LIGHTS
246
LZOHTS
simple eleiueutsa^ light, mudic, rich attire, procesaioiiK,
ablutions, aud lustrations, flowers, unguents, incense,
etc., belong, as it were, to the common stock of all
ceremonial, whether religious or secular. If there is
to be any solemnity of eictemal worship at all it must
include some at least of these things, and whether wo
turn to the polytheistic ritual of ancient Greece and
Rome, or to the nations of the far East, or to the com-
paratively isolated civilizations of the aborigines of
Mexico and Peru, human striving after impressiveness
is found to manifest itself in very similar ways. A
multiplicity of lights is always in some measure joyous
and decorative, and it is a principle taught by every-
day experience that marks of respect which are shown
at first with a strictly utilitarian purpose are regarded
in the end as only the more honorific if they are con-
tinued when they are plainly superfluous. Thus an
escort of torches or candle-bearers, which is almost a
necessity in the dark, and is a convenience in the twi-
light, becomes a formality indicative of ceremonious
respect if maintained in the full li^ht of day. Again,
since the use of lights was so familiar to Jewish ritual,
there is no sufficient ground for regarding the Chris-
tian Church as in this respect imitative either of the
religions of Greece and Rome or of the more oriental
Mitnra worship. At the same time, it seems probable
enough that certain features of Christian ceremonial
were directly borrowed from Roman secular usages.
For example, the later custom that seven acolytes
with candlesticks should precede the pope, when he
made his solemn entry into the church, is no doubt to
be traced to a privilege which was common under the
Empire of escorting the ^reat functionaries of the
State with torches. This nght is expressly recognised
in the '* Notitia Dignitatum , but it may also be found
in embryo at an earlier date, when the Consul Duilius
for his victory over the Carthaginians, in the third
century before Christ, obtained the privilege of being
escorted home by a torch and a flute player. But
granting, as even so conservative an historian as Car-
dinal Baronius is fully prepared to grant, a certain
amount of direct borrowing of pagan usages, this is no
subject of reproach to the Cathol ic Church. ' * WTiat ' ' ,
he savs, '* is to prevent profane things, when sanctified
by the word of God, being transferred to sacred
purposes? Of such pagan rites laudably adopted
for the service of the Christian religion we have
many examples. And with regard more especially
to lamps and candles, of which we are now speaking,
who can reasonably find fault if those same things
which were once offered to idols are now consecrat(Kl
to the honour of the martyrs? If those lamps which
were kindled in the temples on Saturdays — not as
though the gods needed light, as even Seneca points
out (Ep. XV, 66), but as a mark of veneration — are
now lighted in the honour of the Mother of God? If
the candles which were formerly distributed at the
Saturnalia are now identified with the feast of the
Purification of our Lady? What, I ask, is there so
surprising if holy bishops have allowed certain cus-
toms firmly rooted among pagan peoples, and so
tenaciously adhered to by them that even aifter their
conversion to Christianity they could not be induced
to surrender them, to be transferred to the worship of
the true God?" (Baronius, " Annales", ad ann. 58, n.
77).
With regard to the use of lights in direct connexion with the Iioly Sacrifice of the Mass, we find the whole system of portable lights elaborated in the earliest of the "Ordines Romani". Indeed, St. Jerome's plain reference, already quoted, to the carrying of lights at the Gospel, seems probably to take the practice back to at least three hundred years earlier, even if we may not appeal, as many authorities have done, to the words of the Act^ of the Apostles (xx, 7-8) : " And on the first day of the week, when we were assembled to break bread, Paul discoursed with them. . . . And
there were a great number of lamm in the upper
chamber where we were asscmblecf." It does not
seem to have been customary to place lights upon Uie
altar itself before the eleventh century, out the "Or-
dinos Romani" and other documents make it clear
that, many centuries before this, lights were carried in
procession by acolytes (see Acolyte), and set down
upon the ground or held in the hand while Mass was
being offered and the Gospel read. A decree of the
so-called Fourth Council of Carthage directs that in
the ordination of an acolyte a candlestick is to be
eiven him. but this collection of canons does not be-
long, as wckS once supposed, to the year 398, but to the
time of St. Csesarius of Aries (about a. d. 512). A
httle later, i. e. in 636, St. Isidore of Seville (EtymoL,
VII), xii, n. 29) speaks quite explicitly on the point:
" Acolytes ", he says, " in Greek, are called Ceroferarii
in Latin, from their carrying wax candles when the
Gospel is to be read or the sacrifice to be offered. For
then lights are kindled by them, and carried, not to
drive away darkness, as the sun is shining, but for a
sign of joy, that under the form of material li^ht may
be represented that Light of which we read in the
Gospel: That was the true light." It was only at a
later date that various synodal decrees required the
lighting of first one candle, and afterwaros of two,
during the time of the celebration of Mass.
The use of lights in baptism, a survival of which stiU remains in the candle given to the catechumen, with the words: " Receive this burning liffht and keep thy baptism so as to be without blame , etc., is.a^ of great antiquity. It is probably to be connected in a ver^' immediate way with the solemnities of the Easter vied, when the font was blessed, and when, after care- ful preparation and a long series of "scrutinies", the catechumens were at last admittod to the reception of the Sacrament. Dom Morin (Revue B^n^ctine, \^II, 20; IX, 392) has ^ven excellent reason for be- lieving thai the ceremonial of the paschal candle may be traced back to at least the year 382 in the lifetime of St. Jerome. Moreover the term ^xaTiffd^yres (iUumi- riati), so constantly applied to the newly baptieed in early WTitings, most probably bears some reference to the illumination which, as we know from many sources, marked the night of Holy Saturday. Thus St. Am- brose (De Laps. Virg., v, 19), speaking of this occasion. mentions 'Hue blazing light of the neophytes", ana St. Gregoi>' of Nazianzus, in his great Sermon on Holy Baptism ", tells the candidates that the lamps which you will kindle are a symbol of the illumination with which we shall meet the Bridegroom, with the lamps of our faith shining, not carele^y lulled to sleep" (Orat., xl, 46; cf. xlv, 2).
Again, the pagan use of lights at funerals seems to have been taken over by the Church as a harmless piece of ceremonial to which a Christian colour might easily be given. The early evidence upon this pomt in the wTitings of the Fathers is peculiarly abundant, beginning with what Eusebius tells us of the lyinc in state of tnc body of the Emperor Constantino: "They lighted candles on golden stands around it, and afforded a wonderful spectacle to the beholders, such as never was seen under the sun since the earth was made" (Vila. Const., iv, 66). Similarly, St. Jerome tells us of the ol:)semiies of St. Paula in 386: "She was borne to the grave by the hands of bishops, who eyen put their shoulders under the bier, while other pon- tiffs carried lamps and candles Ixjfore her " (Ad Eus- toch., ep. cviii, n. 29). So, again in the West, at the funeral of St. Germanus of Auxerre, "The number of lights beat back the rays of the sun, and maintained their brightness even through the day (Constautius, "VitaS. Gemmni", II, 21).
It is also certain that, from a very early period. lamps and candles w^ere burnt around the bodies, and then, by a natural transition, before the relics, of the martyrs. How far this was merely a development
