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GEMCA : Papers in progress
2013
Tome 2 – numéro 1
http://gemca.fltr.ucl.ac.be/docs/pp/GEMCA_PP_2_2013_1.pdf
Dossier :
Renaissance Society of America 2013
Sponsored sessions by GEMCA
Textes édités par
Nathalie Hancisse et Maxime Perret
1
Jesuit & Spectacle
Framing the Feast.
The Meanings of Festive Devices in the Baroque
Spectacle Culture of the Southern Netherlands1
Ralph DEKONINCK (Université catholique de Louvain)
A large number of studies devoted to the phenomenon of earlymodern festivals have mainly focused on the political or religious
programme they staged2. Spectacular ceremonies primarily lend
themselves to being understood as a fairly sophisticated form of
politico-religious communication, the various levels of meaning of
which must be decoded. In their rhetorical dimension, they offer
themselves up as discourses performed through different artistic
forms, accumulating their effects to better praise the glory of the
sovereigns and the saints celebrated by means of these extraordinary
events. It must also be borne in mind that this approach is a
1
2
This paper is part of a project funded by the Belgian Science Policy Office and
co-directed by Annick Delfosse, Maarten Delbeke, Koen Vermeir and myself.
The project relates to the cultures of the Baroque spectacle between Italy and the
Southern Netherlands. See Ralph DEKONINCK, Annick DELFOSSE, Maarten
DELBEKE and Koen VERMEIR, “Mise en image du spectacle et spectacularisation
de l’image à l’âge baroque”, Degrés, 2013, p. 1-14.
This paper will be published in Johannes SÜßMANN and Sabine SCHMITZ (eds.),
Bauten, Rituale, Aufführung: Medieninnovationen im Nordeuropa des 17.
Jahrhunderts, Wolfenbüttel, Wolfenbüttler Arbeiten sur Barockforschung,
forthcoming.
Among the most recent literature on the subject, I can just mention a few
references: J. R. MULRYNE, Helen WATANABE-O’KELLY, Margaret SHEWRING,
Elizabeth GOLDRING and Sarah KNIGHT (ed.), Europa Triumphans: Court And Civic
Festivals In Early Modern Europe, Farnham, 2004. Renato DIEZ, Il trionfo della
parola. Studio nelle relazioni di feste nella Roma barocca 1623-1667, Rome, 1986.
Maurizio FAGIOLO DELL’ARCO, Corpus delle feste a Roma. t. 1. La festa barocca. t. 2.
Bibliografia della festa barocca a Roma, Rome, 1997. Sarah BONNEMAISON and
Christine MACY (ed.), Festival Architecture, London, 2008. Bernard DOMPNIER
(ed.), Les cérémonies extraordinaires du catholicisme baroque, Clermont-Ferrand,
2009. Peter GILLGREN and Mȯrten SNICKARE (ed.), Performativity and Performance
in Baroque Rome, Farnham, Ashgate, 2012. For the Southern Netherlands that I
will explore here, see: W. KUYPER, The Triumphant Entry of Renaissance
Architecture into the Netherlands. The Joyeuse Entrée of Philip of Spain into Antwerp
GEMCA : papers in progress, 2, 1, 2013.
URL : http://gemca.fltr.ucl.ac.be/docs/pp/GEMCA_PP_2_2013_1_001.pdf
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Ralph Dekoninck
naturally privileged one, given that the vast majority of sources
available are essentially textual in nature. These verbal accounts of
the festivals bring attention to bear precisely on the ideological
programme without overly dwelling on the details of the staging,
except to mention the pomp that accompanies these occasions.
It is therefore very often in the light of these textual accounts
that the few surviving engravings are studied nowadays. However,
attention must be paid to the specific characteristics of these
engravings, which are of course testimonies that partly distort the
temporary architectural displays whose memory they preserve or,
more precisely, which they have the function to commemorate. The
simple fact that they accompany written accounts as their necessary
complement testifies to the obvious importance of a discourse that
is, by its very nature, essentially visual, or rather that we now
comprehend as essentially visual, while the lived reality appeals
largely to the other senses.
Research related to the study of these representations has, for
the most part, sought only to decode the symbolic motifs that
embellish the complex scenic devices and transmit the politicoreligious messages. Little work has been devoted to the devices
themselves that stage them. Here, it is possible to speak of the
phenomenon of framing, the frame being essentially but not
exclusively understood in the wider sense of what establishes the
representation and invites interpretation. The general framing
system gives sense to all the visual and textual units by combining
and organizing them in order to communicate the iconological and
ideological programme, which is nevertheless activated at the exact
moment of the celebration itself, and in particular at the moment
when the procession passes.
More specifically, transposed to the scale of the city, all the
spectacular framings have the goal of transforming pre-existing
space into a symbolic site, full of meaning. They not only have the
in 1549. Renaissance and Manierism Architecture in the Low Countries from 1530 to
1630, Alphen aan den Rijn, 1994. Margit THØFNER, A Common Art: Urban
Ceremonials in Antwerp and Brussels during and after the Dutch Revolt, Zwolle,
Waanders Publishers, 2007. Stijn BUSSELS, Spectacle, Rhetoric and Power. The
Triumphal Entry of Prince Philip of Spain into Antwerp, Amsterdam, Rodopi, 2012.
Tamar CHOLCMAN, Art on Paper: Ephemeral Art in the Low Countries. The
Triumphal Entry of the Archdukes Albert and Isabella into Antwerp, 1599, Turnhout,
Brepols, 2013. Antien KNAAP and Michael PUTNAM (ed.), Art, Music and Spectacle
in the Age of Rubens, Turnhout, Brepols, 2012.
Framing the Feast
9
function of attracting the spectator’s gaze, but even more of converting it into a hermeneutic and sensitive gaze. Furthermore, they
invite a cross-fertilization of the familiar and the novel. “The
familiar is deliberately made strange” writes William Alexander
McClung. Or to put it in another way, they transform “the permanent by the ephemeral”3 to such an extent that the built environment, even the people who move in it, changes their status for the
duration of the festivities. For it is not a matter of simply converting
space by dressing it with various garments, but also of creating a
particular time, a time-frame, so to speak. In fact, the function of
these framings is also, by a subtle play of compression and dilation,
to mark out a symbolic itinerary requiring the participants to pass
through and stop at significant and sacred places.
In this respect the founding device, as it were, of this culture of
the spectacle is the triumphal arch. Punctuating the route taken by
the procession, the arch offers itself at one and the same time as a
frame and a threshold, reordering time and space. As McClung says:
The importance of the arch lies in the fact that it is to be passed
under, penetrated and so experienced not only at a distance, by the
eye, but during a specific passage of time, by the body. To an extent
not possible with a statue, for example, or with a picture, the
encounter unites the participants with the object of celebration
represented both on and by the arch. Arches of triumph cannot be
usefully distinguished as permanent or occasional; their formal
properties are the same and equate the ephemeral with the
enduring, a point made by both the ceremony and the festival
book4.
And this logic holds true for a large number of the forms of
decoration and pageantry that transform and even transfigure the
urban space for the duration of the festivities, in order to create and
capture elusive time.
The hypothesis I would like to put forward here is that these
framing devices are designed to intensify the strength of the
message, at the risk of absorbing its meaning, as there is often an
unstable equilibrium between the symbolic function and the
3
4
William Alexander MC CLUNG, “A Place for a Time: The Architecture of
Festivals and Theatres”, in Architecture and its Image. Four Centuries of
Architectural Representation, Montreal, Canadian Centre for Architecture, 1989,
p. 92.
Ibid., p. 88.
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Ralph Dekoninck
ornamental function. One might even go so far as to say that the
characteristic feature of these ephemeral decorations is to put into
permanent motion, or even to blot out, the border between ergon and
parergon, between the representation and its frame. The frame,
which is supposed to fade into the background in favour of the
display of the representation, sometimes steals the show, with the
general impression of pomp winning out over the details of
symbolic meaning.
It is this unstable equilibrium that I shall illustrate first on the
basis of a corpus of illustrated texts commemorating some Joyous
Entries in the Southern Netherlands, and then using examples taken
from a corpus of textual accounts of canonization celebrations in the
same regions. Confronting visual and textual representations makes
it possible to question either the reticence of the texts concerning
some aspects of the decorative apparatus accurately represented by
the image, or, conversely, the reticence of the images concerning the
events that are framed by this decorative apparatus and the effects
they exert on the spectator and the events described at length in the
texts. Even more important, when the image is adjacent to the text,
we need to consider their complementarity, and thus think about the
properties of the genre of the festival book — icono-textual documents that constitute another type of framing device making the
temporary permanent. We also have to stress the fact that our
reflections deal exclusively with the special status of these festival
accounts and not with the “real” festive events to which we can only
have access through the texts and images conveying them. It is not
necessary to recall something that has already been thoroughly
studied: the principal objective of those accounts is not to render
with exactitude the concrete unfolding of the festivities but to give
an ideal representation that often appears to be a kind of re-creation
or even a creation, as sometimes the account precedes the events
when they were conceived as a kind of programme for the festival.
In both cases, however, the aim is to magnify the spectacle, to
intensify its impact in order to better glorify its main protagonists
and to deliver to posterity a kind of memorial for the greatness of
the saint or the prince.
The spectacular images
Let us start with the nature and functions of the engravings
commemorating or memorializing more than simply recording the
Framing the Feast
11
festive decorations, their aim indeed being to fix in the memory
what is by nature ephemeral, producing the illusion of time stopped
in its tracks. It must be emphasized that different point of views
have been adopted in the illustrations of the festival books: the
temporary architecture is either displayed within the pre-existing
urban context and in close connection with the events that took
place during the festivities, or it is isolated and treated as an
independent structure. “All sense of context is then deliberately
avoided, and the objects float in a dreamlike space5”.
The first option is quite rare. In Southern Netherlands festival
books, it is often used in the introduction, as a bird’s-eye view, or in
the conclusion, as a panoramic view in order to set the frame — the
frame of the town itself and its inhabitants who are the principal
protagonists together with the prince they welcome (Fig. 1). Here, it
is more the events than their architectural frames that are the centre
of attention.
The second option is far more common and widespread: it
exhibits the monuments detached from their spatial and temporal
context, and transforms the book into an itinerary, and the process
of reading it into a kind of journey through these fragmented pieces
(Fig. 2). Represented against a neutral background, they show as the
only mark of their ephemeral dimension some flags and torches, or
sometimes firework machines. This is clearly such a recurrent device
that becomes a distinctive feature of the culture of spectacle, be it
profane or sacred. More specifically, we can say that smoke as a
token of fire and light is probably the more explicit reference and
obvious sign of the liveliness of celebration (Fig. 3). Almost every
designer and engraver devotes a visually marginal but thematically
central place to this single means of evoking the crucial status of
light as the most paradigmatic expression of any kind of celebration,
which is essentially perceived and experienced as son et lumière6.
And this is the biggest challenge for the engraver: to render in black
and white what cannot be frozen into a fixed and bi-dimensional
image, i.e. a four-dimensional experience. Animation was indeed
peculiar to these living decorations, mixing fixed and mobile images
to such an extent that the boundaries between the natural and the
artificial, two dimensions confused in the engravings, became
5
6
Ibid., p. 89.
See Kevin SALATINO, Incendiary Art. The Representation of Fireworks in Early
Modern Europe, Los Angeles, 1997.
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Ralph Dekoninck
blurred. Paradoxically, in a way these engravings petrify and
eternalize what is essentially a performative and thus temporary art
of illusion, an art that often uses flat, painted wooden figures or
stucco sculptures against canvas or tapestry backdrops.
Here, we can speak of a real montage of images, a montage for
each occasional monument but also for the sequence formed by the
different architectural structures punctuating the processional route.
Furthermore, it is evident that this illusionistic montage is characterized by great freedom of invention due to the plastic and
technical means used, permitting — indeed encouraging — improbable and fanciful structures, even if this unbridled fantasy is more
clearly marked at the extremities of festive pageants, with the main
section often respecting more traditional conventions (one of the
best examples being the strapwork motifs designed by Pieter Coecke
van Aelst for the 1550 entry into Antwerp of Philip II [Fig. 4]). Once
more, it is at the margins that the most inventive decorations
flourish, therefore forming a kind of frame for the architecture itself
and expressing by its opulence the very nature of celebration.
Indeed, the principal function of the frame is to celebrate. This is
what I have called the intensifying function of the ornamental frame,
which occupies a central place in the rhetoric of the time.
The place of the spectator within this theatrical set and his
intellectual and sensory experience of these framing devices must
still be questioned. It is striking to note that even if the temporary
architecture is mainly represented as being isolated, it is frequently
accompanied by a few spectators. This is the only contextual
element preserved that invites the actual reader-spectator to identify
with this ideal counterpart. But what these engravings cannot tell us
is the very nature of this visual experience. Is the spectator deciphering the various multilayered messages conveyed by the devices,
the texts in the festival books arguing that the meaning takes
precedence over the form? Or is he experiencing a kind of
contemplation, struck by the magnificence of the architecture? As
McClung rightly commented, “The subtlety and sophistication of
festival presentations exceeded the understanding of many contemporary recorders of the events; the complex union of classical
scholarship and ceremonial design must have left most ordinary
people wholly in the dark7”.
7
Ibid., p. 89.
Framing the Feast
13
The textual sources are rather more explicit than the visual on
this question of effects, as they insist not only on the symbolic
meaning of the iconographic programme, but also on the general
impressions produced by the multimedia and synaesthesic events.
Here, the effectiveness of the beauty and monumentality take
precedence over the meaning. The attention is therefore mainly
drawn to the ornamental paraphernalia rather than to the symbolic
or allegorical elements. The parergon more than the ergon attracts the
viewer, and this is probably even more explicitly present in religious
than in political ceremonies, as we are then dealing with the sacred.
The textual spectacularization
To investigate this other kind of celebration, I shall make use of
the accounts of the festivities organized by the Jesuits in the Belgian
provinces (the Flandro- and the Gallo-Belgica) for the canonization of
Ignatius of Loyola and of Francis Xavier in 16228. This type of
ceremony seems to be something new within the festival culture that
had already been well established and profoundly anchored in the
Southern Netherlands since the 16th century. The first question we
therefore have to address is how this celebration of holiness was
invented or reinvented at that time. Where did it borrow its models
from? And, in particular, to what extent did it find its inspiration in
the 16th century Joyous Entries? Compared to this previous model,
what kind of new and characteristic language was created to express
the transcendence of an absentee, the saint, and through him the
8
Annick DELFOSSE, ‘From Rome to the Southern Netherlands: Spectacular
sceneries to celebrate the canonization of Ignatius of Loyola and Francis Xavier”,
in J. DE SILVA (ed.), The Sacralization of Space and Behaviour in the Early Modern
World, Farnham, Ashgate, forthcoming. See, amongst others, for Italy:
Bernadette MAJORANA, “Entre étonnement et dévotion. Les fêtes universelles
pour les canonisations des saints (Italie, XVIIe siècle et début du XVIIIe siècle)”, in
Bernard DOMPNIER (éd.), Les cérémonies extraordinaires du catholicisme baroque,
Clermont-Ferrand, Presses Universitaires Blaise Pascal, 2009, p. 424-442; for
France: Michel CASSAN, “Les fêtes de la canonisation d’Ignace de Loyola et de
François Xavier dans les provinces d’Aquitaine (1622)”, in Les cérémonies
extraordinaires, p. 459-476; for Spain: Trinidad DE ANTONIO-SAENZ, “Las
canonizaciones de 1622 en Madrid: artistas y organización de los festejos”,
Anales de historia del arte, 4, 1993-1994, p. 701-709; Catalina BUEZO, “Festejos y
máscaras en honor de san Ignacio de Loyola en el siglo XVII”, Boletín de la real
academia de la historia, 190, 1993, p. 315-323; for Brazil: Charlotte DE CASTELNAUL’ESTOILE, Les ouvriers d’une Vigne stérile. Les jésuites et la conversion des Indiens au
Brésil, 1580-1620, Lisbon and Paris, Centre Culturel Calouste Gulbenkian, 2000.
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Ralph Dekoninck
Divine? Did a more obvious relationship exist between the sacred
and the wondrous? Although it is manifestly apparent that the
canonization ceremonies borrowed many elements from the festive
vocabulary and syntax of the Joyous Entries, they nevertheless
shifted the focus elsewhere. Indeed, we would argue that, far more
than in the political festivities, attention is drawn here less to the
symbolic messages conveyed by the apparati than to the inexpressible effects produced by all the parerga.
One characteristic of these types of accounts is that they are not
illustrated, which affects the nature of the texts compared to the
illustrated festival books, where the image dispenses with the need
for the text to comment in detail on the richness of the architectural
devices and all the ornamentation9. Without this visual support, the
textual account has to provide long descriptions in order to
stimulate the imagination of the reader, who has to conjure up his
own mental image of the festivities. Taking into account this aim,
however, the result is rather disappointing and even deceptive, as it
is quite difficult to form a precise representation of what happened
and, even more so, of the way it happened and what it looked like.
So these texts deserve close reading in order to understand how they
function and to what purpose. In particular, the topoi that structure
these texts need to be taken into consideration.
First, we can mention the idea of novelty, which is not only
topical, but certainly also refers to a certain awareness of a new type
of religious festivities: “those who saw several triumphal
processions of this kind in this city maintain that they have never
9
Here are the sources (RA = Rijksarchief; ARSI: Archivum Romanum Societatis
Iesu): Courtrai: Relatio canonizationis BB. PP. Ignatii ac Francisci Xaverii Cortraci
celebratae (Antwerp, RA, FB 1701); Dunkerque: Relatio celebritatis in festo SS. PP.
NN. Ignatii et Xaverii a Residentia Dunckercana (Rome, ARSI, FB60, f. 45-48);
Louvain: Commentarius rerum gestarum a Soc[ieta]te Iesu Lovanii ad Apotheosim SS.
Ignatii et Xaverii (Rome, ARSI, FB 52, f. 17-22). The Litterae annuae and annual
supplements of the Historiae Domus for 1622 are kept in Rome: ARSI, FB 50II, 52
and 56; ARSI, Gallo-Belgica (hereafter GB) 32-34, 40; and Antwerp RA, FB 3.
Antwerp: Michel de Ghryze, Honor S. Ignatio de Loiola Societatis Iesu Fundatori et
S. Francisco Xaverio Indiarum Apostolo per Gregorium XV inter Divos relatis habitus
a Patribus Domus Professae et Collegii Soc[ietatis] Iesu Antverpiae 24 Iulii 1622,
Antwerp, Plantin printing house, 1622; Brussels: Sanctorum Ignati et Xaveri in
Divos relatorum triumphus Bruxellae ab Aula et Urbe celebratus, Brussels, Jean
Pepermann, [1622]; Douai: Narratio eorum quae Duaci pro celebranda Sanctorum
Ignatii et Francisci canonizatione gesta sunt, Douai, Pierre Telu, 1622.
Framing the Feast
15
seen the like10”. Or “it was done with such pomp that Antwerp
doesn’t remember having seen anything similar or bigger for many
years11”. Even strangers, such as Genoese and Neapolitan special
guests, claimed that they “had never seen anything more beautiful
throughout all Italy and the world12”.
It can readily be inferred from these passages that these
descriptions are in no way neutral. The authors are moved by a
rhetoric of marvel and wonder, endeavouring to give an impression
of the splendour and magnificence simply to allow the reader to
relive or re-enact the event, or — even better — the feeling evoked
by the event. The difference between the manuscript accounts
written for the Society of Jesus in Rome and the printed accounts
intended for a wider public has to be taken into account. While the
former somewhat temper the importance of the pomp in order to
meet the need for moderation, the latter render a full account of the
ostentation and admiration, even astonishment of the spectators.
Nevertheless, they share the same tone of celebration, highlighting
the zeal and fervour of the Jesuits but also the desire for emulation
that, through contagion, overcomes all the citizens. Each individual
contributes in his own way and according to his means to the
general success of the festival, from a simple light in front of his
house to more sophisticated ornamental displays: “Certainly, the
houses could be regarded as spectacles, through which we could see
Antwerp’s wealth13”. Or “It is remarkable to see how great the
expectations of the people were and what a considerable effort they
made: some erected theatres, some marked public signposts with the
images of our saints, others searched everywhere for decorations to
adorn public places14”. This kind of emulation also extends to the
10
11
12
13
14
ARSI, FB50 II, 80 (Antwerp), f. 496r: Qui huius generis triumphos in hac urbe
plurimos viderunt, negant umquam similem extitisse.
ARSI, FB50 II, 80 (Antwerp), f. 496r: Quod ea celebritate factum ut nullis retro annis
neq(ue) maiorem imo nec similem se vidisse meminerit Antverpia.
ARSI, FB50 II, 80 (Antwerp), f. 497r : Hic pompae nostrae finem faciam si unum
addidero templum nostrum marmoreum seipso adeo pulc<h>rum ut multi proceres in
quibus Marchio Spinola Genuensis et Dux de Monteleon Neapolitanus fidenter
affirmarint, se tota Italia, mundi ocello, nullum vidisse pulchrius.
Michel de Ghryze, Honor S. Ignatio de Loiola Societatis Iesu Fundatori et S. Francisco
Xaverio…, p. 27: Certe domus singulae spectacula credi poterant, in quibus divitias
tum vere Antverpiae videre licitum.
Michel de Ghryze, Honor S. Ignatio de Loiola Societatis Iesu Fundatori et S. Francisco
Xaverio…, p. 7: Mirum quanta interim populi expectatio, quanta contentio, cum hi
theatra erigere (quorum suo loco ornatus dabitur), illi vexilla publica Sanctorum
16
Ralph Dekoninck
pious rivalry between cities, as for example between Antwerp and
Brussels: “Rivalry is also the arena of pictorial art, so to speak, as the
famous Apellean brushes of Antwerp and Brussels compete to win
the palm15”. This “harmonious competition” or “pious emulation”
ultimately gives the impression of something unpredictable, a kind
of bizarre montage where what counts is the copia and varietas
producing the impression of marvel and preventing any kind of
tedium: “By its very variety, this pomp provokes more pleasure, less
satiety, which could easily overwhelm tired people16”. The delight of
the eyes and of the mind supposedly experienced from this “variety
of things” and “splendid decorations17” “of such beauty that we
never tire of seeing them18”, exemplifies the aviditas spectandi, an
avidity of seeing, of gazing at the spectacle19.
We are encountering here another topos peculiar to these
accounts, the inability of written words to evoke splendour: “the
elegance and opulence were so great that no pen could do them
justice, just as no eye can capture such great majesty20”. Or “I cannot
deny that there is much that escaped the gaze of those who were
watching carefully, however curious they were21”. The impossibility
of describing reflects the emphasis placed on what cannot be
reduced to language, a language usually used, in these types of
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
nostrorum triumphalibus vasa praeparare, alii denique ad ornandas plateas ornamenta
conquirere.
Sanctorum Ignati et Xaveri in Divos relatorum triumphus Bruxellae…, p. 14-15:
Certamen id est et velut arena artis pictoriae: ubi qui celebres sunt Antverpiae
Bruxellaeve Apellaei penicilli, pro palma reportanda depugnarunt.
Sanctorum Ignati et Xaveri in Divos relatorum triumphus Bruxellae…, p. 45 : […] tum
etiam ut varietate hac condita pompa voluptatis plus haberet, satietatis minus, quae
facile in tanto numero ferculorum poterat apud defessum populum obrepere.
ARSI, FB50 II, 80 (Antwerp), f. 496r: illustriora trophaea […] quae licet ob rerum
varietatem, splendidum ornatum et apparatum, oculos animosque intuentium raperent.
Sanctorum Ignati et Xaveri in Divos relatorum triumphus Bruxellae…, p. 27 : […] ea
amoenitate, ut videndo satiari non possent […].
Sanctorum Ignati et Xaveri in Divos relatorum triumphus Bruxellae…, p. 31: Et vos in
gymnasio plaudite, actum est. Non actum: nam per omnes hebdomadae feriatae dies
undae spectatorum magno vomitorio ad aream scholarum effusae sunt spectandi
aviditate ideoque per dies singulos non semel, quia semper scena cum beluatis personis
poscebatur, spectari debuit et spectata reponi.
Sanctorum Ignati et Xaveri in Divos relatorum triumphus Bruxellae…, p. 10: […]
tanta vel elegantia vel opulentia exornarunt, ut nullus scribendo calamus par esse
possit, quando nullus videndo oculus capere tantam maiestatem potuit.
Negare non possum quin omnia solicite lustrantibus quantumvis curiosos oculos multa
effugiant.
Framing the Feast
17
accounts, to present and decipher the symbolic discourse or the
iconographic programme of the festival, expressed through all kinds
of allegories, emblems and symbols. Although the argument of
instruction sometimes seems to be to make the festivities not only
monuments of magnificence but also documents for the instruction
of the common mind22, the main objective is to give an impression of
the abundance, profusion and opulence, the main effect of which is
to dazzle the spectators. This confers on these descriptions a
seemingly chaotic or elusive character, the reader’s imagination
struggling to evoke an image of something comparable. This is why
light and sound occupied a central place. Fire, also conceived as
symbolic of Ignatius igniting mankind with faith (“I have come to
set the earth on fire23”), is probably the principal agent of the
metamorphosis of the ordinary into the extraordinary. Every image
literally comes alive through this animating fire and light.
Everything glows, representing the irradiating holiness and enflaming piety that increase the collective fervour, or the consuming
vices that provoke the horror of the spectators24.
It is now worth focusing on this principle of animation as one of
the main factors contributing to the efficacy of the spectacular.
Beyond fire, the effect of animation is obtained by a constant
blurring of or playing with the boundaries between fiction and
reality, artifice and nature, but also between the different media, the
intermediality contributing to the general effect. For instance,
paintings are framed by real plants, or fake plants accompany real
bodies:
22
23
24
As in this passage commenting that ‘the common mind, which understands
primarily through the sense of sight, was instructed on the life of our saints
through the use of spectacle’ (Accesserunt theatra numero 12 pictis arcubus et
peristromatis adornata, non solum publicae magnificentiae argumenta, verum etiam
spectanti populo documenta. In iis enim estruendis consilium exstitit, ut rudiorum
animi, qui oculorum potissimum sensu capiuntur, eiusmodi spectaculis aptius de Vitis
SS. Nostrorum instruerentur).
Sanctorum Ignati et Xaveri in Divos relatorum triumphus Bruxellae…, p. 45: Operae
pretium facturum me arbitror si sententiarum sacrarum Igneum Ignatium Sancti
Spiritus igne ambientium synopsin ipsissimis verbis appendam. S(anctus) Ignatius,
sacrificantis habitu, in aere sublimis, dissilientibus toto corpore solaribus flammis,
ardentissima oculorum acie, in flammivomum Iesu nomen cordis scintillas eiaculatus,
capitali sententia redimitus, praeferebat in vertice isthaec verba: ‘ Ignem veni, mittere in
terram’.
Haec vi ignis sui, quem pulvis tormentarius alebat, vertebatur continuo spargebatque in
gyrum flammas densissimas, quas vicina pyramis, Hypocrisi victae dedicata, ut excepit,
subito conflagrauit non sine ingeni strepitu ac horrore adstantium.
18
Ralph Dekoninck
there, with great grandeur, two paintings, portraying the saintly
Fathers dressed in the sacred habit, designed by Rubens, the Apelle
of our time were suspended for the spectator. These paintings, with
graceful, artful and elaborated borders, were framed by fringes of
grass, golden leaves and brilliant flowers 25.
It is difficult to infer from this citation whether fake or real plants are
involved. We encounter here the insistent presence of the topos of
illusion and deception. Many expressions comparable to this one can
be found: “It seemed to be the work of nature and not of art26”. This
world of deceitful wonder especially took the form of animated
statues and tableaux vivants, thus a world of moving and speaking
images, of living simulacra, moved by the principle of imitation.
“Those who believed that the images were alive could not see this
spectacle without pain. Those who knew that they were merely
statues seemed incapable of being satiated by this great miracle of
art27”.
If the “as if” principle governs all these accounts, we should ask
ourselves if this is not actually a literary play transfiguring reality,
which would have probably appeared more disappointing, the
verisimilitude revealing itself as dissimilitude, or even fake. In any
case, the main function of the real ornaments and their literary
recreations is to intensify the message coinciding here with the
glorification of holiness. And we must conclude by saying that the
sumptuous gratuitousness always refers ultimately to the value of
piety. All emotions must be converted into pious motions; all
pleasure must serve religious edification; admiration must lead to
veneration. We are dealing here with the central issue of decorum,
the close alliance of dignity and ornament ad maiorem Dei gloriam, a
hot issue due to the insistent advice to respect moderation, even if
this advice was not really respected:
25
26
27
[Deinde ubi ad valvas maiores latiuscula sese muri area inter pilas porrigit,] ibi plena
maiestate sanctoru(m) Patrum habitu sacro amictorum duas tabulas ab Apelle nostrae
aetatis Rubenio delineatas spectatori appenderunt. Has tabulas non specioso minus
quam artificioso laboriosoque ambitu, circu(m)currebant limbi herbarum, bractearu(m)
ac versicolorum florum, textura ita admirabiles.
Sanctorum Ignati et Xaveri in Divos relatorum triumphus Bruxellae…, p. 28: a natura,
non ab arte factam diceres
Qui viva putabant, non sine dolore spectaculum videre poterant; qui statuam scirent,
tanto artis miraculo satiati non posse videbantur.
Framing the Feast
19
From then on, we started to prepare the principal event for which,
religiously and in order to show the modesty of the Company, the
primary advice was that we rejoice more by piety than by
splendour, more for the public good than from a private inclination,
in order not to offend the mortals, those who are aware that we are
the first of this Province to have let shine a torch for others, either
by religious modesty or by popular joy28.
TABLE OF THE FIGURES
Fig. 1
Fig. 2
Fig. 3
Fig. 4
Crispin van den Broeck and Adam de Bruyn,
“Discourse of the Duke of Anjou to the people of
Antwerp”, in La ioyeuse [et] magnifique entrée de
monseigneur Francoys, fils de France, et frere unicque
du roy, par la grace de dieu, duc de Brabant, d’Anjou,
Alencon, Berri, [et]c. en sa tres-renomée ville d’Anvers,
Antwerp, 1582, p. 104.
Pieter van der Borcht, “Triumphal arch of the
Spanishs”, in Joannes Bochius, Descriptio publicae
gratulationis, spectaculorum et ludorum, in adventu
Sereniss[imi] Principis Ernesti Archiducis Austriae…,
Antwerp, 1595, p. 61.
Pieter van der Borcht, “The central square of
Antwerp”, in Joannes Bochius, Descriptio publicae
gratulationis, spectaculorum et ludorum, in adventu
Sereniss[imi] Principis Ernesti Archiducis Austriae…,
Antwerp, 1595, p. 128.
Pieter Coeck van Aelst, “La figure de l’eschaffaulx
de la ville sur le Meerbrugge”, Le triumphe d’Anvers
faict en la susception du Prince Philips, Prince
d’Espaigne, Antwerp, 1550, p. 62.
Pour citer cet article :
Ralph DEKONINCK, « Framing the Feast. The Meanings of Festive Devices in the
Spectacle Culture of the Southern Netherlands », GEMCA : papers in progress, t. 2,
no 1, 2013, p. 7-19, [En ligne]
28
Inde ad praecipuum concinnandum actum totis animis abitum est: in quo religiose ac
pro Soc(ieta)tis modestia exhibendo id consilii cumprimis fuit, ut magis pietati quam
splendori, magis publico bono quam privatae inclinationi studeremus, ne – quod fieri
haud raro solet – inde mortales laederentur, unde solari ac foveri debuerant, rati subinde
nos in hac provincia primos etsi qui aliis facem praeluceremus aut religiosae modestiae
aut saecularis iactantiae.
De la parure festive à l’expérience de l’éphémère :
étudier le sens de l’ornemental ou des dispositifs de
la métamorphose spectaculaire
Caroline HEERING (Université catholique de Louvain)
Les festivités éphémères du premier âge moderne et la question
de l’ornemental sont deux champs d’études qui font actuellement
l’objet de nombreuses recherches et connaissent de profonds renouvellements théoriques et méthodologiques. Mais force est de constater que ces deux domaines n’ont jusqu’à ce jour pas encore été
envisagés de manière conjointe et croisée dans une perspective
approfondie. Le vaste corpus des festivités éphémères, alors qu’il
constitue pourtant un haut lieu de l’ornement, n’a encore été que
trop rarement exploité par les spécialistes de l’ornement. Quant à la
fête, étant considérée comme un lieu hautement symbolique, où se
tissent des configurations nouvelles entre le pouvoir (qu’il soit
religieux, politique ou civil), la société et l’art, la plupart des études
se sont naturellement attachées à en définir le message, en se
concentrant sur le programme iconographique mis en œuvre par des
dispositifs symboliques variés (comme les inscriptions, les emblèmes, les scènes figurées ou encore le théâtre). Quand elle est
envisagée, l’ornementation de la fête est généralement questionnée
sous un angle stylistique, pour en souligner le caractère souvent
novateur — le domaine de l’éphémère étant le laboratoire par excellence de la création de formes nouvelles. Mais si la culture du
spectacle peut à juste titre être envisagée comme un bel observatoire
de la culture, dont il met en exergue, voire parfois forge et transforme, les représentations et les imaginaires, il convient de ne pas
séparer le message symbolique de son expression plastique et de
l’appareil décoratif qui le présente et en accompagne émotionnellement la réception.
Je commencerai par démontrer qu’une étude croisée de
l’ornemental et des festivités se révèle fructueuse à plus d’un titre.
Premièrement, comprendre le sens que peut revêtir l’ornement au
cours de la première modernité suppose d’interroger une triple
22
Caroline Heering
dimension ou triple fonction de l’ornement, corollaire de la triple
acception que recouvre le mot « sens » : celle de signification,
renvoyant à une fonction symbolique ; celle de direction, qui invite à
prendre en considération sa fonction structurante d’ordonnancement ; et enfin celle de sensibilité, qui correspond à une fonction
esthétique et conduit à envisager son effet, qui serait l’empreinte
laissée sur les sens, suscitant une réaction émotionnelle du
spectateur. Alors que les fonctions symbolique et structurante de
l’ornement peuvent être étudiées par le biais d’une étude iconologique et formelle, la dimension sensible reste sans conteste la plus
difficile à appréhender aujourd’hui. Comment l’ornement pouvait-il
agir sur le spectateur et le faire ré-agir à son tour ? Si la théorie de
l’art qui s’élabore à partir de la Renaissance se révèle généralement
muette pour comprendre le sens de l’ornement, le corpus des
festivités éphémères s’avère au contraire d’une grande richesse pour
comprendre l’effet produit, ou du moins attendu, de l’ornement sur
le spectateur. Ces manifestations éphémères nous sont en effet
connues par des sources iconiques et textuelles qui étaient destinées
à figer l’expérience de l’éphémère et à en incarner la mémoire. Par ce
fait même, elles nous renseignent non seulement sur la nature des
décors spectaculaires réalisés mais aussi sur les effets de ces derniers
sur le spectateur, comme le répètent à l’envi les relations écrites qui
insistent sur le détail du décor et sur les sensations produites, de
l’ordre de l’émerveillement ou de la stupeur.
Deuxièmement, si d’un côté les relations offrent donc un point
de vue privilégié pour appréhender la dimension sensitive de l’ornemental, ce dernier s’avère également être l’une des principales voies
d’entrée pour comprendre le fonctionnement même de la fête, de ses
dispositifs et l’expérience recherchée et produite. Je pars du double
postulat théorique suivant :
 L’ornement doit être envisagé comme ce qui s’ajoute à une
autre chose pour la parer, l’embellir, la transformer. C’est ce
que nous rappelle Furetière dans son dictionnaire : « ORNEMENT. subst. masc. Ce qui pare quelque chose, ce qui la rend
plus belle, plus agréable ». Mais il n’est pas inutile de
rappeler la signification qu’il avait au Moyen Âge : les ornamenta désignent ce qui porte la fonction d’une chose à sa
perfection (comme la voile du navire, l’âme de l’homme,
l’armure du guerrier), et la rendent digne d’être célébrée.
