FT13 “Chateaubriand Etudes Historiques,” vol. 2, p. 101.
FT14 “Histoire de la Destruction da Paganismu dans l’Empire d’Orient,” par E. Chastel, Paris, 1850, p. 342 et seq.
FT15 “Histoire de la Destruction du Paganisme en Occident,” par A.
Bengnot, Member of the French Institute, Paris, 1835, 8vo, 2 vols.
FT16 Translator’s note.—Was not the introduction of pagan rites into the church the indirect way to idolatry alluded to in the text?
FT17 Author’s Note—The festivals of the martyrs was a very large
concession made to the old manners, because all that took place during those days was not very edifying.
FT18 Translator’s Note.—I shall give in its proper place a more ample account of Vigilantius.
FT19 Author’s Note.—These compromises were temporary, and the church revoked them as soon as she believed that she could do it without inconvenience. She struggled hard against the calends of January, after having for a considerable time suffered these festivities; and when she saw that she could not succeed in abolishing them, she decided to transport the beginning of the year from the first of January to Easter, ia order to break the Pagan customs.
FT20 Auther’s Note.—“The Saturnalia, and several other festivals, were celebrated on the calends of January; Christmas was fixed at the same epoch. The Luporcalia, a pretended festival of purification, took place during the calends of February; the Christiau purification (Candlemas) was celebrated on the 2d of February. The festival of Augustus, celebrated on the calends of August, was replaced by that of St. Peter in vinculis, established on the 1st of that month. The inhabitants of the country, ever anxious about the safety of their crops, obstinately retained the celebration of the Ambarvalia; St. Mamert established in the middle of the fifth century the Rogations, which in their form differ very little from the Ambarvalia. On comparing the Christian calendar with the Pagan one, it is impossible not to be struck by the great concordance between the two. Now, can we consider this concordance as the effect of chance? It is principally in the usages peculiar only to some churches that we may trace the spirit of concessions with which Christianity was animated during the first centuries of its
establishment. Thus, at Catania, where the Pagans were celebrating the festival of Ceres after harvest, the church of that place consented to delay to that time the festival of the Visitation, which is celebrated everywhere else on the 2d July. Aprile Cronologia Universale di Sicilia, p. 601. I would recommend to those who wish to study this subject the work of Marangoni, a very interesting work, though its author (whose object was to convince the Protestants who attacked the discipline of the Roman Catholic Church on account of these concessions) tried to break the evident connection which exists between certain Christian and Pagan festivals.
FT21 Author’s Note.—“There are at Rome even now several churches which had formerly been pagan temples, and thirty-nine of them have been built on the foundations of such temples.”—Marangoni, pp. 236-
268. There is no country in Europe where similar examples are not found. It is necessary to remark, that all these transformations began at the end of the fifth century.
FT22 Authors Note.—At home four churches have pagan names, viz:—S.
Maria Sopra Minerva, S. Maria Aventina, St. Lorenzo in Matuta, and St. Stefano de Cacco. At Bienna, the temple of Quirinus became the church of St. Quiricus.
FT23 Translator’s Note.—And still more to their corruption.
FT24 Translator’s Note.—Christ has said, “Come unto me, all ye that labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you, and learn of me; for I am meek and lowly in heart; and ye shall find rest unto your souls. For my yoke is easy, and my burden is light.”—
<401128>Matthew 11:28-30. I would ask the learned author, whether these words of our Savior are not sufficiently mild, tender, and consoling, and whether there was any necessity to consecrate some new ideas in order to temper their severity?
FT25 Author’s Note.—Amongst a multitude of proofs I shall choose only one, in order to show with what facility the worship of Mary swept away in its progress the remnants of Paganism which were still covering Europe:—Notwithstanding the preaching of St. Hilarion, Sicily had remained faithful to the ancient worship. After the council of Ephesus, we see eight of the finest Pagan temples of that island becoming in a very short time churches dedicated to the Virgin. These temples were, 1. of Minerva, at Syracuse; 2. of Venus and Saturn, at Messina; 3. of Venus Erigone, on the Mount Eryx, believed to have been built by Eneas; 4. of Phalaris, at Agrigent; 5. of Vulcan, near Mount Etna; 6; the Pantheon, at Catania; 7. of Ceres, in the same town; 8. the Sepulchre of Stesichorus.—V. Aprile Cronologia Universale di Sicilia. Similar facts may be found in the ecclesiastical annals of every country.
FT26 Translator’s Note.—The time when the church is to accomplish this purification has, alas! not yet arrived.
FT27 Beugnot, volume 2, book 12, chapter 1, pp. 261-272.