BEATON
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BEATON
and zeal (verse 9) in behalf of one's neighbour. And
it stands to reason that the blessing, promised to this
continuous looking for God's glorj', should consist of
the supernatural "seeing" of God Himself, the last
aim and end of the heavenly kingdom in its com-
pletion.
Sci-enth Beatitude. — The "peacemakers" (verse 9) are those who not only hve in peace with others but moreover do their best to preserve peace and friend- ship among mankind and between God and man, anil to restore it when it has been disturbed. It is on account of this godly work, "an imitating of God's love of man" as St. Gregorj' of Nyssa styles it, that they shall be called the sons of God, "cliildren of your Father who is in heaven" (Matt., v, 45).
Eighth Beatitude. — When after all this the pious disciples of Christ are repaid with ingratitude and even "persecution" (verse 10) it -n-iU be but a new blessing, "for theirs is the kingdom of heaven".
So by an inclusion, not uncommon in Biblical poetr}', the last blessing goes back to the first and the second. The pious, whose sentiments and de- sire^ whose works and sufTerings are held up before U.S, shall be blessed and happy by their share in the Messianic kingdom, here and hereafter. And \iewed in this light the different kinds of blessing enumerated in the intermediate verses seem to express, in partial images of the one endless beatitude, the same posses- sion of the Messianic salvation. The eight conditions required constitute the fundamental law of the king- dom, the ven,' pith and marrow of Christian perfec- tion. For its depth and breadth of thought, and its practical bearing on Christian life, the passage may be put on a level with the Decalogue in the Old, and the Lord's Prayer in the New, Testament, and it surpasses both in its poetical beauty of structure.
Besides the commentaries on St. Matthew and St. Luke, and the monograptis on the Sermon on the Mount, the Beati- tudes are treated in eight homilies of St. Gregory of Nyssa, P. G.. XLIV. 1193-1302, and in one other of St. Chromatics, P. L.. XX, 323-328, Different patristieal sermons on single beatitudes are noticed in P. /,.. CXXI (Index IV), 23 sqq. JoHX P. VAN KaSTEREN.
Beaton (or Bethune), David, Cardinal, Arch- bishop of St. Andrews, b. 1494; d. 29 May, 1546. He was of an honourable Scottish family on both .sides, being a younger .son of John Beaton of Balfotu-, Fife, by Isabel, daughter of Da\'id Monj-penny of Pitmilly, also in Fife. Educated first at St. Andrews, he went in his seventeenth year to Glasgow, where his uncle, James Beaton, was then archbishop, and where his name appears in the list of students of the university, in 1511. He completed his education in Paris, and in 1519 was appointed by James V Scottish resident at the French court. His first ecclesiastical preferment was to the rectories of Camp- sie and Cambuslang, to which he was presented by his uncle, the Archbishop of Glasgow, and when the latter was translated to the primatial see in 1522, he resigned to his nephew the commendatory Abbacy of Arbroath, obtaining for him from Pope .4drian IV a dispensation from wearing the monastic habit. Beaton returned from France in 1525, took his seat in Parliament as Abbot of Arbroath, and was soon created by the young king Lord Priv-y Seal, in suc- cession to Bishop Crichton of Dunkeld. James di-spatched him to Paris in 1.533, with Sir Thomas Erskine, in order to renew the Scottish alliance Mnth Francis I, and to negotiate for the marriage of James with Magdalen, only daughter of the French king. Beaton was present at the marriage of the royal pair at Notre-Dame on 1 Januarj^, 1537, and returned with them to Scotland in May; but the young queen died of consumption two months later. We next find Beaton on a mission in England, nego- tiating about certain difficulties which had arisen on the Border. The Queen-Mother (Margaret) wrote specially commending the .\bbot of Arbroatli
(Original
to her brother, Henry VIII, mentioning that he was
"gret ^yth the Kyng" (of Scots). A few months
later he was again in Paris, arranging for the mar-
riage of his widowed king with Marj^ of Guise. After
the ceremony (by proxy) in the French capital,
Beaton conducted the bride to Scotland, assisted
at the solemniza-
tion of the marri-
age in St. An-
drews Cathedral,
and was after-
wards sponsor
(together with the
.\rcli bishop of
Glasgow) to the
first child that
was born of the
union. His eleva-
tion to the epis-
copate took place
during thissecond
embassy to the
French court.
King Francis
nominated him to
the Bishopric of
Mirepoix (a stif-
fragan see of Tou-
louse, with an
annual revenue of 10,000 li\Tes), and he received the
papal confirmation on 5 December, 1537. Two
months later he assisted at the coronation of James
and Mary at HoljTOod, himself crowning the queen.
In 1538 the Kings of France and Scotland showed
their appreciation of Beaton's services by petitioning
Pope Paul III to advance him to the cardinalate.
James in making this request (15 August, 1538)
protested liis own firm attachment to the Holy See,
and urged the necessity of some ecclesiastic being
invested with a dignity which wotild enable him to
represent the majesty of the Church in Scotland,
and better -n-ithstand the "insane errors" of the time.
The king repeated his request a month later, and on
20 December, 1538, Beaton was created Cardinal-
Priest of the Title of St. Stephen on the Coelian Hill.
This had been the title of Cardinal John de Salerno,
who had presided at the meeting of Scottish bishops
at Perth in the reign of William the Lion; but the
only Scottish cardinal before Beaton had been Wil-
liam Wardlaw, Bishop of Gla.sgow, who died in 1387.
Early in 1539 Archbishop James Beaton of St.
Andrews died, and his nephew the cardinal (who
had six months before been appointed his coadjutor
\\\Xh right of succession) was promoted to the primacy
of Scotland. A year later, at his request, William
Gibson, Titular Bishop of Libaria, was nominated
his coadjutor, with an annual income of £200, paid
out of the revenues of the archiepiscopal see.
Beaton, whose commanding ability had now raised him to the highest position attainable in Scotland by a subject, was to have that ability fully tested in the growing unrest of the times, and in the rela- tions, becoming rapidly more and more strained, between James V and his uncle, Henrj' VIII of England. The latter, in his designs to detach Scot- land from its allegiance to the Holy See and bring it into subjection to himself, was supported bj' the Douglases and other powerful nobles, and by the sympathy of his sister, the Queen-Mother Margaret James, on the other hand, was backed by the zeal, wealth, influence, and talent of the whole clergj' of the realm, and by many loyal Scottish lords; he had the sympathy of France and of the Emperor of Germany, the strong support of the Holy See, and the warm adherence of the great mass of his subjects. Henry in vain tried to shake his nephew's confidence in Beaton by sending two successive embassies to
