s. 4d. if the monastery is rich, even though the monk takes it from the portion assigned to his own use; but supposing he gave it to other monks belonging to the monastery, he extends the sum to 11. 58., provided that it is not in actual money. Sanchez, Bonacina, the Salamanca Doctors, &c. allow that it is no grave fault to take eatables at many different times and in light matter, though afterwards they reach to grave matter, as Prelates are presumed not to be gravely unwilling, provided (as they limit it) that the damage done to the convent is not great, and the things are not precious.'Hom. Apost. xiii. 10.

The principle is the same in the Theologia Moralis, but there is a difference in some particulars. The sums there fixed for grave matter are (1) 18. 8d.; (2) more than 1s. 8d. provided that the convent be rich; (3) still more than that if it is not money, but clothes, books, &c.; (4) 28. 11d. if taken from what is destined for himself; (5) or 3s. 4d.; (6) more than that if purloined for his own use; (7) 2s. 6d. if purloined from the common goods of the monastery, and given to strangers; (8) 3s. 4d. if taken ex rebus que usu non consumuntur, provided it is only done once or twice a-year; (9) or 3s. 9d.; (10) 10s.; (11) the same sum which sons are allowed to steal, for monks stealing what 'would in ordinary cases be grave matter, commit no sin against 'justice, but only against their vow of poverty, unless the theft 'causes grave damage to the monastery;' (12) 58. if taken from what is allowed for his use, and given to a brother-monk; (13) or even 88. 4d.; (14) more than 17. 5s. if not actually money; (15) still more than that if coming from extraneous persons to give to others. Thefts of small amount do not coalesce so as to become grave if there is a long interval between them: and a long interval' is interpreted by Sanchez to mean a year, by the

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NO. LXXXVI.-N.S.

Salamanca Doctors, Filliuccius, Diana, Garcias, and Antony of the Holy Ghost, to mean a month.'

And as we are anxious that we should not make things appear worse than they really are, we desire therefore especially to call the attention of our readers to the fact that in this passage the word theft implies something a little different from that which we generally understand by it. The notion which we generally have of theft is secret appropriation for personal gratification. Here it does not always mean that the thing appropriated is consumed in personal gratification: it may be given away to others, or spent upon self: and it may be taken from the common goods of the monastery, or from the goods assigned to the monk's own use. In the last case the chief feature of the act is that of disobedience, because it is a thing forbidden by the laws of the community, to the control of which the individual has submitted himself; it does, however, likewise involve secret appropriation, because he has no right to more than that which is sufficient for his personal support, according to the rules of the Society: and if that which he purloins is anything of the nature of clothes or of a fixture with which the monastery had supplied him, it will become necessary for the monastery to replace it. Still we should not brand it with the title of theft in the harshest sense of that word. But whenever the sum taken is purloined from the general goods of the monastery, the pilferer is then directly guilty of theft:theft more excusable, if what is taken is given away to others; theft less excusable if retained for himself. The tariff by which monks are to steal, varies according to these differences. The sums fixed are the following:

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1 Theol. Mor. v. 24, 25.

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2 We have considerable doubts whether there is not a misprint of argentei for aurei in the Theologia Moralis, and that instead of 18. 8d. it ought to be 17.; for the same authors (Navarrus, Azorius, &c.) are quoted in the Homo Apostolicus for the latter sum who are set down in the former as authorizing only the less liberal amount. It is a thing which should be looked to; for it would be a serious hardship on a monk to confine him, owing to a misprint, to stealing 1s. 73d a-month, when he might have stolen 198. 113d.