Dans un cadre religieux, la beauté de l’ornement tire sa
légitimité d’un principe anagogique : « faire apparaître la
De la parure festive à l’expérience de l’éphémère
23
gloire ou la rendre sensible dès ici-bas, c’est la faire exister sur
un mode sensible — celui d’une apparition réelle et non
d’une simple apparence1 ». Même si la signification de
l’ornement évolue au cours de la première modernité, la
période post-tridentine n’est pas sans renouer avec ce genre
de principe et l’ornement est replacé dans un régime de
l’excès et revient comme de droit à la chose ornée (c’est-àdire que rien n’est trop beau que pour orner le saint ou le
monarque). Et, on le comprend aisément, ce principe trouve
dans le champ des festivités éphémère tout son sens.

1
2
L’autre principe théorique concerne la fête : en appliquant à
l’espace urbain une parure festive (constituée de divers
apparati : portes, d’arcs de triomphes, d’échafauds, de
galeries ou de portiques, de textiles sur les façades), c’est-àdire en l’ornant, la fête fonctionne comme un cadre métamorphosant un espace existant — la notion de cadre doit être
comprise comme ce qui délimite un espace pour une
représentation et engage une lecture, une interprétation de ce
nouveau lieu chargé de sens. Habillant et transformant
l’espace urbain, la parure spectaculaire crée un espace-temps
singulier qui rompt avec le quotidien et l’ordinaire. Car la
fête ne reconfigure pas seulement une réalité spatiale pour en
construire une autre, elle suspend aussi la temporalité
traditionnelle et marque le passage d’une frontière, dont la
porte ou l’arc de triomphe constitue le dispositif fondamental. Et ce hors-temps qui est créé, l’est aussi dans la mesure
où la fête se situe en marge de la temporalité ordinaire, tant
au niveau du cycle liturgique habituel, qu’elle déborde
largement2, qu’au niveau de la vie quotidienne, qui est
marquée au XVIIe siècle dans les anciens Pays-Bas par un
climat anxiogène, engendré par les incessantes agressions
hollandaises et françaises, climat auquel la fête répond par le
divertissement et le plaisir. Ce caractère extraordinaire tient
Jérôme BASCHET, Jean-Claude BONNE et Pierre-Olivier DITTMAR, Le Monde roman
par-delà le Bien et le Mal. Une iconographie du lieu sacré, Paris, Les éditions arkê,
2012, p. 47.
Voir Bernard DOMPNIER (dir.), Les cérémonies extraordinaires du catholicisme
baroque, Clermont-Ferrand, 2009, et en particulier les articles « Déchiffrer » de
Bernard Dompnier (p. 11-16) et « La distinction ordinaire/extraordinaire dans
les textes rubricaux, les cérémoniaux, et chez leurs commentateurs autorisés »
de Jean-Yves Hameline (p. 19-32).
24
Caroline Heering
aussi au fait — en se situant à un niveau axiologique —,
qu’elle se situe dans les marges de la transgression autorisée
(de même nature qu’un état de siège3), en se définissant par
un régime de l’excès et de la dépense.
La fête revêt donc un caractère ornemental à plus d’un titre :
tant au niveau de sa définition interne (fonctionne comme un cadre),
que des dispositifs mis en œuvre (les apparati ajoutés à l’espace
urbain) ou encore de son statut (en marge de l’ordinaire). Cette
structure particulière de la fête impose aux chercheurs des
déplacements constants. Faut-il aussi rappeler que ces déplacements
sont également induits par la nature intermédiale de cette culture du
spectacle, qui convoque et fusionne toutes les formes d’expressions
artistiques avec les progrès scientifiques et techniques, en vue de
créer une expérience multi-sensorielle ? Enfin, il faut aussi ajouter
que les documents iconographiques et textuels qui en rendent
compte constituent en eux-mêmes des phénomènes de cadrage,
puisqu’ils proposent une re-présentation (ou une recomposition) de
l’événement et que le livre offre pour ainsi dire un nouveau
spectacle. Ces sources doivent s’accommoder de la double incapacité
du texte à rendre compte du visible et de la simultanéité, et de
l’image à rendre compte du temps ; et plus généralement de
l’impossibilité de rendre compte de l’éphémère et de l’expérience
synesthésique à laquelle elle donne lieu (autrement dit de rendre
compte des sensations et de l’effet produit). Truffées d’enjeux
idéologiques, ces sources nous donnent le plus souvent une image
idéalisée de l’événement : elles ne reproduisent pas la fête telle
qu’elle s’est réellement déroulée, mais plutôt telle qu’elle était
conçue et voulue. Consistant en quelque sorte en un déplacement
supplémentaire, ces sources n’en sont pas moins des documents
essentiels car destinés à diffuser le message et l’image que la fête
veut durablement signifier.
Entre l’événement festif et le chercheur s’interposent donc toute
une série d’écrans — qui sont comme un écho du principe même de
la fête. Pour refléter ces déplacements continuels et cette structure
particulière de la fête, la méthodologie se doit donc d’être suffisamment souple.
3
Voir Daniel VAILLANCOURT, « Prestige et urbanité : le luxe dans la rue », dans
Marie-France WAGNER, Louise FRAPPIER et Claire LATRAVERSE (éd.), Les jeux de
l'échange : entrées solennelles et divertissements du XVe au XVIIe siècle, Paris, Honoré
Champion, 2007, p. 47-65.
25
En me basant sur les relations des festivités dans les Pays-Bas de
la fin du XVIe et du XVIIe siècle, je voudrais proposer ici une méthode
d’analyse des dispositifs de la métamorphose spectaculaire. Cette
méthode est fondée sur le principe structurel de l’ornemental, à
savoir, que l’ornemental doit être compris comme ce qui s’ajoute à
quelque chose pour l’embellir, et doit donc être compris comme la
prise de possession d’un support, ou un mode de participation à ce
support. Envisagé comme tel, l’ornemental est bien d’abord un
fonctionnement qui met en relation et articule différents acteurs ou
agents : ce que j’appellerai l’orné tout d’abord (ce quelque chose, ou ce
support qui appelle et reçoit l’ornement) et l’ornant ensuite (ce qui
s’applique sur l’orné). Mais l’ornemental ne se limite pas à une
relation à deux composantes, encore faut-il prendre en compte les
hommes qui les produisent et ceux qui les commandent (que l’on
peut appeler les « destinateurs » ou les « émetteurs », en empruntant
cette terminologie au champ de la narratologie, et desquels émanent,
pour ainsi dire, le processus ornemental). Il faut donc envisager les
hommes qui les produisent, les hommes qui les commandent, mais
aussi les hommes qui les regardent et les éprouvent (que j’appellerai
les « destinataires » autrement dit les récepteurs ou les spectateurs).
Ces destinateurs et destinataires sont évidemment des entités théoriques, ou idéales, et pas toujours identifiables — le destinateur pouvant par exemple être une personne, un pouvoir, une institution
religieuse, voire se confondre avec l’artiste. En étant à la fois
l’émetteur du phénomène ornemental, et le bénéficiaire, toujours
implicite, ce destinateur idéal se situe par conséquent en amont et en
aval du processus, et doit donc être situé un peu en dehors du
schéma que j’ai ici esquissé. Toute étude de l’ornemental s’inscrirait
au sein de cette configuration triangulaire et consisterait donc à
étudier les relations entre les acteurs les destinataires (qu’ils soient
commanditaire ou spectateur).
26
Caroline Heering
Pour saisir le fonctionnement ornemental à l’œuvre dans les
dispositifs spectaculaires, je prendrai comme cas d’application les
festivités jésuites consacrées à la canonisation d’Ignace de Loyola et
de François Xavier de 1622, et celle de 1640 célébrant le centenaire de
la compagnie, qui ont donné lieu dans chaque centre jésuite de la
province gallo- et flandro-belge à de nombreuses et importantes
festivités. Ces dernières nous sont connues par des documents
d’archives manuscrits, destinées à être copiées et envoyées à Rome
pour être ensuite distribuées dans les collèges des autres provinces
de la Compagnie.
Il s’agit dans un premier temps d’identifier les acteurs de ces
relations. L’orné tout d’abord. En transformant une réalité spatiotemporelle, ce sont tous les niveaux de la réalité qui peuvent être
métamorphosés par la parure spectaculaire : c’est d’abord l’espace
urbain (l’espace tridimensionnel ouvert de la ville), qui devient le
territoire de la fête dès que le parcours est rythmé d’arc de triomphes
et autres apparati. C’est aussi l’espace tridimensionnel fermé de
l’église qui est orné ; et tout ce qui présente une surface bidimensionnelle inscriptible (une façade de maison ou le corps vivant de
l’être humain par exemple). Il en va de même de la temporalité
(changée et transformée par la musique, comme le son des cloches
qui annonce dans le temps le début des festivités), mais aussi de la
lumière (par les feux d’artifices), de l’action humaine (dans la
mesure où les intervenants jouent un rôle dans les processions et les
représentations théâtrales), ou encore des représentations (les
images ou les inscriptions, qui peuvent êtres ornées ou encadrées).
On le devine déjà ici, l’orné est potentiellement infini et il faut dès
lors penser ce schéma comme mouvant, dans la mesure où la place
des agents est interchangeable : envisageant le dispositif spectaculaire dans son ensemble, tout orné peut à son tour devenir ornant,
27
tout comme le spectateur (destinataire) peut lui-même être orné (par
le costume par exemple), et même, nous le verrons, devenir ornant.
Quant aux ornants, autrement dit aux différents médiums
convoqués pour transformer ces niveaux de réalité, ils peuvent être
de nature diverses : depuis les chars des processions jusqu’aux
textiles et aux végétaux déguisant l’architecture, en passant par arcs
de triomphes, les jeux pyrotechniques, la musique, etc. On saisit là la
nature intermédiale de la fête qui convoque différents médiums
pour transformer des niveaux de réalité divers et ainsi contribuer à
la métamorphose d’un espace-temps.
Mais c’est en étudiant la relation entre les « ornés » et les
« ornants » que l’on peut comprendre la manière dont fonctionnent
les dispositifs de la métamorphose. On peut ainsi mettre en lumière
des dispositifs complexes, comme les arcs de triomphe, qui influent
à la fois sur le temps (en balisant le parcours temporellement) et
l’espace (en rythmant et découpant l’espace urbain), mais aussi
l’action humaine4 (car le corps est transformé en passant dedans, ou
à tout le moins, en s’arrêtant devant, puisque l’on pourrait douter
que des constructions frêles et fragiles permettaient réellement la
déambulation d’un cortège). Les arcs de triomphe sont eux-mêmes
le support, ou plutôt le cadre, de représentations diverses. L’arc de
triomphe apparaît donc comme un dispositif qui met en œuvre un
jeu incessant de cadres s’emboîtant les uns dans les autres, comme
des poupées russes. En reflétant ainsi la nature même de la fête, on
comprend pourquoi l’arc de triomphe apparaît comme un dispositif
central des festivités et pourquoi il constitue aussi souvent le principal dispositif illustré dans les ouvrages : se succédant au fil des
pages, il permet aussi au lecteur de parcourir le livre comme le
spectateur a pu pendant la cérémonie vivre le parcours festif urbain.
Dans cette lecture relationnelle, un autre type de relation à
envisager est celle qui lie entre eux les différents médiums ou
apparti, autrement dit les différents ornants. Elle permet de comprendre si cet espace-temps est cohérent ou composé de pièces rapportées, tel un patchwork composé d’éléments divers juxtaposés. Cette
dimension de l’unité/totalité reste sans conteste la plus difficile à
appréhender, d’autant que les documents iconographiques se limi4
Voir William Alexander MC CLUNG, « A Place for a Time : The Architecture of
Festivals and Theatres », dans Architecture and its Image. Four Centuries of
Architectural Representation, Montreal, Canadian Centre for Architecture, 1989,
p. 87-108.
28
Caroline Heering
tent à des fragments de décor, et que le texte, dont la lecture suppose
une durée dans le temps, est incapable de rendre compte de la
simultanéité de la vision (autrement que par des formules type qui
permettent de rendre compte du caractère englobant du décor, du
type « quelque soit où tu tournais les yeux », « de tous côté », etc). À
cet égard, il faut noter que les gravures qui présentant des vues
cavalières et englobantes (mais donc fictives) des décors et des
cortèges intégrées dans le cadre urbain (fig. 1), qui apparaissent à la
fin du XVIe siècle — alors que prévalait jusqu’alors des défilements
linaires de cortèges (fig. 2) —, peuvent apparaître comme une
réponse à cette volonté de traduire la globalité et la simultanéité de
l’événement, en rendant compte de l’animation de la foule. Les
agents qui composent le cortège, figurés dans ce genre de planches
(fig. 1 et fig. 3), revêtus de costumes somptueux, tout comme les
spectateurs, relient, unissent mais aussi animent les différents
apparati festifs — une animation que traduit bien le flux continu de
la foule suggéré dans ces gravures. En constituant en quelque sorte
une composante supplémentaire — vivante — du décor urbain, les
figures apparaissent comme autant de motifs qui tendent à se
confondre ou à se fondre avec le fond en créant une unité entre les
agents et les médiums. Cette osmose entre les agents et le milieu
constitue d’ailleurs, comme l’a souligné Daniel Vaillancourt5, un
paramètre clé du dispositif festif. Elle est d’ailleurs évoquée dans les
relations écrites : des formules précisant que l’assemblée « ornait »
ou « décorait » la ville ou l’église, par exemple, sont fréquentes6.
Si l’on en revient au schéma, on comprend ainsi toute l’ampleur
de cette circularité que j’évoquais plus haut et cette force potentielle
de l’ornemental à tout envahir, cette fluidité et ces permutations
entre les agents qui caractérisent si bien le phénomène ornemental,
puisque les destinataires/spectateur peuvent devenir non seulement
orné mais aussi ornants ; le nouveau destinataire étant alors, dans le
cas du livre imprimé, le lecteur du livre et de l’image.
Cette question des « agents », qui vivent la fête en même temps
qu’ils la créent, nous amène à étudier un autre type de rapport
constitutif du dispositif festif, à savoir la relation entre les médiums
(orné et ornant) et le spectateur. Cette dimension est une donnée
5
6
Voir Daniel VAILLANCOURT, op. cit.
Dans la relation de Dunkerke, par exemple, on peut lire : « Pendant ce temps, un
concert fort gracieux parcourut toute l’église, que la décoration imprévisible de
l’assemblée (ecclesia) rendait plus agréable. »
29
essentielle car elle permet de comprendre l’effet et l’expérience
produits par les décors. On touche ici à la question de la dimension
sensible et performative de l’ornemental, dont les textes, au contraire de l’image, peuvent rendre compte par divers moyens.
Tout en se situant dans la tradition de l’ekphrasis propres aux
recueils de fête, les relations de ce corpus « jésuite » consacrent de
longues descriptions à la parure spectaculaire. À côté d’une insistance sur le caractère extraordinaire et exceptionnel7 des décors, et
de l’usage récurrent du champ lexical de la richesse et de la
merveille8, les descriptions s’attardent constamment sur la valeur
des objets composant le décor. Toutes s’attachent avec un même
souci de précision à chiffrer les données matérielles qui permettent
de « quantifier » la décoration : ainsi, on insiste le prix des décors9, le
poids des métaux, les dimensions ou le nombre précis des éléments
qui composent le décor. Une insistance toute particulière est accordée à la description des matières, de leur richesse, de leurs couleurs,
de leur diversité et de leur éclat : on ne compte plus les mentions de
textiles somptueux10 comme les brocarts, la soie, la baptiste, les
broderies, les lamelles d’or et d’argent, les gemmes, pierres précieuses, perles, pyropes, ébène, objets et statues de saints en argent
massif, mobilier doré et argenté… autant de matières qui, je cite,
« luisent », « reluisent », « brillent », « scintillent », « étincellent »,
« resplendissent », « rayonnent de leur éclat », autant de matières
7
8
9
10
Relation de Courtrai : « les Courtraisiens ne se souvenaient pas d’avoir jamais
rien vu de pareil de ce genre », « reçut chez nous le plus grand apparat qu’il
nous a été possible » ; de Bergues : « Jamais, assurément, l’église n’a resplendit
d’une parure plus vénérable ».
Dans toutes les relations, les formules suivantes se répètent à l’envi :
« confectionné avec art », « magnificence » (celebritas), « avec élégance »,
« remarquablement décorés », « par la splendeur de son ornementation et son
apparat », etc. À propos du costume d’un enfant, dans la relation de Dunkerke :
« pour l’ornement duquel les parents n’avait lésiné ni sur les dépenses, ni sur le
zèle ».
Le prix est mentionné soit de manière approximative (« autres ornements de
grands prix et très somptueux »), soit en indiquant une estimation précise du
coût (dans la relation de Leuven, au sujet de la châsse : « avec un tel ornement
de gemmes et de pierres précieuses, que les experts en estimaient la valeur à
plus de quarante mille florins).
On s’étonne d’ailleurs de la richesse du vocabulaire utilisé pour différencier ces
étoffes.
30
Caroline Heering
qui, nous dit-on, rivalisent avec l’art11 (la matière rivalisant donc
avec la manière). À travers ces descriptions, on saisit l’importance
du plaisir sensuel provoqué par la diversité des matières, le luxe, le
brillant et le clinquant qui touche et affecte un public large. Les
relations ne manquent d’ailleurs pas d’évoquer l’effet produit par
cet étalage de richesses scintillantes, qui « arrêtaient », « attiraient »
ou « étourdissaient les yeux » des spectateurs au « regard ébahi et
admiratif12 ».
À ce titre, il n’est sans doute pas inutile de noter que la mention
des émotions produites se voit, dans la relation écrite, en quelque
sorte renforcée, pour ne pas dire réitérée, par le style même de la
description. En effet, à lire ces relations, le lecteur s’enfonce dans le
fourmillement des descriptions de tous les détails de l’ornementation, comme il se perd aussi dans les méandres des ajouts multiples
à la structure descriptive, qui ne facilitent pas du tout la reconstruction mentale du décor par le lecteur. À lire ces relations, donc, le
lecteur du récit semble se trouver dans un état plus ou moins
similaire d’étourdissement ou d’éparpillement, revivant à sa
manière l’éblouissement de l’éphémère. Qu’elle soit consciente ou
non, cette perte du lecteur dans le texte de la description, revient
d’une certaine manière à l’encercler ou l’englober dans le décor, ce
qui permet dans une certaine mesure de compenser l’impossibilité
du texte — que le lecteur découvre au fil des lignes — à rendre
compte de la simultanéité de la vision. On comprend donc aussi que
ces descriptions minutieuses des décors peuvent finalement épargner la description de l’effet.
Revenant à la question de la richesse, si l’insistance sur ce qui
brille permet d’insister sur les plaisirs sensuels et l’éblouissement
provoqué, il faut également noter que cette insistance sur la richesse
et l’éclat peut s’étendre à un registre moral, dans le sens où, dans la
mentalité du XVIIe siècle, la richesse extérieure est toujours l’exact
11
12
Dans la relation de Courtrai, à propos des autels : « Leur prix n’était pas
inférieur à leur art » ; de Dunkerke : « il est difficile de déterminer qui de l’art ou
du prix l’emportait sur l’autre ».
Les mentions suivantes sont fréquentes : « arrêt des spectateurs », « yeux
étourdis des spectateurs », « des spectacles nous distraient », « attirent les
yeux », « attirent les regards des spectateurs », « d’une telle beauté qu’on ne
pouvait se lasser », « au plus grand éblouissement », « ravissaient les yeux et les
âmes de ceux qui regardaient ».
31
reflet d’une richesse ou une éducation intérieure13. Si l’étalage des
richesses permet de célébrer la sainteté, leur éclat se reflète aussi
dans la personne du donateur qui a financé l’objet14. C’est ce que
nous explique Furetière dans son dictionnaire : est magnifique
« Celuy qui est splendide, somptueux, qui se plaist à faire depense
en choses honnestes. C’est la principale qualité des Princes, d’estre
magnifiques. Le magnifique ne fait estat des richesses, que pour faire
paroistre la grandeur de son ame, sa liberalité. On le dit aussi des
choses qui ont de l’éclat, et qui ont beaucoup cousté, de la dépence
qu’on fait pour paroistre. On a fait au Roy une entrée magnifique
[…] ».
Dans un contexte religieux, c’est plus précisément la piété du donateur qui est illustrée par la richesse déployée, comme le mentionnent
aussi les relations. Et puisque la fête s’inscrit par principe dans une
économie du don et de la perte, comme l’avait bien souligné
Georges Bataille15, on ne sera donc pas étonné de trouver dans ces
relations nombre de mentions des dons et des donateurs des objets
(liturgiques ou autres) utilisés lors des cérémonies religieuses. Que
ces objets somptueux aient été donnés dans des circonstances
différentes, parfois bien antérieures aux festivités, importe peu : il
s’agit de mettre en évidence un principe de perte et d’étalage des
richesses qui garantit la somptuosité de l’événement.
Parallèlement à ces descriptions minutieuses de la richesse
déployée, les relations insistent également sur la vraisemblance des
décors : si les rochers ou les fleurs artificielles qui décorent l’architecture et les différents apparati imitent la nature à s’y tromper16, les
13
14
15
16
Emmanuel COQUERY, « “Rien d’éclatant n’y manque”. L’esthétique et le statut
des arts du décor en France dans la première moitié du XVIIe siècle », dans
Catherine GOUGEON (éd.), Un temps d’exubérance. Les arts décoratifs sous Louis XIII
et Anne d’Autriche, Exposition du 9 avril au 8 juillet 2002 aux Galeries nationales
du Grand Palais à Paris, Paris, Réunion des musées nationaux, 2002, p. 54.
« La reine du ciel elle-même et le Fils de Dieu assis dans les bras maternels,
portait une couronne qui en ceignait la tête et dont l’éclat était dû à la splendeur
et au coût si merveilleux de ses gemmes, qu’on concevait aisément la piété et
l’industrie des trois princesses qui avaient assemblé à cette fin leurs trésors et
leur peine ». — « La très pieuse princesse Isabelle a voulu rendre cette église
plus glorieuse et vénérable par sa sérénissime présence ».
Voir Georges BATAILLE, La part maudite, précédé de La Notion de dépense,
introduction de Jean Piel, Paris, Minuit, 1967.
« [à propos du rocher artificiel] on dirait une œuvre de la nature et non de
l’art », « l’art imitait avec l’or et l’argent des roses », « [à propos d’une vigne]
32
Caroline Heering
sculptures, quant à elles, semblent vivre et respirer, et sont réalisées
avec un tel art que « même les observateurs curieux qui s’y étaient
mêlés pouvaient difficilement les distinguer des vivants17 ». Les
décors trompent les amateurs comme les experts18. De même, à côté
de l’usage de matériaux artificiels imitant la nature à s’y tromper
(parfois réalisés en cire), les relations font également mention de
végétaux réels (romarin, palmier, laurier, lierre, palme, etc.) qui se
confondent avec le décor artificiel — une confusion que le lecteur de
la relation est d’ailleurs aussi amené à revivre, à sa manière,
puisqu’à la lecture, on ne situe pas toujours la limite entre les
matériaux de l’art et ceux de la nature. On pourrait encore citer
comme exemple l’affichage des emblèmes dans l’église SaintCharles-Borromée à l’occasion du jubilé, en 1640 : les descriptions de
cet affichage laissent supposer des passages entre le plan de
l’emblème (ou de la peinture), avec celui de la sculpture exhibant ces
emblèmes, et celui du spectateur. Ces sculptures représentaient en
effet des anges dont les figures en cire avaient été réalisées d’après le
modèle des têtes d’enfants du collège, que les parents pouvaient
reconnaître.
Les relations nous décrivent ainsi des décors qui semblent
estomper les frontières entre les arts mais aussi entre l’artifice et la
nature, la vie ou la réalité — autant de manifestations d’un désir de
« donner corps » aux images, de les rendre vivantes par la
permutation des médiums19, et de plonger le spectateur dans une
17
18
19
réalisée avec art, mais rivalisant avec la nature », « [à propos des fleurs]
façonnées avec un fort grand artifice pour rivaliser avec la nature et les jardins ».
Relation de Dunkerke : « deux statues de nos saints, de part et d’autre du
maître-autel, sculptées en buste avec un tel art qu’elles semblaient en quelque
sorte vivre et respirer » ; à propos des images et sculptures dans le théâtre :
« Mais leur imitation de la vivacité des corps et leur aisance à se tourner de tous
côtés étaient telles qu’il ne leur manquait presque rien si ce n’est la parole.
Mieux (ce dont je peux m’étonner), même les observateurs curieux qui s’y
étaient mêlés un peu partout pouvaient difficilement les distinguer des
vivants. »
Cette idée de tromper les experts est un autre topos de ces relations écrites :
« réalisée avec un tel art qu’il semblait tout entier en argent, non seulement aux
“amateurs” mais aussi aux experts » ; « rien n’y manquerait pour <en faire> un
vrai bateau […]. Même les hommes qui s’y connaissaient en navigation en
étaient stupéfaits ».
Comme l’a démontré Giovanni Careri de manière singulièrement convaincante,
ces passages témoignent de la vocation multimédiale des décors baroques, dont
les sacri monti constituent des exemples parlants, au même titre que le fameux
projet de Borromini pour un jardin composé d’une arche de Noé avec des
33
expérience multi-sensorielle, tout d’abord visuelle, mais aussi tactile,
olfactive et sonore. Nous sommes bien loin du jeu sublime de
distanciation de l’art savant et plus particulièrement de l’art
classique. L’effet produit par la vraisemblance des décors et les
passages incessants entre les médiums, est celui de l’« émerveillement » et de la « crainte », qui se transforme aussitôt l’illusion
déjouée, en « admiration20 ». Ainsi, comme nous le rapporte la narration de Dunkerke de 1622, les statues d’Ignace et de Xavier « étaient
si réussies qu’à distance beaucoup les croyaient en vie, si bien que
quelques-uns ont exprimé leur crainte […]. Quand, en s’approchant
plus près, ils comprirent qu’il n’y avait aucun danger, la terreur se
transforma en admiration ». Par des effets de présence continuels, le
décor touche physiquement et émotionnellement le spectateur en le
mettant dans une autre posture de lui-même.
Finalement, ces textes illustrent un autre type de relation activée
par le dispositif festif : les relations entre les acteurs — humains —
de la fête. Elles peuvent être des relations horizontales interhumaines, c’est-à-dire entre les destinataires, mais aussi, et surtout,
des relations verticales, c’est-à-dire entre les destinataires et les
destinateurs. Dans le cadre des cérémonies princières, ces relations
verticales relient les hommes, voire le pouvoir civil, au prince ou au
monarque. Dans le cadre des cérémonies religieuses, ces relations
verticales relient les hommes et le saint célébré ou l’institution
religieuse. Ce qui importe ici, c’est que ces relations verticales déterminent la nature, et les enjeux, des textes qui en rendent compte. En
effet, bien davantage que dans les relations des entrées solennelles,
qui accordent une importance majeure au cortège, à l’ordre et au
rang occupé par chacun21 (contribuant à la construction identitaire
du pouvoir politique et civil), les relations de cérémonies religieuses
accordent une importance particulière à la forme sensible des décors
et de leur effet, au point d’en absorber le message ou le contenu
symbolique. À la différence des entrées solennelles, qui glorifient un
20
21
animaux vivants, sculptés et peints. Ils sont aussi liés aux pratiques de la
dévotion moderne, dont l’engagement des cinq sens dans la prière est l’une des
caractéristiques majeures. Giovanni CARERI et Ferrante FERRANTI, Baroques, Paris,
Citadelles & Mazenod, 2002, p. 47 et p. 61 et suiv.
Les décors, nous dit-on fréquemment dans les relations, suscitaient l’« admiration respectueuse » ou « attisaient l’admiration doublée de vénération ».
Voir Fanny COSANDEY, « Entrer dans le rang », dans Marie-France WAGNER,
Louise FRAPPIER et Claire LATRAVERSE (éd.), Les jeux de l'échange : entrées
solennelles et divertissements du XVe au XVIIe siècle, op. cit., p. 17-46.
34
Caroline Heering
personnage vivant et présent, ces fêtes de canonisation sont conçues
à la gloire d’une puissance immatérielle, que le décor d’ici-bas est
chargé de rendre présent sur un mode sensible (on renoue bien ici
avec le principe anagogique des ornamenta du Moyen Âge). Faut-il
rappeler à cet égard l’importance de l’engagement des sens dans la
prière au service d’un sentiment d’empathie avec l’objet de la contemplation, suggéré les Exercices spirituels d’Ignace de Loyola. Pour
le spectateur du XVIIe siècle, comme le mentionnent aussi les
relations, ravir les yeux revient à ravir les âmes, et forcer l’admiration c’est augmenter la piété, voire susciter un sentiment de
vénération.
Mais si l’on se déplace de la fête au livre, il faut bien garder à
l’esprit que le spectateur de ce nouveau spectacle qu’est le livre est le
lecteur de la relation. Et puisque ces relations étaient destinées à être
diffusées, en interne, au sein des différents établissements jésuites de
la Compagnie, l’enjeu est bien de mettre en avant l’efficacité du
dispositif, censé « accroître la dévotion des citoyens envers les
nouveaux saints et leur zèle envers la Compagnie22 ».
Je voudrais à présent conclure cet aperçu du « fonctionnement
ornemental » des festivités sur la question de l’illusionnisme, qui me
semble essentielle et éminemment paradoxale, et donc théoriquement fertile, au sein du principe structurel des festivités. Il me
semble en effet que l’on pourrait parler d’un renversement de l’illusionnisme tel qu’on l’entend ordinairement. Si on le prend à sa
racine, le principe de base du dispositif festif n’est en effet pas d’être
une fiction qui s’avoue comme réelle (comme pourrait l’être un
artefact, un tableau imitant la nature à s’y tromper, comme c’est le
cas dans la compétition entre Zeuxis et Pharrasios, relatée par Pline
l’ancien, qui constitue un véritable topos du genre), mais à une réalité
qui s’avoue, se présente, comme une illusion (puisque c’est bien la
réalité spatio-temporelle mais aussi sociale, qui, étant ornée et
travestie par la parure festive, devenant illusion, comme un « monde
22
Dans la relation de Dunkerke : « En effet, les fenêtres (qui sont nombreuses et
grandes) portaient chacune une image translucide : ces images représentaient
des faits fort remarquables de nos saints, alimentées par des luminaires jours et
nuits. Et des spectacles de ce genre ne furent pas vains car, beaucoup partageant
assez peu de bons sentiments à propos des mérites de nos saints, commencèrent,
une fois que ces peintures les eurent mieux instruits, à beaucoup les estimer et à
les exalter de leurs louanges ». « De cette festivité solennelle, nous avons enfin
tiré ce profit : on a vu s’accroître la dévotion des citoyens envers les nouveaux
saints et leur zèle envers la Compagnie ».
35
qui devient théâtre », comme le souligne W. Alexander Mc Clung).
Cette réalité devient fiction et s’affiche comme telle car elle se monte
et se démonte, se construit et se déconstruit, par les citoyens qui
assistent ou participent au montage et démontage des dispositifs. Et,
ce que nous disent ces relations, comme je viens de l’évoquer, c’est
que cette fiction/illusion rattrape pour ainsi dire la réalité, en lui
empruntant ses codes, au point, nous dit-on de s’y tromper, dans un
jeu perpétuel entre artifice et nature, entre illusion et réalité (comme
si on avait affaire à des niveaux emboîtés de jeu entre fiction et
réalité). Mais s’il y a fort à douter que cette illusion était vraiment
réussie (si on s’imagine ces dispositifs et les moyens mis en œuvre,
qui devaient certainement avoir un effet kitsch ou factice), c’est que
le but de l’illusion recherchée n’est sans doute pas de rendre cette
fiction plus réelle mais de la rendre plus performante, plus extraordinaire, au sens littéral, de surpasser l’ordinaire, la réalité ordinaire. Plus qu’un renversement de l’illusionnisme, on a ici affaire à
une intensification de l’illusionnisme. Dans ce processus, c’est l’effet
produit, et l’intention recherchée, autrement dit ce qui se situe en
aval et en amont, qui compte sans doute plus que le degré de
réalisme atteint. Cet effet est suscité par une expérience sensible,
excitée par ces jeux incessants de déplacement entre ces différents
agents, qui contribuent à mettre le spectateur hors de lui et modifie
son rapport au monde réel et à la temporalité. Ceci m’amène à penser que l’on devrait pourrait prendre en compte l’illusion, non pas
dans ce qu’elle est (à savoir si elle est réussie ou pas), mais dans ce
qu’elle produit réellement, dans sa matière même, ou, autrement dit,
on pourrait penser l’effet dans sa portée phénoménale. On pourrait
presque parler à propos des festivités d’une « phénoménologie des
apparences », un oxymore que Louis Marin utilise à propos des
vanités, ces natures mortes, en trompe l’œil, dont le but est
justement de figer le caractère éphémère des choses.
TABLE DES FIGURES
Fig. 01
Fig. 02
Lucas DE HEERE, L’entrée magnifique de monseigneur
Francoys fils de France… faicte en sa metropolitaine [et]
fameuse ville de Gand…, Gand, Cornelis de
Rekenare, 1582.
Johannes et Lucas VAN DUETECUM, La magnifique et
sumptueuse pompe funèbre faite aus obseques et
funérailles du très grand et très victorieux empereur
36
Fig. 03
Caroline Heering
Charles cinquième célébrées en la ville de Bruxelles le 29
Jour du mois de Décembre 1558 par Philippes Roy
catholique d’Espaigne, Son fils, Anvers, Plantin, 1559.
Johannes BOCHIUS, Historica narratio profectionis et
inavgvrationis serenissimorvm Belgii principvm Alberti
et Isabellae…, Anvers, Ex officina Plantiniana, apud
J. Moretum, 1602.
Caroline HEERING, « De la parure festive à l’expérience de l’éphémère : étudier le
sens de l’ornemental ou des dispositifs de la métamorphose spectaculaire »,
GEMCA : papers in progress, t. 2, no 1, 2013, p. 21-36, [En ligne]
“Jesuita non cantat.” Evidence from the Inaugural
Year of the Roman Church of the Gesù
Cynthia Anne CAPORELLA (John Caroll University of Cleveland)
Within the field of liturgical music, one still hears — even today
— that Jesuits pay no particular attention to music. Comments run
the gamut from statements that Jesuits have never had any use for
music nor any sense of its place within Catholic liturgy to bluntly
stating that “Jesuita non contat”; “Jesuits do not sing1”. In this paper, I
shall use primary documentary evidence to refute these statements,
which, as I shall show, misrepresent the Ignatian perspective and
Jesuit practice2.
Historically, music has been integral to the life of the Roman
Catholic Church from its inception, yet the Jesuits often have been
accused of minimising this aspect of Catholic tradition. A sixteenthcentury sacristy handbook entitled Ordine et Osservationi della nostra
Chiesa per tutto l’Anno, catalogued as Chiesa del Gesù Busta XI Nr. 968
and held in the Jesuit Archives in Rome tests the veracity of this
claim. This Ordine is a manual of practical instructions for the rituals
held at the Church of the Gesù in Rome, mother church of the
Society of Jesus. Its contents date from late 1584 through 1585, the
inaugural year of the Gesù3, and demonstrate that, in fact, music
permeated the liturgical practice of the early Jesuits throughout the
entire liturgical year. Thus, while the Constitutions restricted the use
of music within the Society, the public worship life at the Jesuits’
mother church was quite another matter.
The charge that St. Ignatius and his Jesuits dismissed music
stems from the Constitutions of the Society of Jesus. As the founder and
1
2
3
Thomas CULLEY, Jesuits and Music, 15. Fr. Culley was the 1966 Rome Prize
Fellow in Musicology, the American Academy in Rome.
For a more extensive discussion of this topic, see Cynthia Anne CAPORELLA,
“Instructions and Observations of Our Church for the Entire Year” (dissertation;
Kent State University, 2006).
I would like to express my thanks to Sheila E. McGinn, Ph.D., and Nathalie
Hancisse for their editorial suggestions in producing this article and to the
GEMCA for inviting me to participate in this project.
The church was consecrated on November 25, 1584.
