Book Description

Excerpt from Lays of the Saintly: The New Golden Legend A book of this kind, however harmless in its purpose, may yet be judged by some people to need a few words of apology. Despite the wide toleration of the present day, there are still persons who take exception to the humorous treatment of any subject even remotely connected with religion; and others who see in every jocose allusion to Saints and Miracles a studied irreverence towards the Roman Catholic form of Christianity. No such offence, however, is herein intended; the object of raillery being, not any existing religion, but merely the superstition of the Middle Ages. Even this has only called forth a sort of good-natured ridicule, much in the same way as the Nursery Stories of our childhood, which may still afford entertainment, although we have long ceased to believe in them, or regard them with serious interest. The Saints of old were doubtless most meritorious personage?, who did their best according to their lights, but their lights were not our lights, and the stronger illumination of nineteenth century knowledge has cast them and their miraculous doings into the cold shade of myth and fable. Even their boasted virtues have become obsolete, and modem ideas of duty are very much at variance with those they entertained. To wear an iron belt night and day, to go without food for six weeks, to stand upon a pillar for twenty years, are not now-a-days the most accepted methods of getting to Heaven. But the records of the worthies who are credited with these extravagant feats of pious servour have come down to us in such an exaggerated and distorted form that, while we may preserve some sympathy and respect for the Saints themselves, we can have none for their unveracious or over-credulous biographers. Another objection may be that the author has trespassed on the preserves of the immortal "Thomas Ingoldsby." About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.