The Book of Hallowe'en/V.

From Wikisource
Jump to navigation Jump to search
134158The Book of Hallowe'en — V.Ruth Edna Kelley

CHAPTER V

THE COMING OF CHRISTIANITY. ALL SAINTS'. ALL SOULS'


The great power which the Druids exercised over their people
interfered with the Roman rule of Britain. Converts were being made
at Rome. Augustus forbade Romans to became initiated, Tiberius
banished the priestly clan and their adherents from Gaul, and
Claudius utterly stamped out the belief there, and put to death a
Roman knight for wearing the serpent's-egg badge to win a lawsuit.
Forbidden to practise their rites in Britain, the Druids fled to
the isle of Mona, near the coast of Wales. The Romans pursued them,
and in 61 A. D. they were slaughtered and their oak groves cut
down. During the next three centuries the cult was stifled to
death, and the Christian religion substituted.

It was believed that at Christ's advent the pagan gods either died
or were banished.

    "The lonely mountains o'er
     And the resounding shore
       A voice of weeping heard, and loud lament.
     From haunted spring and dale,
     Edged with poplar pale,
       The parting genius is with sighing sent.
     With flower-inwoven tresses torn
     The nymphs in twilight shade of tangled thickets mourn."

               MILTON: On the Morning of Christ's Nativity.

The Christian Fathers explained all oracles and omens by saying
that there was something in them, but that they were the work of
the evil one. The miraculous power they seemed to possess worked
"black magic."

It was a long, hard effort to make men see that their gods had all
the time been wrong, and harder still to root out the age-long
growth of rite and symbol. But on the old religion might be grafted
new names; Midsummer was dedicated to the birth of Saint John;
Lugnasad became Lammas. The fires belonging to these times of year
were retained, their old significance forgotten or reconsecrated.
The rowan, or mountain ash, whose berries had been the food of the
Tuatha, now exorcised those very beings. The trefoil signified the
Trinity, and the cross no longer the rays of the sun on water, but
the cross of Calvary. The fires which had been built to propitiate
the god and consume his sacrifices to induce him to protect them
were now lighted to protect the people from the same god, declared
to be an evil mischief-maker. In time the autumn festival of the
Druids became the vigil of All Hallows or All Saints' Day.

All Saints' was first suggested in the fourth century, when the
Christians were no longer persecuted, in memory of all the saints,
since there were too many for each to have a special day on the
church calendar. A day in May was chosen by Pope Boniface IV in 610
for consecrating the Pantheon, the old Roman temple of all the
gods, to the Virgin and all the saints and martyrs. Pope Gregory
III dedicated a chapel in St. Peter's to the same, and that day was
made compulsory in 835 by Pope Gregory IV, as All Saints'. The day
was changed from May to November so that the crowds that thronged
to Rome for the services might be fed from the harvest bounty. It
is celebrated with a special service in the Greek and Roman
churches and by Episcopalians.

In the tenth century St. Odilo, Bishop of Cluny, instituted a day
of prayer and special masses for the souls of the dead. He had been
told that a hermit dwelling near a cave

  "heard the voices and howlings of devils, which complained
  strongly because that the souls of them that were dead were taken
  away from their hands by alms and by prayers."

                                       DE VORAGINE: Golden Legend.

This day became All Souls', and was set for November 2d.

It is very appropriate that the Celtic festival when the spirits of
the dead and the supernatural powers held a carnival of triumph
over the god of light, should be followed by All Saints' and All
Souls'. The church holy-days were celebrated by bonfires to light
souls through Purgatory to Paradise, as they had lighted the sun to
his death on Samhain. On both occasions there were prayers: the
pagan petitions to the lord of death for a pleasant dwelling-place
for the souls of departed friends; and the Christian for their
speedy deliverance from torture. They have in common the
celebrating of death: the one, of the sun; the other, of mortals:
of harvest: the one, of crops; the other, of sacred memories. They
are kept by revelry and joy: first, to cheer men and make them
forget the malign influences abroad; second, because as the saints
in heaven rejoice over one repentant sinner, we should rejoice over
those who, after struggles and sufferings past, have entered into
everlasting glory.

    "Mother, my Mother, Mother-Country,
       Yet were the fields in bud.
     And the harvest,--when shall it rise again
       Up through the fire and flood?

     * * * * *

    "Mother, my Mother, Mother-Country,
       Was it not all to save
     Harvest of bread?--Harvest of men?
       And the bright years, wave on wave?

  "Search not, search not, my way-worn;
     Search neither weald nor wave.
   One is their heavy reaping-time
     To the earth, that is one wide grave."

                       MARKS: All Souls' Eve.