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The vow of poverty, which was referred to above in the passage taken from the Theologia Moralis, and which, if honestly observed, would make it impossible for monks to give away anything not supplied to them for the purpose, except by first stealing it, is one of the three vows essential to the monastic life; the others being those of chastity and obedience. By the vow of poverty,' says the Theologia Moralis, the monk is bound to have nothing of 'his own; that is, no temporal goods which can be valued at a price; the ownership of these things, or, at least, the free and 'independent disposition of them, he has given up for ever.' By the vow of poverty,' says the Homo Apostolicus, monks ' are forbidden to possess or to dispose of anything whatsoever 'which can be valued by money.' This appears strict and selfdenying. Now mark the exceptions:

'It is not contrary to the vow of poverty, 1, to possess goods in common, as S. Thomas teaches, and as it is expressly allowed by the Council of Trent. It is not contrary to the vow of poverty, 2, to possess private property, or a maintenance, which monks in many Orders keep with the Prelate's licence; because, though according to the Council of Trent it does not seem possible to doubt that this is forbidden, since it is there said, "Let none be allowed to possess goods, moveables, or fixtures, even in the name of the convent:" nevertheless the custom which has now become almost universal, and is tolerated by the Holy See, does make it allowable to have private property, for necessary and honest uses, with the permission of the Superiors, provided that the monk is ready to give it up at the Prelate's nod: for the vow of poverty, though it cannot be abrogated in substance, yet (as the Doctors agree) can be changed as to its manner, according to custom, which is presumed to be right when practised by scrupulous monks, and tolerated by Superiors, who know what goes on, and do not forbid it, when they easily might.'-Hom. Apost. xiii. 6.

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Thus we learn that custom is superior in authority to Church law and to the Decrees of Councils, and that a monk is still considered to keep his oath of possessing nothing, though he possesses things (1) in common with others, (2) in private by himself. We learn from the same chapter that Clement VIII. and Urban VIII. issued Bulls forbidding monks to make any gifts but many doctors quoted by those of Salamanca, say that Clement's Bull has not been received, or at least has 'become obsolete, and therefore does not bind; and others have said the same of Urban's.' Liguori, however, thinks that this cannot be maintained, and goes off to the question of grave and light matter,-for, of course, if they give a small quantity, they make no grave transgression of the Bulls: how much that quantity may be, depends, he says, on the approved 'custom, according as the aforesaid Bulls have been received in any of the Orders." Again, we learn that Monks commit. no sin in not observing their primitive rule after a contrary use

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1 Hom. Apost. xiii. 24.

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has been introduced." Elsewhere we find, on the same authority, that monks may go out hunting two or three times a-year, provided they can do so without giving scandal or making a great deal of noise; and it is laid down as a rule, supposing that each monk has 251. a-year, he may stake 17. 58. every year on games of cards, &c. There may be some room left for observance of the vow of poverty and strict self-denial, and we doubt not that a man who was in earnest would find it, like, for example, S. John of the Cross; but we cannot be surprised to learn, still on S. Alfonso's authority, that one motive which frequently induces men to enter monasteries, and against which Confessors are desired to be on their guard, is the desire of spending a more comfortable life'-vitam agendi commodiorem.s Nor can one be greatly astonished at finding that it is his deliberate opinion that the majority of nuns (major harum pars) enter their nunneries not by the calling of God, but by the urgency of their parents, and hence it is that they afterwards lead there a life of restlessness, and introduce laxities into the

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1 Hom. Apost. xiii. 17.

2 Ibid. x. 72.

How great a sum may a monk stake on a game? Sporer thinks that if the game is not specially forbidden by his Rule, he may stake three florins a-year. But others, as Lugo, Elbel, Sanchez, Navarrus, Gregory of Valentia, Jacobus de Graffiis, Salonius, Molina, &c. think," with probability," that if a monk has 251. a-year, he may stake 17. 58., provided that he has not spent as much during the same year on other unnecessary uses. Others, again, as the Salamanca Doctors, Lugo, Molina, Azorius, &e. say that he may stake as much as he can save by spare living out of the things assigned to his use.'-Theol. Mor. 1. iv. 901. This is not a very high motive for a monk's living sparely.