38
Cynthia Anne Caporella
first General of the Society, St. Ignatius (1491–1556) wrote this rule of
life for Jesuit mission and ministry. In it, he specified that singing
the “Liturgy of the Hours” or “Divine Office” in community (“in
Choir”) would not be a requirement:
Because the occupations which are undertaken for the aid of souls
are of great importance, proper to our Institute, and very frequent;
and because, on the other hand, our residence in one place or
another is so highly uncertain, our members will not regularly hold
choir for the canonical hours or sing Masses and offices. For one
who experiences devotion in listening to those chanted services will
suffer no lack of places where he can find his satisfaction; and it is
expedient that our members should apply their efforts to the
pursuits that are more proper to our vocations, for glory to God our
Lord (Constitutions VI.3.[586]–4).
This injunction could very well be the reason for the provocative
declaration, “Jesuita non cantat”.
The singing of the Office in Choir had been part of the daily rule
of monastic communities since the sixth century. By lifting the
requirement that the Office was to be sung in community, Ignatius
turned his back on the age-old practice of an order coming together
for common sung prayer at regularly set times during the day. This
decision created a new model for religious life, leaving behind the
late-medieval emphasis on fleeing the world to find redemption.
Instead, Ignatius adopted an incarnational view of the world, one of
“finding God in all things,” encouraging his Society to embrace the
world on a universal scale and to seek “contemplation in action.”
In reality, the Jesuits were forging new customs for a new way
of mission within the world. The philosophy and mission of the
Jesuits prioritised a “radical availability” for mission, promoting the
world as the “theatre of God’s grace.4” The Jesuits’ way of
proceeding was to focus on ministry among the people rather than
cloistered from the people, and fostered by a spirituality that
engaged the world rather than fleeing from it. In order to achieve
this, the Jesuits needed a radical freedom of mobility. Some have
asserted that the Jesuits had no time to “waste” on their inward spiritual lives or the care of the soul strengthened through the praying
of the Office in Choir. That was simply not the case. Instead, it was a
4
Paul V. MURPHY, “The Ignatian Vision and the Mission of Higher Education,”
Ignatian Day Lecture at John Carroll University, Cleveland, Ohio (13 January
2006).
Jesuita non cantat
39
matter of needing to be available at a moment’s notice to respond to
a pastoral need or to continue to be pastorally present, rather than
worrying about returning to the community in time for the next
Office (basically, every three hours)5.
All of these remarks underscore that, for spiritual and missiondriven reasons, the Jesuit tradition deliberately limited the use of
music within the prayer life of the members of the Society of Jesus.
This being said, one must remember that the governing directives in
the Constitutions were laid out for the internal life of the Society.
However, the ministerial life and prayer life of the Jesuits also had a
public focus. Chiesa del Gesù 968 gives us a glimpse into the public
liturgy, worship, and actual use of music by the Society of Jesus at
their principal church.
Then, I would like to say a word about the description, date and
specifics of the Ordine. Two versions of the Ordine are housed in the
Archives of the Jesuit Curia in Rome, catalogued as Chiesa del Gesù
Busta XI Nr. 968 and Chiesa del Gesù 2007. After transcribing and
translating the entire manuscript of Chiesa del Gesù 968, and comparing it with Chiesa del Gesù 2007, I concluded that the manuscripts
date from 1592 and 1593, respectively, and are copies of an Ordine
dating from 1584-1585. The autograph appears to have been lost,
most likely during the suppression of the Society in 1773. Added
notes at the beginning and end of both documents serve as clues to
the chronology of the two copies. I chose to transcribe and translate
the earlier of the two versions, and the information presented in this
paper is the result of that project.
The small, approximately 7x9-inch, leather-bound document
contains 68 numbered vellum pages. The 16th-century Italian
language appears in a longhand script. Most of the script in the
document flows in a very florid hand. In several places, a later hand
has written marginal comments. Within the text, other scribes or
editors, most likely fellow Jesuits, deleted some lines of the text by
crossing them out; at other times, they added in new text. In
addition, editorial comments appear in the left and right margins.
All of these added citations seem to derive from a date later than
the original. They appear in another hand and change or expand
upon the original instruction. It appears that these comments came
5
Thomas CULLEY, “The German College in Rome: A Center for Baroque Music”,
in Baroque Art: The Jesuit Contribution, Rudolf WITTKOWER and Irma B. JAFFE
(eds.), New York, Fordham University Press, 1972, p. 111.
40
from individuals from the community of priests and brothers living,
working, and worshipping at the Gesù in the years following the
writing and copying of the original 1584 document. Dating the
original material for this Ordine to 1584-1585 reveals its proximity to
the years of the Council of Trent. The Jesuits were avid followers of
the Pope and supporters of the Council, some actually attending its
sessions. The Jesuits’ use of music in their public worship, detailed
in this sacristy manual, remains consistent with the teaching and
practice of the Roman Catholic Church in the sixteenth century. The
Council of Trent, in its third session ending in 1563, twenty-one
years before the writing of Ordine et Osservationi della nostra Chiesa
per tutto l’Anno in 1584, upheld the importance of music in the life of
the Church. The document demonstrates that the public liturgical
and musical practice of the Jesuits maintained a strong congruency
with the teaching of the Council of Trent. Since one of the major
strengths of the Society of Jesus was its focus on defending the
teaching and tradition of the Roman Catholic Church, it follows that
the Jesuits would have continued to use the musical tradition of the
Church.
The beauty of this document is that, in addition to being a
primary source, it is a practical, working document from the late sixteenth century. Handwritten notes are found in the margins and
above the original citations, suggesting that it was a manual housed
in the sacristy and revised as time went on and practical details
and/or preferences changed or morphed. When trying to picture the
liturgical events that are described in the Ordine, one is struck by the
sights, smells, and sounds of sixteenth-century liturgical practice.
Page after page of this Ordine illustrates the way music enhanced and unified the public worship at the Church of the Gesù. The
citations document that music complemented the soul of Jesuit spirituality, even though Ignatius and his early followers did not make it
as central to their mission as other religious orders had done. And
so, even with their focus on active public ministry, and in spite of
Ignatius’ concerns in the Constitutions, this Ordine from the Church
of the Gesù demonstrates the importance of music in the early
communal worship of the Society of Jesus.
A close look at this primary-source document reveals the specifics of the noteworthy place of music at the Gesù. The document has
forty-two sections of notated directives, with a total of five hundred
and seventy-five citations. Of these, one hundred and forty-seven
are musical citations. Thus, nearly one quarter of the document's
Jesuita non cantat
41
contents refer to a musical directive of some kind. Attesting to this
musical attentiveness, two words resound throughout these musical
references: “is sung.” Citations and phrases abound throughout the
text such as:
**Tutte le Domeniche et feste, nelle quali si predica si suol cantar la
Messa. (6:1)
**The Mass is usually sung on all the Sundays and Feasts on which
there is preaching.
**Si canta il Mattutino la notte di Natale. (7:1)
**Matins is sung on the night of Christmas.
**In questo mezzo si canta un mottetto… (19:24)
**In this part a motet is sung…
These references and many more like them clearly demonstrate that
music was integral to Jesuit public rituals and played a substantial
role in the public liturgies offered at the Church of the Gesù
throughout the entire liturgical year.
The general references to what was sung span the following
genres: the Mass, Matins, Vespers, Compline, Lauds, Benediction,
the Epistle, the Gospel, the Passion, Tenebrae, the Divine Office, the
Gloria, Psalmody, the Prophets, the Intercessions, the Prayers, the
Blessing of the Pascal Candle, Litanies, and the Responsory. While,
for the most part, specific musical details, such as titles and composers, are lacking in the pages of Chiesa del Gesù 968, the one-hundred
and forty-seven references to music and sung liturgy do offer us
more than just the words “is sung.” In general, the citations of Chiesa
del Gesù 968 reveal the following musical details in greater or lesser
degree:
 what was sung;
 when it was sung;
 who sang it;
 in what style it was sung;
 what titles were sung;
 special directives concerning environment, arrangement of
the liturgical space, decor, movement or vesting for these
sung liturgies (including times when the Cantor and/or
choir sing while in procession and the reminder to darn one’s
socks in order to appear “proper” for the Good Friday
service… one of my personal favorites!)
42
Several examples of these diverse citations are as follows. As
you read them, I encourage you to imagine yourselves seated within
the church and to engage your senses in the descriptions contained
in these wonderful directives.
I. Examples of what was sung with special environmental
directives
Section 6, Notes on the Sung Mass, Citation 6
On the principal Feasts of The Lord and of the Madonna, as well
as on some other solemn days, two other brothers, in addition to
the two brothers named above, vested in surpluses and with
candlesticks and lit candles, accompany the Priest who sings the
mass to go to the altar and to return to the sacristy at the end of the
Mass. They also stand behind the Priest when he sings the Gospel.
Section 7, Notes on Matins, Citation 1
Matins is sung on the night of Christmas.
Section 15, Notes on the Office of Holy Week, Citation 3
Music stands are prepared with violet cloths at the side of the
Gospel, for those who sing the Passion.
II. Examples of who sang it, again with special environmental
directives
Section 22, Notes on the Day of Christmas, Citations 4 and 5
As the doors of the church are opened, two Brothers go to call the
Cantors, and they carry two torches in order that they come with
light.
They prepare three candlesticks with three white torches in the
Choir, so that the Cantors are able to see well when they are singing
Matins.
Section 21, Notes on the Matins for the Dead, Citation 6
At the end of the Gospel of the High Mass, the Acolytes take from
the Celebrant his chasuble and maniple, and at this point the
Cantors, with the Choir, begin to sing the Responsory.
Jesuita non cantat
43
Though sparse, there are some musical styles and titles
referenced within the manual. The use of both plainsong and motet
styles are delineated in the citations. Cantors are specifically referenced as singing a motet. In addition, there are a total of six specific
titles mentioned in the manual citations from both the sung Mass
and Office: the Pange Lingua, Panne de Coelo, Benedicamus Domino,
Veni Creator Spiritus, Te Deum Laudamus, and Benedictus Dominus
Deus Israel. These titles are mentioned in the sections on the Procession of Corpus Christi, the Feast of St. Mark, the Election of the
General, Christmas Day, and the Sounding of the Bells.
III. Examples of musical titles found in the manuscript include the
following citations
Section 23, Notes on the Election of a General, Citations 22,
23, and 24
The bells ring immediately at the end of the election, and in the
same order that it entered (after the Priest has placed the incense in
the thurible) the new General is led into the Church singing the
song Benedictus Dominus Deus Israel and any other psalm of rejoicing, if the song is not long enough for them to arrive in the
Church.
As they arrive in the Church, the bells stop ringing. As the
General arrives at the high altar, he enters inside of the balustrade
with the electors, and all of them kneel down, singing the hymn Te
Deum Laudamus.
At the end of the Te Deum Laudamus, the above-mentioned Priest
sings the following prayers. First, that of the Blessed Trinity.
Second, the Thanksgiving. Third, that of the Day of the Madonna.
When those are finished, two Cantors sing the Benedicamus Domino.
The Ordine et Osservationi della nostra Chiesa per tutto l'Anno also
provides a unique window into sixteenth-century liturgical tradition. Considering its contemporaneity with the reforms of the Council of Trent, the establishment of the Jesuit community, and the year
of consecration of one of the most important churches in Rome, it
truly is an historical gemstone illuminating the integral role of music
in the public liturgy at the Church of the Gesù. Although the Jesuit
Constitutions limited the use of music, both the people and the
magisterium of the Roman Catholic Church expected sacred music
in their public services. This Ordine demonstrates that the Jesuits
responded to this need. In the inaugural year of their mother church,
44
in 1584, liturgical music played a major role in the public worship of
the Society of Jesus. Jesuita non cantat? On the contrary, music was
alive and well within the walls of the Mother Church of the Society
in the earliest years of the Jesuit tradition.
Cynthia Anna CAPORELLA, « “Jesuita non cantat.” Evidence from the Inaugural Year
of the Roman Church of the Gesù », GEMCA : papers in progress, t. 2, no 1, 2013,
p. 37-44, [En ligne].
Jesuit Solemnities in the Southern Netherlands:
Immersion and Experience1
Annick DELFOSSE (ULg/ Transitions
DER Moyen Âge tardif et première Modernité)
A Religious Baroque Festival Culture in the Low Countries?
The research project “Baroque Festival Culture”, promoted by
Ralph Dekoninck (UCL), Maarten Delbeke (Gent), Koen Vermeir
(KUL) and myself (ULg) aims to study the mechanisms operating
within the baroque spectacle and also to explore the links between
Italy and the Low Countries in matters of spectacular events. We
want to understand how (and if) the Baroque Festival Culture
displayed in Italy (and especially the well-known Roman Baroque
Festival Culture) reached the Low Countries and influenced them. It
seems to us that the most obvious way to explore this link is via the
religious. Indeed, since the very end of the 16th Century, Rome had
established itself as the head of Catholicism on which she intended
to impose her supervision and her uses. It is commonplace for those
who work on post-tridentine topics: Rome set itself up as ‘the’ centre
and asserted universal claims over local needs. The institutions of
the Roman Church became stronger, as power was mainly concentrated in the hands of the pontiff, surrounded with his new congregations. The hyper centralized post-tridentine Church has exploited
spectacular ways to celebrate and represent its new central majesty.
Rome became in fact an important spectacular center where festivities almost became a daily routine: in this Gran Teatro del Mondo,
the ephemeral events followed each other in an uninterrupted
1
Part of this paper is included in the following article (which incorporates further
a large part of the lecture given at the 2012 RSA annual meeting in Washington:
From universal to local: celebrating new saints in the Southern Netherlands): “From
Rome to the Southern Netherlands: Spectacular Sceneries to Celebrate the
Canonization of Ignatius of Loyola and Francis Xavier”, in Jennifer DA
SILVA (ed.), The Sacralization of Space and Behavior in the Early Modern World,
Ashgate, forthcoming.
46
Annick Delfosse
flow… As far as the Roman festive events are concerned, historians
like Carandini speak of a “magmatic set2”.
So, we initially wanted to see how that Roman spectacular
phenomenon, closely linked to the hyper-centralization of the
Catholic Church, was exported, especially in the Low Countries that
formed a confessional frontier between Catholic and Protestant
areas. Our intention was to understand the spectacular links
between the Roman “centre” and the Belgian “frontier”, between the
“head” and one “member” of the catholic body: we wanted to
understand how the model circulated, how it was adapted, and
finally whether the Roman festive model, once exported, continued
to have impacts on the centralization process. Therefore, it was
necessary to first conduct a survey of the religious spectacular
demonstrations in the Low Countries for the post-tridentine period.
We decided not to consider ordinary liturgy — even though it
became more and more sumptuous for the period we are interested
in — but to focus on the extraordinary ceremonies and, in particular,
on the religious processions in the urban space. Indeed, the
exacerbated theatricality of these extraordinary ceremonies, with
their accentuated effects, offers a rich material of analysis for our
interdisciplinary team. Up to now, this survey has led us to a double
observation:
1/ First, the examination of the sources reveals that we can only
detect a few spectacular religious feasts of “Roman” inspiration: a
large series of these celebrations were not exported to the Low
Countries. For example, the organisation of the spectacular Forty
Hours is not locatable in this area. In this connection, the Italian
Capuchin friar Giacinto di Casale Monferrato, who arrived in
Brussels in 1623, tried to organise a Forty Hour procession for Palm
Sunday3. According to the example of the Capuchin friar, numerous
Spanish young men, present in Brussels, offered a very spectacular
— and shocking — show, flagellating themselves during the
procession. It provoked such a strong reaction that the Infanta
Isabella had to ask father Giacinto to leave Brussels for a short
period. Indeed, not only the practice of the collective self-flagellation
2
3
S. CARANDINI, “L’Effimero spirituale. Feste e manifestazioni religiose”, dans
L. FIORANI & A. PROSPERI (eds), Storia d’Italiae. Annali, vol. 16 (Roma, la città del
papa), Einaudi, p. 5519-5553.
Joris SNAET, « Isabel Clara Eugenia and the Capuchin Monastery at Tervuren »,
in Cordula VAN WYHE (ed.), Isabel Clara Eugina. Female soveriengty in the Courts of
Madrid and Brussels, CEEH, 2011, p. 361-362.
Jesuit Solemnities in the Southern Netherlands
47
had firmly been condemned as heretic in the 14th Century, at the
time of the big processions of Flagellants that took place in these
regions to fight against the Black Death4, but also, since the end of
the 16th Century, the Belgian synods worked energetically towards a
radical disciplining of the processions: in order to restore worship,
decency and method in the processions (in short, in order to
spiritualise the processions even more), they tried to eliminate all
sorts of “excess”. Amongst these, we can identify a varied range of
realities: the flagellations are a good example but we can also, and
especially, underline all the spectacular and theatrical aspects and
notably the “ludi theatrales” (or theatrical plays). Since the Middle
Ages, partially thanks to the success of the Chambers of Rhetoric,
religious processions were indeed characterized by an important
dramatisation by means of tableaux vivants5. The synods considered
these processional elements as farcical and decided to eliminate
them. Moreover, since 1600, this disciplining process had been
coupled to a codification process: in 1600, the Congregation of Rites
published the Caeremoniale episcoporum intended to accurately codify
the way to organise processions, setting the standard for ordinary
and extraordinary processions6.
2/ Nevertheless — and it is our second observation —, in spite
of this very strong disciplining phenomenon and this codification
process, we can identify some feasts that defied the imposed set of
rules and norms. Some religious actors organised some spectacular
processions a odds with the authorities’ orders: these actors were to
say the least mainly — if not exclusively — the Jesuits who appeared
as “the” Masters of spectacularity. From the 1610s onwards, we see
them proposing some processional performances characterised by
their intense spectacularity caused by a powerful convergence of
diverse media: beatification and canonisation celebrations (Ignatius’s beatification in 1609, Francis Xavier’s beatification in 1619,
Ignatius & Fr. Xavier’s canonisation in 1622, Francis Borgia’s beati4
5
6
Anne AUTISSIER, « Le sang des flagellants », in Médiévales, 27 (1994), p. 51-58.
Anne-Laure VAN BRUAENE, Om beters wille. Rederijkerskamers en de stedelijke
cultuur in de Zuidelijke Nederlanden (1400-1650), Amsterdam University Press,
2008.
About this codification process and the local (strong) reactions, see « Rome et les
normes du culte. Les prescriptions de la Congrégation des Rites », dans
B. DOMPNIER (dir.), Les langages du culte aux XVIIe et XVIIIe siècles. Actes du colloque
(28-30 octobre 2010), Clermont-Ferrand, Presses Universitaires Blaise Pascal,
Collection « Histoires croisées », forthcoming.
48
Annick Delfosse
fication in 1624…), triumphal arrival of Roman catacombs relics
(from 1610), Jubilee of the Society (1640), ceremonies for the election
of a patron saint in the war context (from 1630s) and all the intensely
spectacularised processions, organised in the very stressful context
of the wars which shook the Low Countries throughout the
17th Century.
When these spectacular Jesuit events appeared with the
Ignatius’s beatification feasts, they represented a real ceremonial
strangeness in the Belgian Catholic landscape on which I would like
to expand here below.
A ceremonial strangeness
It is striking that, by organizing these spectacular processions,
the Jesuits transferred to them a lot of well-known components of
civic festivities: we see them integrating triumphal arches (rather
typical of Solemn Entries), allegorical chariots (that we rather
associate with profane festivities like Carnival or civic parades),
scaffolds with “tableaux vivants”, very impressive fireworks, etc.
They seemed to take advantage of the strong Belgian festive legacy
to reinvent religious ceremonies and, in this way, to favour their
pastoral project: in a rather obvious way, these processions pertained to a large collection of techniques of conversion and education,
well mastered by the Society.
The sources themselves which describe these spectacular
processions are the best evidence of this phenomenon: they show
how the Jesuits have taken advantage of a rich and fertile local
ground to transform it into their own process: these descriptions
were widely fed by a long tradition of public triumphs descriptions,
in particular the descriptions of Solemn Entries which the Jesuits
knew well, according to their library catalogues. And yet, there were
major differences between the Jesuit descriptions and the public
triumphs accounts. First, the Jesuit sources are not printed and
illustrated documents like the festival books that we can find for the
Solemn Entries for example. By contrast, they are mainly — apart
from some exceptions7 — internal archives, intended to report the
7
Sanctorum Ignati et Xaveri in divos relatorum triumphus Bruxellae ab Aula et Urbe
celebratus, Bruxelles, Pepermans, [1622] ; Michel DE GHRYSE, Honor S. Ignatio de
Loiola Societatis Iesu Fundatori et S. Francisco Xaverio Indiarum Apostolo per
Gregorium XV inter Divos relatis habitus a Patribus Domus Professae et Collegii
Soc[ietatis] Iesu Antuerpiae 24 Iulii 1622, Anvers, Plantin, 1622 ; Narratio eorum
49
various local ministries to the authorities in Rome: their authors
aimed to demonstrate how the feasts were integrated in a global
pastoral conception. Besides, in these documents, the purpose of the
Jesuits, unlike the one pursued by festival books, was more to show
the effects than to describe the programmes, which often were only
described very summarily (or very confusingly). In these documents, the fathers did not so much sought to describe the devices
themselves, but rather the efficiency of these devices as the support
of a pastoral project. The descriptions of spectacular and sumptuous
processions found in the archives insist about the intention of their
authors to show that all these “mises-en-scène” — I quote some
extracts from the Jesuit accounts — “increase the devotion and the
religion of the multitude” (Saint-Omer 1610), allow a “dense rush”
towards the Jesuit church (idem), allow to considerably increase the
communions and the confessions, make the whole city converge
around a common event and also attract the benevolence of the
authorities towards the Jesuit schools, characterised by their gifts
and their donations.
However, with these spectacular choices, the Jesuits did not only
work in their own interest: they also worked as the relay of the posttridentine spectacular model in the Low Countries. They not only
contributed to spread the culture of magnificence and solemnisation
as displayed in Rome, but also clearly supported the multi-media
offensive of the Hapsburgs in the region. In this Spanish satellite
country, they helped to proclaim loudly and clearly the Hapsburg’s
power and legitimacy, which coincided with Catholic power and
legitimacy. Their spectacular exacerbation was therefore also a
political tool.
But we have to keep in mind — and it will be my third and
ultimate point — that these spectacular processions consisted in
more than a representation, more than a demonstrative expression,
more than the statement of the Catholic victory and the Hapsburg
power. They were also — and above all — a time-space where something profound and fulfilling was being performed. They were not
only a language, but also a performance.
quae Duaci pro celebranda sanctorum Ignatii et Francisci canonizatione gesta sunt,
Douai, Pierre Telu, 1622.
50
Annick Delfosse
Immersion and experience
These spectacular processions offered people the opportunity to
live an intense physical experience. We only have to read the Jesuits’
descriptions of materials, lights, sounds, perfumes, special effects,
monumentality of the “machines” to understand how the participants were actually immersed in an ultra-sensory space with great
effects. In this respect, some Jesuit accounts highlight the fact that
the ephemeral sceneries had to inspire the mind of the spectators to
sacer horror (or sanctus horror or pius horror). The Latin word horror
refers first both to bristling hair and a cold shiver or feverous thrill.
But the word also refers to all physical sensations that the Ancients
felt in front of divinity: shudders of fear, thrill of delight, cold sweat,
dry mouth, stomach tied in knots… The sacer horror is the bodily
manifestation of religious awe8, the organic sensation of respect
mixed with fear and wonder felt in the presence of gods or cosmic
forces. Using this expression to describe the audience’s reaction to
early modern pomp could be a pedantic writing feature of a father
whose Latin command is owed to a humanist literary education. But
I would like to discuss this topic in another way. The ephemeral
decorations also had a direct effect on the body. As just noted, the
festive devices invited the audience to participate in an overwhelming visual experience: the splendour of the pageantry should
delight or stun the eyes. This amazement, however, was not gratuitous. Indeed, the accounts abundantly recalled that to delight eyes
meant also to move souls. Building a glowing décor that overwhelmed the senses aimed therefore to the overwhelming of the
mind.
In this way, the Jesuit Juan de Mariana wrote in his De spectaculis
(1609)9 that if somebody wanted to “increase religion or devotion in
8
9
The first and most famous study about “religious awe” is Rudolf Otto’s work
about the “Numinous” and its terrifying manifestation (mysterium tremendum);
Rudolf OTTO, Das Heilige, 1917. The concept was used a lot by all the obsolete
emotionalist/psychological theories to explain the origin of the religions. Here I
use the term only as an expression of a personal experience and feelings, not as
a starting point for religious phenomenon.
In 1599, Juan de Mariana dedicated the fifteenth chapter of the third book of his
very famous De Rege to the spectacles. Ten years later, he developed his
arguments in a separate treatise entitled De spectaculis, released with six other
treatises: Juan DE MARIANA, Tractatus VII (Cologne: Hieratus, 1609). In this
treatise, Mariana — like Tertullian before him — firmly fought against the
51
the hearts of the mortals”, he should remember that “these ones,
since they were led by their senses, were particularly seized by the
external splendour of things, ornament and pomp10”. Juan de
Mariana then echoed what the fathers gathered at the twenty-second
session of the Council of Trent already decreed: “such is the nature
of man, that, without external helps, he cannot easily be raised to the
meditation of divine things11”. The fathers continued by underlining
that the Church had chosen for that reason to institute rites and
ceremonies, defining the last ones as
mystic benedictions, lights, incense, vestments, and many other
things of this kind […] whereby both the majesty of so great a
sacrifice might be recommended, and the minds of the faithful be
excited, by those visible signs of religion and piety, to the contemplation of those most sublime things which are hidden in the
sacrifice [of the Mass]12.
This conception of liturgy has something to do with the “sacer
horror”. Indeed, if we follow the author of a scholarly essay on the
liturgical ceremonial of Mainz at the end of de 18th Century, “All
these rules and ceremonies inspire a sacrum horrorem and proclaim
the holy majesty we should pay tribute to13”. In other words, all the
“visible signs of religion” delivered by the liturgy have to unveil the
majesty of God, to the extent of inspiring a “sacer horror”.
The same logic was implemented in the Jesuit processions. We
obviously cannot confuse the Sacrifice of the Mass with the Jesuit
processions. However, we can still consider that the logic of divine
unveiling which governs the conception of Tridentine Mass can also
be found in hyper-spectacularised processions. By inviting the faithful into a church saturated with colours, materials, and shapes, i.e. in
a hyper-stimulating sensorial environment where the “visible signs”
10
11
12
13
theater, its indecency, its ignominy, particularly when the “histriones”
performed sacred plays.
“[N]ihilque omnino praemittere earum quae religionem et pietatem in animis mortalium
auguent: qui quoniam sensibus ducuntur, externo rerum apparatu, ornatu, pompa
capiuntur maxime”; Juan DE MARIANA, De spectaculis, 1609, XVI.
The canons and decrees of the sacred and oecumenical Council of Trent, ed. and trans.
J. Waterworth (London: Dolman, 1848), Session XII, chap. V.
The canons and decrees, Session XII, chap. V.
“omnes dispositiones caeremoniaeque sacrum horrorem inspirant, sanctam Majestatem,
cui homagium praestatur, venerabileque Sacramentum proclamant”, Ordo et
argumentum agendarum Moguntinensium ab ineunte saeculo XVI. Dissertatio
liturgica.
52
Annick Delfosse
dominate, the organisers aimed to excite the minds, to seize the
faithful and to provoke a reaction of sacer horror among the
audience. The décor became an immersion device, inviting the faithful to a meeting with holiness — and in particular with the Jesuit
version of holiness as represented by the two new saints —, which
caused a physical reaction of fear or delight. Here is the key feature:
all the spectacular devices settled by the Society were designed to
seize, to capture, to rapt the soul of the faithful-spectator “who is led
by his senses”. Much more than stimulation of the senses, this
overflow of sensory stimuli that characterized the processional
apparatus caused such confusion, such a devastation that it pushed
the spectator “beside himself” (hors de lui) and made a deep religious
experience possible.
Annick DELFOSSE, « Jesuit Solemnities in the Southern Netherlands: Immersion and
Experience », GEMCA : papers in progress, t. 2, no 1, 2013, p. 45-52, [En ligne].
2
Figurative Thinking and Mystical Experience in the
Baroque Age
Main Introduction to the Session
Agnès Guiderdoni (FNRS, Université catholique de Louvain)
This session is the presentation of a collaborative project funded
by the National Fund for Scientific Research in Belgium from 2012 to
2015, which is entitled: “Figurative thinking and mystical experience
in the baroque age: A new emerging culture of representation”. The
corpus under study is part of the digital library Bibliotheca Imaginis
Figuratae, and more specifically the works by the Jesuit Maximilian
van der Sandt (or Sandaeus). The starting point of the project is the
translation from Latin into French of his Clavis mystica (1640) by
Aline Smeesters.
This project aims to renew the understanding of theoretical and
practical foundations of representation in the early modern period.
It explores the way in which figurative thinking works from within
spiritual and mystical literature, producing a meta-discourse on
representation. The working argument is as follows: linking the uses
of figurative thinking in emblematic literature and in mystical
literature reveals a process of figurability, the latter being understood as the potentiality or the virtuality of the appearance either of
the image within language or of language within the image, according to Louis Marin’s definition. In order to carry out this study, we
will, on the one hand, analyse the vocabulary related to the field of
figura (based on the emblematic corpus of the Bibliotheca Imaginis
Figuratae). On the other hand, we will study the interactions between
this corpus and a group of mystical texts from the early 17th century.
We mean to find the conditions under which mystical experience is
recast into the rhetorical shape of symbolic language.
Agnès GUIDERDONI, « Main introduction to the session “Figurative Thinking and
Mystical Experience in the Baroque Age” », GEMCA : papers in progress, t. 2, no 1,
2013, p. 55.
Mystical Theory and Emblematic Practice in
Sandaeus’s Works
Agnès GUIDERDONI (FNRS, Université catholique de Louvain)
By way of introduction, I would like to recall some now wellknown facts about the historical and epistemological basis of emblematic literature. Emblematic literature belongs to or is based on
figurative thinking — pensée figurée, imago figurata, and, as a process
based on the functioning of the figura, it implements and organises
what should be termed a “work of figurability” (travail de la
figurabilité). This means that emblematic representations contain
and transmit to the reader/spectator much more than what they
show or say. In order to deploy the full consequences of this functioning and to understand how it is related to mystical discourse, we
need to go back to the definition and the evolution of the figura, and
follow the path from figura to figurability.
I will start from there and then move on to Sandaeus and his
works, and finally identify a kind of mystical figurability in one of
his texts.
As a legacy from the medieval figura (Auerbach), reinvented in
the Renaissance, “figurative expression” (“expression figurée”,
Klein), developed into the various genres of the imago figurata, that
were widely spread throughout Europe during about three centuries. Designed from the beginning as a form of expression and
thought, embodied in a considerable number of genres and media, it
became one of the major modes of representation during the early
modern period. It flourishes extensively in spiritual literature, which
is due to the initial theological root(ing) of the figura, first an interpretive principle to understand Holy History then transformed by
transfer into a mode of representation (Auerbach). However, — to
make a long and complex story short — from the beginning of the
16th century, in the context of the humanist renewal of biblical
exegesis, this theological figure/figura was soon conflated with the
rhetorical figure (allegory mainly). As a consequence, moving from a
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Agnès Guiderdoni
deciphering framework that makes sense of a Creation invested of a
meaning a priori, the figure became a tool for designing persuasive
representations in order to give a meaning a posteriori to the world.
In other words, one could see the theological figure as if “contaminated” by the rhetorical figure from within, a fact that induced an
alienated representation of the content of the theological figure,
deploying all its imaginary and fictive virtualities, eliciting new
images beyond literal representation, or rather beyond the “obvious
meaning” (sens obvie): the work of the rhetorical figure within the
theological figure makes appear latent images (“images en latence”),
and, I would already add, latent images that God may well have
placed there, in a way described by the Jesuit Maximilian Vander
Sandt, in his Clavis mystica, as we shall see a bit further.
Considering this historical and epistemological context, we will
argue that the way in which meaning emerges out of the figurative
process in emblematic literature and how its efficacy acts upon the
reader are key elements to understand how the process of figurability at work in mystical discourse was renewed in the early
modern period, and especially from the beginning of the 17th century, when mysticism reached a breaking point in its history.
As a “modern” device, the by-product of a deep transformation
in the conception of verbal representations and language, and as a
mode of thought shaping early modern mindsets (both as a testimony to and as an operator of this transformation), the functioning of
the emblem, of the figurative process at work in emblematic literature constitutes the basis for the reconfiguration of spiritual discourse, and especially mystical discourse. At the same time, Christian
mysticism encountered a crucial but also fatal evolution, which first
took the appearance of a controversy over the legitimacy of mysticism and second which consisted in the empowerment of mysticism
as a theology in its own right, that is mystical theology, distinct from
the other mainly positive and scholastic theologies. This empowerment is characterised by an implicit restructuration of mysticism in
the terms of a language experience marked by a strong emphasis,
even an obsession, from both the supporters and the opponents of
mysticism on their language and their use of figurative language.
This has been clearly shown in several recent studies, mainly for
France.
In this respect, Maximilian van der Sandt’s works stands as a
meeting point of both worlds, emblematic and mystical. This has
already been established mainly through the study of his Theologia
Mystical theory and emblematic practice in Sandaeus’s works
59
symbolica, and only partially of his Theologia mystica and his Clavis
mystica. However, the consistency of his writings still needs to be
fully elaborated. Sandaeus stands among the great Jesuit theoreticians of the ars symbolica. Born in Amsterdam in 1578 and deceased
in Cologne in 1656, he joined the Society of Jesus in 1597. He is the
author of a copious work whose richness and originality have been
largely neglected so far. His writings pertain to the fields of controversy, devotional literature (mainly Marian devotion) through
several emblem books and theology. Our interest lies in particular in
the connection between his symbolical theology and his mystical
theology, from both of which a fascinating image theory emerges.
This connection seems to be implemented in his emblem books, all
dedicated to the Virgin Mary and produced for the benefit of Marian
sodalities in Cologne. On the one hand, Sandaeus adapts the scholastic and mystical medieval legacy to a new cultural and epistemological context. This form of cultural integration consists, on the
other hand, in the invention of a language that is not inscribed any
longer in the Creation but that is still to be invented, created. This is
the common ground for mysticism and symbolism, the former striving to express an experience, the latter to persuade, both fields
feeding one another. From this combination emerges a new way of
conceiving language in the spiritual experience, a new modus
loquendi, as Sandaeus states in the preface of his Clavis mystica:
The mystics use some new words, never heard of anywhere, such
as egoitas, ipsitas, meitas, velitur, and many others. They pretend to
follow necessity. […] Whenever the situation obliges, we must, as
they say, command the words and not be commanded by them.
This is this linguistic material, even linguistic “matter”, informed by
mystical experience, that Sandaeus seeks to inventorise and define
in this dictionary, because the Clavis mystica is literally a dictionary
of mystical language, published in 1640. Given this rather late publication date (with regard to the historical evolution and “decline” of
mysticism), this “dictionary” can be viewed both as a synthesis of
several centuries of Western mystical tradition and as a marker in a
new development of mysticism in Christian spirituality. Michel de
Certeau in his Mystic Fable has well spotted the significance of this
work.
Conversely, in his Theologia symbolica, Sandaeus fully absorbs
and integrates emblematics into this emerging language, identifying
a specific discursive mode which also serves as a basis for mystical
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Agnès Guiderdoni
theology. He implemented this emblematic shaping of both symbolical and mystical theology in his emblem books, which should be
the next step of the project.
Given that the process of figurability is the connecting part
between emblematics and mystical discourse, I will devote the final
part of my paper to that notion as it is expressed in Sandaeus’s
Clavis mystica. Through some key elements from the two entries
“Experience” and “Vision”, Sandaeus sketches what could be identified as a process of figurability.
After expounding the usual scholastic categories of vision, he
explains what the mystical vision is, and, doing so, supports his
explanation with a long quotation of Johannes Tauler regarding
vision in the midst of darkness (in tenebris):
This vision is so sudden, so swift that there is no remaining image
of what we saw; it is impossible to know or to understand what it
is; but one understands with certainty that it is something although
one cannot define its nature […]. [Indeed] neither the intellect, nor
the senses could have grasped [this light], because of its great
subtlety. That is why no image of it remains […].
