THE INFLUENCE OF CHRISTIANITY UPON NATIONAL CHARACTER.

Waikato Times, Volume IV, Issue 183, 12 July 1873, Page 2

THE INFLUENCE OF CHRISTIANITY UPON NATIONAL CHARACTER.

Thk Dean of St Paul's gave the second of his course of three lectures " On the Influence of Clinstianity upon National. Character " before a large audience of men under the domeof the Cathedral. He observed that it was to Western Christendom that they must look for a ful'er development or the capacities and originalities of men in the striking varieties of national character, and that there could be no doubt that in the later ages of the world men and nations had been more enterprising, aspiring, and energetic in the West than in the East, that their history was more eventful and their revolutions graver, and that they had aimed at, hoped for, and ventured upon more. The subject of his paperthat evening was the effects of Christianity upon the character of the Latin races,,and more especially of the Italian* and the French. Those races occupied the ground where Roman civilisation at the time of the Empire had k»»e*t and main influence, and when the Empire fell its plteo and homo were taken by nations closely connected with 'si by blood and race, and now two of the foremost nations in themodern world. With one of them we had maintained a rivalry of centuries, which, however, had not; prevented theexchanges of much sympathy, and with the other, wth which in former times we had shared a great ecclesiastical organisation, we now felt a strong interest not only on ac- : count of its wealth in literature and art, but of a continual personal contact with the country by a stream of English travellers. Comparing from our present point of view the two nations with the races whose places they took, we could not help feeling how strangely modern the ancient Roman*both in thought and words seemed, but yet how vast and. brotfd was the interval that existed between our conception of French and Italian character in its modern form and of the same national character in the days of Cicero, Senecca, and Marcus Aurehus. He proposed to take one or two important points of difference in that ch&raoter,. and to aicertain how and from what causes they arose. The first was the strikingly different sphere and space in national <jbaracter that was occupied by the affections, using th« t«rm in its widest sense. In the Roman character the affections, though far from being absent, were yet habitually subordinated,, and jealousy suppressed, but the modern character was penetrated and permeated by the development and life of theaffections and the emotional part of our nature-. We attributed to our French and Italian neighbours a softness of nature, a proneness to indulge in an excessive pouring-forth, of the heart, an exaggerated expression of the- feelings, and a love of endearing and tender words, and we called them sentimental, childish, and effeminate. But who would dream, of employing the word "sentimental" to anything Roman,, and who could, for instance, imagine a Roman Rosseau? The Romans could be passionate, affectionate, tender, virtuous, and, indeed, everything that could be expressed by their own expressive word " pietas ;"" but with them the plajr . of the affections was looked upon with mistrust and misgiving, was not encouraged, and was habitually disavowed^ One affection, however, the true Roman possessed ani gloried in — the love of bis country, and an obstinate, never-flagging passion for the greatness and public good of Rome. The Dean instanced on the other hand, the wonderful and forcible display of the affections, either beautiful or contemptible, m the literature and manners o£ modern Italy and France, and cited the works of SU Francis de Sales, Feuelon, Lacordaire, and MonUlembert, among others, in proof of his statement, Such a diaplayr was not a thing of modern growth, for it was to be met with in the Middle Ages— as, for instance, in the marvellous -career of St. Francis d'Assisi, who reflected and evoked what was really in the he.irt of his countrymen, and who once wielded an enormous power for good in theworld. To have found such a man in ancient Rome would have been inconceivable. Another great point of difference between the ancient and modern nation* was in their exercise of the imagination. Not forgetting Lucretius, Tertnllian, Virgil, and Horace, and not being insensible to what Roman art had produced, he still contended that in no great sense were the Romans an imaginative people, and that their art constantly occupied the same place in the general history as our literature would have taken if judged only by the works of Dryden and Pope, and with the omission of the imaginative and original genius displayed by Chaucer, Shakespeare, and Milton. On the other hand, the noblest poetry, painting, sculpture, and music had emanated from Italy, and in some provinces of art that country was still unsurpassed. In fact, one of the most unimaginative, prosaic, and businesslike nations had given place to the most imaginative, p Seeking the- rtason for such remarkable changes, the Doan attributed it principally to the conversion of thfr Latin races to the faith of Christ, which gave man a new idea of the sense of sin, and a feeling of companionship with the Son of God, and formed a new brotherhood in the family and the Church. They thus learnt a new enthusiasm and the secret of new affections, and they moulded them intotheir national character. They ibowed thw by their care of the poor, their compliance with the New Commandment of brotherly love and charity, their services of perpetual prayer and thanksgiving, and their courage in the blood-stained amphitheatre and the catacombs. Christianity had also strongly brought out the imaginations, and had opened up a new world in creative art such as had never been dreamed of before. In painters it had created such magnificent works as " The Last Supper," by Leonardo de Vinci, and in poetry it had elicited the "Divine Coinmedia" of Dante. To the light-hearted Greeks Christianity gave a resolute hope of final victory after long struggles, to the more sensible Romans it brought joy, peace, love, at»d rejoicing. What, indeed, would the world have been without it ? The eloquent lecture of the Dean was listened to. throughout with most marked attention.