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Show CLERICAL CELIBACY AGAIN. Editor Sir: 1 lour rejoinder to my communication with Jus- uitical cunningncss avoids all reference to Holy writ. If celibacy has a divine sanction how wr? it that St. IVter. whom you claim as the first prelate pre-late of your church, was a married man, for when J Jesus came into Peter's house. He saw his wife's J (Peter's) molher laid and hick 'of a fever, and : J'c touched her hand and the fever left her, and : hhc arose and ministered to them." Does he not also mention his son Marcus? St. Faul, address-it address-it in- Timothy, says: "A bishop then mu-t be blame-:! blame-:! lpsS lliP husband of one wife.'' You maintain, sir, that the new dispensation is simply a continuance ! of tnP ld. Does not a celibate life contravene :j ' tljc commend, "Increase and multiply ?"' You al- Ic'"G if is an ecclesiastical law. but all ecclesiastical 11 - laws must harmonize with the natural and divine I l laws. Your church, in instituting such a law, I j breaks up family ties and the happiness of a home. ! A celibate life is an unnatural life. Therefore can f not be defended on any ethical principle. ! CYRUS FIELDING. i We do not think that the letter of Mr. Field- I n t0 hich we give insertion, is entitled to no- ; tice at our hands, and if we review it this morn- , i'1 w? do so not for any intrinsic merit attaeh- f i US to Ir. Fielding's objections, but rather to re- ' move any doubts on the part of any of our read- v ers touching the wisdom of the church in com- manding celibacy to her consecrated officers. No nc denies the marriage of St. Peter before T his fall to the Apostolate. But when our Lord ; called him, to make him "a fisher of men," he left P things including his wife to follow Christ ! ; (consult Math. xix-2s). ' St. Mark, the Evangelist, was converted by St. Peter, who always referred to him as his spiritual 1: fon (1 Kp- chap. v-13). He was the disciple and ": interpreter of St. Peter. If Mr. Fielding knew .1 ; anything of the early history of the church he I I would have escaped this imputation of ignorance If auacnea to ins Jotter, the divine exhortation to j "increase and multiply" was a benediction on the f 'I married state, not a command to marry. Among the natural rights of man is included the right to marry. The freedom of choice is man's privilege J ""d np may fleet to marry-or remain a celibate. I (See Math. xix-12). Mr. Fielding does not under- I stand the distinction between natural rights, nat- i "nil duties, natural laws or the Noachic precepts. I the natural .state and the state of nature. Pushed j to its logical issue, his argument would force all I over the age of sixteen to marry or charge them I with infraction of the natural law; it would con- viet of sin every man and woman leading a single I life, and revive the Papian laws of Rome which f inflicted a fine on free-home citizens who remained unmarried after their twenty-fifth year. So far 1 Mr. Fielding . Now let us see what was the uni- I versal opinion of our race concerning celibacy. The opinion is held by men of all times, all places and iall religions, that there is in continency something some-thing heavenly, which exalts man and renders him agreeable to God; and that by a necessary consequence, conse-quence, every sacerdotal function, every religious act, every sacred ceremony, is but little, if at all, in accordance with the state of marriage. The Hebrew priest could not espouse a woman that had been repudiated, and the high-priest could not marry a widow. The Talmud adds that he could not have two wives, although polygamy was tolerated tol-erated in the rest of the people; and he was compelled com-pelled to continence for three days before he entered en-tered the Holy of Holies to offer sacrifice. The Egyptian priest likewise could have but one wife, while plurality of wives was permitted to others. The hierophant or sacrificing priest among the J Greeks was a celibate and obliged to the strictest continency. The priests of Ethiopa, like those of I Egypt, lived in seclusion, and observed celibacy. , And Virgil attributes glory in the Elysian fields '-i the rriest who had always remained fthastc. The " 1 "'" "V Priestesses of Ceres, at Athens, where the law assigned as-signed to them the highest importance, were supported sup-ported at the public expense, and consecrated their whole lifetime to the worship of the godess, were obliged to livev in the most austere continency. Thus did antiquity distinctly acknowledge both the hig himportanee of continency for sacerdotel functions, and the weakness of human nature when unsupported by any other than its mere natural fctrength. " In its migrations across seas our race carried car-ried with it reverence for continency. Prescott, in his History of Peru, tells us the virgins dedicated ded-icated to the worship of the sun were compelled to continency and Landa in his "Relation de Yucatan," Yuca-tan," says that the Xacon or High-priest of the Mayas, during his three years term of office, lived a life of continency. Virgins consecrated to God are to be found among every people, and at every epoch of the history of mankind. What is there of greater celebrity in the world than the vestals i In the temple of Minerva at Athens the sacred fire was kept alive, as at Rome, by virgins. These same vestals have been met with in other nations; as, for instance, in the Indies and South America, Amer-ica, where and it is very remarkable the violation viola-tion of the vow of chastity was punished in the same way as at Rome, that is by burying alive. Whence comes this universal opinion? Where did Xuma learn, three thousand years ago, that in order to raise his community of vestals to holiness holi-ness and reverence, it was necessary to oblige them to virginity, and whence arose the general persuasion persua-sion among the Romans that if a vestal was dispensed dis-pensed from her vows and married, the marriage was never happy. At Rome, Pollio and Agrippa contended for the honor of presenting a vestal virgin to the state. The daughter of Polio was preferred pre-ferred for the reason that Polio had never dishonored dishon-ored his house by a divorce. Was there ever anything so extraordinary? Where did the Romans of that age learn of the j integrity of marriage,, and of the natural alliance between chastity and the altar? Where did these ! ancient Romans learn that a maiden, a daughter of a divorced man, although born in lawful wedlock wed-lock and personally irreproachable, was, notwithstanding, notwith-standing, "damaged" for the altar? These ideas must have sprung from a principal natural to man, as ancient as man, and, so to speak, a portion of his being. |