In the entry “experience” — a key notion for early modern mysticism since it is the core, the matter itself of mystical theology and
mystical knowledge — Sandaeus presents how “experimental
knowledge” operates in the soul: “The experience of divine
operation leaves in the soul some traces and impressions, which are
more useful to it than discourse and imagination”. He goes on to
explain how the intellect can paradoxically (my interpretation) make
use of theses traces: “The intellect itself concentrates on a number of
interior and obscure forms (species), which have neither been
conceived nor formed by the imagination but which have been left
by the experience of the divine operation.” He then reaffirms the
fact that nothing is left in the intellect “except a certain number of
interior forms, traces, impressions, enigmas and ideas of the experience of divine love”. Then, “with the aid and the support of these
ideas”, the will, or the affective part of the soul can act in order “to
raise the interior gaze towards God.”
After assembling the pieces of this puzzle, one understands that
divine discourse — provided there is such a thing as divine discourse
— leaves traces, impressions, forms in the intellect, but it seems that
at the same time nothing (no image) is left that can be used, that can
be consciously perceived by the intellect to be used or to be reflected
Mystical theory and emblematic practice in Sandaeus’s works
61
upon. However, the will can seize these forms and use them to
transcend the inner vision of the soul and reach to God, raising its
inner gaze. In other words, the intellect obscurely perceives something, of no use for itself, but that the will, short-circuiting the intellect, can transform into a gaze. It makes the “image” of God emerge
out of something that is both present and nothing; it reveals the
image latent within the obscure form. At the level of mystical
discourse, which is Sandaeus’s main preoccupation of in his Clavis
mystica, it leads to literally inform the narrative of the divine
experience, that is a theological discourse of some sort, with the
“imaginal” by-products, indexical signs (symptoms) issued from the
work of the will on this form. In other words, the theological content
is re-oriented, re-routed towards a spiritually visual experience. By
doing so, Sandaeus has properly sketched a process of figurability.
To conclude, I would like to link these observations to the
“emblematic theology” that Sandaeus defines in his Theologia symbolica, and suggest that this enables the identification of a new emerging culture of representation since this allows to reconstruct the
line that goes from traces left by God in the soul to their representation. These representations are first shaped in symbolical theology
and then elaborated to be transferred to mystical theology on the
basis of the emblematic process.
Agnès GUIDERDONI, « Mystical theory and emblematic practice in Sandaeus’s
works », GEMCA : papers in progress, t. 2, no 1, 2013, p. 57-61, [En ligne].
Maximilianus Sandaeus, S.J. (1578-1656),
Explorer of the Mystical Language
Aline SMEESTERS (FNRS, Université catholique de Louvain)
The Pro theologia mystica clavis (“Key to the mystical theology”)
(Cologne, 1640) written by the Jesuit Maximilianus Sandaeus1 takes
the form of a dictionary providing definitions, explanations (by
means of disquisitiones, a system of questions and answers) and
quotations (from a range of authorities, including four favourites:
Ruysbroeck, Tauler, Herp and Blosius, always quoted in Latin), with
the aim to clarify the meaning of the most current mystical ways of
speaking. It was conceived in defence of the Mystics, often criticised
in this time and for whom Sandaeus already stood up a few years
earlier in his Theologia Mystica (1627), where he tried to demonstrate
the entire compatibility of the mystical and the scholastic traditions.
Sandaeus now enters the battlefield again, but focuses this time on
the question of language: in his view, the main problem concerning
the Mystics is their use of a peculiar language, full of figures, obscure terms, neologisms, inappropriate wordings, that prevents them
from being well understood… However, the content of their message is in fact totally orthodox and in accordance with the teachings
of the traditional church and scholastic theology. According to
1
R.P. Maximiliani Sandaei e Soc. Iesu Doctoris Theologi Pro Theologia Mystica Clavis
elucidarium, onomasticon vocabulorum et loquutionum obscurarum, quibus Doctores
Mystici, tum veteres, tum recentiores utuntur ad proprium suae Disciplinae sensum
paucis manifestum, Coloniae Agrippinae, ex officina Gualteriana, 1640 (reprint
Heverlee-Louvain, Éditions de la Bibliothèque S.J., 1963). See the recent articles
by Anne-Élisabeth Spica, ‘La Pro Theologia Mystica Clavis de Maximilien van der
Sandt : un inventaire lexical à valeur encyclopédique?’, in Pour un vocabulaire
mystique au XVIIe siècle. Séminaire du Professeur Carlo Ossola, textes réunis par
François Trémolières, Torino, Nino Aragno Editore, 2004, p. 23-41; and Christian
Belin, ‘La métaphore iconoclaste chez Sandaeus’, in Emblemata sacra. Rhétorique
et herméneutique du discours sacré dans la littérature en images, Turnhout, Brepols,
2006, p. 267-275.
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Aline Smeesters
Sandaeus, it follows that people just need a list of vocabulary in
order to correctly understand what the Mystics say.
The question that arises is the following: if everything the
Mystics say can be “translated” into scholastic or traditional language, then why, after all, do they need to use such a strange and
problematic way of speaking? According to Sandaeus, they actually
have no other choice (quonam alio sermone exprimerent?), for reasons
that I will make clear in this paper. Before entering the subject, I
want to point out once for all that all my effort will aim to summarize and clarify Sandaeus’s conceptions, as they appear or are suggested throughout the Clavis. Even though I do not repeat “according to Sandaeus” before every sentence, the ideas exposed are
Sandaeus’s, not mine.
I will start by the definition that Sandaeus gives of his/the
Mystical Theology. Already with the opening quotation of the book
(from the Jesuit Alvarez), we learn that “the Mystical Theology rises
up towards a very high knowledge of God2”. In the foreword,
Sandaeus gives his own definition of the Mystical Theology:
“Mystical Theology, if one looks at the etymology, refers to a hidden
and concealed knowledge of God and the Divine3”. At the end of the
foreword, Sandaeus summarises the true favours enjoyed by the
Mystic: the first one is “that, at the same time, the Mystic’s intellect
is wonderfully enlightened in the mysteries of the faith, and that his
will is kindled and set on fire4; while the second favour, akin to the
first, is that “the Mystic, united with God, even though he is
uneducated and illiterate, is often raised by God’s teaching towards
a very high knowledge of the supernatural things5”. It clearly appears
that, in Sandaeus’s view, Mysticism brings an actual progress in
knowledge, and not only a personal progress in faith, love and
spiritual life.
Talking about knowledge, three questions have to be asked:
how is it acquired? What is it about? And how is it expressed (first
built and then circulated)?
2
3
4
5
“Mystica Theologia, ad altissimam quamdam DEI cognitionem erigitur.”
“Theologia Mystica, si etymon spectes, significat occultam, arcanamvé Dei ac
Divinorum notitiam” (p. 17).
“et intellectus Mystici mirabiliter illustretur in mysteriis fidei; et voluntas accendatur,
et inflammetur” (p. 37).
“Mysticus Deo unitus, quamvis cetera indoctus et illiteratus, Magisterio Divino saepe
ad altissimam rerum transnaturalium cognitionem evehitur.”
Maximilianus Sandaeus, Explorer of the Mystical Language
65
Now, this knowledge is acquired in a very specific way, highly
distinct from the speculative way followed by Scholasticism: the
Mystical Theology is Practice-practica, et Affectuosa (p. 18); it follows
the two ways of experience and of love. Let us take a closer look at
these two notions.
In the beginning of the 17th century, Experience had acquired new
epistemological validity through the progress of scientifical
knowledge based on observation. Sandaeus himself gives the
example of the modern sailors who explored terrae incognitae, and
found that some traditional geographical views based on the
Ancients’ authority were actually wrong (p. 24).
However, the problem of experience is its individual touch, and
especially in church matters: it is gained nullo docente, without
listening to any master. Sandaeus is highly conscious of the danger
involved, as the Reformation shows how disastrous it can be to
reject the authority of the Church and pretend to be personally
taught by the Holy Ghost.
Est insanus error Novatorum huius temporis, qui ut se subducant à
Pastorum, Ecclesiae, et Conciliorum doctrina ac decretis, solum Spiritumsanctum pro Magistro se habere iactitant. (p. 35)
He states that the humble Mystics, even though they enjoy the Hoy
Ghost’s personal teachings, usually freely accept to submit
themselves to other men in order to learn from them; and he
recommends to the Ascetics to persevere in this humility, since it is
always safer to learn from someone else than from oneself.
[…] humiles Mystici, […] quamvis tanquam nobilissimi Spiritus Divino
lumine copiosè illustrentur […], libenter tamen propter Deum, aliis se
submittunt, ut ab iis aliquid addiscant. […] Monendos esse Ascetas, ne
sibi facilè persuadeant, sese ad talem apicem pervenisse, cum tutius semper
sit, alieno magisterio doceri, quam suo.
Even though Sandaeus repeatedly states that Mystical Theology
provides a higher knowledge of God and the Divine, we will find no
“scoop” about God in his Clavis. His very method prevents him
from it: whenever the Mystics say something about God that even
slightly differs from tradition, Sandaeus explains that they speak
“improprie”, but actually mean the same old view. There is nevertheless a field where the Mystic can bring real novelty: the human
soul, with its actions and powers. Immediately after having mentioned the discoveries made by modern sailors, Sandaeus goes on:
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“Why could not the same happen to other commonly held opinions,
for example about the actions and powers of the soul, so that they
would be found untrue, under a veil of probability6?” So the terrae
incognitae explored by the Mystics are, in fact, their own inner
beings…
Under the lemma Homo interior (secunda disquisitio), Sandaeus
goes into very detailed explanations about the cognitive faculties of
man. In summary, he distinguishes three levels of cognitive knowledge: the first is the sensitive level, which enables us to know
through the external senses and the internal faculties related to the
information given by the senses (such as common sense, and also
imagination); the second is the rational level, able to reason, deduce,
conclude…; the third is the intelligentia simplex, which enables us to
gain knowledge without preceding sensation or reasoning, receiving
it directly from the divine Light; it is by this way that we know, for
example, that the first principles are true (for instance: the principle
according to which the whole is always bigger than the part). To
each of these cognitive powers, is linked an affective power, able to
be moved by the corresponding apprehension (sensitive, rational, or
divine/natural).
But love is also an impulse able to pull each of the cognitive
powers above the faculties inferior to it (Sandaeus speaks, at each
stage, about a “raptus super inferiores potentias”): love is able to
neutralise the lower cognitive processes and let the spirit work only
with the higher ones. At the lower stage, the amoris affectio can bring
man to concentrate so much on a mental image that he becomes
totally blind to the external sensations from the surrounding world.
At the medium stage, the amor voluntatis can cancel out even imagination, leaving all the free space to reason. Ultimately, the amor
ecstaticus can bring man to know only through the light of God.
The path of Mystical experience involves a long and gradual
progression in prayer and contemplation. At the first stages, it
makes use of the traditional media of knowledge, including images.
Every good image can teach something to the religious man, and it
is advisable, tells Sandaeus, to travel along all those images, from
the lower ones to the higher ones, and to extract all the truth they
can give us.
6
“Quidni igitur possit aliis quibusdam vulgo notis opinionibus, ac receptis, quae de […]
animae actionibus, atque potentiis circumferuntur, tale quid evenire, ut revera,
falsitatem aliquam sub velo probabilitatis involvant?” (p. 24)
67
Sed prius cunctae Imagines recto ordine percurrendae: ut videlicet ab
infimis ad medias, et à mediis ad supremas conscendam, quo nulla me
veritas subterfugiat, (sub Imago interna).
But at the higher stage, the ultimate experience involves a
relinquishment of this path of images to reach the naked Truth:
“Cum autem Imagines via quaedam sint ad nudam ac simplicem veritatem;
si ad veritatem pertingere velim, paullatim abdicanda via est.” The
mystical union with God himself happens in the absence of any
image, in what the soul experiences as a kind of very bright light or
very deep obscurity.
It remains unclear, in Sandaeus’s explanations, whether all
human cognitive powers are also made quiet during this union, or if
some remain active, either efficiently or not (the intellect, even
though active, would be unable to embrace something infinite, since
7
it is itself finite ). The secunda disquisitio under the lemma cognitio Dei
is the following one: “If, and in what way, the negative knowledge
of God happens without any action of the intellect and without any
image8?” The answer given by Sandaeus is not very clear: trying to
escape the spinosae subtilitates causing passionate discussions among
Philosophers and Theologians, Sandaeus moves the debate away
from the cognitive powers of the soul he has defined elsewhere, and
only relies on the distinction between knowledge accessible through
faith (that requires no evidence) and knowledge accessible through
reason (building on evidence).
Anyway, what is repeatedly stated is that the unitive experience
with God, even though it is called a “vision”, happens in the soul
without any image, and even without any concept. As a quotation
from Tauler indicates (p. 362), neither the intellect nor the senses are
able to grasp anything from the presence of God, because of God’s
perfection and our own imperfection — to the point that, if some
image or idea has been grasped, we can be sure that it was not God’s
(even though, as Tauler adds, it can be something divine, such as an
apparition of the Virgin Mary or of Christ, for instance — but we
will focus here on the ultimate union with God).
7
8
As becomes clear from a quotation of Saint Grégoire: “mens nostra nequaquam se
ad comprehendendam incircumscriptam circumstantiam dilatat, quia eam inopiâ suae
circumscriptionis angustat” (p. 363).
“An et quomodo cognitio Dei negativa sit sine actu intellectus, et absque omni
imagine?”
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The Mystical exploration brings man in a land beyond any
human image and concept; but then, after that meeting with the
unutterable/the unspeakable has taken place, how can they put
words on this experience, for themselves and for the others? How to
build and circulate this new knowledge about God — and, above all,
as we have seen, about the human soul in its interaction with God?
Now we come to the problem of mystical language, its conditions of possibility and why it just has to be so particular and so
inappropriate… Sandaeus does not discuss those points at length
(his goal is rather to explain what happens before and during the
mystical union, not after), but some parts of the Clavis give us
interesting clues to reconstruct his views: mainly the third chapter of
the foreword (called Canones pro mysticarum loquutionum intellectu)
and some lemmas as Experientia and Cognitio Dei.
To be able to communicate his experience, the Mystic has to
build on the remains of this experience. We have seen that, in
theory, mystical union leaves no clear image or data. But it deeply
tranforms the inner being of the Mystic and does leave some
“traces” in his soul. Those traces left in the soul are described by
Sandaeus under the lemma Experientia, through a long quotation
from Constantin de Barbanson: they are called “vestigia et
impressiones, interiores obscurae species”, and also “aenigmata” and
“ideae”. Barbanson clearly states that those impressions are not
conceived by man’s imagination, but left in the darkness of the spirit
by the experience of the divine operation. And after this experience,
the various powers of the soul, including the intellect, can turn their
attention to those traces and concentrate on them.
We find here again the traditional paradigm of the traces left by
God, first in the Creation, then in the Bible, which enable man, by
concentrating on these figures and trying to unveil their meaning, to
gain indirect knowledge of God. This paradigm is the basis of the
whole symbolic way of thinking, so pervasive in the emblematic
culture that flourished in the sixteenth and early seventeenth centuries, notably amoung the Jesuits — Sandaeus himself was a great
specialist and practitioner of symbolics, and wrote a Theologia
symbolica, among other books. In his Clavis, he also defines a way of
knowing God that proceeds through “imagines” and “similitudines”,
which we find among the creatures, or among the things we hear or
read, and which we submit to a rational investigation (p. 361). The
great differences with Mysticism are 1st) that the Mystic, instead of
looking for visible traces left by the sea on a piece of land a long time
69
ago, is himself the land that has just been flooded over by the sea,
and 2nd) that the vestigia the Mystic has to deal with are not clearly
formed images (like creatures or biblical figures). Yet, the very
process of trying to make sense from enigmatic traces can explain
the affinity between the mystical and symbolic languages.
Furthermore, the only tools available to build and express any
knowledge are concepts and images. So the Mystics will have no
other choice than to use them, searching through existing vocabulary or creating new words — but always making clear, at the
very time they use them, that their words are totally inappropriate.
When using concepts, the Mystics will often ascribe them to God
only through negation (per negationem) — it is the apophatic
tradition, saying for example that God is increatus, incorporeus… —
or through excess (per excessum) — saying for instance that God is
super-substantialis — (Sandaeus, p. 161-162). When talking with
images, the Mystics will prefer the clearly dissimilar images9, and
will often bring together opposing images (creating oxymorons). In
the Mystical language, figures are not an ornamental piece of
rhetoric, that one could replace with the “proper expression”, but
the only way found to express, however inappropriately, something
that has no proper expression. To quote Sandaeus: Mystics are
forced to talk in this way by virtue of, on the one hand, the “height
and incomprehensibility of the divine truths there are dealing with,
and on the other hand, by means of the condition of their emotions,
impossible to explain through other words10”.
Let us give some examples. As I already mentioned, the Mystics
often describe their union with God as happening in a great and
very bright light, or also in a very deep obscurity (“caligo”, in Latin).
Those opposing images are regularly brought together, in expressions such as “caliginosa lux” and “lucida caligo” (p. 131). This
oxymoron makes clear that what it is about is neither light, neither
obscurity, but something beyond. Under the lemma caligo, Sandaeus
explains that those two natural phenomena, although they greatly
differ from each other in genere qualitatis, may come together in a
mystical sense propter eiusdem generis effectum, because their effect is
of the same kind (that is, because they both prevent man from seeing
9
10
Canones, point 5: “In Divinis explicandis dissimilia plerumque adferunt. Nempe, ne
errorem, si similibus utantur, inducant.”
“tum rerum divinarum, de quibus agunt celsitudine ac incomprehensibilitate, tum
affectuum alia eloquutione inexplicabilium conditione” (p. 20).
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anything)11. Here it becomes clear that the images of light and darkness are not about what God really is, but about the effects he
creates on the human soul.
It is also interesting to note that the effects made by God on the
soul are described in terms borrowed from the sensible and bodily
experiences (here, vision). This is a common feature of many mystical expressions (the soul is said to “taste” God, to exit from itself, to
liquefy, to be brought to death…) All those expressions seem to
suggest a spiritual experience which, although happening at a much
higher and inner level than that given by the external senses, shares
the immediate evidence and the possible violence of the bodily
feelings. Let us have a look at the lemma raptus in the Clavis.
Sandaeus starts by stating that the word is used by the Mystics sensu
translatitio, and then he proceeds with a disquisitio: “What analogy is
there between the mystical spiritual raptus and the bodily one12?”
The elements of answer he gives concern the transfer from one place
to another (transferre de loco in locum), but also the sudden violence of
the process: “violentia quaedam repentina, qua mens subito avellitur
sensibus, et ad Divinam inspectionem ac amorem contra modum naturae
suae, celeriter ac potenter attollitur”. The soul is wrested from the
senses, but the sensible comparison remains meaningful because it
gives an idea of the violence and speed of the process, that goes
against the natural way of operation of the soul (contra modum
naturae suae).
It is already time to conclude. In view of Sandaeus’s aim (that is,
to save and keep alive the Mystical tradition), his lexicographical
method may not be the best one. By systematising and theorising the
mystical vocabulary, by articulating it and reducing it to the scholastic tradition, Sandaeus plays down its subjective and potentially
subversive character — in a sense, he kills the vitality and spontaneity of Mystical literature and builds its commemorative monument. Yet, in view of the aims pursued by our research team,
Sandaeus’s lexic, by its insistance on vocabulary questions, provides
fascinating insights into the complex relationship between figurative
thinking and mystical experience in the Baroque age. The analysis I
proposed today is of course intended to be further refined, taking
11
12
“Quamvis autem Lux in genere qualitatis, plurimum differat à Caligine, ac proinde
distinguantur significatione naturali, tamen significatione mystica, omnino conveniunt,
propter eiusdem generis effectum” (p. 131).
“Quam analogiam habeat raptus spiritualis mysticus ad corporeum?”
71
into account Sandaeus’s other writings about figurative uses of
language and situating them more precisely within the complex
cultural and religious context of his time.
Aline SMEESTERS, « Maximilianus Sandaeus, S.J. (1578-1656), Explorer of the
Mystical Language », GEMCA : papers in progress, t. 2, no 1, 2013, p. 63-71, [En ligne].
Itineraries in 16th- and 17th-century Spiritual Writing
Anne-Françoise MOREL (F.W.O., Ghent University)
The Baroque age and the architectural metaphor
The use of architectural metaphors in religious texts is overwhelming. This is, to the least, a consequence of the Old and New
Testament’s numerous architectural references. The Baroque period
offers a propitious climate for a rich interchange between architecture, devotion and texts. The (Counter-)Reformation was a welcome
stimulant to rethink the role of the arts (including architecture) in
devotional practice, while the Baroque crisis created a mindset that
was profitable and applicable to the investigation of the human soul.
Not only did both investigations resonate against a common background of a spiritual and psychological crisis, they also shared a
common vocabulary to describe the origins and effects of this crisis.
By means of introspection, the psychology of the human soul shared
its hidden chambers with the apogee of the mystical experience. As
Benedetta Papasogli has brilliantly demonstrated in “Le fond du
cœur”, spatial representations and architectural metaphors served
the moral introspection and the rethinking of spiritual representations from the late humanists over the mystics to the Jansenists.
Inner and outer space, clarity and obscurity, monumentality and
confinement are the constituents of Baroque magnificence that
encompasses the secret realm of that which cannot be expressed in
words, the “non-dit”. The aim of my presentation is to examine the
role of architectural metaphors in 17th-century French spiritual texts.
I will analyse the status and function of the architectural representations by exploring the structuring and incentive role of the architectural figure or itinerary in the devotee’s spiritual journey.
Architecture in moral and spiritual texts
The analysis of the status of the architectural metaphor in
Baroque mystical texts needs some broader introduction on the use
74
Anne-Françoise Morel
of the figura in these texts. Results of earlier research done by Agnès
Guiderdoni and Ralph Dekoninck on Figurabilité have demonstrated
that in the early modern period, figura (or figure) commonly acted as
an interface between several dimensions of reality, including the
material world and the conceptual, the concrete and the abstract.
“Figure” refers to the dialectical movement between reality and
representation which was at the core of the theological discussion
since the (Counter-)Reformation. Hence, figura and especially the
derived notion of “figurabilité” are to be understood as a process of
making visible what initially belongs to the reality of the invisible or
ineffable through the figurative. As a consequence, the concept of
“figure” had a considerable importance in mystical theology based
on the experience of the ultimate love and union with God. 17thcentury spiritual texts discern three main types of images: material
images (referring to the external world and seen by the eye),
spiritual or imaginary images (images raised by the inner faculties
and referring to the external world) and intellectual images
(sometimes even living) images which are solely inspired by God
and independent from any external stimulus. It is obvious that these
categories are an early modern reading of Saint Augustine’s theory
on vision (discerning corporal, spiritual and intellectual vision), a
theory that has been fundamental to the Christian discourse on
vision and images1. Important for our research is to see how new or
alternative approaches of figurative thinking can be explored
through to the mystical figurability of the indescribable. As Cousinié
explains, the figure rather refers to a presence than to a visual
element and consequently testifies to the possibility of an exceptional and immediate relation between men and the divine:
Il s’agirait moins de rapports autres que strictement “visual”… moins
d’une image que d’une présence essentielle, l’image n’étant pas cette
présence ni même lieu de son advenue mais le lieu a partir duquel elle
(présence essentielle) peut, éventuellement, s’instaurer2.
As I will show, it is precisely this transcendental or almost ontological use of the architectural metaphor that makes it favourable and
consistent to the rendering of the spiritual experience.
1
2
Frédéric COUSINIÉ, “Images et Contemplation dans le discours mystique du VII
Siècle Français”, Dix-septième siècle, 2006, 230, p. 33-34.
Ibid., p. 38.
Itineraries in 16th and 17th-century Spiritual Writing
75
“Construire sa propre demeure, c’est aussi apprendre à
l’habiter”
Our journey to the Baroque understanding of the role of
architecture in spiritual texts starts at the foundations of the
building. In French, the etymology of “edifice” goes back to aedificium, which is the substantive of the verb aedificare > édifier. Both
French and English commonly use “edification” when referring to
the building of something and in particular to the construction of the
moral man3. The verb “édifier” can be used respectively in its literal
and figurative sense, referring to the construction of building and
man: “se dit figurément en Morale, et signifie, Porter à la pieté par les bons
discours, par les bons exemples. La lecture de l’Escriture Sainte édifie
beaucoup les Fideles4.” Hence, the use of architectural metaphors in
moral and religious texts is rather self-evident. The interchangeability of the disciplines was possible on the level of writing and
thinking about the subject matter5. But what about the architectural
experience itself? As Papasogli has pointed out, the experience of the
inner self — often referred to as “demeure” — is dictated by two
itineraries leading to at least two different concepts of the architecture of the soul. The first itinerary — the moral one — is leading to
moral edification through introspection. The mystical journey
equally leads the reader along the faculties and passions. But instead
of edifying the reader in the knowledge and correct handling of
them, the mystical journey proceeds to the creation of a potential of
a maximal oblivion or deconstruction of the self, culminating in the
“néant” (nothingness), where the union with God’s love takes place
(i.e. a total surrender)6. Hence, the mystical journey transgresses the
(moral) figurative sense of the architectural metaphor. Whether in
image or verbal description, the architectural figure becomes part of
the mystical experience as it delimits and makes visible the inner
3
4
5
6
S. PLOEG, Staged experiences Architecture and Rhetoric in the Work of Sir Henry
Wotton, Nicholas Hawksmoor and Sir John Vanbrugh, Unpublished PhD,
Universiteit Groningen, 2011, p. 130-131.
Antoine FURETIÈRE, Dictonnaire Universel, 1690 (www.lexilogoscom).
Henry Wotton — a 17th-century English author, diplomat and politician —
wrote both on architecture as an operative art and on education or the moral
building of man. In the Epilogue of The Elements of Architecture Wotton referred
to a new work by his hand, namely A Philosophical Survey Education, which he
also termed a “Kinde of Morall Architecture”.
Benedetta PAPASOGLI, Le Fond du Cœur, Figures de l’espace intérieur au VIIe siècle,
Paris, Honoré Champion, 2000, p. 233.
76
place or space of the mystical experience. As we shall see, this
“action” (<> mystic theology = theology of passiveness) encompasses the three levels of spiritual vision/imaginative representation.
Thereby, various uses of the architectural figure are adopted: from
external referent to mental image, or spiritual referent. The use of
the figure is thus as variegated as the figure itself, the aim however
remaining the (expression of the) achievement of the spiritual
journey.
The structuring role of architecture in texts
If the outward expression of mystical exaltation became a successful topic for Baroque artists, no direct evidence or representation
of the spiritual journey in the human soul could be given. Hence the
importance to provide the devotee with figurative testimonies,
guidelines on how to reach the rapture of the soul following the total
surrender to God. First, the architectural journey is often used as the
guide or itinerary towards the spiritual experience. Secondly, the
architectural setting conceptualises the mystical experience by
creating both its mental and physical space.
Desmarets de Saint-Sorlin (French author and mystic) gives us a
brilliant example of the use of architecture as a visual and mental
image on different levels of the mystical journey. Saint-Sorlin guides
the devotee in “la ville de la vraie volupté” (the city of true pleasure).
This city consists of fictive buildings illustrated in engravings. Each
building represents a specific step in the spiritual exercise. On a first
level, architecture structures the text and the actions undertaken in
the spiritual journey. The access to this heavily secured city leads
from the fictive room of Eusèbe (fictive but represented as a real
room belonging to the conceptual world) to the mental city of the
mystical experience. The journey proceeds from buildings with a
real external referent such as a tavern, an academy or a museum
towards mental constructions like the house of fortune. Moreover,
on a second level the architecture organises the journey along the
cognitive and spiritual level of the mystical experience. The taverns,
galleries, academies, etc. represent the carnal and intellectual
pleasures and faculties of life which are gradually abandoned7. The
7
“O Philédon tu es demeuré comme embourbé dans les plaisirs charnels qui sont ceux de
la jeunesse de l’esprit, dont tu n’as pas pu te retirer par manque de force et de courage.
Et ainsi, bien que tu te sois avancé dans l’age, tu ne t’es point avancé dans le goust des
plaisirs et tu es demeuré toujours jeune d’esprit, c’est a dire toujours insensé. De sorte
77
discovery of the “ville the la vraye volupté” is dictated by humility,
obedience, prayer and mortification. Thus, the journey in the city is
simultaneously dictated by architectural splendour and poverty of
the sensory impressions. There could be no greater opposition
between the exuberant description of richly decorated and gilded
marble rooms and the humble mindset that is to be adopted by the
devotee. The splendour of the architectural settings acts as a contrastive figure for the mystical experience. Such a contradiction between
the figure and the referent are typical for mystical texts and is
recognized as such by Saint-Sorlin:
Scache que dans les choses de l’intérieur on fait tout le contraire de ce qui
se fait dans les choses de l’extérieur […] car le plus grand plaisir et le plus
grand courage est a s’abaisser a se retrancher, a se dépouiller, a se
destacher d’affection et de haine, a se faire moindre de plus en plus et a se
remetrre au néant8…
Laurent de Paris, a French Capucin, published his Palais de
l’Amour Divin in 16029. In order to describe this mystical union with
God (l’amour Divin), Laurent de Paris refers to the Song of Songs,
the ultimate reference to the mystical union with God. Laurent de
Paris defines three necessary components or mindsets of this true
love, namely the memory of God’s presence, the surrender to the
divine will and the quest for Divine glory. Only a fulfilment of the
three will lead to the union with God, which takes place in the sacrésaint cabinet du tres pur amour Divin. Contrary to Desmarets de SaintSorlin, Laurent de Paris does not use the structural and pedagogical
qualities of the architectural figure. The figure is used to reveal the
capacity of the soul to achieve the mystic union. The palais de l’amour
divin points to the ultimate transformation of the soul as a place for
introspection, memory and prayer into the soul as a temple (sacré des
sacrés) of God’s love.
The structuring role of the text in architecture
In the examples given so far, a mental image of architecture is
created in order to structure the text, to guide the devotee and to
8
9
que tu es encore bien éloigné de la ville de la vraye volupté, dont tous ces grands plaisirs
humains sont que les faubourgs et dans laquelle on gouste les divins plaisirs.“ — Jules
DESMARETS DE SAINT-SORLIN, Les Délices de l’esprit, 1675, p. 2.
Ibid., tableau 11, 42.
This work was an important inspiration for François de Sales.
78
create the possibility of the mystical experience. It is now time to
question the transcendental or figurative potential of built architecture. Some examples of built architecture used to stimulate the
mystical experience are well-known.
Richeome’s book Les Peintures Spirituelles is a guided tour of the
old noviciate of the Jesuits on the Roman hill of the Quirinal10. The
aim of the book is to make the built environment part of the mystic
experience. As Agnès Guiderdoni pointed out in a conference paper,
the Peintures Spirituelles revisits and reconfigures the noviciate as
place of memory and meditation touching at the spiritual experience
— which she calls a fourth dimension — through the interaction of
material and sacred figures11. As Bailey has demonstrated, this is
best understood when looking at the infirmary. The combination of
the physical presence in the building, the biblical inscriptions and
the images acts as a three-dimensional emblem, meant to dispose the
onlooker towards God’s will.
Les Tableaux que iusques icy vous avez veus, servent en santé, pour vous
inviter à l’amour et pratique de plusieurs belles vertus ; ceux que vous
verrez en ces infirmeries, sont dressez pour […] vous monstrer les vrays
remedes de vos maux, il vous apprendrons a vous disposer à la mort, si
telle est la volonté de Dieu…
Through the text of Richeome, the architecture of the noviciate
becomes an image-language, strictly coded in order to lead the
associative powers of the image in desired, controlled directions
while, at the same time, blocking unwanted peripheral associations
of the mystical experience12.
The Carmelite Deserts and the mystical texts produced in their
seclusion — e.g. Albert de Saint Jacques’s guide to the mystical
10
11
12
Richeome derives the very act of seeing and perceiving from the will of the
Creator. The “species” by which we see an object can only exist by the will of the
creator. Furthermore, according to Richeome, the mind of the viewer is altered
by such a contact with an exterior form.
Agnès GUIDERDONI, « Hors Texte et Hors Image. L’Univers Figural du
P. Richeome SJ. »
Louis RICHEOME, La peinture spirituelle ou L’art d’admirer aimer et louer Dieu en
toutes ses œuures, et tirer de toutes profit salutere , 1611, p. 309 (293). — K. VAN
ASSCHE, “Louis Richeome, Ignatius and Philostrates in the Novice’s Garden”, in
J. MANNING, M. VAN VAECK (eds), The Jesuits and The Emblem Tradition, Turnhout,
Brepols, 1996, p. 4. — A “dédoublement” of the meaning of the architecture
takes place: the built environment creates a place where the mystical experience
can be initiated but it is the accompanying text that shares the actual spiritual
journey through the figure of the architectural environment.
79
experience of the Desert of Marlagne — equally combine all the
aspects and strengths of the Baroque image-language. The
establishment of the deserts is to be understood as a “‘spatial
reform’ analogous to the reform of the bodies, institutions and
consciences undertaken by the mystics in Counter-Reformation,
Baroque era13”. The Carmel Deserts housed, reified and made
dramatically visible the radical apophasis which was so central to
the order’s distinctive spirituality. Being a physical recreation of
Mount Carmel, the deserts also created a sacred topography.
Architecture itself became the figure of the mystical ideal expressed
both in text and stone. Again, the visual and sacred image fuse into a
fourth dimension aiming at the spiritual experience. The fusion of
the holy person and the sacred space was indeed the ideal to which
these Baroque Eden projects aspired.
Conclusion
The study of architectural metaphors in 17th-century spiritual
writings proposes a unique possibility to see the “figurabilité” at
work. As the examples cited here show, architecture is used as a
figure which transcends the function of the metaphor in contemporary moral texts. While for the latter, the architectural metaphor is
only used as a figurative expression, it becomes structural and
ontological in spiritual writings. 17th-century mystical texts all use
the figurative powers of the architectural metaphor in order to share
the authentic and direct experience of God. Both the use of the
image and of the architectural metaphor are based on a longstanding tradition since Augustine and 12th-century mysticism. 17thcentury mystical writers inscribe themselves into this tradition by
means of exploring all the possibilities of the image in the Baroque,
especially the interplay between concealment and revelation (both in
their literal and figurative meaning).
Anne-Françoise MOREL, « Itineraries in 16th and 17th-century Spiritual Writing »,
GEMCA : papers in progress, t. 2, no 1, 2013, p. 73-79, [En ligne].
13
T. JOHNSON, “Gardening for God: Carmelite deserts and the sacralisation of
natural space in Counter-Reformation Spain”, in W. COSTER, A. SPICER (eds),
Sacred Space in Early Modern Europe, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press,
2005, p. 193.
3
Queens in Reception: Catherine de’ Medici and
Mary Stuart
Has-been Queens? Reception and (Re)figuration of
Catherine de’ Medici and Mary Stuart in Translation
Nathalie HANCISSE (FNRS, Université catholique de Louvain)
Introduction
Published anonymously in Paris in 1575, Discours merveilleux de
la vie, actions & deportemens de Catherine de Medicis Royne mere […] is
the anonymous translation of a Latin pamphlet against Catherine
de’ Medici, attributed to Henri Estienne, but also to Théodore de
Bèze, Jean de Serres and Pierre Pithou. It was the focal point of a
fierce controversy around the Queen Mother. One year later, the
French text was translated into English and published in Edinburgh,
linking it clearly with the debate about another controversial queen,
Mary Stuart. Both in power at a time of political and religious
change, the French and Scottish queens have left an enduring mark
in memory and history. Their public image has been deeply influenced by the circulation of polemical texts that have contributed to
turn them into emblematic figures. Similarly to other works published about Mary Stuart, this text and its translations attempt to
orientate the reception of the queen’s actions according to their own
political agenda.
In this paper, I will more specifically focus on the ways in which
translation leaves open space for fiction and how this interacts with
a rhetoric of truth-telling. For that purpose, I will next put this
pamphlet in contrast with John Leslie’s Defence of the Honour, which
was first published anonymously in Rheims by Jean Foigny in 1569.
The Defence of the Honour represents an interesting challenge to
modern-day readers in terms of analysing how rhetoric, law and
poetic discourse interact to build up a powerful apology and claim
of the Queen of Scots’ rights to the English throne. An even more
challenging task is to examine how these notions are modified by/
and evolve within the successive versions of Leslie’s treatise, which
was published again in 1571, and then translated into Latin in 1584,
and into French and Spanish in 1587.
