Southern Christian Advocate

From the Church of England Magazine
NUNNERIES OF ROME

I went one morning to the chapel of a neighbouring convent, to see some of the ceremonies connected with the profession of a nun. Around the altar stood the lady-abbess, and four novices who were about to confirm their vows. A cardinal sat in a chair of state within the rails of the altar; attended by other ecclesiastics. When mass had been performed, the novices knelt one by one at the feet of the cardinal; and, the lady-abbess having removed the covering from the head of each young lady, a pair of scissors were given to him, with which he cut off the hair of the novitiate. After this ceremony was performed, the latter stood up, and taking a truss of her own hair from the golden salver on which it had been deposited, threw it on the ground with an exclamation expressive of her entire renunciation of the pomps and vanities of the world. There was something in the countenances of the priests during the ceremony, that I did not at all like: they bore a sarcastic expression, as if they secretly despised the poor creatures who were thus voluntarily sacrificing their liberty.

The number of persons who are thus immured for life in Italy, is very great. In 1830, in the metropolitan city alone, were 2,023 monks and friars, and 1,466 nuns.

In some convents the laws possess little rigor; but in others the inmates are exposed to great privations and hardships. The capuchin nuns wear, in remembrance of the crown of thorns, a band of coarse linen, wound tightly several times round their heads; and even in dangerous illness this is not taken off. Other more severe mortifications are imposed, such as wearing sackcloth,
One who was once an inhabitant of a monastery in Rome, but who has been led by divine grace to forsake the errors of Roman Catholicism, thus writes of a member of her own family, who fell a victim to these austerities:

'I had a sister, amiable and good in a superior degree. At the age of twenty she left an infirm mother to the care of servants and strangers, and shut herself up in a convent, where she was not allowed to see even the nearest relations. With a delicate frame, requiring every indulgence to support it in health, she embraced a rule which denied her the comforts of the lowest class of society. A coarse woolen frock fretted her skin: her feet had no covering but that of shoes open at the toes, that they might be exposed to the cold of a brick floor. A couch of bare planks was her bed, and an unfurnished cell her dwelling. Disease soon filled her conscience with fears: and I had often to endure the torture of witnessing her agonies at the confessional. I left her when I quitted Spain, dying much too slowly for her only chance of relief. I wept bitterly at her loss two years after; yet I could not be so cruel as to wish her alive.'

The idea that the performance of such works as these is meritorious in the sight of God, appears to be the principal inducement to them. The poor recluse is taught by her spiritual guide, that she may assist in the work of salvation, forgetting that Christ is the end of the law for righteousness to every one that believeth.