Cornelius

“ Without it, he would have felt alternately suffocated and exhausted by an existence, at once so gaudy and overdone, and yet so intolerably empty; in which people, even at their best, seemed only to be brooding, like the wise emperor himself, over a world’s disillusion. For with all the severity of Cornelius, there was such a breeze of hopefulness—freshness and hopefulness, as of new morning, about him. For the most part, as I said, those refusals, that reserve of his, seemed unaccountable. ”

“ Since I had known him, I could not remember the time when the thought of Cornelius had not been to me as the daily bread of my heart. There had been familiarity in my deepest tenderness, and lingering passion in my very freedom. I had felt intuitively that I could not make my love for a man, young and not of my blood, too sacred and too pure, and that love ever craving for a more perfect, more entire union, had caught eagerly at these shadows of what it sought. ”

“ The young man called to mind the many traditions which made Cornelius a personage both curious and formidable. Though quite decided through the violence of his love to enter that house, and stay there long enough to accomplish his design, he hesitated to take the final step, all the while aware that he should certainly take it. But where is the man who, in a crisis of his life, does not willingly listen to presentiments as he hangs above the precipice? A lover worthy of being loved, the young man feared to die before he had been received for love’s sake by the countess. ”

“ O Cornelius, it won't be lucky for us when father hears about
Ellen and Matt.
CORNELIUS
That's true. No man sees his house afire but looks to his rick.
SALLY Come down a bit of the road with me, Cornelius. The sow will be grunting and grunting, reminding father that I'm away. Och, a minute ago I was as contented as if there was no land or pigs, or harsh words to trouble one. (She goes to the door) The boys and girls for America are coming here.
CORNELIUS Give me your hands to hold, Sally. (She gives him her hands) We are as young as any of them after all. ”

“ He was a wise philosopher, but had no acquaintance with any spirits but those clad in flesh and blood. His science was simply human; and human science, I soon persuaded myself, could never conquer nature's laws so far as to imprison the soul for ever within its carnal habitation. Cornelius had brewed a soul-refreshing drink--more inebriating than wine--sweeter and more fragrant than any fruit: it possessed probably strong medicinal powers, imparting gladness to the heart and vigor to the limbs; but its effects would wear out; already were they diminished in my frame. ”

“ The old woman made a gesture as if to take the lamp.
“Do you mean to leave us alone, without light?” cried Cornelius, in a meaning tone of voice. “At your age can’t you see in the dark? It isn’t difficult to find a key.”
The sister understood the meaning hidden beneath these words and left the room. Looking at this singular creature as she walked towards the door, Philippe Goulenoire was able to hide from Cornelius the glance which he hastily cast about the room. ”

“ The declaration of the angel to Cornelius in the same passage, “Thy prayers and thine alms are come up for a memorial before God,” they most wickedly pervert to prove that the practice of good works prepares a man to receive the grace of God. For Cornelius must have been already illuminated with the Spirit of wisdom, since he was endued with the fear of God, which is true wisdom; and he must have been sanctified by the same Spirit, since he was a follower of righteousness, which the apostle represents as one of the Spirit’s most certain fruits. ”

“ Cornelius, as a Roman officer, would be tempted to feel the usual contempt for one of the subject race, and, unless his eagerness to know more of God's will overbore his pride, to kick at the idea of sending to beg the favour of the presence and instruction of a Jew, and of one, too, who could find no better quarters than a tanner's house. The angel's voice commanded, but it did not compel. Cornelius bore the test, and neither waived aside the vision as a hallucination to which it was absurd for a practical man to attend, nor recoiled from the lowliness of the proposed teacher. ”

“ It would be well for the reader to reflect on the character of Cornelius before the angel visited him. He was not a pagan Gentile, or a wicked sinner in danger of hell fire; but a proselyte of righteousness, or an outer-court worshipper. "He was a just and devout man, and one that feared God with all his house; gave much alms to the Jews, among whom he was of good report; and he prayed to God always." No better man, lay or clerical, can be produced from any modern sect than Cornelius. ”

“ Cornelius is devout and liberal and God-fearing, and therefore a heavenly visitor directs his way to still fuller light and grander revelations, and Cornelius the centurion of the Italian band leads the Gentile hosts into the fulness of blessing, the true land flowing with milk and honey, found only in the dispensation of Jesus Christ and within the borders of the Church of God. This was God's course of dealing with the Roman centurion, and it is the course which the same loving dealings still pursues with human souls truly desirous of Divine guidance. ”

“ Why did I remember the tender caresses of my dead father, and the embrace of Cornelius in the garden, and feel very dreary and desolate? Providence often answers our feelings and our thoughts in a manner that is both touching and strange. Ere long the door again opened; I looked up, and saw—Cornelius O'Reilly. ”