84
Nathalie Hancisse
Concerning the Discours merveilleux de la vie, actions & deportemens de Catherine de Medicis Royne mere, there were three editions of
the English translation of this polemical tract: one allegedly published in Paris, whose real origin remains unknown today1; one
apparently printed in Heidelberg, but actually issuing from London
presses2, and one saying to have been printed in Cracow, but that
was in fact produced in Edinburg3.
1. Catherine de Medici in Polemics
When this inflammatory pamphlet was published in 1575,
barely three years had passed since the infamous Bartholomew Day,
where more than 3000 Protestants were massacred in Paris, and
10,000 in all France. It is not surprising then to find a rather illboding subtitle following this title full of irony. It is announced to
the reader that “sont recitez les moyens qu’elle a tenu pour usurper
le gouvernement du Royaume de France, & ruiner l’estat d’iceluy”.
The typographical distinction, visibly highlighting the two types of
discourse on the page (irony and reality) is abolished on the English
title page of the translation of this book, reuniting these two
registers in a single, strong accusation.
Although printed and published at three different locations
(London, Edinburgh and a third unknown place), the English
editions of the text were all made by the same translator, as the three
texts feature exactly the same phrases, expressions and use of words.
Only the Edinburgh edition displays a different spelling of its
words, as the text is an Anglo-Scots version of English. Distinctively
Scots, the spelling speaks for itself as to the identification of the
actual place of printing of the book (i.e., Edinburgh), in spite of the
clear imprint of Paris on the title page.
The author begins with an outspoken declaration of his
intentions. He vows to be writing “unwillingly,” as he “supposis to
be wished, that the memorials of such personis as do delite or tak
(sic) paines in doing of mischief, or committing of evill, shuld be
1
2
3
[Henri ESTIENNE?], Ane Mervellous discourse upon the lyfe, deides, and behaviours of
Katherine de Medicis (…). (Paris [s.n.], 1576).
Katherine de Medicis (…) At Heydelberge [i.e. London: Printed by H. Middleton?],
1575.
Katherine de Medicis (…) Printed at Cracovv [i.e. Edinburgh: Printed by J. Ross],
1576.
Has-Been Queens?
85
buried in perpetuall oblivion […]”, and to have “so long refrained
from publishing the detestable doingis of Katherine de Medicis,”
fearing to “soile my handes in such villannous and fylthie matter
[…]4”. However, the ensuing 192 pages rather question this claim, as
they set out to expose in painstaking detail the deeds of a queen who
is accused of having “bewitched and transformed [the French
people] into the shapes and conditions of brute beastes”, by means
of “her enforcement drinkes5”. In the French source text, the author
complains that “Catherine, sous pretexte d’un titre audacieusement
usurpé, nous veut regenter, & continue à nous fouetter & bourreller
cruellement sans presque qu’aucun de nous face semblant de le
sentir […]6”.
2. Re-figuration of Queens
Interestingly, the author resorts to similar arguments that are
found in the various versions of George Buchanan’s De Maria
Scotorum Regina, aiming at discovering the heinous deeds of Mary,
Queen of Scots7. In order to demonstrate her tyranny, and justify her
deposition — and execution —, Buchanan accuses Mary of having
poisoned the late King (Lord Henry Darnley, her second husband)
and of ruling the kingdom, or rather being ruled, by her passions.
Here, the author also asserts that Catherine “ruleth all thinges
according unto those passions which do governe her selfe […]8”.
Moreover, Catherine de Medici is described as a woman full of
dissimulation, a master at using all sorts of disguises to achiever her
ends:
4
5
6
7
8
[Henri ESTIENNE?], Ane Mervellous discourse, sig. A iiir.
Ibid.
Anon., Discours merveilleux de la vie, actions & deportemens de Catherine de Medicis
Royne mere […] (Paris, 1575), sig. A iiir.
[George BUCHANAN], De Maria Scotorum Regina, totamque eius contra Regem
coniuratione, foedo cum Bothuelio adulterio, nefaria in maritum crudelitate & rabie,
horrendo insuper & deterrimo eiusdem parricidio: plena, & tragica plane Historia…
Actio contra Mariam Scotorum Reginam in qua ream & consciam esse eam huius
parricidij, neccesarijs argumentiseuincitur […] (London: John Day, 1571).
[Henri ESTIENNE?], Ane Mervellous discourse, sig. Aiiir.
86
Nathalie Hancisse
In most fylthie and beastly whoredomes and lechery they do excel:
Depe dissimulation is naturally ruted in them: and in the execution
of all kynde of treasons they be moste ready9.
The plural pronoun “they” stands for the Medici family as a whole,
which is described as the bed of Catherine’s inherent wickedness.
Likewise, Mary Stuart was depicted by Buchanan as naturally
bound to dissimulation, especially after her second husband, Lord
Henry Darnley’s suspicious death. A key argument in Buchanan’s
treatise was the impropriety of Mary’s mourning, which lasted very
little time in the eyes of Mary’s opponents. Buchanan’s description
of this episode spares no detail, blending the vocabulary of
dramaturgy with rhetorical craft to throw a sharp ironical light on
the scene:
Quhen these doynges were knawin abrode, […] she beganne to set
hir face, and with counterfaiting of mournyng she labored to
appease the hartes of the grudgyng pepill. […] But the myrth of
heart far passing the fayned sorrow, she shut the dores in dede but
she set open the windowes, […]. For quhen Henry Killegree, was
come from the quene of Ingland to comfort her, […] yet he came in
sa unseasonably ere the stage wer prepared and furnished, that he
found the windowes open, the candeles nat yet lighted, and all the
provision for the play out of order.10
The Mervellous discourse also lays blame on Catherine de Medici for
inappropriate mourning, as it is stated that “she did not long
bewaile” her husband, King Henry.
Besides similar lines of arguments that are used to re-figure
major queens like Catherine de Medici and Mary, Queen of Scots,
Buchanan’s treatise and Ane Mervellous discourse recourse to documentary proof to nail down their point. Although the use of references to letters written by the queen herself is not developed on as an
impressive scale as in the Detectio, a passage of the text refers to
Catherine de Medici’s compromising letters:
9
10
Ibid., sig. A iiiv. « […] de paillardises brutales, & principalement d'une tres
profonde dissimulation, propre à exécuter toutes sortes de trahisons. » (Anon.,
Discours merveilleux de la vie, sig. A iiiv.)
George BUCHANAN, Ane Detectioun of the duinges of Marie Quene of Scottes,
touchand the murder of hir husband, and hir conspiracie, adulterie, and pretensed
mariage with the Erle Bothwell.[…] (trans. Thomas Wilson and George Buchanan
([Edinburgh ?] London: John Day, 1571), sig. E iiv-E iiir.
Has-Been Queens?
87
The Quene is convict by hir owen letters, & by those letters which
she caused the King hir Sonne to direct unto the Lieutennentis and
Governoures of Provinces, and uther officers of this kingdome,
[…] in the which […] she
greatly lamented this chance,
happenes to the Admirall [Coligny's death] and his partakers,
against the willis both of the King and of hirself, […]: Of the treuth
of the contentis of these letters, I reporte me to all that then were
Embassadoures. Them selves shall confesse, whither thay wer
ashamed when as, sone after that thay had certified those Princes,
where thay wer resident, that all these thingis wer done by the
Lordes of Guise, for credite whereof, thay had aslo shewed the
Kingis letters, now sodenly thay wer recharged to give furth to
understand, that the King him self was the Author heirof, in
punishement of a certaine conspiracie, detected against thair
Maiesties: […]. Let us as it wer, penetrate into the pernitious
counsallis of this woman, and marcke whereunto this ruting out,
either of the Protestantis only, either of all the mighty men of this
kingdome, without respect of Religioun, do tend11.
This long excerpt highlights the period’s general growing distrust
for the written medium, and especially manuscript letters.
Catherine, like Mary Stuart, is on the whole accused of lying, of
dissimulation, of failing to not being true to one’s word. Truth is
what is really at stake in the eyes of the authors of these pamphlets,
written as attacks or defence of these leading queenly figures. At
some point further down his text the author finally articulates more
clearly his deep fear for women in power. As he states:
To be briefe, she laboured so fore, that notwithstanding the
exceptions of diversof the deputies of the estates, founded upon the
11
[Henri ESTIENNE?], Ane Mervellous discourse, sig. E iiiiv. « La Royne est
convaincue par ses propres letres, & celles qu’elle fit escrire au Roy son fils aux
gouverneurs des provinces & places de ce Roiaume, & à ses ambassadeurs, pour
en faire recit aux Princes ses voisins, esquelles elle dit expressement, qu’elle
estoit bien marrie du cas advenu en la personne de l'Amiral & des siens, contre
la volonté du Roy & d'’elle […]. Je les en ay fait tous tesmoins. Les
ambassadeurs mesmes me confesseront qu’ils rougisseoient de honte, quand
quelques jours apres dit aux Princes, vers lesquels ils estoient, que messieurs de
Guise l’avoient fait, & en avoient monstré letres du Roy, les mandemens
changez, on les chargea de donner à entendre, que le Roy mesmes l’avoit fait
faire, pour cause d’une conspiration descouverte contre leurs maiestez. […] Ie
vous prie, examinons ce fait avec jugement, penetrons le pernicieux conseil de
ceste femme, voyons s’elle tend à l’extermination des Huguenots seulement, ou
de tous les grans de de Roiaume sans esgard de religion. » (Anon., Discours
merveilleux de la vie,, sig. F iir).
88
Nathalie Hancisse
auctority of the Salicque law and the evill successeof the regiment
of women in this Kingdome, yet she through… the whole
government was deferred unto the Quene […].12
These words betray the author’s strong disapproval of any system
that allows women to rule. By contrast, John Leslie took up arms to
defend women rule in his famous treatise, A Defence of the Honour of
the Right Highe, Mightye and Noble Princesse Marie Quene of Scotlande,
where a full book was dedicated to demonstrate that “conformable
bothe to the lawe of God, and the lawe of nature13”.
3. Fiction into Truth-telling discourse
In 1569, Mary Stuart had been kept in custody in England for
one year. In the aftermath of the York and Westminster conferences,
where her guilt in the murder of Lord Darnley, her second husband
and late king consort of Scotland, had been under intense scrutiny,
her reputation was seriously damaged by the exposition of the
“Casket Letters” scandal. As Leslie mentions in his preface, he wants
to restore Mary’s honour by answering to recent tracts, which he
unequivocally terms “poysoned pestiferous pamflett[s]14”.
One of the most visible sites of modification between various
editions of a text, the preface often provides valuable clues to
authors’ and translators’ projects, intentions and ideological positions. In his 1569 preface, Leslie misleadingly defines himself as “an
Englishe man15”, a posture certainly meant to give him more credit
in the eyes of the English readers.
From the onset, Leslie ties up his legal dispute with historical
and even legendary elements, as he compiles a long list of famous
kings of the Antiquity and of British history who all released their
enemies from prison, in a rhetorical attempt at convincing the
Queen of England to let go of Mary Stuart. By alluding in particular
to the story of “Cordell” and her “father driven from hence by hys
two other unkinde and unnaturall dowghthers16”, the Bishop also
12
13
14
15
16
Ibid., sig. B iiiiv.
John LESLIE, A Defence of the Honour, sig. † iiijr.
John LESLIE, A Defence of the Honour of the Right Highe, Mightye and Noble Princesse
Marie Quene of Scotlande and Dowager of France, with a Declaration Aswell of Her
Right, Title and Intereste to the Succession of the Crowne of Englande, as That the
Regimente of Women Ys Comfortable to the Lawe of God and Nature (London? i.e.
Rheims: Jean Foigny, 1569), sig. † iiv.
John LESLIE, A Defence of the Honour, sig. † ijr.
Ibid., sig. † iiijv.
Has-Been Queens?
89
associates Mary’s misadventures in crown inheritance with the
legend of King Lear, one of the darkest episodes of British lore,
about to become the national literary staple of failure in both family
and state succession relationships.
In 1571, a second edition was published with the false imprint of
Liège (Belgium) under the pseudonym of Morgan Philippes,
without address neither from the printer nor from the author17. The
book was in fact printed in Louvain by John Fowler. Again issuing
from Continental presses, this new edition was this time more
openly aimed at an English readership, as an essential strategic
weapon in the Ridolfi plot in which Leslie was actively involved.
The plot consisted in a marriage between Mary Stuart and the duke
of Norfolk and eventually, of replacing Elizabeth by Mary on the
throne of England. However, the whole affair was a failure after the
discovery of Leslie’s text. The duke of Norfolk was executed and
Leslie sent to the Tower before being sent into exile.
Almost a decade unfolded before a new edition of the Bishop of
Ross’s tireless Defence saw light. In 1580, he chose Rheims again to
print a Latin edition of his work, which is in fact a rewriting of the
second and third book of the original Defence. This new form of his
treatise was then translated back into English in 1584 and published
in Rouen by Georges l’Oyselet. This back-and-forth linguistic movement from vernacular to vernacular via (the medium of) Latin is
revelatory of Leslie’s will to both circulate his work among a
carefully-chosen audience, and to refine the words of his text to
perfection. The prefatory material reflects the changes that took
place in the political and diplomatic context on the British Isles. By
dedicating his book to James I, Leslie re-focuses his authorial
attention on the next generation in line for the throne. A poem
concludes Leslie’s preface, authored by a “T. V. Englishman.” The
lines gradually sweep along into an upward movement, from
celebrating the “gloriouse Rases of [England’s] so riche a soyle” at
the beginning, to eventually rejoicing England’s “Quene to heavens
resigned”, thus performing a hierarchical and spiritual ascension:
[…]
17
[Morgan PHILIPPES] John Leslie, (A Treatise) concerning the Defence of the Honour of
the right high, mightie and noble princesse, Marie Queene of Scotland, and Douager of
France, with a Declaration, as Wel of her Right, Title, and Interest, to the Succession of
the Croune of England: as that the Regiment of women is conformable to the lawe of God
and Nature. (Liège: Gualterum Morberium, 1571).
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Nathalie Hancisse
You Britaines therfore, with attentive heede,
Drawe neer, and reape the croppe of this his seede.
Esteme his worke, and weighe his warninges wyse,
That telles the truthe, still one in woorde and mynde:
Regarde the right of her, who once may ryse
And rule in state: your Quene to heavens resigned 18.
This last stanza consists of a miniature version of the whole poem,
duplicating its upward spiral movement. After being invited once
more to “drawe neer”, initiated by a literal reading of Leslie’s work
that picks up “the croppe of this his seede”, the British reader gains
access to a treatise that claims to “tell[es] the truthe”, until he or she
finally takes part in the celebration of a queen sent to heaven. The
equation of the biblical queen of heaven with the Queen of Scots
herself is a particularly daring gesture, creating a powerful image
whose effect on the reader should not be underestimated. By
making another Mary finally accessing the crown of a far mightier
supremacy than earthly rule, Leslie’s evocation is highly subversive,
as one of its implications is that James, Mary’s son, becomes a
Christ-like figure whose reign-to-come on earth (Britain) is the last
hope of the faithful. Clearly Catholic, this conclusion on the figure of
the Virgin reigning in Heaven is a deft and determinate declaration
of Leslie’s stand in the Marian controversy and strengthens his
formal appeal to King James to (re)turn to Catholicism.
In 1587, the year of Mary Stuart’s execution, Leslie’s treatise was
finally translated into French and published in Rouen under the title
“Du Droict et Tiltre de la Sérenissime Princesse Marie Reoyne d’Escosse,
& de tres-illustre prince Iaques VI. Roy d’Escosse son fils, à la succession
du Royaume d’Angleterre19”. With a similar emphasis on James’
succession to the crown, this title makes clear that the source text of
this version is the 1584 English new version of Leslie’s treatise.
18
19
John LESLIE, A Defence of the Honour, sig. † iiijv.
John LESLIE, Du Droict et Tiltre de la Sérenissime Princesse Marie Reoyne d’Escosse, &
de tres-illustre prince Iaques VI. Roy d’Escosse son fils, à la succession du Royaume
d’Angleterre. Avec la genealogie des Roys d’Angleterre ayans regné depuis cinq cens
ans. Premierement composé en Latin & Anglois, par R. P. en Dieu M. Iean de Lesselie
Evesque de Rosse, Escossois, lorsqu’il estoit Ambassadeur en Angleterre pour sa
Majesté, & nouvellement mis en François par le mesme Autheur. A Rouen De
l’Imprimerie de George l’Oyselet. (Rouen, Georges l'Oyselet, 1587).
Has-Been Queens?
91
4. Truth plays with Fiction
The actual legal part of Leslie’s treatise is developed at its fullest
in book two, where the Bishop presents a very elaborate argumentation and vindication of Mary Stuart’s right to the crown of
England. The more we dig into Leslie’s text, the deeper the intertwining between claims of truth-telling and recourse to fiction
becomes. First, a deep distrust for documents and seals springs out
from the page, as Leslie heavily criticises his contemporaries’ blind
reliance on written proofs and testimonies in legal matters. In the
section of the second book where the legal implications of King
Henry VIII’s testament undergo intense scrutiny, Leslie goes so far
as asserting that “[a] kingdome ys to heavie to be so easilie carried
awaye by suche scrowls and copies […]20” which is rendered in the
French text as “[…] le poix du royaume est trop grand & trop pesant
pour pouvoir estre transferé par copies & exemplaires21”. This
sentence sets the concreteness of a kingdom, made heavy by its size
and all the lives it contains, in stark contrast with the mutability of
mere pieces of paper, which termed as “copies” are already denied
any claim at authenticity. Leslie comes promptly to the conclusion
that King Henry VIII’s will is void, because the list of limitations to
the will does not exist on any copy at hand22. It was on this basis that
Mary Stuart’s adversaries claimed that she had to be dismissed from
the succession. Taking advantage of a growing general distrust for
the written media, too easily forged, copied, and smuggled, Leslie
declares that the only reliable force is truth alone:
Or rather leit us withoute any perchance saye, the iustice and
equitie of her cause, and the invincible force of trewthe to be suche,
that neither the stampe nor the kynges owne hande can beare and
beate yt downe23.
In Leslie’s words, truth is presented as an unequivocal force, a virtue
coming from God that is undeniably stronger than the King himself
and a fortiori, (than the) external signs of his power. In the French
version of the treatise, the same pride of place is given to invisible,
rather than material or visible means of authentication:
20
21
22
23
John LESLIE, A Defence of the Honour, sig. N iiiir.
John LESLIE, Du Droict et Tiltre de la Sérenissime Princesse Marie Reoyne d’Escosse
[…], sig. I iir.
John LESLIE, A Defence of the Honour, sig. M iiiir.
Ibid., sig. N iiiiv.
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Nathalie Hancisse
Voire il faut que nous disions pour vérité, que la iustice de sa cause
est telle & si bonne, & la force de la vérité si invincible, qu’elle ne
peut estre abbatue ou expugnee par le seau du Roy, ny par son
propre seing24.
This conception of royal power is in keeping with Leslie’s definition
of the crown succession developed in the first part of his treatise.
Rather than a mere inherent quality, kingship has to be considered a
corporation that survives the person of the king:
[…] ye muste consider, that the kinge cometh to the crowne not
onlie by discente, but also and cheifelie by succession, as unto a
corporation: […], and the crowne holden of no earthlie lorde, but of
God almightie onlie25.
Asserting that inheriting a crown cannot be solely determined by
blood nor lineage allows Leslie to bypass the difficulties linked to
Mary Stuart’s rather indirect genealogical claim to the throne. The
terminology used in the French translation highlights even better the
conceptual significance of regarding the crown as a corporative
institution that plays a transitional role, as the phrase “corps
politique” is chosen to translate “corporation”:
D’avantage ils doibvent considerer que le Roy ne vient pas
seullement au Royaume, par droit de ligne, descendant de ces
ancestres: mais aussi il y est appelé par succession comme à
quelque corps politique26.
Furthermore, the Bishop of Ross invites fiction right into his legal
argumentation by using a rhetorical device that has deep consequences on the perception of truth, and of the role this notion plays
in his text. As he says, “[…] [S]o lett us frelie and liberallie grante the
adversaries that which ys not trewe […]27”, starting so a detailed
exploration of his adversaries’ arguments — or probable arguments
— in order to empty out any possibility of counterattack in the
future. The French translation similarly conveys the Bishop’s
particularly paradoxical rhetorical strategy: “Accordons encore aux
24
25
26
27
John LESLIE, Du Droict et Tiltre de la Sérenissime Princesse Marie Reoyne d’Escosse,
sig. I iiiir.
John LESLIE, A Defence of the Honour, sig. H iiiiv.
John LESLIE, Du Droict et Tiltre de la Sérenissime Princesse Marie Reoyne d’Escosse,
sig. E iir.
John LESLIE, A Defence of the Honour, sig. P iir.
Has-Been Queens?
93
adversaires comme nous leur avons des-ia liberallement accordé ce
qui toutesfois n’est pas veritable […]28”.
All along, Leslie vindicates recourse to customary law in order
to solve the succession crisis, rather than showing willingness to
adopt new and revolutionary principles, as Buchanan did. What is
particularly interesting to study is the full range of implications of
the translation of such a text. Will the argumentation either hold or
be lost in translation, when its premises [e] are undermined by the
passage to another linguistic, and hence, judicial and cultural
sphere? Whether Leslie’s rhetorical strategy was more efficient to
defend Mary Stuart’s rights to the throne is not readily proven, but
his reasoning, that proclaims truth’s invincible force in the face of all
opposition demonstrates his remarkable oratory abilities. His invitation of fiction into the legal argument should not pass for inconsequential, because it highlights the fragility of truth and its
permeability to fiction.
Nathalie HANCISSE, « Has-been Queens? Reception and (Re)figuration of Catherine
de’ Medici and Mary Stuart in Translation », GEMCA : papers in progress, t. 2, no 1,
2013, p. 83-93.
28
John Leslie, Du Droict et Tiltre de la Sérenissime Princesse Marie Reoyne d’Escosse,
sig. K iiiiv.
Catherine de Médicis revue et corrigée par Balzac :
enquête sur une tentative de réhabilitation
Maxime Perret (FNRS, Université catholique de Louvain)
Au XIXe siècle, Catherine de Médicis est loin d’être une figure
populaire de la monarchie de l’Ancien Régime : une légende noire1
est associée à sa personne pour trois raisons au moins : ses origines
italiennes qui l’assimilent à une empoisonneuse ; son rôle prédominant (pour ne pas dire dominateur) à la Cour de France durant
les règnes successifs de ses fils ; et son implication supposée dans le
massacre de la Saint Barthélémy. À rebours de l’opinion dominante,
Balzac voue une admiration sincère à cette reine de France de
laquelle il dit qu’elle fut « un grand Roi » (Cath., XI, p. 1702).
En France, et dans la partie la plus grave de l’histoire moderne,
aucune femme, si ce n’est Brunehault ou Frédégonde, n’a plus
souffert des erreurs populaires que Catherine de Médicis ; tandis
que Marie de Médicis, dont toutes les actions ont été préjudiciables
à la France, échappe à la honte qui devrait couvrir son nom. […]
Catherine de Médicis, au contraire, a sauvé la couronne de France ;
elle a maintenu l’autorité royale dans des circonstances au milieu
desquelles plus d’un grand prince aurait succombé. Ayant en tête
des factieux et des ambitions comme celles des Guise et de la
maison de Bourbon, des hommes comme les deux cardinaux de
Lorraine et comme les deux Balafré, les deux princes de Condé, la
reine Jeanne d’Albret, Henri IV, le connétable de Montmorency,
1
2
Les premiers développements de cette légende noire ont été présentés par
Nathalie Hancisse dans ce même dossier : voir Nathalie HANCISSE, « Has-been
Queens? Reception and (Re)figuration of Catherine de’ Medici and Mary Stuart
in Translation », GEMCA : papers in progress, t. 2, 2013-1, p. ###-###.
Honoré DE BALZAC, Catherine de Médicis, dans La Comédie humaine, éd. PierreGeorges Castex (dir.), Paris, Gallimard, « Bibliothèque de la Pléiade », 1980, t. XI.
Toutes nos références à l’œuvre de Balzac proviennent de cette édition à laquelle
nous renvoyons de manière abrégée.
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Maxime Perret
Calvin, les Coligny, Théodore de Bèze, il lui a fallu déployer les
plus rares qualités, les plus précieux dons de l’homme d’État, sous
le feu des railleries de la presse calviniste. Voilà des faits qui, certes,
sont incontestables. Aussi, pour qui creuse l’histoire du seizième
siècle en France, la figure de Catherine de Médicis apparaît-elle
comme celle d’un grand Roi. Les calomnies une fois dissipées par
les faits péniblement retrouvés à travers les contradictions des
pamphlets et les fausses anecdotes, tout s’explique à la gloire de
cette femme extraordinaire, qui n’eut aucune des faiblesses de son
sexe, qui vécut chaste au milieu des amours de la cour la plus
galante de l’Europe, et qui sut, malgré sa pénurie d’argent, bâtir
d’admirables monuments, comme pour réparer les pertes que
causaient les démolitions des Calvinistes qui firent à l’art autant de
blessures qu’au corps politique. (Cath., XI, p. 169-170)
La visée apologétique de Sur Catherine de Médicis est indéniable :
Balzac se livre dans cet essai à une entreprise de réhabilitation de
cette reine. Or, l’intérêt du romancier pour cette figure historique du
XVIe siècle s’explique par des raisons idéologiques et politiques sur
lesquelles il faut revenir dans un premier temps. Je m’intéresserai
ensuite aux moyens que Balzac emploie pour faire comprendre qui
fut réellement Catherine de Médicis — l’un des titres antérieurs du
texte que j’étudie aujourd’hui était Catherine de Médicis expliquée.
Enfin, j’évaluerai les effets produits par ce mélange d’histoire et de
littérature pour expliquer les raisons qui font de cette tentative de
réhabilitation un échec.
***
Avant d’entrer dans le vif du sujet, il est nécessaire de dire un
mot de la genèse du texte (particulièrement complexe) et de la
structure de Sur Catherine de Médicis. Je considérerai ici son état
définitif, qui date de 1844, mais il faut préciser que ce texte est
composé de quatre parties, composées à trois moments distincts : la
dernière partie, Les Deux Rêves, date de 1830 ; la deuxième, La
Confidence des Ruggieri, date de 1836 ; seules l’introduction et la
première partie intitulée Le Martyr calviniste ont été rédigées entre
1842 et 1844. La rédaction s’étend sur une quinzaine d’années et
prouve l’intérêt constant de Balzac pour la reine Catherine. Cette
durée et cette rédaction en trois temps expliquent aussi l’aspect
relativement disparate de l’œuvre.
Catherine de Médicis revue et corrigée par Balzac
97
L’introduction consiste en une mise au point très didactique des
faits historiques : Balzac y explique son entreprise et donne au
lecteur les éléments qui sont indispensables pour lui permettre de
comprendre les relations entre les différents grands personnages de
la Cour depuis François Ier jusqu’à Henri IV. L’histoire du Martyr
calviniste se passe à la fin du règne éphémère de François II ; elle
montre la position inconfortable de la reine-mère, puisque le
pouvoir de la Régence est aux mains du cardinal de Lorraine et du
duc de Guise, les oncles de Marie Stuart. La Confidence des Ruggieri se
déroule sous le règne de Charles IX ; ce texte a toutes les
caractéristiques d’un conte philosophique au sens balzacien du
terme : c’est l’alchimie qui est au cœur du récit, et Catherine y est un
personnage secondaire, même si Balzac consacre quelques pages à
expliquer le caractère despotique de la reine mère sous le règne de
Charles IX. Enfin, Les Deux Rêves se passent en 1785, à la veille de la
Révolution : Marat et Robespierre y racontent lors d’un souper deux
de leurs rêves, et Robespierre explique comment Catherine lui est
apparue en songe.
*
* *
Balzac est véritablement fasciné par le personnage de Catherine
de Médicis. Ce sont des motivations idéologiques et politiques qui le
poussent à réhabiliter cette reine dont il fait un maillon dans la
chaîne qui relie les grands hommes politiques que sont Louis XI et
Richelieu3. Au début des années 1830, Balzac s’engage politiquement en faveur de la monarchie légitime qui vient d’être destituée
au profit de la branche cadette d’Orléans. Peu importent, au fond,
les motifs de ce virage politique : ce qui est essentiel, c’est la position
affirmée de Balzac en faveur d’un pouvoir fort, autoritaire, très
hiérarchisé, et dont les sujets doivent tolérer les inévitables abus
sans se plaindre, même si le romancier ne va pas jusqu’à prôner un
retour au système politique de l’Ancien Régime. Dès lors, on
comprend son admiration pour des personnages historiques aussi
différents en apparence que Louis XI, Catherine de Médicis ou
3
« Louis XI vint trop tôt, Richelieu vint trop tard. Vertueuse ou criminelle, que
l’on m’attribue ou non la Saint-Barthélemi, j’en accepte le fardeau : je resterai
entre ces deux grands hommes comme l’anneau visible d’une chaîne inconnue »
(Cath., XI, p. 453).
98
Maxime Perret
Richelieu4, qui incarnent chacun à leur façon un pouvoir autoritaire,
absolu et qui ont su se faire respecter de la noblesse en la soumettant
au pouvoir royal.
La qualité principale de Catherine de Médicis, aux yeux de
Balzac, est d’avoir su conserver le trône aux Valois : ses enfants sont
les détenteurs légitimes du pouvoir royal, mais ils sont menacés par
les différentes puissances que sont les Guise, les Bourbons et la
Réforme. En opposant les différents partis les uns aux autres,
Catherine a su protéger la couronne :
Elle résolut de jouer successivement le parti qui voulait la ruine de
la maison de Valois, les Bourbons qui voulaient la couronne, et les
Réformés, les Radicaux de ce temps-là qui rêvaient une république
impossible, comme ceux de ce temps-ci qui cependant n’ont rien à
réformer. Aussi tant qu’elle a vécu, les Valois ont-ils gardé le trône.
Il comprenait bien la valeur de cette femme, le grand de Thou,
quand, en apprenant sa mort, il s’écria : — Ce n’est pas une femme,
c’est la royauté qui vient de mourir. Catherine avait en effet au plus
haut degré le sentiment de la royauté ; aussi la défendit-elle avec un
courage et une persistance admirables. (Cath., XI, p. 170)
De plus, Balzac porte au crédit de Catherine d’avoir combattu la
Réforme dont elle avait perçu les dangers politiques : il fallait
s’opposer à la contestation religieuse en France parce que tolérer la
Réforme, c’était accepter la contestation du peuple.
Catherine écrivit aussitôt, au fond du cabinet des rois de France, un
arrêt de mort contre cet esprit d’examen qui menaçait les sociétés
modernes, arrêt que Louis XIV a fini par exécuter. […] Assise entre
les champs déjà parcourus et les champs à parcourir, Catherine et
l’Église ont proclamé le principe salutaire des sociétés modernes,
una fides, unus dominus, en usant de leur droit de vie et de mort sur
les novateurs. Encore qu’elle ait été vaincue, les siècles suivants ont
donné raison à Catherine. Le produit du libre arbitre, de la liberté
religieuse et de la liberté politique (ne confondons pas avec la
liberté civile), est la France d’aujourd’hui. (Cath., XI, p. 172-173)
Balzac se sert du recul temporel pour juger les actes de Catherine
dans une perspective idéologique : il fait de la reine mère une
visionnaire. Le massacre de la Saint Barthélémy a été condamné par
la postérité parce qu’il a échoué : si Catherine avait réussi à éradiquer les Huguenots, elle aurait été honorée. Balzac va plus loin :
4
On pourrait ajouter à cette liste le nom Napoléon, au risque de s’attirer le
reproche de commettre un anachronisme.
99
Catherine savait qu’il fallait supprimer l’hérésie calviniste parce que
la liberté de conscience et l’indépendance d’esprit que supposait la
Réforme représentaient une menace pour le pouvoir royal. Les
événements de 1789, que Balzac connaît, semblent donner raison à la
prudence radicale de Catherine. Dans la perspective légitimiste qui
est celle de Balzac, tout ce qui aurait pu éviter la Révolution (et donc
la rupture dynastique) doit être salué, même si cela a coûté la vie à
des milliers de personnes. Pour préserver un pouvoir monarchique
fort, il est prêt à adopter les maximes de Machiavel : la fin (c’est-àdire la conservation de la monarchie) justifie toujours les moyens.
Malgré ces qualités politiques qui font d’elle un personnage
incontournable sur le plan historique, Catherine n’est pas présentée
comme un ange, loin s’en faut : Balzac lui reconnaît le talent d’avoir
su écarter les forces qui menaçaient le trône de France, mais il révèle
également son caractère ambitieux, son goût pour le pouvoir
personnel et son manque d’amour pour ses enfants. En effet, Balzac
doit concilier deux logiques différentes : celle du récit historien, qui
s’appuie sur des faits attestés par l’Histoire, et qui doit lui permettre
de réhabiliter Catherine de Médicis ; et celle du récit littéraire, qui lui
impose de tenir compte de la psychologie des personnages et de
l’enchaînement des aventures romanesques fictives, tant dans Le
Martyr calviniste que dans La Confession des Ruggieri. Or, l’opération
de réhabilitation est entravée par l’image ambiguë qui émerge d’une
œuvre qui devrait être apologétique d’un point de vue historique et
qui se révèle plus nuancée du fait de sa dimension romanesque. On
est là face à un paradoxe qui traverse toute La Comédie humaine et
que l’on perçoit particulièrement dans Sur Catherine : Balzac ne se
résout jamais à une lecture morale univoque de ses personnages,
que ceux-ci soient historiques ou fictifs. Le système romanesque
balzacien, qui est fondé sur le vraisemblable et non sur la vérité
historique et qui multiplie les points de vue et les jugements
contradictoires, empêche Sur Catherine de devenir un roman à thèse,
ce qui rend délicate la tentative de réhabilitation. Même s’il veut
montrer la supériorité des vues politiques de Catherine, et même s’il
veut prouver par l’exemple que ses actes étaient guidés par le
souhait de protéger le pouvoir royal, Balzac délivre un portrait de
Catherine susceptible de laisser le lecteur dubitatif sur sa grandeur
morale.
***
100
Maxime Perret
Malgré les prétentions affichées par Balzac dans son introduction et dans sa dédicace, Sur Catherine est loin d’être une œuvre
d’historien : le romanesque affleure partout parce que le roman
historique permet d’une part un traitement axiologique de l’Histoire
et, d’autre part, une lecture psychologique des motivations des
personnages historiques. La réhabilitation de Catherine de Médicis
passe certainement par une mise au point historique, mais elle est
soutenue par une exploration psychologique du personnage qui
s’effectue au sein même de la fiction.
La première partie de Sur Catherine est révélatrice à ce titre. Le
Martyr calviniste revient sur la jeunesse de la reine, sur son arrivée
contestée à la cour de France, où elle n’est considérée que comme
une fille de marchands florentins. Pendant plus de vingt ans, Balzac
y insiste, Catherine de Médicis souffre de sa fausse position : elle
n’est rien sous François Ier jusqu’à ce qu’Henri II devienne le
dauphin. Quand il est devenu roi, Henri II l’a maintenue autant que
possible à l’écart de la Cour en lui faisant porter dix enfants. Au
début du règne de François II, elle voit la Régence lui échapper au
profit des Guise, les oncles de la nouvelle reine de France, Marie
Stuart. L’influence du duc et du cardinal de Lorraine est telle sur les
monarques que Catherine est forcée de chercher des alliances avec
les Bourbons : ces derniers sont les protecteurs des calvinistes mais
ils sont surtout les ennemis des Guise. À ce titre, et dans ces circonstances, ils peuvent aider Catherine à reprendre la main à la
Cour.
