Excerpt: 2. S. Antony of Padua was not only one of the greatest, but, perhaps, the most popular, among the preachers of the Middle Ages. His extant Sermons, or, as they might rather be called, Sermon Notes, though coming down to us with all the disadvantages of their skeleton form, nevertheless evince a grasp of the Sacred Volume which well entitles him to the name bestowed on him by Gregory IX., -"The Ark of the Testament." That which he exemplifies in his discourses, he shows in a not less striking manner by the ...
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Excerpt: 2. S. Antony of Padua was not only one of the greatest, but, perhaps, the most popular, among the preachers of the Middle Ages. His extant Sermons, or, as they might rather be called, Sermon Notes, though coming down to us with all the disadvantages of their skeleton form, nevertheless evince a grasp of the Sacred Volume which well entitles him to the name bestowed on him by Gregory IX., -"The Ark of the Testament." That which he exemplifies in his discourses, he shows in a not less striking manner by the "Concordanti??? Morales," which are now, for the first time, presented to the English reader. 3. To enter into the question of the allegorical interpretation of Scripture in which the Middle Ages delighted, would require a volume instead of a preface. [Further remarks on this subject may be seen, if the reader wishes it, in the introduction to my Medi???val Preachers.] It is not denied that many of the passages adduced by S. Antony could scarcely be quoted to a modern audience in the sense in which he applies them. Nevertheless even from these, by way of illustration, if not by way of proof, a preacher of the present century might learn much, as a few examples, presently to be given will, perhaps, prove. 4. The "Moral Concordances" have come down to us in a very imperfect state. They were long supposed to be lost, and indeed considerable doubts were entertained whether such a book had ever existed. S. Antony died in 1231, and the manuscript was not discovered till about 1638, when it was disinterred in the library attached to the Church called Aracoeli, in Rome. It seems to have been published without very much attention to the correctness of its references; and as its author had, of course, merely referred to the chapter, without the verse, a great portion of the mistakes which occur may be owing to such (then necessary) vagueness of quotation. Further, it would seem that the subjects and the texts had been written in parallel columns, so that sometimes the verse which ought to have been last on one list, has found its way into the section which follows. The references are throughout most incorrectly given; one book even of Holy Scripture being sometimes substituted for another, while the chapters are very frequently wrong, and the verses in the later edition badly quoted in, perhaps, one instance out of three. 5. In the present edition all the references have been verified, and have been made to correspond with the authorised version
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