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S. Juan de la Cruz was, under S. Teresa's auspices, the great reformer of the Carmelite Order. The Breviary's account of him is short: Severioris disciplinæ et arctioris vitæ cupidissimus, primitivam Ordinis Regulam ex Superioris licentiâ professus est. It tells us, too, that strictioris discipline promovenda ardore accensus, he was divinely given to S. Teresa, as her assistant in restoring the observance of the original Rules; and that finally, after great toils, and worn out by sickness, he fell asleep in the 49th year of his age. His Spanish biographer enters into further details, and shows us what the Superior's licence' means, and what was the cause of his toils and sickness. The convent into which he entered was one where the rules were, as usual, not observed, and the young monk resolved upon keeping them. At first he was scorned for his Puritanism; then he was persecuted. He was shut up in the carcel, or prison of the monastery, a small dark room, admitting light only by an opening in the door: from hence he was brought out, and scourged before all the brethren, at first every day, afterwards every Friday. At last he determined to escape; he broke out of his prison, and let himself down from the convent wall by a rope, assisted, as his Biographer says, by la Virgen Santisima. For a time he was in danger of being retaken, but after a while he settled himself at a distance, and lived alone and unmolested. Others came and joined him, and S. Teresa suggested to him to found a new monastery on the old rule. She furnished him with money obtained from the nunncries under her control, procured him licences from Rome, and under her direction he carried out the desired reform, But it was to the sufferings which he had to undergo in his original monastery, that his Biographer (in his Life prefixed to the folio edition of his Works, and published by authority) attributes the ruin of his health, to which the Breviary refers.

Prax. Conf. cap vii. 92.

community to the common detriment.'1 And supposing this laxity to have crept in, we do not see how it is easily to be weeded out again, for it seems that liberty of lying-we beg pardon, of covering the truth by means of words-is granted to nuns, even when subject to their Bishop's visitation:

'It is to be noted that nuns being interrogated by the Bishop or the Prelate of the Order in the act of Visitation, are bound to discover the truth about the observance of the rule, as De Alessandro and Texeda say, even though the transgressions be light, because the relaxation of the whole rule generally begins from them."

Bravely spoken! But now for the exceptions. Could there be one nun who would not be excused?

'Lezana and Alessandro, however, excuse nuns from telling the truth, 1. If the crime is amended: hence they infer that no one is bound to lay open another's crime committed some years since, say three years, as Mascardus thinks: and for the same reason reproof is generally to be used before denunciation. 2. Nuns are excused from telling the truth if the crime is concealed, and there is no scandal or clear proof. 3. If they are sure that the Prelate will apply no remedy; or if they know that other nuns, from whom they heard of the crime themselves, have denounced it, for no one is bound to do a useless work. 4. If telling it has a tendency to do harm to themselves. 5. If the crime is known under the obligation of a natural secret, except, however, it is productive of common damage.' -Theol. Mor. 1. V. 57.

We have lingered so long over Liguori's Theory of Theft and of Domestic and Monastic Economy, that we have no space left for the Theory of Restitution of what is stolen. We will extract one passage from the Praxis Confessarii:—

'If the theft is uncertain,-i.e. if it is not known who the person is to whom the damage is done-the penitent is to be bound to make restitution for the purpose of having Masses celebrated, or giving alms to the poor, or making gifts to holy places, and, if he is poor himself, he may apply it to himself, or to his family.'-Cap. ii. 44.

For example, Pius V. decreed that, if incumbents did not say divine office, they should make restitution of a certain part of the fruits or income of the benefice: but he did not say to whom the restitution was to be made. The Casuists supply the omission:

'It is to be given to the poor, or the Church, or to be spent on the parsonage house, or in improving the parsonage lands. And under the name of the poor come all poor people, wherever they live, and the dead, too, are meant by it. And the incumbent himself, also, may apply the said fruits to his own relief, if he is really poor, as Palao, Navarrus, Suarez, Bonacina, Toletus, Viva and Lessins say in accordance with the "common opinion." Except, however, he purposely omits office, knowing that he may keep the fruits because he is a poor man, as Palao and Viva rightly notice.'-L. iv. 672.

Hom. Apost. vii. 61.

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