Au milieu de ces grands intérêts et de ces forces en présence, le
héros de l’histoire narrative, Christophe Lecamus, risque de se
retrouver broyé (au sens propre, puisqu’il est soumis à la question
ordinaire et à la question extraordinaire). Le jeune homme est chargé
d’apporter à Catherine le traité secret avec les Bourbons, mais il est
découvert et finalement sacrifié par la reine : il portera seul la
responsabilité de la conspiration. Catherine termine son éducation
politique en sacrifiant ce jeune homme à ses propres intérêts. Elle est
justifiée dans ce geste par la persécution que lui font subir les Guise
et Marie Stuart et par le fait que Christophe était un martyr consentant : il était conscient du danger qui le menaçait. Christophe était
prêt à mourir pour la nouvelle religion ; Catherine devait logiquement laisser torturer sans sourciller un bourgeois qui ne lui était
plus d’aucune utilité pour réduire le pouvoir des Guise et dont la
seule existence représentait une menace pour elle. Elle sera rachetée
symboliquement à la fin du récit en allant dîner chez son pelletier, le
101
père de Christophe : elle offre au martyr encore convalescent les
moyens de devenir Conseiller au Parlement et elle parvient à le
détourner de la nouvelle religion par cette nomination.
Balzac peut susciter un sentiment d’empathie pour Catherine de
Médicis tant que celle-ci est dépouillée de son pouvoir. On la
découvre victime d’Henri II puis des Guise, et on conçoit éventuellement qu’elle envisage de s’allier aux Réformés pour diminuer
l’influence des Guise, les ennemis de la Couronne, pourvu qu’elle
conserve leur trône aux Valois. En revanche, d’un point de vue
moral, psychologique et fictionnel, il est difficile d’admettre que
cette femme fasse passer ce qu’elle estime être les intérêts de l’État
avant la vie de son propre fils. Elle s’oppose à ce qu’Ambroise Paré
soigne François II sur son lit de mort : elle laisse son fils mourir
parce qu’elle sait que ce sera le seul moyen de le soustraire à
l’influence de Marie Stuart et des Guise. Charles IX étant plus jeune,
elle compte manipuler son royal enfant et jouir enfin du pouvoir
qu’elle convoite depuis qu’Henri II est devenu roi.
À dix ans de distance, selon la temporalité de la fiction
narrative, le portrait de Catherine de Médicis dans La Confidence des
Ruggieri est accablant pour la reine mère. Sous le règne de
Charles IX, on la découvre passée maître dans l’art de réduire ses
ennemis au silence en les opposant les uns aux autres.
Admiratrice de la maxime : Diviser pour régner, elle venait
d’apprendre, depuis douze ans, à opposer constamment une force à
une autre. Aussitôt qu’elle prit en main la bride des affaires, elle fut
obligée d’y entretenir la discorde pour neutraliser les forces de deux
maisons rivales et sauver la couronne. Ce système nécessaire a
justifié la prédiction de Henri II. Catherine inventa ce jeu de bascule
politique imité depuis par tous les princes qui se trouvèrent dans
une situation analogue, en opposant tour à tour les calvinistes aux
Guise, et les Guise aux calvinistes. Après avoir opposé ces deux
religions l’une à l’autre, au cœur de la nation, Catherine opposa le
duc d’Anjou à Charles IX. Après avoir opposé les choses, elle opposa les hommes en conservant les nœuds de tous leurs intérêts
entre ses mains. Mais à ce jeu terrible, qui veut la tête d’un Louis XI
ou d’un Louis XVIII, on recueille inévitablement la haine de tous les
partis, et l’on se condamne à toujours vaincre, car une seule bataille
perdue vous donne tous les intérêts pour ennemis ; si toutefois, à
force de triompher, vous ne finissez pas par ne plus trouver de
joueurs. (Cath., XI, p. 385)
102
Maxime Perret
Catherine, que l’on a vue sacrifier François II, a rendu Charles IX
malade et paranoïaque. Le roi, qui a conscience de n’avoir qu’un
rôle de figuration, se trouve réduit à comploter contre sa mère et ses
conseillers. Catherine, fidèle à sa maxime Diviser pour mieux régner
parvient à convaincre son fils qu’il est menacé par une conspiration
organisée par son frère, le duc d’Anjou, auquel il s’était pourtant
allié pour renverser le pouvoir despotique de sa mère. Ne sachant à
qui se fier, Charles IX finit par rentrer dans le giron de sa mère en
reconnaissant sa supériorité. Toutefois, on ne peut se détacher de
l’impression que Catherine œuvre davantage pour la préservation
de son propre pouvoir que pour son fils qui est réduit au rôle de roifainéant alors qu’il n’a que vingt-quatre ans et qu’il aurait pu
devenir un grand roi, élevé par le grand Amyot.
Catherine, qui a laissé son premier fils mourir, rend Charles IX
complètement paranoïaque. Elle œuvre pour confier le pouvoir à
Henri III, ce fils qu’elle a trop aimé et qui se fera remarquer par son
ingratitude. Paradoxalement, l’amenuisement du pouvoir de la reine
mère sous le règne de ce dernier fils est seulement évoqué dans Sur
Catherine. Sans doute Balzac ne pouvait-il montrer la puissance
politique de Catherine mise en échec par son propre fils : ce serait
reconnaître qu’elle a commis une faute politique en reportant toute
son affection sur Henri III. De manière très significative, Balzac
préfère montrer Catherine qui se justifie dans Les deux rêves : elle
apparaît à Robespierre et entreprend de se réhabiliter elle-même, au
cours d’un songe très politique qui vise à démontrer sa supériorité
sur Henri IV et Louis XIV.
***
La dernière partie de Sur Catherine de Médicis est particulièrement problématique et contradictoire avec la visée apologétique du
texte. Dans ce récit écrit en 1830, Catherine apparaît en rêve à un
personnage mystérieux que l’on découvre être Robespierre à la fin
du récit. Au cours de ce songe, Robespierre interroge la reine sur ses
choix politiques, et notamment sur la nécessité d’avoir, sinon organisé, du moins autorisé le massacre de la Saint Barthélémy. Catherine se justifie longuement, en comparant sa décision, dictée par les
circonstances, et celle de Louis XIV de révoquer l’Édit de Nantes, qui
était juste mais qui intervenait trop tard.
103
Si le 25 août il n’était pas resté l’ombre d’un huguenot en France, je
serais demeurée jusque dans la postérité la plus reculée comme une
belle image de la Providence. Combien de fois les âmes clairvoyantes de Sixte-Quint, de Richelieu, de Bossuet, ne m’ont-elles
pas secrètement accusée d’avoir échoué dans mon entreprise après
avoir osé la concevoir. Aussi, de combien de regrets ma mort ne futelle pas accompagnée ?… Trente ans après la Saint-Barthélemy, la
maladie durait encore ; elle avait fait couler déjà dix fois plus de
sang noble à la France qu’il n’en restait à verser le 26 août 1572. La
révocation de l’édit de Nantes, en l’honneur de laquelle vous avez
frappé des médailles, a coûté plus de larmes, plus de sang et
d’argent, a tué plus de prospérité en France que trois SaintBarthélemy. Le Tellier a su accomplir avec une plumée d’encre le
décret que le trône avait secrètement promulgué depuis moi ; mais
si, le 25 août 1572, cette immense exécution était nécessaire, le
25 août 1685 elle était inutile. Sous le second fils de Henri de Valois,
l’hérésie était à peine enceinte ; sous le second fils de Henri de
Bourbon, cette mère féconde avait jeté son frai sur l’univers entier.
Vous m’accusez d’un crime, et vous dressez des statues au fils
d’Anne d’Autriche ! Lui et moi, nous avons cependant essayé la
même chose : il a réussi, j’ai échoué ; mais Louis XIV a trouvé sans
armes les protestants qui, sous mon règne, avaient de puissantes
armées, des hommes d’État, des capitaines, et l’Allemagne pour
eux. (Cath., XI, p. 449-450)
Le récit qu’elle fait de sa vie, et le développement de son propre
point de vue sur les événements parviennent à convaincre Robespierre, au moins en partie, que le bain de sang de la Saint Barthélémy était nécessaire : il fallait que la couronne se fasse craindre
pour affirmer son pouvoir. Pourtant, c’est une leçon que Robespierre
considère avec scrupules en 1785.
Je trouvai tout à coup en moi-même une partie de moi qui adoptait
les doctrines atroces déduites par cette italienne. Je me réveillai en
sueur, pleurant, et au moment où ma raison victorieuse me disait,
d’une voix douce, qu’il n’appartenait ni à un roi, ni même à une
nation, d’appliquer ces principes dignes d’un peuple d’athées.
(Cath., XI, p. 454)
Quand on sait le rôle que cet homme a joué dans l’avènement du
régime de la Terreur, il y a de quoi être surpris et décontenancé :
l’homme qui a tué la monarchie n’a fait que suivre les conseils de la
reine Catherine. Ses actes sous la Révolution donnent raison à la
morale politique appliquée par la reine mère (un pouvoir doit
toujours s’affirmer violemment quand il est menacé). En fait, Balzac
104
Maxime Perret
ne justifie pas Catherine, il ne justifie pas le légitimisme : il justifie
l’usage de la Force pour asseoir un pouvoir politique et supprimer la
contestation. Catherine conseille une politique à Robespierre, ce qui
aboutit à la mort de Louis XVI, et donc à la fin de la monarchie (du
moins à la suspension de celle-ci). Il y a pour le moins un problème
de cohérence : si la principale qualité de Catherine est d’avoir su
préserver le pouvoir royal sous les Valois, cette qualité est mise en
échec par ce rêve et par la folie sanguinaire qu’il inspirera à
Robespierre en 1793, sous le régime de la Terreur. Il ressort finalement des Deux rêves que c’est l’héritage politique de Catherine
donné en songe à Robespierre qui conduit à la mort de Louis XVI et
à la fin de la royauté.
Au lieu de faire coïncider le discours préfaciel historique de type
« essai » et la forme romanesque, Balzac les place en contradiction.
La réhabilitation de Catherine de Médicis ne passe pas, dans La
Comédie humaine, par un discours historique fondé sur la vérité :
l’écrivain produit un roman historique obéissant aux règles de la
vraisemblance et de l’intérêt. La vérité historique toute nue n’est
peut-être pas suffisamment puissante, aux yeux de Balzac, pour
susciter l’intérêt et conserver l’attention du lecteur. Mais en
choisissant la forme romanesque plutôt que l’essai historique, Balzac
soumet son récit à une logique narrative qui ne correspond pas au
discours historique de l’Introduction. Si les lecteurs peuvent
éventuellement s’accorder avec la thèse de Balzac et reconnaître la
grandeur politique de Catherine de Médicis, ils ne peuvent totalement adhérer à l’entreprise de réhabilitation à cause de la peinture
que donne le romancier du caractère de la reine mère : sa politique a
été inspirée par un sentiment d’ambition personnelle, ce qui rend
très relative sa grandeur morale. Or, passant par la forme romanesque, une grande part de la réhabilitation de Catherine par Balzac est
tributaire de l’empathie qu’est susceptible de susciter le personnage.
Le lecteur ne peut pas éprouver de compassion pour une femme
capable de laisser mourir un de ses enfants (même pour raison
d’État) et d’en tyranniser un autre pour conserver son pouvoir
personnel. La trajectoire personnelle de Catherine avait déjà de quoi
laisser le lecteur dubitatif sur ses qualités morales : on voit dans le
récit balzacien que la reine a tout fait pour exercer le pouvoir et le
conserver le plus longtemps possible. Le rêve de Robespierre achève
de rendre impossible la lecture apologétique de Catherine et de sa
science politique : son système, appliqué par un homme comme
Robespierre, a produit les exécutions de la Terreur que tous les
105
lecteurs contemporains de Balzac gardent encore en mémoire.
Surtout, il reste toujours cette question en suspens, qui se pose avec
force à la fin des Deux rêves : la fin peut-elle toujours justifier les
moyens ? Que Balzac assume le machiavélisme politique est une
chose ; il n’est pas certain en revanche que la peinture romanesque
qu’il donne de Catherine de Médicis parvienne à convaincre les
lecteurs que cette manière de gouverner soit moralement acceptable
et que la réputation de la reine mère soit totalement injustifiée.
Partant, sa tentative de réhabilitation est au moins partiellement
mise en échec par ces contradictions entre deux discours —
romanesque et historique — dont la logique est différente.
Maxime PERRET, « Catherine de Médicis revue et corrigée par Balzac : enquête sur
une tentative de réhabilitation », GEMCA : papers in progress, t. 2, no 1, 2013, p. 95105, [En ligne].
Varia
The Contested “Space” of the Æsthetic Realm
in the Seventeenth Century Church of England
Anne-Françoise MOREL (FWO, UGent)
The aim of this article is to analyse the performativity of church
buildings in the Stuart period. I understand performativity as the
role of the architectural environment in the edification of the believer. As the article will make clear, the architectural environment
acted as an agent for spiritual stimulation. Three hypotheses are
formulated to demonstrate that religious architecture took up an
active part in devotional exercises. The first hypothesis is that sensory impressions were deemed important for the act of devotion
either in a positive or in a negative way, thus being stimulating or
deceptive. Secondly, it is proposed that this importance stems from
the close relation between sensory and moral qualities or values. The
third hypothesis is that this close relationship explains the role of
architecture in the performativity of devotion, since architecture is a
sensory fact whose impact can be understood in moral terms: the
building of a beautiful church becomes an act of piety and charity.
Since Elizabeth I, the “visible” Church of England was defined
as “a congregation of faithful men, in which the pure Word of God
is preached and the Sacraments be duly ministered according to
Christ’s ordinance in all those things that of necessity are requisite to
the same1”. Outward expressions of devotion were nevertheless not
banished completely and ceremonial improvements commonly
found their way in, for example, Laudian, or High Church circles.
However the æsthetic realm of the Church of England unquestionably remained an issue of great importance.
1
CCJ. BUTLIN, The Thirty-nine articles of religion of the church of England, a simple
handbook of their history and meaning, together with Scriptural proofs, quotations from
authorities and list of books for further reading, Sheffiled,1986, article 19.
110
Sermons preached at consecrations of churches reveal in
surprising detail how ideas about sense perception interact with
devotion. These sermons address the role and the position of the
beholder as well as the interaction with the building’s architecture.
The majority of the consecration sermons examine how the degree of
architectural splendour affects the worshippers in their devotional
exercises. The church building becomes a sensory fact with an
acknowledged impact on the beholder. This impact is explained in
categories in which ethics and æsthetics are entwined, such as
simplicity, decency, comeliness and magnificence. Clearly, architectural and moral qualities are explicitly linked through the bias of
the viewer’s perception of their built environment.
In order to map the æsthetic realm of the Early Modern Church
of England, it is necessary to understand how religion and devotion
interacted with the worshipper’s sensory experiences. Early modern
philosophy was the body of theory that explains assumptions about
sensations, and how they mediated between the physical and the
metaphysical world. In this contribution, I will compare relevant
passages on religion and the senses as well as on æsthetics with
contemporary theories on epistemology, perception theory, morality, judgment, taste and early æsthetics. I will argue that these
theories explain how architecture could act as an agent to stimulate
devotional exercise, as they examine how an object such as the
church building was perceived. In other terms, these theories help
us to understand how the architectural space could be used for
religious edification, and how it could play a role in devotion other
than purely as the liturgical setting.
The devotee’s sensory impressions
The sermons rarely describe church buildings — if at all — by
giving an extensive architectural description. They rather focus on
the nature and degree of the decoration and its impact on the
worshipper by means of generic æsthetic references and common
religious metaphors. This degree of decoration is described by a
limited set of æsthetic notions. These include simplicity or sobriety,
comeliness, gloriousness, magnificence, loftiness, sumptuousness
and stateliness.
111
Simplicity and sobriety refer to the most serious2, the essential. A
simple and sober church has an architecture which is great and pure
without superfluous ornamentation. Simplicity, also refers to
honesty. In the glossary accompanying his anthology on English
Renaissance literary texts, Brian Vickers terms superstitious as a
synonym for excessive and superfluous3. Comeliness refers to the
appropriate decorum4 according to God’s special presence and service.
The glorious is the haughty, which also includes magnificence and
loftiness or the exalted and the sublime. All these notions refer to God’s
glory and require appropriate architecture which should exalt
devote experiences. Finally, sumptuousness and stateliness reflect
God’s omnipotence and omnipresence by scale and dignity as
princely palaces do for earthly kings.
It is clear that all these terms and categories are generic. Even if
they describe architectural ornamentation, they do not imply artistic
or stylistic requirements. Rather, they point to an effect or affect that
has to be achieved. Consequently, they are well suited for the
entwinement of æsthetic and ethic categories.
Besides this limited set of æsthetic notions, the consecration
sermons also use traditional religious metaphors to address the
problem of perceiving religious architecture and the ornament. They
commonly refer to biblical sacred places such as the Tabernacle or
Solomon’s Temple, Eschatological models such as the Apocalyptic
Whore or Antichrist and the Church as the Living Temple of God.
Except for the more extreme Puritan factions in the Church of
England and Protestantism in general, all confessions, whether
Protestant or Catholic, describe churches in very similar terms. For
instance, these churches are referred to as re-foundations of the
Temple of Solomon, the second Temple erected as a permanent
shrine to the Ark of the Covenant, or as pre-figurations of the
Heavenly Jerusalem, alternatively depicted as the bride clothed in
fine linen, bright and pure or the perfect city built of gems and gold
at the end of time5. This body of metaphors is, of course, shared by
2
3
4
5
B. VICKERS, English Renaissance Literary Criticism, Oxford, Clarendon Press, 2003,
p. 642.
Ibid., p. 643.
Ibid., p. 631.
For a topology of this imagery, see for instance Y. HIRN, The sacred shrine: A study
of the poetry and art of the Catholic Church, London, Macmilan, 1958 ; A.-F. MOREL
and M. DELBEKE, “Metaphors in Action: early modern church buildings as
spaces of knowledge”, Architectural History, 53, 2010.
112
all Christians, since it is embedded in the Bible and early Christian
literature6.
The Temple of Jerusalem
The Temple of Jerusalem is a popular example in the consecration sermons7. From the beginnings of Christian history, a fourfold
interpretation of the Temple is adopted in religious texts, namely the
historical, the allegorical, the tropological and the anagogical. The
historical reading gives us an account of the events according to the
Letter of Scripture. The allegory refers to the spiritual meaning while
the tropological reading aims to advance moral instruction. The
anagogical approach ultimately leads the mind to heavenly experiences through mystical expressions8. The consecration sermons
also discuss the Temple’s architecture and its moral implications.
These components are necessary to create mechanisms of meaning
and perception of church architecture.
Using the Temple as a referent, however, creates not only
opportunities, but also complexities. A continuous tension dominates the divergent stances within the Church of England. Ceremonialist and High Church partisans believe that the building and its
sumptuous architecture, as described in Scripture, can offer sufficient proof that stately and even magnificently built churches are
needed. Indeed, this building is a built prototype, dedicated by God
himself. Many sermons draw a parallel between the Temple and
their own parish church, proposing the Temple’s history and
architecture as a Scriptural fiat for constructing stately churches:
Solomon had no such mean and derogating Thought, as to imagine
the Temple proportionable to God’s Immensity and Greatness […]
6
7
8
D. IOGNA-PRAT, La maison Dieu. Une histoire monumentale de l’Église au Moyen Âge,
Paris, Seuil, 2006.
On Early Modern Temple Studies and Reconstructions in England see: P. DE LA
RUFFINIÈRE DU PREY, Hawksmoor’s London Churches: architecture and theology,
Chicago, University of Chicago Press, 2000, p. 125-132.
Wilhelmus DURANDUS, John MASON NEALE and Benjamin WEBB (eds.), The
Symbolism of Churches and Church Ornaments, a translation of the first book of the
Rationale Divinorum written by William Durandus with an introductory essay and
notes by Rev. John Mason Neale B.A. and the Rev. Benjamin Webb B.A., New York,
Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1893, re-edn of 1286, p. 7-8: “In like manner, Jeruzalem
is understood historically of that earthly city whither pilgrims journey;
allegorically, of the Church Militant; tropologically, of every faithful soul;
anagogically, of the celestial Jerusalem, which is our country”.
113
All that Solomon designed by rearing up such a noble Fabrick upon
Mount Zion, was only that he and the People of Israel might have a
Place for Solemn and Divine Worship, suitable to the Honour of
God’s Majesty and to which they might have recourse […]9.
Opponents, however, argue that the Temple is a Jewish place of
worship, originated under the Law. The Temple acted as a shrine
which contained the Old Testament’s Ordinances, and as a type of
Christ. The sacrifices made at the Temple would atone for the sins of
Israel. Christ had sacrificed himself in order to save mankind, thus
fulfilling the type. From this point of view, it could no longer
assume the role of church building, as the type had been fulfilled in
the coming of Christ under the Gospel. The magnificent architecture
ordained by God was part of a ceremonial Jewish worship which
had ultimately ended in sin and the final destruction of the Temple
itself. Furthermore, God himself had proclaimed the “latter Temple”
or Herod’s Temple more glorious than Solomon’s, not referring to
the sumptuous architecture but to the presence of Christ himself10.
Alternatively, Solomon’s Temple is put forward in defense of rich
and stately church architecture, while the Temple under Herod
underlines the deceptive qualities of richly decorated buildings. The
early sermons in particular, which oppose Calvinist and Laudian
opinions towards church architecture, make good use of the
dichotomy of the Temple-architecture. The richness of the
architecture was approved of as a way to honour God, though
dismissed as the instigator of superfluous materialism. This point is
made, for instance, at the consecration of the parish church in
Flixton (1630), when the Calvinist Brinsley condemned the richness
of Herod’s temple as a work of Satan, diverting the thoughts of the
worshippers through external beauty:
9
10
Richard BURD, Two Sermons preached on the 3rd and 6th Sunday After the Opening of
the New Chappell of St. James Westminster. The First on the 18 th day of October. The
Second on the 8th day of November 1702, London, Printed for Sam. Keble at the
Turks Head, 1702, p. 34-35.
Sampson PRICE, The Beauty of Holines: or the consecration of a House of Prayer by the
example of our saviour. A Sermon Preached in the Chappell at the Free-Schoole in
Shrewsbury. The 10.Day of September, Anno Dom. 1617. At the Consecration of the
Chappell by the Right Reverend Father in God, the Lord Bishop of Coventry Lichfield,
London, Imprinted by B.A. for Richard Meighen, 1618 ; John BRINSLEY, The
“Glorie of the Latter Temple Greater than of the Former” opened in a Sermon Preached
at the Consecration or Restitution of the Parish Church of Flixton, London, Robert
Bird, 1631.
114
That the eyes of the Iewes be dazzled with this outward pompe and
glory they might looke no further, but that their thoughts might
hereby be wholly taken off from looking for or longing after the
promised Messias. And if so, then was this cost bestowed upon this
last Temple, rather a profanation then an adorning of it 11.
At this occasion, Brinsley also refers to Solomon’s Temple, urging
the community to repair and adorn the places of worship. Moreover,
he stresses that beauty, glory and decency on the outside (the
building) requires the same on the inside (the worshipper’s
disposition) in order to be lawful and acceptable.
The Attractiveness of the “Roman Catholic Whore”
Contemporary Roman Catholic church buildings often appear in
the sermons as well. Their magnificent and sumptuous architecture
is seen as a powerful means to persuade people of the Roman
Catholic confession. Preaching at the opening of the new parish
church of Isleworth, Williams links the lack of gravity and decorum
in church architecture with indecent behaviour of some members of
the congregation at service. Decency, order, appropriate behaviour
and laudable decorum make divine service and religion attractive as
they become outward signs of God’s majesty and solemnity.
But ought it not to be confessed, (amongst friends at least) that if we
look into the generality of the congregation, there is not that
Decency and Order, that gravity and laudable decorum, that
outward Beauty of Holiness, that is to be observed amongst those
whose Doctrine is yet so scandalously corrupted with the Traditions of Men, and their Worship defil’d and over-run with the
insufferable Weeds of Superstitious and Idolatrous Innovations.
There is not that Uniformity and Exactness of behaviour in our
Churches which becomes the Majesty and Solemnity of God’s
Worship, as we should wish for: Insomuch that if an infidel-spy
shou’d drop into one of our Congregations, and see with what
Indecency and Indevotion some behave […] he were to choose his
Religion, he would hardly make ours his choice […].12
Of course, according to the same preacher, all this is based on
trickery as “popish Roman Catholic worship” is a mere sensual reli11
12
John BRINSLEY, The “Glorie of the Latter Temple Greater than of the Former”, op. cit.,
p. 12.
C. WILLIAMS, A Sermon Preach’d at the Opening of the New Church in Isleworth, in
the County of Middlesex, London, William Hawes, 1707, p. 22.
115
gion based on sheer outward glory. The Puritan preacher Dyke, who
preached at Epping in 1622, even compares Rome and the Church of
Rome with a whore who distracts and deceives through the senses:
She is deckt with gold and precious stones: so are her churches, her
images, her idols, all gloriously adorned to set forth an outward
maiesty to sense… full of abomination and the filthinesse of her
fornication. All is but the whores garish habite to catch carnall
eyes.13
The metaphorical comparison of Roman Catholic Church
architecture with the whore of Babylon is not gratuitous. St. John the
Divine describes her in Revelation 17-19 as great, mysterious and
decked in gold but even so the mother of harlots and abominations
of the earth14. John wrote in a time of persecution to give courage to
his fellow Christians. He clearly wrote from a deeply anti-Roman
point of view. According to Christian exegetes, the Babylonic whore
was Rome under Christian persecution: the big powerful city at the
river built on seven hills where Domitian (90-95 AD) had persecuted
Christian martyrs. She was thus commonly associated with evil,
Satan and the Anti-Christ15. From the earliest interpretations
onwards, the Apocalypse should therefore be engaged in attacks on
contemporary aberrations, heresies and schisms. During the
Reformation, Luther and Calvin had explicitly denounced the Pope
and the Roman Catholic Church as Anti-Christ and the harlot of
13
14
15
Ieremiah DYKE, Sermon Dedicatory. Preached at the Consecration of the Chappell of
Epping in Essex, London, I.D. for Nathanael Newbery, 1623, p. 9.
ST. JOHN THE DIVINE, Revelation 17, 1-6: “Come hither: I will show unto thee the
judgment of the great whore that sitheth upon many waters / with whom the
kings of the earths have committed fornication. / So he carried me away in the
spirit into the wilderness: and I saw a woman sit upon a scarlet-colored beast,
full of names of blasphemy, having seven heads and ten horns. / And the
woman was arrayed in purple and scarlet color, and decked with gold and
precious stones and pearls, having a golden cup in her hand full of
abominations and filthiness of / her fornication: / and upon her forehead was a
name written, MYSTERY, BABYLON THE GREAT, THE MOTHER OF HARLOTS AND
ABOMINATIONS OF THE EARTH. / And I saw the woman drunken with the blood of
the saints and with the blood of the martyrs / of Jesus / And when I saw her, I
wondered with great admiration”.
U. SALS, Die Biographie der “Hure Babylon”, Studien zur Intertextualität der BabylonTexte in der Bibel, Tübingen, Mohr Siebeck, 2004, p. 76-77; B. MCGINN, “Early
Apocalypticism: the ongoing debate”, in C.A. PATRIDES, J. WITTREICH (eds.), The
Apocalypse in English Renaissance Thought and Litterature, Ittaca / New York,
Cornell University Press, 1984, p. 23.
116
Babylon16. Also in England, the Apocalypse became important in
explaining the Reformation17. According to the Millenarian theory,
for example, the Anti-Christ would be denounced. The high Middle
Ages corresponded with the high-days of superstitious practices,
idolatry, popish usurpation and the reign of Anti-Christ while the
True Church hid in wilderness. The Beast received its wound at
Protestant Reformation and would be destroyed in the near future18.
Once the Beast and the whore of Babylon would be destroyed, the
way would be paved for the second coming of Christ19.
Artificial and Spiritual Beauty
Careful not to be caught in the trap of “the Roman Catholic
whore”, most preachers also became well aware that only very few
16
17
18
19
J. PELIKAN, “Some Use of Apocalypse in the Magistrial Reformers”, in C.A.
PATRIDES and J. WITTREICH (eds.), The Apocalypse in English Renaissance, op. cit.,
p. 82-86.
John BALE, The image of both churches after the most wonderfull and heavenly
Revelation of sainct Iohn the Evangelist, London, by Thomas East, 1570, 2nd edn.;
John FOXE, Actes and Monuments of these latter and perilous dayes touching upon
matters of the Church, wherein ar comprehended and described the great persecutions
(and) horrible troubles, that have bene wrought and practised by the Romishe prelates…,
London, by Iohn Day, 1563 ; Arthur DENT, The Ruine of Rome. Or an exposition
upon the whole Revelation Werein is plainely shewed and proved, that the popish
religion, together with all the power and authority of Rome, shall ebbe and decay still
more and more troughout all the churches of Europe, and come to an utter overthrow
even in this life, before the end of the world. Written especially for the comfort of
Protestants and the daunting of papists, seminary priests , Iesuites and all that cursed
rabble, London, Printed by William Iaggard for Simon Walterson and Richard
Banckworth, 1607; John MILTON, Of Reformation touching church-discipline in
England and the causes that hitherto have hindred it. Two books, written to a friend,
London, Printed for Thomas Underhill, 1641.
M. MURRIN, “Revelation and Two Seventeenth Century Commentators” in C.A.
PATRIDES and J. WITTREICH (eds.), The Apocalypse in English Renaissance, op. cit.,
p. 132.
See for instance: Joseph MEDE, Clavis Apocalyptica ex innatis et insitis visionum
charateribus eruta et demonstrate…, Cambridge, Printed by T. and J. Buck, 1627;
Isaac NEWTON, Observations upon the Prophecies of Daniel, and the Apocalypse of
St.John, Dublin, Printed by S. Powell, 1733 — The manuscript was written in the
1690’s; Henry MORE, Apocalypsis Apocalypseos; or the Revelation of St.John the
Divine Unveiled containing a brief but perspicuous and continued exposition from
chapter to chapter and from verse to verse of the whole book of the Apocalypse, London,
Printed by J.M. for J. Martyn and W. Kettilby, 1680. A much more moderate
view of the Millenium, explaining that the events prophesied in the Book of
Revelation had already taken place during “the late Reformation”.
117
were capable of reaching spiritual beauty without some sensory
assistance. Help from the senses and the passions, even in religious
exercise, was assumed to be inherent to the mortal state of human
beings. As humans are instructed by both the senses and the soul,
they also remain subject to material impulses and means of
devotion. For Thomas Mangley, preaching at the consecration of the
Holy Trinity Church in Sunderland (1719), this was one of the
reasons why decent and adorned churches were still required: “The
senses and the imagination must go along with the Spirit and
Understanding in true Devotion, nor are we thoroughly spiritual in
our religious Affections as not to find some Benefit from sensible
Objects and Representations20”.
The High Church clergyman Gaskarth, who preached at All
Hallows in London in 1705, stated that the experience of a decent
church building encouraged spiritual exercise: “We receive from our
senses the idea’s and notices of most things and most of our
passions derive thence, […] and next to its actings or impressions
upon us21”.
The question remained of course whether the outward
impressions should be sober and comely or sumptuous and magnificent.
Newton addressed this issue when preaching at the consecration of
the new college chapel of Hart Hall in Oxford in 1716. He reminded
his audience that it was not the beautifully designed and decorated
architecture that made the chapel acceptable to God, but the
humility and sincerity of its worshippers:
The Noblest consecrated Fabrick is not, in its own intrinsic worth,
more acceptable than the Obscurest Unconsecrated Closet. That
which God chiefly regards is the Humility, Meekness, and Sincerity
of the Votary: “For thus” saith the Lord, “the Heaven is my Throne,
and the Earth my Footstool; where is the House that ye build unto
me? And where is the Place of my Rest? For all those things hath
mine hand made, and all those things have been”, saith the Lord:
20
21
Thomas MANGEY, The Holiness of the Christian Churches, set forth in a Sermon
Preach’d at the Consecration of the New Church at Sunderland, London, W. and J.
Innys, 1719, p. 16.
John GASKARTH, The Beautiful Sanctuary, and The Holy Offering. A Sermon Preach’d
in the Parish-Church of All Saints Barking, London, At the First Opening of the Said
Church, After its having been Re-paired without, and new Pewed, and in several
Respects Improved, as well as Beautified within, London, Walter Kettilby, 1705,
p. 14.
118
“but to This Man will I look, even to Him that is Poor, and of a
Contrite Spirit, and trembleth at my word22”.
Confessional Background
The consecration sermons indicate that the Church of England
attached a great deal of importance to the sensory realm, which
touched upon devotion as well as æsthetics. The confessional background certainly influenced the importance accorded to sensory
impressions in spiritual exercise and their architectural environment. This concern can be explained by the concerns about Roman
Catholicism as well as by internal tensions within the Church of
England herself. The sermons illustrate the fear of latent dangers for
ceremonialism and idolatry. They also refer to the strive for a more
spiritualised worship present among the more “Puritan” preachers,
versus the urge for a more ceremonial and sensual worship as
advocated by ceremonialists and High Church partisans.
This ambiguity towards the sensory realm of religion had existed since the earliest years of the Church of England and was based
on different interpretations of biblical texts. Several passages inspired the most zealous early reformers under Edward VI to consider
the performative aspects of public prayer as hypocritical, visible and
earthly contaminations of invisible and divine qualities. This view is
for instance reflected in the following biblical quote (Matt. 6, 5-6):
“And when thou prayest thou shalt not be like the hypocrites. For
they love to stand and pray in the synagogues; and in the corners of
the streets, that they might be seen of men […] Thou therefore, when
thou prayest, go into thy chamber, and shut thy door and pray to
thy Father which is in secret”. The moderate William Tyndale, on
the other hand, offered a metaphorical reading of this same passage
in his Exposition of Matthew (1533). In this reading he juxtaposes the
visible and invisible manifestations of the soul and the visible body.
He concludes that not only the soul and the heart but also the body
experiences and shows the effects of sincere devotion. Some decades
later, referring to Solomon’s prayer at the Temple, Lancelot
Andrewes claimed that words were insufficient to worship God.
Sensible signs of the body not only reflect but also incite men’s
inclination and reverence towards God. Consequently, by the
22
Richard NEWTON, A Sermon Preach’d at the Consecration of Hart-Hall Chapell in
Oxford, Oxford, Stephan Fletcher, 1716, p. 17.
119
seventeenth century, praying in the Church of England had become
a synonym of acting23.
The ambiguity between spiritual and bodily worship certainly
resided in the fact that the Common Prayer was a liturgy based on
comprehension and participation but also conceived in opposition to
Roman Catholic superstitious ritualism. According to Richard
Hooker, author of Of the Laws of Ecclesiastical Politie, commonly seen
as the founder of via media of the Church of England, the value of
the Common Prayer was that it could compensate for the natural
deficiencies of spontaneous and private devotion. Human inwardness was considered as weak and in need of external aids24.
The conception of the worshipper’s mind and body clearly
evolved. While the early reformers were anxious about a potential
disjunction, by the 1630s elaborate accounts on the involuntary
correspondence between external and internal states of devotion had
gained popularity25. Renowned puritans accepted that a sensitive
component was needed and High Church men warned against the
possibility of error due to the beholder’s fault in being distracted by
worldly magnificence. In order to fully understand the role accorded
to the senses in the performance of worship, it is necessary to
discuss and analyse broader discussions of the senses and the
passions.
Senses, passions and magnificence in the Seventeenth century
What is common to all preachers, regardless of their confessional stance, is the belief in the close correlation between the
æsthetic and ethic effect. Moreover, from the sermons, it becomes
clear that there is an evolution across the confessional spectrum with
regard to this particular link. The consecration sermons make clear
that not every aspect can be explained solely in confessional terms.
In other words, sermons draw different relations between æsthetics
and ethics as a result of their confessional background and historical
evolution. However, they all share common assumptions with
regard to æsthetic qualities and their possible role in the edification
of the worshipper. By examining the nature of these relationships, it
23
24
25
R. TARGOFF, Common Prayer: the language of public devotion in early modern
England, Chicago / London, 2001, p. 7-9.
Ibid., p. 55.
Ibid., p. 10.
120
becomes possible to understand how architecture was used to obtain
devotional affects.
The following paragraphs will deal with this issue from the
point of view of early modern English theories on sense perception.
These theories conceptualize the interaction between sensory perception and devotion, ethics and æsthetics and finally architecture
and worship, as they all address the topics and relations between
sense, ethics, passions, will and reason. These topics are also present
in the consecration sermons, which question the role of the church
building and its architecture in devotion.
Senses
In the seventeenth century, changing and opposing attitudes
emerged towards the reliability of senses and the role of perception
versus reason, in the process of gaining universal knowledge in all
aspects of God’s Creation. Rationalists claimed independence from
the senses, while sceptics raised challenges. A recurrent sceptical
argument was that the senses perceive only the outward appearances of objects, and that the nature of these objects could therefore
not be grasped by the senses. However, most theories also claimed
that it is possible to correct sense perception and man’s dependency
on sensory perception.
Philosophy can thus serve as an explanatory model for the
sermons. Both preachers and philosophers shared common terminology, concepts, and ideas as well as historical and conceptual backgrounds. Both groups were confronted with the same religious and
political issues of the Church. The ideas developed by the preachers
thus only acquire their full meaning with the contemporary philosophy of sensory perception in mind. The sermons of the first half of
the century accept the necessity of sensory perception with some
reluctance, while the late sermons are more confident. As such they
show an analogy with the development of English Empiricism.
Throughout this period, the relationship between mind and body
and that between senses and reason occupied philosophers,
scientists and preachers alike.
For instance in the sermons, the resonance of theorists as Francis
Bacon, Thomas Hobbes, and John Locke is conspicuous. The vocabulary used in the sermons when discussing sense perceptions is borrowed from their writings and vice versa. As we will see, Francis
Bacon for example described the fallacies of human understanding
121
as idols26. The same Bacon was also influential in theological and
religious circles because he regularly referred to apocalyptic themes
included in his writings.
This cross-fertilization engendered a re-evaluation of senseexperience in spiritual exercise. It gradually became accepted that as
a consequence of man’s mind-body analogy, sensory experience
could be of help in spiritual exercise, especially to the less devote.
Even the wisest and best of us have senses, as well as reason and
religion; flesh as well as spirit, bodies as well as souls, and
consequently, that sensible images and representations may be of
great use to us, even in the most refin’d and spiritual of our
performances27.
Most preachers did recognise the fact that worshippers were
necessarily liable to sensory experience:
We receive from our senses the idea’s and notices of most things
and most of our passions derive thence, as we are affected with
some objects or occurrences that first touch them, and cause such
motions in our animal spirits and so pass to our minds thro’ them 28.
In this reference, Gaskarth refers to the motions caused in our
animal spirits. This strongly reminds us of corpuscularian theories
espoused by Hobbes, which were widely developed in the
seventeenth century to explain the considerable influence of sensory
experience. According to Hobbes, sense impressions are caused by
pressure and counter-pressure and the subsequent mediation
thereof in body and mind:
The Originall of them all, is that which we call Sense (For there is no
conception in mans mind, which hath not at first, totally, or by
parts, bee begotten by the organs of Sense.) The rest are derived
from that originall […] The cause of Sense, is the Externall Body, or
Object, which presseth the organ proper to each Sense, either
immediately, as in the Taste which pressure, by the mediation of
Nerves, and other strings, and membranes of the body, continued
inwards to the Brain and Heart, causeth their a resistance, or
26
27
28
Francis BACON, Novum Organum, Book I, in J. DEVEY (ed.), The Physical and
Metaphysical Works of Lord Bacon, London, 1904, p. 390.
Joseph TRAPP, A Sermon Preached at Shipburn in Kent, Upon the Opening of the New
Church There, London, 1723, p. 5.
John GASKARTH, The Beautiful Sanctuary, and The Holy Offering, op. cit., p. 14.
122
counter-pressure, or endeavour of the heart, to deliver it self: which
endeavour because outward, seemeth to be some matter without 29.
Hobbes was a sense-oriented philosopher, and as a corpuscularian by definition committed to real qualities and sensible species.
His theory consisted of two main parts, namely the elaboration of a
new theory of the senses and the relation of sense to understanding.
Its key assumption was that the senses operate by motion. All ideas
arise from the senses, which can only be affected by bodies in
motion. The object causes (immediate or mediated) pressure on the
sense organ, which leads to a motion in the beholder all the way to
the “brain and the heart”. The sensations remain after the act of
sensing; this is how we form ideas based on imagination or memory,
namely the fading sensations. For Hobbes the human mind consists
of sense, imagination and the working of language. There is no
further rational or cognitive faculty. He thus concluded that all
human cognition could be achieved through the senses and imagination alone, without the help of an incorporeal agent30. However,
Hobbes was also aware of deception of sense and fallacy of reason,
which should be corrected under the precept Nosce teipsum (know
yourself31).
Although preachers and philosophers agree that sensory
impressions are an important part of our information, they are also
aware of their restrictions. Contrary to reason, these impressions
may dazzle and mislead us. For Francis Bacon, the senses are “the
idols of tribe… falsely asserted to be the standard of things32”. They
become tricks of Satan to keep the community away from God in
religious terms. Bacon characterized the unguided senses as dull,
incompetent and deceitful. However, he most harshly criticised the
idea of “understanding”, which was prone to hasty generalisations,
mistaken impositions, and infection by affections and desires33.
Combined with false philosophy, such fallacies could even induce
29
30
31
32
33
Thomas HOBBES, Leviathan or the Matter, Form and Power of a Common Wealth
Ecclesiastical and Civil, London, Printed for Andrew Crooke, 1651, p. 3.
G. HATFIELD, “The Cognitive Faculties”, in D. GARBER and M. AYERS (eds.), The
Cambridge History of Seventeenth Century Philosophy, Cambridge, 2003, p. 976.
Thomas HOBBES, Human Nature or the Fundamentals Elements of Policy of Being, A
Discovery of the Faculties Acts and Passions of the Soul of Man, From their Original
causes; According to such Philosophical Principles as are not commonly known or
asserted, 3rd edn, London, Printed for Matthew Gilliflower, 1684, p. 10, 30, 66.
Francis BACON, Novum Organum, Book I, op. cit., p. 390.
G. HATFIELD, “The Cognitive Faculties”, op. cit., p. 966.
123
superstition. Inspired by superstition some seek to derive knowledge from false religions driven by spirits and genii34. Contrary to
those he designated as sceptics, he would nevertheless not destroy
the authority of the senses and the understanding but rather supply
them with assistance35.
Of major importance in the development of sense perception
theories was John Locke’s magnum opus An Essay Concerning
Human Understanding (1690). In this work Locke ignored the claims
of Bacon and Hobbes. In this this essay, he aims to explain in detail
what one can legitimately claim to know and what not. According to
Locke, human beings have no innate knowledge. All knowledge
comes from ideas, and all ideas from experience. There are two
kinds of experience, namely sensation and reflection. Sensation
relates to the processes and objects of the external world, whereas
reflection refers to the operations of the mind. Nothing in the
intellect was not previously in the senses, which are broadened to
include reflection36.
Perception then being the first step and degree towards Knowledge
and the inlet of all Materialls of it, the fewer Senses any Man, as
well as any other Creature hath; and the fewer and duller the
impressions are, that are made by them; and the duller the Faculties
are, that are employed about them, the more remote are they from
that Knowledge, which is to be found in some Men. But this being
in great variety of Degrees (as may be perceived amongst Men)
cannot certainly be discovered in the several species of Animals,
much less in their particular individuals. It suffices me only to have
remarked here, that Perception is the first Operation of all Our
intellectual Faculties, and the inlet of all Knowledge into our
Mind37.
This power of the senses did not go unnoticed in religious
circles. Sensory experience could be used as a means to excite
devotion and religious architecture was part thereof. The perception
of the beauty and the comeliness of the church building recalled the
sacred majesty of God. The sensible perception was thus a first,
though inferior, step to the greater and higher purpose, namely the
knowledge and worship of God. According to the ceremonial High34
35
36
37
Francis BACON, Novum Organum, aphorism LXII, op. cit., p. 400.
Ibid., aphorism XXXVII, p. 389.
John LOCKE, An Essay Concerning Human Understanding, Oxford, 2008 [1690],
p. 55.
Ibid., p. 86.
124
Church preachers, the decorum and richness of the architecture
were a compensation for what it could not be in extent, as even the
heavens of heavens could not contain God’s Majesty. More generally
accepted was that the glory of the architecture reflected the glory
God, following a precept taken from Vitruvian architectural theory.
According to this precept, quoted in Henry Wotton’s Elements of
Architecture, ornament should be appropriate for the building and its
inhabitant or function38. James Lacy, preaching at the consecration of
the new parish church in Castleton, built by Lord Digby, refers to
both theories of sense perception and Vitruvian architecture:
The consideration whose House we are in, minds us of the Business
of the Place, and strikes a kind of Awe into our Thoughts, when we
reflect upon that Sacred Majesty we usually converse with there.
And the Beauty and Comeliness of it, not only takes our Eye and
pleases it, but carrieth also its Profit along with it, enlivens our
devotion, rouses it when it slumbers, and recalls it when it
wonders. For so the Grace of God is pleased to move us by Ways
suitable to our Nature, and to Sanctify these sensible and Inferior
helps to greater and higher Purposes, that as the Soul receives
Impressions through the Senses, so the Devotion of it may be
heighten’d by the Loftiness, the Beauty and Ornaments of the
Temple39.
Even if sensory impressions were still considered as inferior to
spiritual ones, they were accepted as an integral part of human
nature. They were thus provided to us by God himself within the
Creation in order to facilitate our life, including spiritual exercise
and devotion.
Passions
The ambivalence towards sense perceptions also resulted from
the close association of the senses with the passions. It was generally
agreed that man is most affected by the responses to sensory
experiences as our passions drive us to respond to the external
world. On the other hand, passions were believed to exert dubious
influence on sensory knowledge. Passions were commonly seen as a
source of error and opposed to human reason and will, as they were
38
39
Henry WOTTON, The Elements of Architecture, Charlottesville, The University
Press of Virginia, 1968 [1643], p. 95.
James LACY, A Sermon Preach’d at the Consecration of a Church in the Parish of
Castle-Ton, near Sherborne, Dorset, London, W. Taylor, 1715, p. 9.
125
supposed to be irrational and deceptive. Furthermore, passions were
considered as an irrational faculty or confused perception because
they involved bodily sensation. It is because the mind depended on
the body to perceive the external world that it was liable to the
confusion that renders certain thoughts passions. As a consequence,
passions were considered to be extremely difficult to control both
morally and metaphysically40.
Most philosophers however — following the Aristotelian tradition
— believed that reason and will were strong enough to control or
manipulate the passions41. Furthermore, the opposition between
passion and reason began to be gradually re-examined during the
seventeenth century and the notion of the passion was progressively
reconfigured42. As a result, by the early eighteenth century, Hume
for instance distinguished between affections and passions. Affections are a kind of passions but they are calm desires and produce
little emotion. Therefore, these affections are confounded with
reason by all those who judge something at first sight and appearance. Hume concludes: “Reason is and ought only to be the slave of
the passion43”.
While passions were still regarded with suspicion and ambivalence by Neo-stoics, most seventeenth-century authors gradually
regarded them as part of the good life. These authors shared the
commonly held assumption that passions were functional in a broad
sense. Passions were commonly portrayed as affects that make us
act in ways intended to protect us from harm or to improve our fate
as they both sustain bodily welfare and involve the soul on the
body’s behalf as a reinforcement for actions44. They became bodily
phenomena which were an ineradicable and morally necessary part
of human life, since man is made up of body and mind.
The seventeenth century thus witnessed an exploration of the
ethical dimensions of the passions. Central were the questions
40
41
42
43
44
44
J. BARNOUW, “Passion as confused perception or thought in Descartes,
Malebranche, and Hutcheson”, Journal of the History of Ideas, 53, 3, 1992, p. 399;
S. JAMES, “Passions and the good life”, in D. GARBER and M. AYERS (eds.), The
Cambridge History of Seventeenth Century Philosophy, op. cit., p. 202.
Ibid., p. 918.
Ibid., p. 200.
David HUME as quoted by: J. BARNOUW, “Passion as confused perception”,
op. cit., p. 420.
S. JAMES, The Passions in the Metaphysics and the Theory of Action, Cambridge,
2003, p. 913.
J. BARNOUW, “Passion as confused perception”, op. cit., p. 413.
126
whether the passions were morally good or bad and to what extent
virtuous people need to control or transcend them in the end.
Treatises were published examining the faculties, acts and passions of
the soul. Important English publications were Thomas Hobbes’
Human Nature or The Fundamental Elements of Policy being A Discovery
of the Faculties Acts and Passions of the Soul of Man (1650); Edward
Reynolds, A Treatise of the Passions and Faculties of the Soul of Man
(1650) and Walter Charleton Natural History of the Passions (1674).
Bacon only accorded minor importance to the passions and defined
them as perturbations or diseases of the mind. All the later authors,
however, weighed up the good and bad qualities of the passions
against each other45. Passions were a consequence of man’s twofold
nature consisting of the mind and body. Reynolds referred to
Christ’s affections as a case in point. He argued that not the passions
themselves were to be withdrawn. Following Christ’s example, it
was their violence and lawlessness that had to be restrained. This
could be achieved by reason or contrasting passions:
So there is more honour, in having the Affection subdued than in
having none at all; the business of a wise man, is not to be without
them but to be above them. And therefore our Saviour himself
sometimes loved, sometimes rejoiced, sometimes wept […] but
these were not passions that violently and immoderately troubled
him […] His Reason excited, directed, moderated, repressed them
according to the rule of perfect cleare and undisturbed judgement 46.
However, if reason was, unable to uphold her principles and
resolutions, Reynolds warned that the human heart was weak and
would give leave to false delights and pleasures. More specifically,
man was seduced by profit, luxury and attractiveness of worldly
and sensual objects. This argumentation is reminiscent of the words
of the Puritan preacher Dyke, who was quoted at the beginning of
this contribution. Both Reynolds and Dyke referred to the deceptive
tricks of the Roman Catholic worship: “How weak is thy heart
seeing thou doest all these things the works of an impious whorish
woman47?”
45
46
47
Francis BACON, Advancement of Learning, in J. DEVEY (ed.), The Physical and
Metaphysical Works of Lord Bacon, op. cit., p. 286.
Edward REYNOLDS, A Treatise of the Passions and Faculties of the Soul of Man,
London, F.N. for Robert Bostock, 1650, p. 48.
Ibid., p. 71, 495.
127
Walter Charleton also subscribed to the erratic mood of the
passions. Nevertheless, man remained responsible for his actions as
he had an independent will and the capacity to make moral
judgements.
For it is not only impious but highly absurd to imagine that God
can be the Author of our Errors, because he hath not given us an
understanding omniscious […] But that Man should have a Will
[…] that he can and doth act by his own will, and that is freely; and
so is, by a peculiar prerogative the defect lieth in our own act, or in
the use of our liberty, not in our nature […]48.
Charleton still considered the human passions as a consequence of
the Fall, but he explicitly made man responsible for his own acts.
Passionate Sermons
Similar arguments also appear in the consecration sermons. The
preachers wanted to formulate an argument for or against the use of
externals including bodily reverence and stately architecture in
religious worship. Therefore, they addressed the problem of the
human passions and their possible interaction with devote life. The
topic was certainly of interest in sermons dating from the second
half of the seventeenth century. Analogous to the authors of the
treatises quoted above, the preachers accepted the bi-medial human
composition of body and mind. The body and mind analogy was
commonly proposed as a motive for using external expressions of
devotion in worship. Even a Whig preacher like Waugh concluded
in 1713 that “it is a dictate of a natural religion, that we express the
inward Sense of our Mind by the Outward Acts and Carriage of our
Bodies49”. According to the mind-body analogy, holy exercise
required both inward affections and outward respectful behaviour,
mental or internal reverence and outward expressions of adorations.
The late seventeenth-century preachers also accepted the passions as a natural constituent of the human condition. They commonly addressed the passions as a means to incite devotion as they
considered these passions as powerful affects to bodily sensations.
These included visual impressions as well as the acts of rising and
48
49
Walter CHARLETON, Natural History of the Passions, Savoy, Printed by T.N. for
James Magnes, 1674, p. 171.
John WAUGH, Publick Worship Set forth and Recommended in a Sermon Preached at
St. Peter’s Cornhill, at the Opening of the Said Parish Church after Repairing, London,
George Straham, 1713, p. 24.
128
kneeling during the service. The same preachers were, however, also
aware of the dangers of a too passionate state of the mind, which
could either lead to popish superstition and idolatry or superfluous
worldly matters. Instead of reason, they called in the assistance of
religion — namely the established Anglican worship — to subdue
the passions in order to make them durable blessings:
Religion sets before us things suitable to our reasonable faculties,
Correspondant to our Souls in their primitive State, and Places our
Affections upon the most sincere and durable Blessings: Whilst
worldly minded Men are miserably tossed to and fro and carried
about with vain and perishing delights50.
If worshippers were still distracted by worldly matters or by the
magnificent church architecture surrounding them, Sykes, preaching
at Trinity College in 1691, asserted that the fault was in the
worshipper’s attitude and not in the decorum of the place of
worship:
[…] and if any man is offended with the greatness and
magnificence of these, or other sacred places designed for the
honour and glory of God and employs his thoughts in the
contemplation of the riches and beauty of them, when they should
be lifted up to Heaven, the fault is in the Votar, not in the place of
Worship51.
Nonetheless, the magnificence of the place of worship had been
— and remained — a heavily contested subject. Pretenders saw the
magnificent church building as way of honouring God, while
opponents continued to emphasise the deceptive qualities.
Moral Taste and the Æsthetically Good: Shaftesbury
When discussing sense perception and passions with regard to
the architecture of church buildings, the preachers regularly associate the object of perception with moral values. As we have seen,
the simplicity of the church building refers to the simplicity and
honesty of early Christianity; more specifically, the beauty and
purity of the church reminds the worshipper of the Church as God’s
50
51
Richard BURD, Two Sermons Preached after the Opening of the New Chapel Of St.
James Westminster, London, Printed for Sam. Keble at the Turks-Head, 1702,
p. 27.
Thomas SYKES, A Sermon Preached at the Consecration of Trinity-College Chappel in
Oxford, Oxford, Printed at the Theater, 1694, p. 20.
129
bride. Alternatively, the magnificence of the building could represent the magnificence of God himself. From the very start, the
Church of England entwined ethical and æsthetical categories,
which continued throughout the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. Simplicity, purity and comeliness were characteristics of Christ
and the early reformed Church. Magnificence, stateliness and loftiness represented the ideals of the triumphant Church as it had to be
shaped under the late Stuarts, especially Queen Anne. All concepts,
however, were also applied to express opinions regarding church
architecture and more specifically the degree to which the building
should be ornamented. Even the notion of Beauty Holiness expresses
this double concern: the æsthetic is expressed in the word beauty
while the sacred is reflected in the term holiness. However, it was
only from the late seventeenth century onwards and particularly in
the early eighteenth century that the consecration sermons mentioned the act of building a decent, beautiful or even magnificent
church as an act of piety and charity. For example, James Lacy
praised the stately churches of the Early Christians during Constantine’s reign, when he was preaching at Castleton (1715):
They spared no Cost and thought nothing to dear, not only to
Build, but to Beautify and Adorn those Sacred Edifices. Expenses of
that Nature went under the Name of Piety and Devotion and none
counted that Waste, which was expended about so Religious a
Work52.
According to the late seventeenth-century preachers, also in
contemporary times, beautiful church buildings still function as
monuments of charity and piety, embodying the Christian duties:
“For, by leaving him a lasting monument of his Piety, he leaves also
a standing motive to all the Duties, and promotes all the ends of
Religion, as long as it shall endure53”. God is pleased with such
stately places of worship as they show the honour of religion and
give man the full sense of his religious duty. They represent God’s
magnificence and glory, as well as man’s gratitude and zeal. As such
they become an instrument and facility for devotion, recalling
Christian ideals as piety and charity.
52
53
James LACY, A Sermon Preach’d at the Consecration of a Church in the Parish of
Castle-Ton, op. cit., p. 5.
Thomas SYKES, A Sermon Preached at the Consecration of Trinity-College, op. cit.,
p. 29.
130
This continual shifting between moral and æsthetic qualities
reminds of the late seventeenth-century moralist and æsthete,
Anthony Ashley Cooper, the Third Earl of Shaftesbury (1671-1713).
Anthony Shaftesbury played a fundamental role in the reconception of the relationship between sensory experience, passions
and art in the second half of the seventeenth century in England.
Shaftesbury was the first in early modern England to explicitly link
the morally good with the æsthetically attractive. Key to his
association of ethics with æsthetics are his Characteristics of Men […]
and especially The Moralists, drafted in the early 1700s and published in a much revised form in 1709. The Moralists are dialogues on
diverse topics that pay special attention to the inseparability of
ethical truth and æsthetic beauty. According to Shaftesbury, man
was gifted with the ability to discern beauty in works of art, nature
and moral actions. In this work he invariably links virtue to beauty
through the association of “the beautiful, the proportioned and the
becoming” with “the virtuous, the benevolent and the good”.
Shaftesbury’s Second Characters (1712) is a practical transition from
his moral æsthetic theory of his Characteristics applied to art. He
discusses not only beautifying components, but also artists and the
corruptions of taste54. This means that Shaftesbury was both an
ethical and religious thinker as well as a philosopher of the arts.
Shaftesbury’s writings should be situated in a programme of
self-fashioning; a contemporary penchant for moral and cultural
refinement which was inextricably linked to the development of
moral and æsthetic sensibility. In an essay on the morality of art
appreciation, Preben Mortensen, has demonstrated that it was
Shaftesbury’s aim to place the contemplation of beauty within the
realm of acceptable morality. According to Mortensen, Shaftesbury
wanted to defend a moral approach to admiring objects, not
identified with luxury, covetousness, avarice, ostentation and other
immoral qualities55. The theory of Shaftesbury allows us to provide a
better understanding of the historical shift in the views on ethics and
æsthetics in early modern England. In this respect, three points of
interest arise from Shaftesbury’s work: the association of beauty and
54
55
B. RAND, “Introduction”, in B. RAND (ed.), Second Characters or Language of Forms
by the right honourable Anthony, Earl of Shaftesbury author of Characteristics, New
York, 1969 re-edn., p. 25.
P. MORTENSEN, “Shaftesbury and the Morality of Art Appreciation”, Journal of
the History of Ideas, 55, 4, 1994, p. 631-650.
131
morality, his theory of the affects and his theory of the world of
forms.
Firstly, Shaftesbury has placed the contemplation of beauty
within the realm of morality56. He started from the premise that due
to divine creation all things are united in the world and the human
mind and soul are therefore strongly imprinted by the idea of order
and proportion57. “Will it not be found in this respect, above all, that
what is beautiful is harmonious and proportionable, what is harmonious and proportionable is true, and what is at once both beautiful
and true is of consequence agreeable and good58?” For Shaftesbury
beauty was truth, virtue and compliance; it was a moral goal while
moral sense became a faculty of man. Consequently, this moral
sense is an inner perceptive faculty which transcends the immediate
physical perceptions of the delightful and the pleasurable. The
moral sense, on the other hand, perceives the metaphysical notions
of the virtuous and the good. As such, moral sense perception is an
innate quality contrary to physical sense perception59. Secondly, the
distinction between the good of the inferior world (world of things)
and that of the superior world (world of affections) suggests an
ultimate order to which both are answerable. Shaftesbury has taken
up Hobbes’s claim that our affects lead us, but he rejects the
dominance of aggressive desires at the expense of the affects of love
and benevolence60. Similarly to Hobbes, moral behaviour is completely motivated by affections, but contrary to Hobbes, man is not
fundamentally selfish61. For Shaftesbury, all men possess latent
affections for the good of mankind, as moral self-consciousness and
deliberate moral judgment distinguishes men from beasts. The good
joins the beautiful when the moral judgment approves its own
beauty. There is no virtue where there is no beauty, such as for
instance in a fundamentally aggressive and selfish human philosophy as Hobbes’s, which is based on principles of power, dominance and fear.
56
57
58
59
60
61
Ibid., p. 631-650.
A. SHAFTESBURY, The Moralists, in L. KLEIN (ed.), Shaftesbury, Characteristics of
Men, Manners, Opinions, Times, Cambridge, 2003 re-edn, p. 273-274.
A. SHAFTESBURY, Miscellany III, in L. KLEIN (ed.), Shaftesbury, Characteristics of
Men, Manners, Opinions, Times, op. cit., p. 415.
L. SHIQIAO, Power and Virtue, Architecture and Intellectual Change in England 16601730, London, Routledge, 2007, p. 103.
S. JAMES, “Passions and the good life”, op. cit., p. 212.
R. VOILTE, “Shaftesbury’s Moral Sense”, Studies in Philology, 52, 1, 1955, p. 27.
132
Hence Hobbes, Locke etc. still the same man, genus at the bottom
— “Beauty is nothing” — “Virtue is nothing” — “So perspective is
nothing – “Music is nothing” – But these are the greatest realities of
things, especially the beauty and order of affections. These
philosophers together with the anti-virtuosi may be called by one
common name viz. Barbar […]62.
Shaftesbury’s concept of disinterestedness can thus not to be
understood in the modern æsthetic sense as “when perceiving
anything in this manner any other concerns, such as practical, moral,
political, or religious are suspended63”. Disinterestedness for
Shaftesbury should be understood as free from self-interest, a strife
for freedom of passions and freedom of reason. This notion of
disinterestedness was of particular importance for Shaftesbury as it
included the claim that one should strive to love God and virtue for
God or virtue’s sake and not for the view of future reward or
punishment64. In æsthetic contemplation, it offered the possibility of
spectatorial detachment from all evil desires represented by a
surrender of any narrow form of individualistic satisfaction in
favour of admiration of the general harmony. It is based on the
fundamental concept that “reality as a whole, the world of nature as
created by God, exhibited a beauty which is moral as well as
gratifying to the sense of form, and that the discernment of this
character of reality conduces directly to moral action65”.
This brings us to his third point of interest, namely that
Shaftesbury also often asserted that a man’s inner disposition is
affected by his intercourse with the world of forms, be they natural
or artificial. The world of forms is closely related to human
affections and temper.
This too is certain, that the admiration and love of order and
harmony and proportion, in whatever kind, is naturally improving
to the temper, advantageous to social affection, and highly assistant
to virtue, which is itself no other than the love of order and beauty
in society. […] For it is impossible that such a divine order should
be contemplated without ecstasy and rapture since, in the common
62
63
64
65
A. Shaftesbury, Second Characters, in L. KLEIN (ed.), Shaftesbury, Characteristics of
Men, Manners, Opinions, Times, op. cit., p. 178.
P. Mortensen, “Shaftesbury and the Morality of Art Appreciation”, op. cit.,
p. 632.
Ibid., p. 634; A. SHAFTESBURY, The Moralists, op. cit., p. 268.
J. BERNSTEIN, “Shaftesbury’s Identification of the Good with the Beautiful”,
Eighteenth-Century Studies, 10, 3, 1977, p. 309.
133
subjects of science and the liberal arts, whatever is according to just
harmony and proportion is so transposing to those who have any
knowledge in the kind66.
As a consequence of Shaftesbury’s premise of unity of creation,
the admiration of order and proportion in nature or art enhances
virtue as it stimulates order and harmony in society and human
affections. However, the effect of contemplation on human affections can be both positive and negative. When dealing with painting,
Shaftesbury emphasises that moral paintings are to be understood as
those of judicious representations of the human passions67. These do
certainly not include scenes of martyrdom, which are represented in
“popish” art. Such barbarous scenes can only lead to barbarous
affections. In his third maxim on moral and theological citations and
maxims Shaftesbury summarizes this view:
3. Maxim. Viz. Ruinous in religious and moral sense to wonder or
admire wrong. Hence superstition. So barbarity (that of — tyrants)
from delight in blood, pain, torture. First a horrour removed delight
remains, etc. επιχαιρεκακια
According to the judgment of taste and politeness, no art which
is savage, monstrous or cruel should be shown; while divine forms
render a more perfect idea of humanity68. With regard to architecture he rejected all that was “Gothic” on the same grounds.
Gothic in Shaftesbury’s terms should be understood as nonClassical, thus also including the licentious Baroque of Bernini, or
even the architecture of Christopher Wren and Nicholas
Hawksmoor69. Shaftesbury thus connected the good to the beautiful
and saw them as inherent qualities of the object of thought or
perception. He also regarded moral and æsthetic judgment as
equally compliant to objective standards. When a beholder discerned these moral and æsthetic qualities of an object and made a
conscious judgment of it, this act of perception became an act of
66
67
68
69
A. SHAFTESBURY, An Inquiry Concerning Virtue or Merit, in L. KLEIN (ed.),
Shaftesbury, Characteristics of Men, Manners, Opinions, Times, op. cit., p. 191.
A. SHAFTESBURY, “Hercules”, in B. RAND (ed.), Second Characters or The Language
of Forms by the Right Honourable Anthony, Earl of Shaftesbury, New York, 1969 reedn, p. 53.
A. SHAFTESBURY, “Plastic Art”, in B. RAND (ed.), Second Characters or The Language
of Forms by the Right Honourable Anthony, Earl of Shaftesbury, op. cit., p. 105.
E. CHANEY, The Evolution of the Grand Tour, Anglo-Italian Cultural Relations since
the Renaissance, London, Frank Cass, 1998, p. 318.
134
reflection. The passions evoked through association of the good and
the beautiful became a moral action; æsthetic judgment became
moral judgment70. Contrary to the ideas of other philosophers,
Shaftesbury’s theories were applied to contemporary architecture
quite directly71.
Even if Shaftesbury explicitly expressed his disdain for the
churches built by Wren in London and even if he preferred temperance to luxury and sumptuousness, his theory certainly reflects and
influenced contemporary thinking. As we have seen, the entwinement of ethics and æsthetics culminated at the end of seventeenth
and early eighteenth century. This culmination resulted in the
perception of the building of a magnificent church as an act of piety
and charity. Gaskarth preaching at All Hallows in London in 1705
has a strikingly similar flow of ideas when contemplating the beauty
of the church building. We see Shaftesbury’s ideas in action:
[…] beauty is a higher Charity, as it more directly conveighs its
Benefits to the souls of our Brethren, affording them the
opportunity of maintaining and strengthening the Sense of
Religion, the just Apprehension of God in their Minds, which
without publick Worship would be mainly lost, and of their
partaking of the freer Graces that attend this72.
Conclusion
The multiple references to the realm of the senses and the passions in the consecration sermons are not gratuitous. Since the
beginning of the Church of England, the “sensory realm” had been
highly debated in opposition to the “sensual worship” of the
“superstitious” Roman Catholic Church. This discussion had a
tremendous impact on liturgy, ritual and decoration.
The seventeenth-century debate on the senses and the passions
was not only a concern in religious discourse, but even more so in
contemporary philosophy. The consecration sermons show a crossfertilization between religious and philosophical debate. Models and
referents from the biblical and Christian history, including Solomon
and Herod’s Temple, Babylon and Early Christianity are re-activated
within the context of the contemporary discussions on human
sensory perceptions and passions.
70
71
72
A. SHAFTESBURY, Miscelanny III, op. cit., p. 415.
L. SHIQIAO, Power and Virtue, op. cit., p. 119-122, 154-155.
John GASKARTH, The Beautiful Sanctuary, and The Holy Offering, op. cit., p. 30.
135
This cross-fertilisation certainly produced a more positive attitude towards sensory experience in devotional exercise and sustained the development of performative and rhetorical qualities in the
architecture of the Church of England in the seventeenth and early
eighteenth century.
From the second half of the seventeenth century onwards, it
became gradually accepted that man was made up of mind and
body and that both should equally participate in the worship and
service of God. Sensory impressions could even function as a
stimulus to devotional exercise. It was commonly accepted that our
senses were a powerful instrument, through their direct relationship
with the passions. By the second half of the century, it was also
generally accepted that if an individual was distracted by worldly
magnificence rather than inspired by spirituality, the fault lay with
the devotee.
The negative connotations of magnificence (idolatry) were
gradually tempered as æsthetic qualities became entwined with the
ethical realm. This progressively introduced the concept of the
beautiful church building as an act of charity or piety.
To summarise, I refer to Richard Roderick’s words, preaching at
Longleat:
And since it is hard for the earthly-minded Men to be taken off their
sensual delights and to fix their scattered Thoughts upon religious
Duties, the best expedient to dismiss the World for a time, the
Concerns and Love of it, is to have recourse to Holy Places; which
being dedicated to the Almighty’s Honour will in some measure
display his Majesty, stamp in Men lasting impressions of Reverence
and heighten Devotion73.
Anne-Françoise MOREL, « The Contested “Space” of the Æsthetic Realm in the
Seventeenth Century Church of England », GEMCA : papers in progress, t. 2, no 1,
2013, p. 109-135, [En ligne].
73
Richard RODERICK, Sermon Preached at the Consecration of the Lord Weymouth’s
Chapel in Long-Leat, London, Miles Flesher, 1684, p. 5.
Traduction et ambiguïté du langage dans le discours
politique à l’époque de la première modernité :
enjeux idéologiques1
Grégory EMS (FNRS, Université catholique de Louvain)
et Nathalie HANCISSE (FNRS, Université catholique de Louvain)
Le présent texte est le résultat d’un travail visant à croiser les
recherches de Nathalie Hancisse et de Grégory Ems. Bien que nous
soyons tous deux directement concernés par la problématique de la
traduction, cette collaboration n’allait pas de soi, dans la mesure où
nos sujets de recherche ne sont pas issus des mêmes cadres
temporels et géographiques. Mais c’est justement au carrefour de
nos recherches et de nos angles d’approches, différents mais complémentaires, que nous avons trouvé la matière pour enrichir nos
réflexions respectives.
Nathalie Hancisse travaille sur la littérature polémique autour
de la reine d’Écosse, Marie Stuart. Elle s’intéresse plus particulièrement à la manière dont les textes originaux et les traductions qui en
sont faites dressent le portrait de cette personnalité très controversée, tantôt aimée, tantôt détestée. L’une de ses pistes de recherche
envisage les altérations et transformations opérées entre différents
états d’un même texte (diverses langues sont ici envisagées : anglais,
français, latin et allemand ; ainsi que divers lieux de production qui
sont autant de milieux d’élaboration intellectuelle différents) en tant
que vecteurs et marques d’une idéologie politique.
Quant à Grégory Ems, il a réalisé une thèse qui portait sur un
corpus singulier d’emblèmes, qu’il a traduits et expliqués : il s’agit
1
Ce texte a été présenté dans une version abrégée à la Journée d’études « Traduction
et médiation culturelle », dans le cadre du séminaire doctoral organisé par l’École
Doctorale du F.R.S.-FNRS (modules « Langues et Lettres » et « Traductologie »), le
25 avril 2013, à Louvain-la-Neuve (Belgique).
138
Grégory Ems et Nathalie Hancisse
de compositions réalisées tout au long du XVIIe siècle (1630-1685) par
les deux classes terminales du collège jésuite de Bruxelles et
exposées publiquement en rue2. Il s’est plus particulièrement intéressé à la période de la régence de Léopold-Guillaume (1647-1656),
prince habsbourgeois et grand ami et promoteur des jésuites, dont
les expositions emblématiques font l’éloge et suivent la fortune
(heureuse au départ, puis moins dès lors que sa situation va se gâter,
si bien que la figure du personnage disparaît rapidement de l’éloge
qui en est fait dans les emblèmes)3.
Nos deux champs de recherche illustrent différemment les difficultés que pose la traduction. Celle-ci ne consiste pas en un rendu
parfait et, en traduisant, l’auteur recrée, intentionnellement ou non,
mais irrémédiablement pour ainsi dire, un nouveau texte. Ce qui
réhabilite la traduction comme champ de recherche à part entière de
la littérature, mais ce qui pose aussi question quant au statut des
traductions.
Nous avons décidé de structurer cette communication en deux
parties : dans un premier temps, à travers le corpus emblématique
étudié par Grégory, nous expliciterons les difficultés auxquelles le
traducteur est confronté [dans le cas d’un traducteur qui, dans son
projet scientifique, cherche à être fidèle à « l’idéologie » de l’original
et vise donc à ne rien soustraire ni ajouter par rapport au textesource] ; dans un second temps, nous examinerons comment les
traducteurs de l’époque ont « altéré » les textes en les traduisant
pour transmettre ou modifier une idéologie.
2
3
Grégory EMS, Imago Principis. La représentation du pouvoir dans les affichages du
collège jésuite bruxellois sous la régence de Léopold-Guillaume de Habsbourg (16471656), thèse présentée en vue de l’obtention du grade de Docteur en Langues et
lettres, sous la direction des professeurs Agnès Guiderdoni et Lambert Isebaert,
Université catholique de Louvain, février 2012 (thèse en cours de révision). Pour
plus de renseignements sur le corpus, consulter Karel PORTEMAN, Emblematic
Exhibitions (affixiones) at the Brussels Jesuit College (1630-1685). A Study of the
Commemorative Manuscripts (Royal Library, Brussels), with contributions by E.
COCKX-INDESTEGE, D. SACRÉ, M. DE SCHEPPER, Turnhout, Brepols, 1996.
Sur Léopold-Guillaume, voir essentiellement Jozef MERTENS en Franz
AUMAN (éd.), Krijg en Kunst. Leopold Willem (1614-1662), Habsburger, Landvoogd
en Kunstverzamelaar, mit niederländischen und deutschen Beiträgen, Alden
Biesen, Landcommanderij Alden Biesen, 2003 ; Renate SCHREIBER, « Ein galeria
nach meinem humor ». Erzherzog Leopold Wilhelm, Vienne, Kunsthistorisches
Museum Wien, « Schriften des Kunsthistorischen Museums », 2004.
Traduction et ambiguïté du langage dans le discours politique
139
Emblématique, ambiguïtés et jeu de mots : le défi de la traduction.
Une consultation du corpus emblématique des élèves jésuites de
Bruxelles fait rapidement apparaître que l’ambiguïté et le jeu de
mots y occupent une place et un rôle importants. Deux questions se
posent alors : Quelle place pour le jeu de mots ? Comment le
traduire d’une langue à l’autre ?
Partons d’un exemple concret : un emblème signé en 1647 par
un élève de la classe de rhétorique4. L’emblème comprend quatre
parties essentielles qui participent au sens de l’ensemble : un titre,
une image peinte, une épigraphe et un poème. Le titre, qui signifie
« la crainte du Seigneur est le commencement de la sagesse » (Timor
Domini initium sapientiae5), indique le sujet que la classe a été chargée
d’emblématiser : le Timor Domini, la Crainte du Seigneur6. Le choix
de cette thématique n’est pas anodin : le Timor Domini est un sujet
qu’affectionnaient tout particulièrement les jésuites, mais c’est aussi
la devise de Léopold-Guillaume, le nouveau gouverneur des PaysBas espagnols arrivé en avril 1647 quelques mois avant l’exposition
qui avait lieu en juillet7. Tout en n’étant jamais mentionné dans la
série des rhétoriciens, Léopold-Guillaume y est omniprésent.
La pictura représente une classe. À l’arrière-plan, on distingue la
foule des élèves, tandis que l’avant-plan fait voir une double scène :
au centre, un élève s’approche de la chaire du professeur (à droite),
lequel apprend à un jeune enfant à écrire. Même si on entrevoit déjà
l’association de l’idée de sagesse avec la scène scolaire, la confrontation entre le titre et l’image n’est pas très claire et c’est le poème qui
vient l’expliciter. En voici la traduction : « Avant que ta main, mon
enfant, ne rende stable son tracé, / Tu traces souvent la lettre d’une
main tremblante. / Crois-moi : craindre Dieu est la première sagesse. / Quelle ignorance, si tu ne révères pas ton Seigneur8. » Autre-
4
5
6
7
8
L’emblème est conservé au cabinet des manuscrits de la Bibliothèque royale de
Belgique à Bruxelles : KBR, ms. 20.306, fol. 8r.
Notez l’inspiration biblique : Psaumes, 111, 10 (Initium sapientiæ timor
Domini / intellectus bonus omnibus facientibus eum : / laudatio eius manet in
sæculum sæculi) et Ecclésiastique, 1, 16 (Initium sapientiæ timor Domini).
Voir Karel PORTEMAN, Emblematic Exhibitions (affixiones)…, 1996, p. 106-107.
Voir ibid., p. 104-105.
KBR, ms. 20.306, fol. 8r : Ante puer stabilem quam firmet dextera c<ursum>, / Saepe
tibi trepida est littera ducta manu. / Crede mihi : timuisse Deum sapientia prima. /
Quam rudis es Dominum ni uereare tu<um>. Le rognage étroit du manuscrit
explique que nous ayons dû reconstituer le texte latin (cursum et tuum).
140
ment dit, la Crainte du Seigneur est comme l’apprentissage de
l’écriture : tous deux précèdent la sagesse.
L’emblème repose tout entier sur un jeu de mots, formulé dans
l’épigraphe (trepidando docemur : « C’est en tremblant que nous
apprenons »). Le verbe lié à timor en latin est timere qui signifie
littéralement « craindre » et qui a plusieurs synonymes : tremere,
trepidare, qui signifient à la base « s’agiter, trembler », et par
métonymie « trembler par crainte » et donc « craindre9 ». Phrase
ambiguë parce qu’elliptique et synthétique, l’épigraphe fait le lien
entre tremblement et crainte.
Ce jeu de mots fondamental est mis en scène et même en valeur
sur l’image, sur laquelle l’élève qui apprend à écrire occupe une
place marginale (excentrée à une extrémité de la pictura), tandis que
la scène au centre montre un collégien qui s’approche révérencieusement de son maître (en ôtant son couvre-chef) : cette scène permet à
l’image de fonctionner en parfaite complémentarité avec le texte,
puisqu’elle introduit dans l’image l’idée de crainte et garantit la
réussite de l’interaction texte-image.
À travers un tel emblème, Léopold-Guillaume est célébré pour
une valeur qui lui est chère (le Timor Domini), qui révèle sa sagesse
et dès lors inspire la confiance à son égard, comme le révèle le soustitre de la série (In Timore Domini Fiducia Serenissimo Leopoldo Archiduci), qui est volontairement ambigu : soit on lit « dans la crainte du
Seigneur, le Sérénissime Archiduc Léopold puise sa confiance (s.e. :
dans tout ce qu’il entreprend, il est confiant parce qu’il respecte
Dieu) » (datif comme marqueur de possession), soit on comprend
« dans la crainte du Seigneur, <se trouve> la confiance à l’égard du
Sérénissime Archiduc Léopold » (datif d’avantage). Dans un cas, on
célèbre la profonde piété de Léopold-Guillaume dont la confiance en
soi repose sur la crainte de Dieu ; dans l’autre, on adresse au gouverneur un aveu de confiance en raison de sa dévotion religieuse.
N’insistons pas et relevons seulement combien les ambiguïtés sont
essentielles dans l’économie des séries pour véhiculer plusieurs messages complémentaires, et combien les jeux de mots sont essentiels
dans le processus emblématique.
9
Voir les traductions dans Félix GAFFIOT, Le grand Gaffiot. Dictionnaire LatinFrançais, nouv. éd. rev. et augm. sous la dir. de Pierre FLOBERT, Paris, Hachette,
2000 (aux différents mots) ; et Alfred ERNOUT et Antoine MEILLET, Dictionnaire
étymologique de la langue latine : histoire des mots, 4e éd., 3e tirage / augm. d’add. et
de corrections nouv. par Jacques André, Paris, Klincksieck, 1979, p. 700 (s.v.
tremo) et p. 691-692 (s.v. timeo).
141
L’ambiguïté ne pose en général aucun problème de traduction. Il
n’y a aucune difficulté à traduire l’épigraphe vivit in armis (« il vit
dans son armure »), qui permet dans un recueil emblématique de
1650 de rapprocher le homard représenté sur la pictura et LéopoldGuillaume dont le titre nous dit qu’il est « infatigable dans son
armure » (Ser(enissi)mo Leopoldo, in armis indefesso)10.
Mais l’ambiguïté devient problématique pour le traducteur
lorsqu’elle se couple d’un jeu de mots, comme c’est souvent le cas
dans le corpus des emblèmes estudiantins bruxellois. De l’avis des
spécialistes, le jeu de mots est intraduisible. Dans une étude récente,
consacrée à la traduction des jeux de mots, Jacqueline Henry écrit
que « l’intraduisibilité commence exactement là où la forme devient
un élément signifiant »11. Un tel constat avait déjà été posé au
XVIIe siècle. Le jésuite Baltasar Gracián (1601-1658) écrit ainsi dès
1648 dans son Agudeza y Arte de Ingenio : « les traits par équivoque
ont pour défaut de ne pouvoir passer à une autre langue ; en effet,
comme tout leur artifice consiste en un mot à deux sens, en une
autre langue il est différent et ne possède pas cet avantage12 ». Les
jeux de mots sont donc toujours aussi difficiles à rendre, mais l’enjeu
est plus important lorsqu’ils sont au centre de la structure sémantique.
Il existe plusieurs cas de figure dans notre corpus. Au mieux, le
jeu de mots latin est fonctionnel en français ou s’y laisse comprendre. C’est le cas d’un emblème faisant partie de l’exposition de
1651 qui célèbre la victoire de Léopold-Guillaume à un concours de
tir organisé par une gilde d’arbalétriers ; d’où la récurrence du motif
10
11
12
Emblème conservé à la bibliothèque nationale d’Autriche, à Vienne : ÖNB,
Ms. 10.119, fol. 14r. Sur cet emblème, voir : Karel PORTEMAN, Emblematic
Exhibitions (affixiones)…, op. cit., p. 113 ; Franz AUMANN, « ‘Flandria liberata’. Een
merkwaardige kunstprent in 1653 door de stad Gent opgedragen aan landvoogd
Leopold Willem van Oostenrijk », dans Jozef MERTENS (ed.), Miscellanea Baliviae
de Juncis II. Verzamelde opstellen over Alden Biesen, Bilzen, « Bijdragen tot de
geschiedenis van de Duitse Orde in de balije Biesen, deel 6 », 2000, p. 265-305, à
la page 302 ; Renate SCHREIBER, « Ein galeria nach meinem humor », op. cit., 2004,
p. 150. Sur le dîner emblématique de 1650, voir Karel PORTEMAN, Emblematic
Exhibitions (affixiones)…, op. cit., p. 112-113 et Renate SCHREIBER, « Ein galeria nach
meinem humor », op. cit., p. 149-151.
Jacqueline HENRY, La traduction des jeux de mots, Paris, Presses Sorbonne
Nouvelle, 2003 (réimp. 2008), p. 97.
Baltasar GRACIÁN, La Pointe ou l’art du génie, traduction intégrale par Michèle
GENDREAU-MASSALOUX et Pierre LAURENS, préface de Marc FUMAROLI, Lausanne
/ Paris, L’Âge d’homme, 1983, p. 241.
142
de l’arbalète sur les images13. Dans cet emblème, dont la pictura
montre un putto, une arbalète posée sur l’épaule, l’élève utilise le
mot latin crux (qui signifie « la croix ») pour désigner l’arbalète
(cruciforme). Cela lui permet de jouer sur le mot crux, qui est dans
l’Antiquité un instrument de torture — d’où les sens secondaires de
malheur, fléau14 — et est depuis le Christianisme le symbole de la
Passion du Christ. D’où l’expression « porter sa croix », c’est-à-dire
« porter son fardeau, supporter le mal », qui permet à l’élève la
formulation d’un paradoxe : « Et bien que l’arc [=l’arbalète] soit une
croix [de forme], il n’a rien d’une croix [=d’un fardeau] » (poème,
v. 2 : Et quamuis crux est, nil crucis arcus habet). Le putto qui supporte
sa croix (son arbalète) figure Léopold-Guillaume, qui « considère
comme légère l’adversité qu’il supporte pour la patrie » (titre :
Ser(enissi)mo Leopoldo, aduersa pro patria leuia aestimanti15).
Toutefois, dans la majorité des cas, les jeux de mots ne fonctionnent plus en français. Restons en 1651, où la victoire anodine de
Léopold-Guillaume au tir fut envisagée comme un présage, sinon
comme les prémices, de sa future victoire dans le conflit armé qui
l’opposait à la France16. Or, si les Habsbourg étaient réputés pour
leur politique intransigeante à l’égard de l’hérésie (une position
présentée comme un signe de fermeté dans leur foi), la France était
plus tolérante et conciliante à l’égard des confessions réformées (ce
qui était vu à l’époque comme une foi plus lâche et une forme d’inconséquence).
En latin, « la foi » se dit fides, un mot que l’on peut confondre
avec un homonyme signifiant « la corde »17. Une coïncidence qui
permet un jeu de mots facile, comme l’atteste un emblème selon
lequel « toute sa force vient de sa fides » (épigraphe : vis omnis a fide
13
14
15
16
17
Voir Karel PORTEMAN, Emblematic Exhibitions (affixiones)…, op. cit., p. 116-118 ;
Renate SCHREIBER, « Ein galeria nach meinem humor », op. cit., p. 152-153.
Voir Félix GAFFIOT, Le grand Gaffiot. Dictionnaire Latin-Français, 2000, p. 451,
s.v. crux.
KBR, ms. 20.309, fol. 86v (pictura), 87r (poème) et 88v (titre et épigraphe).
Sabine VAN SPRANG, « In the Style of Isabella : Leopold Wilhelm’s Victory at the
Shooting Contest of the Brussels Crossbowmen in 1651 », communication nonpubliée prononcée au colloque No Man’s Land. The Twelve Years’ Truce and the
Unmaking of the Netherlands, 1609–1621 (25 et 26 septembre 2009, Anvers, Hof
van Liere, Université d’Anvers).
Nous abordons ce jeu de mots plus amplement dans une publication à paraître :
Anne-Emmanuelle CEULEMANS et Grégory EMS, Musica quid prodest ?
L’iconographie musicale dans les emblèmes estudiantins des collèges jésuites de
Bruxelles et Courtrai au XVIIe siècle.
143
est18). Ce jeu de mots fonde une analogie entre l’arbalète représentée
sur l’image (l’épigraphe se traduit alors : « toute sa force vient de sa
corde ») et le sens figuré (et élogieux) auquel l’élève vise, à savoir
célébrer Léopold-Guillaume « fort de sa foi en Dieu » (titre :
Ser(enissimo) Leopoldo, fide in Deum forti ; l’épigraphe se comprend
cette fois : « toute sa force vient de sa foi »). Le jeu de mots ne peut
donc être ni négligé ni minimisé. Une des solutions serait ici d’être
plus vague en traduisant : « toute sa force vient de là ». Le problème
est que cette phrase pourrait conduire le lecteur à penser que « de
là », c’est « de l’arme » ; or, le poème contraste l’arme (qui ne se
suffit pas) à la corde (nécessaire au bon fonctionnement de l’arbalète), tout comme la foi est nécessaire pour remporter la victoire au
combat.
Inversement, l’ennemi français privé de foi est comme l’arbalète
privée de corde : il devient inoffensif (épigraphe : Arma quae carent
fide / non sunt timenda : « il ne faut pas craindre les armes auxquelles
il manque une corde » ou « il ne faut pas craindre les armes
auxquelles il manque la foi19 »). Il faut constater ici l’échec de la
traduction qui au premier vers du poème doit donner deux
traductions pour le même mot fidem (v. 1 : Si nec arcus habet fidem nec
hostis… : « Si l’arc n’a pas de corde et l’ennemi pas de foi »). Une
solution pourrait être de traduire l’épigraphe par « il ne faut pas
craindre les armes auxquelles il manque une partie / l’essentiel ».
Cette traduction toutefois est inappropriée car elle manque de clarté
et fait perdre la finesse du jeu d’esprit qui se cache dans le texte
latin.
Ces exemples montrent l’importance du jeu de mots dans la
structure emblématique. Une des solutions proposées par les experts
du domaine pour traduire un jeu de mots est, à défaut, de pouvoir le
rendre fidèlement, d’en créer un semblable qui produise les mêmes
effets que dans la langue de départ20. Or, la nature bimédiale de
l’emblème qui mêle intimement texte et image impose d’énormes
contraintes et restreint les possibilités d’adaptation du jeu de mots
d’une langue à une autre : un sens en effet est figuré sur l’image et
l’autre forme le cœur du message que l’élève cherche à faire passer.
Un autre problème tient aux jeux de mots boîteux et en premier
lieu les jeux de mots fondés sur des associations qui imposent d’être
18
19
20
KBR, ms. 20.309, fol. 19v-20r.
KBR, ms. 20.309, fol. 44v-45r.
Voir Jacqueline HENRY, La traduction des jeux de mots, op. cit.
144
éclaircies. Par exemple, le concours à l’arbalète consistait à devoir
abattre un oiseau-cible dénommé en néerlandais papegay, c’est-à-dire
« perroquet ». Pour le désigner, les élèves utilisent psittacus (« perroquet ») mais aussi gallus, qui signifie le « coq » aussi bien que « le
Français21 ». Ce choix de gallus n’est évidemment pas anodin : le tir
du papegay est ici envisagé comme un présage de la future victoire
de Léopold-Guillaume sur l’ennemi français (le gouverneur a déjà
abattu un gallus et il ne lui reste plus qu’à en abattre un second). Ce
jeu de mots facile demande un tout petit peu plus de bonne volonté
de la part du lecteur, puisqu’il ne va pas de soi d’associer le papegay
à un coq.
Pire encore, lorsque les sens sur lesquels repose le jeu de mots
ne sont pas attestés même si le lecteur devine aisément. C’est le cas
pour le mot arcus, qui désigne l’arme (arc ou arbalète ; en latin
arcuballista ou manuballista) mais aussi toute une série d’autres objets
arqués : « arc-en-ciel », « voûte, arche, arcade », « arc de triomphe »,
« l’arc zodiacal » autant de sens bien attestés. En revanche, sa portée
sémantique extrêmement large n’inclut ni l’arche (arche de Noé ; en
latin arca) ni l’ancre (en latin ancora), que les élèves mettent en
rapport avec l’arc mais pour lesquels il existe d’autres mots propres.
Ces jeux de mots sont problématiques puisqu’ils ne sont théoriquement pas toujours ni pleinement fonctionnels. Les jeux de mots
imposent ici au lecteur (et avec lui, au traducteur) de jouer le jeu car
les associations sont quelque peu forcées. Ils sont pourtant
nécessaires au bon fonctionnement de l’emblème et aussi pour
véhiculer le message politique qui s’y cache. Il faut donc, tout en
sachant que le jeu de mots est inapproprié, le mettre en valeur dans
la traduction.
Pour conclure cette première partie, il faut souligner le rôle
essentiel que joue le traducteur : il ne peut pas se contenter de
traduire, car cela ne suffit pas à faire comprendre le texte : qui sait
encore que l’ancre est un symbole d’espoir, ou que l’arche de Noé
est un symbole d’alliance complémentaire de la présence de l’arc-enciel qui représente la paix ? Ces différents sens sont directement
convoqués dans les textes et nécessitent d’être explicités pour faire
comprendre les jeux d’esprits et la symbolique / sémantique qui se
cache dans les emblèmes. Le traducteur est ainsi souvent confronté à
de nombreux problèmes, parce qu’aux enjeux langagiers s’ajoutent
aussi des enjeux idéologiques. Le traducteur a donc bien un rôle de
21
Voir Renate SCHREIBER, « Ein galeria nach meinem humor », op. cit., p. 153.
145
médiateur culturel : il doit faciliter le bond chronologique et culturel
qu’impose la lecture d’un genre qui n’est plus en vogue, d’une
langue (synthétique) désormais morte mais qui fonctionnait à
l’époque comme l’anglais aujourd’hui, et d’une culture symbolique
qui peut aujourd’hui troubler et paraître nébuleuse.
Traduction et idéologie : Marie Stuart, enjeu de la polémique
Abordons maintenant le cas des traductions de pamphlets et
autres textes polémiques publiés à propos de Marie Stuart, reine de
France et d’Écosse, à la fin du XVIe siècle : un cas particulièrement
« emblématique » (pour ne pas faire de jeu de mots) de la situation
de traduction où le traducteur évolue entre texte-source et textecible tel un équilibriste sur une corde. L’étude de ce corpus de textes,
tous publiés et diffusés suivant plusieurs étapes importantes pour la
propagande en faveur de / ou contre la reine d’Ecosse, se révèle
riche de par la variété des manipulations, conscientes ou inconscientes, du texte par le traducteur, qui, bien davantage qu’un simple
intermédiaire, apparaît comme un acteur à part entière de la
construction de sens opérée pour le lecteur.
Selon les modifications, parfois très subtiles, opérées dans l’une
ou l’autre traduction, c’est un tout autre effet de lecture qui apparaît,
en lien avec l’identité du lecteur cible, et / ou du traducteur, ainsi
qu’avec le contexte dans lequel celui-ci évolue. On peut considérer
que la traduction fait traverser au texte des frontières externes bien
réelles — qu’elles soient géopolitiques, linguistiques ou confessionnelles — tout en modifiant en interne les « frontières » inhérentes au
texte, par jeu sur le paratexte (ajout ou suppression de dédicace, de
préface, de frontispices…). Les traductions ne restent pas systématiquement fidèles à l’environnement idéologique ou confessionnel
que celui de leur texte-source. En effet, il arrive que des textes
protestants soient traduits pour un lectorat catholique, et ce, à des
fins de propagande catholique, ou vice-versa. Dans son livre
Descriptive Translation Studies and beyond, Gideon Toury propose de
considérer les traductions « comme faits de la culture qui les
accueille22 ».
À travers cet exposé, nous illustrerons brièvement quelques
situations-types de modifications rencontrées dans les textes de ce
22
Gideon TOURY, Descriptive Translation Studies and beyond, Philadelphia, John
Benjamins, 1995, p. 24. Translations, according to him, must be regarded as
“facts of the culture which hosts them”.
146
vaste corpus, tout en tâchant de respecter une progression chronologique dans l’exposition de ces exemples.
Dès son accession au trône d’Écosse en 1561, Marie Stuart a été
confrontée à une situation difficile. Souveraine catholique, elle règne
sur un pays qui vient d’adopter le Calvinisme presbytérien comme
seule religion autorisée en Écosse, sous la houlette de John Knox.
Cette cohabitation ne se fit pas sans heurts et rapidement tous les
aspects de la vie et du règne de Marie Stuart suscitèrent la controverse parmi les Écossais : sa religion, sa politique matrimoniale, et la
funeste réputation dont elle hérita à la suite de la mort de son
deuxième mari et de son remariage rapide avec le principal suspect
du meurtre. De plus, les écrits polémiques à l’encontre de la reine
furent encouragés par les autorités anglaises sous Élisabeth Ire, qui,
outre le fait qu’elle était opposée à l’instauration d’un pouvoir catholique, craignait que Marie Stuart n’abandonne jamais ses prétentions
héréditaires au trône d’Angleterre.
Dans son traité publié en 1569, A defence of the honour of the right
highe, mightye and noble Princesse Marie Quene of Scotlande […], John
Leslie, évêque catholique écossais et fervent défenseur de la reine,
énumère de manière presque exhaustive les droits de Marie Stuart à
la couronne d’Angleterre. Plusieurs traductions de ce traité ont vu le
jour, toutes effectuées par Leslie lui-même : traduction partielle en
latin en 1580 et du latin à nouveau vers l’anglais en 1584. Or, même
dans le cas d’une auto-traduction, plusieurs différences notables
entre les éditions du texte sont à noter, qui concernent plus particulièrement l’appareil préfaciel des différentes traductions, ce qui nous
permet d’illustrer le rôle important que jouent ces préfaces.
Prenons pour exemple la préface de la nouvelle traduction en
anglais du traité, publiée en 158423, et qui se base sur une traduction
latine du livre datant de 1580, De illustrium foeminarum24. Dans cette
nouvelle traduction, un passage — absent de l’édition de 1569 —
insiste sur l’identité « anglaise » de Marie Stuart et son amour pour
le peuple anglais :
23
24
John LESLIE, A Treatise touching the right, title, and interest of the most excellent
Princesse Marie, Queene of Scotland, And of the most noble king Iames, her Graces
sonne, to the succession of the Croune of England […] Compiled and published before in
latin, and after in Englishe, by the right reverend father in God, Iohn Lesley, Byshop of
Rosse, Rouen, G. L’Oyselet, 1584.
John LESLIE, De illustrium foeminarum in repub(lica) administranda, ac ferendis
legibus authoritate libellus…, Rhemis, Ioannes Fognaeus, 1580.
147
Les Anglais ne doivent pas du tout considérer cette reine d’Écosse
comme une étrangère : si du moins elle est à considérer en une
quelconque façon comme telle. Car Écossais et Anglais sont des
chrétiens, habitent la même péninsule et ont la même langue, sans
oublier qu’ils sont imprégnés par à peu près les mêmes mœurs,
habitudes et lois. Voilà pourquoi, la différence qui sépare Écossais
et Anglais n’est nullement viable ici, surtout quand on parle de
Madame Marie Reine d’Écosse 25.
Dans la version anglaise de 1584, Leslie écrit :
Quant à la noblesse et au peuple d’Angleterre, ceci devrait les
pousser à l’aimer, car en elle coule du sang anglais de plusieurs
façons […]. Puisqu’elle démontre […] tant d’affection pour la nation
anglaise […]. Et que dire maintenant des signes et preuves de sa
piété dont elle fait montre en Angleterre, ou de sa courtoisie, de son
bon vouloir et de son amour de la nation anglaise 26.
Ces deux passages mettent en avant l’appartenance de Marie
Stuart à une même nation qui engloberait les peuples anglais et
écossais dans une esquisse de ce qui deviendra le Royaume-Uni. Le
texte latin met encore davantage l’accent sur la proximité des
Anglais et des Écossais, qui partagent, en outre, une même religion.
Toutefois, l’emplacement différent de ces deux extraits dans leur
texte respectif est, selon moi, significatif au niveau idéologique.
Alors que dans l’édition latine, cet extrait est placé dans le corps du
texte, il apparaît dans la dédicace de la traduction anglaise, qui est
adressée « au sacré et très puissant empereur », désignant à la fois
Élisabeth Ire et Jacques VI d’Ecosse, le fils de Marie Stuart et
l’« héritier pressenti » (heir apparent) de la couronne anglaise27. Ce
glissement de l’extrait vers la préface insiste véritablement sur les
25
26
27
« Talem alienigenam Angli hanc Scotoru(m) / Reginam minime existimare debent : si
tamen aliquo modo alienigena censenda sit. Scoti enim & Angli Christiani sunt &
eiusde(m) pene insulae incolae eiusde(m)que linguae, necnon iisdem fere moribus,
consuetudinibus ac denique legibus imbuti. Itaque haec distantia inter Scotos & Anglos
[…] nullo pacto hic congruit : maxime cum de D(omina) Maria Regina Scotiae agitur »
(ibid., fol. 7r-v).
John LESLIE, A Treatise touching the right, title, and interest, 1584 : “As for the
nobilitie and Commons of England, this should move them to love her, that she
is come so many wayes of English blood […]. ‘… that she was … so muche
affected toward the Englishe Nation…’ ‘What should I report of the signes and
tokens of her pietie wiche now she showeth in England, or of her Courtesie,
good will and love towarde the English Nation.”
John LESLIE, A Treatise touching the right (…), 1584. “To the sacred and most
mightie emperour.”
148
liens filiaux entre Marie Stuart et le futur souverain qui sera amené,
après le décès d’Élisabeth Ire sans succession, à réunir les couronnes
anglaises et écossaises, et de ce fait, à accomplir les visées de sa
mère. Il constitue donc un geste stratégique fort de la part de Leslie,
traducteur de son propre texte, dont les références initiales très
péjoratives à l’encontre de la reine d’Angleterre ont par ailleurs été
soigneusement édulcorées.
Les enjeux idéologiques gagnent en intensité au fur et à mesure
que le réseau des conspirations ourdies par Marie Stuart depuis sa
prison en Angleterre est mis à jour par les agents du gouvernement
anglais. Dans ce contexte, la moindre altération apportée au texte
par le traducteur produit des effets considérables sur la réception
d’un texte par le lecteur. À cet égard, la traduction du compte rendu
de l’exécution de Marie Stuart en 1587 fut sans doute la plus chargée
idéologiquement de toutes celles qui ont circulé sur la Reine
d’Écosse. Deux passages problématiques de ce texte sont abordés cidessous.
Tandis que la publication du premier récit d’exécution visait à
légitimer la mort de Marie Stuart, présentée comme une traîtresse à
la couronne, il fut interdit aux témoins catholiques de la scène de la
décapitation de quitter le Royaume durant les six mois qui suivirent
les faits ; ce qui n’empêcha pas les catholiques de faire paraître leur
propre version des événements en se basant sur le texte-source protestant, en l’amendant de façon à faire passer Marie Stuart pour une
martyre. Quelques changements très subtils, opérés à des niveaux
hautement symboliques, sont révélateurs de cette démarche.
Le premier point sur lequel les compte rendus protestants et
catholiques divergent concerne les conditions de détention de Marie
Stuart, maintenue en « résidence surveillée » en Angleterre pendant
dix-huit ans. Les récits publiés en allemand précisent que ces
conditions de détention étaient plutôt laxistes :
Pour Cologne, nous lisons : « Cette sus-mentionnée reine
d’Écosse… fut gardée pendant de longues années en Angleterre en
liberté surveillée (littéralement, ‘dans un emprisonnement libre’ [in
freyer Gefengnuß28]) ».
28
Gründliche und Eigentlich, Warhaffte Beschreibung…, sig. Aiv. : Diese vorgeschriebene Königin von Schotlandt… ist vor langen Jahren in Engellandt in freyer
Gefengnuß gehalten worden / […] [“This previously described Queen of
Scotland… has been kept in free imprisonment in England for long years […].”
(my translation and emphasis)].
149
Par contre, le compte rendu traduit en néerlandais, imprimé à
Anvers (en terre catholique), remplace astucieusement le mot
« libre » [« freyer »] par « strict », ce qui bouleverse considérablement l’impression suggérée par la lecture :
[…] Déjà, aussitôt qu’elle fut reconnue, elle fut emmenée prisonnière et placée immédiatement dans un ferme emprisonnement [in
strickte ghevanghenisse] avec ses gens dans le château de
Fotheringhay, dont les maîtres étaient les Lords Amyas Paulet et
Breudeny29.
Ensuite, un second point de discorde entre les traductions
intervient à un moment crucial du texte, dans un passage concernant
les dernières paroles de la reine d’Écosse. Dans le compte rendu
protestant officiel publié par les presses anglaises, il est relaté que
Marie Stuart supplie son serviteur, Melville, d’être le témoin de sa
mort en tant que « vraie écossaise, vraie française et fidèle à sa
religion30 ». En allemand, la traduction (elle aussi protestante) du
compte rendu, traduit ce passage assez fidèlement au texte
d’origine, en précisant la nature de sa « religion » :
(...) und du Melus solt mein zeuge sein / das ich sterbe eine
getrewe Schottische / getrewe Französische/ und eine getrewe
Catholische / wie das mein Profession jederzeit gewest (...)31.
La traduction latine, imprimée à Cologne, reproduit ce passage de
manière identique :
Fidēlis serve Melvin, … testis esto, me mori fidelem Scotam,
fidelem Francam, fidelem Catholicam, uti semper professa sum32.
29
30
31
32
Waerachtich Verhael…, sig. Aii. : « […] al-waer sy terstont bekent ende
ghevanghen is geworden / ende selve terstont ghescelt in strickte
ghevanghenisse met hare compaignie op het casteel ghenaemt Fodringan /
waer van de Casteleynen waren de Heeren Ammes Paulet / ende Breudeny
[…].”
Andrew MCLEAN (ed.), The Execution of Mary Queen of Scots, p. 18. “‘[…] but I
pray thee’, said she, ‘carry this message from me that I do die a true woman to
my religion and like a true woman of Scotland and France[…]’”.
Execution oder Todt ..., sig. Biv.
Mariae Suartae… Supplicium & Mors, sig A6r-6v.
150
Ces lignes sont aussi présentes dans la traduction en néerlandais.
Cependant, on observe un changement « de taille » :
Devant Melville […], je vous supplie d’être témoins que je meurs en
catholique, fidèle à l’Écosse et à la France [ick sterve Catholicq /
ghetrou het Schotlandt / ende Vranckrijc], comme je l’ai toujours
déclaré33.
La préposition de l’épithète « catholique » en tête de la déclinaison
de la triple identité de Marie Stuart, même si elle est très discrète à
l’échelle du texte entier, permet au traducteur d’infléchir l'attitude
de Marie Stuart face à la mort. En donnant l’impression que la
priorité de la reine est de mourir pour sa foi, avant sa patrie, le
traducteur catholique ouvre la voie au déferlement de publications
martyrologisantes visant à élever la reine d’Ecosse en égérie de la
cause catholique.
Conclusion
Au cours de cette présentation, nous avons envisagé deux cas
distincts. D’une part, celui du traducteur moderne qui, dans sa
traduction scientifique, doit rendre compte de tous les sens et rester
fidèle au sous-bassement idéologique des textes, qu’à défaut de
pouvoir traduire il lui faudra expliciter. D’autre part, nous avons
abordé le cas du traducteur de l’époque utilisant un texte
contemporain, qu’il traduit en le modifiant pour l’adapter à ses
propres idées et à ses propres intentions.
Un élément commun à l’un et l’autre cas est la problématique du
non-dit que véhiculent les langues (c’est-à-dire des messages qui ne
sont pas formulés clairement ou explicitement, mais qui sont
pourtant essentiels dans la lecture du texte, où toutes les potentialités du langage ou des langues sont mobilisées pour faire passer le
message). Le risque est toujours grand de mésinterpréter (c’est-àdire, d’interpréter à l’excès, ou sous-interpréter un aspect du texte
qui n’apparaît qu’entre les lignes). Étudier la traduction revient à
scruter, tout aussi attentivement qu’un historien du livre, le
33
Waerachtich Verhael, sig. Aiiiv. : Voorts Melvin 300 begheere ick op u dat ghy
wilt wesen ghetuyghe dat ick sterve Catholicq / ghetrou het Schotlandt / ende
Vranckrijc / waer van ick altijt tot noch toe professie hebbe ghedaen.
151
« filigrane » du non-dit du texte, qui se devine par transparence
entre deux états de texte.
Grégory EMS et Nathalie HANCISSE, « Traduction et ambiguïté du langage dans le
discours politique à l’époque de la première modernité : enjeux idéologiques »,
GEMCA : papers in progress, t. 2, no 1, 2013, p. 137-151, [En ligne].
Table des matières
Dossier : Renaissance Society of America 2013
Sponsored sessions by GEMCA
1. Jesuit & Spectacle
DEKONINCK Ralph, « Framing the Feast. The Meanings of Festive
Devices in the Spectacle Culture of the Southern
Netherlands » ......................................................................... p. 7
HEERING Caroline, « De la parure festive à l’expérience de
l’éphémère : étudier le sens de l’ornemental ou des
dispositifs de la métamorphose spectaculaire » ............. p. 21
CAPORELLA Cynthia Anne, « “Jesuita non cantat?” Evidence from the
Inaugural Year of the Roman Church of the Gesu » ...... p. 37
DELFOSSE Annick, « Jesuit Solemnities in the Southern Netherlands:
Immersion and Experience » ............................................. p. 45
2. Figurative Thinking and Mystical Experience
in the Baroque Age
GUIDERDONI Agnès, « Main Introduction to the Session » ........... p. 55
GUIDERDONI Agnès, « Mystical Theory and Emblematic Practice in
Sandaeus’s Works » ............................................................ p. 57
SMEESTERS Aline, « Maximilianus Sandaeus, S.J. (1578-1656),
Explorer of the Mystical Language » ................................ p. 63
MOREL Anne-Françoise, « Itineraries in 16th- and 17th-century
Spiritual Writings » ............................................................. p. 73
3. Queens in Reception: Catherine de’ Medici and Mary Stuart
HANCISSE Nathalie, « Has-Been Queens? Reception and
(Re)figuration of Catherine de’ Medici and Mary Stuart in
Translation »......................................................................... p. 83
154
Table des matières
PERRET Maxime, « Catherine de Médicis revue et corrigée par
Balzac : enquête sur une tentative de réhabilitation ».... p. 95
Varia
MOREL Anne-Françoise, « The Contested “Space” of the Æsthetic
Realm in the Seventeenth Century Church of
England » ............................................................................ p. 109
EMS Grégory et HANCISSE Nathalie, « Traduction et ambiguïté du
langage dans le discours politique à l’époque de la première
modernité : enjeux idéologiques » .................................. p. 137

référence - gemca - Université catholique de Louvain

Transcription

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