“ From that evening I could not say that Cornelius was less kind or seemed less fond of me, but I vaguely felt a change in his manner; something lost and gone I could neither understand nor recall. At first I was rather uneasy about it, then I attributed it to his painting, with which he was wholly engrossed. "The Young Girl Reading," had been finished for some time, and he was hard at work on his two Italian pictures. Never did he seem to have loved painting better; never to have given it more of his soul and heart. ”

“ You recollect that the Lord sent an angel, as he always does when he has a Church on the earth, to a certain man called Cornelius. This man had been praying, he wanted to know how to be saved. The Lord had heard his prayers, and had sent an angel to him, and the angel said to him, "Cornelius, thy prayers are heard, and have come up before the Lord as a memorial. Now send to Joppa for one Simon, whose surname is Peter, and he will tell you words whereby you and your house will be saved." What! Cornelius not in a state of salvation, and he a praying man? ”

“ Of all his valuable compositions, nothing remains but his lives of the illustrious Greek and Roman generals, which have often been attributed to Æmylius Probus, who published them in his own name in the age of Theodosius, to conciliate the favour and the friendship of that emperor. The language of Cornelius has always been admired, and as a writer of the Augustan age, he is entitled to many commendations for the delicacy of his expressions, the elegance of his style, and the clearness and precision of his narrations. ”

“ I took off my bonnet and suspended it from the branches of the willow; I sat again beneath it; Cornelius unconsciously took the very attitude in which I remembered him—half reclining on the bank, with his brow resting on the palm of his hand. The same bending trees above, with their glimpses of blue sky; the same clear stream flowing on, with its silent world below, and its green wilderness beyond; the same murmur of low and broken sounds around us; the same sweet sense of freshness and solitude made past weeks seem like one unbroken summer day. ”

“ What was it to me that Cornelius left me his love and his kindness, when I knew and felt, with a keener bitterness than words can convey, that I had for ever lost his esteem? Did I, could I, care for an affection from which the very life had departed? No; child as I was in years, something within me revolted from the mere thought of his tenderness and endearments. If he believed me guilty, then let him hate and detest me: sweeter would be his aversion than such fondness as he could bestow on one whom, the more he forgave her, the more he must despise. ”

“ Another man to hang for you! Hola, Tristan!”
The grand provost, who was walking up and down the courtyard, came with slow steps, like a dog who exhibits his fidelity. The group paused under a tree. The king sat down on a bench and the courtiers made a circle about him.
“Sire, a man who pretended to be a Fleming has got the better of me—” began Cornelius. ”

“ As no church could be organized at the house of Cornelius at that time, these ordinances had to be postponed. In truth, their introduction and observance must always be guarded with care, lest they be abused and perverted, as they were at Corinth some years later. But of this we are sure: "If there be first a willing mind, it is accepted of a man according to that which he hath, and not according to that which he hath not."
I cannot close without a few reflections on what has been said. When Cornelius was told what to do, he did not hesitate a moment. Forthwith he sent for Peter. ”

“ Each rests upon the same false assumption, that the works done by Cornelius were done in his own strength, "before" and independently of "the inspiration of God's Holy Spirit," (Art. 13) ; since otherwise there were no question, on the part of the Schoolmen, of "grace of congruity;" for as the prayers, the almsgiving, the fasting of Cornelius were the fruit of faith in God, and of the guidance of His Spirit, the imparting of "grace after grace" has nothing to do with the question of human fitness. ”

“ A great many, to prove that baptism and laying on of hands are not necessary, have cited the case of Cornelius, who, though he was not baptized, received the Holy Ghost. The case of Cornelius is the only case of the kind on record, and there were strong reasons why it should be as it was with him. The Gospel and its ordinances were administered only to the Jews; Cornelius was a Gentile, and between the two races strong prejudices existed, the Jews looking upon the Gentiles as far inferior to them. ”

“ Tradition tells very little about Cornelius. There is indeed a long article devoted to him by the Bollandists, Acta Sanctorum, Feb. t. 1, p. 280, but there is nothing in it. He is commemorated on Feb. 2nd. The Greeks make him bishop of Scepsis, the Latins of Cæsarea. St. Jerome says that in his time the house of Cornelius had been turned into a church. The story of his life as told in the Martyrologies is evidently a mere mediæval concoction. At Scepsis the prefect Demetrius brings him into a temple of Apollo, when at his prayer the idol is smashed to pieces and the magistrate converted. ”

“ There has been much difference of opinion as to whether the centurion Cornelius had joined himself in any recognised degree to the Jewish religion before this incident, and a majority of critics maintain that he is represented as a Proselyte of the Gate. (1) The terms in which he is described, [———] , certainly seem to indicate this, and probably the point would not have been questioned but for the fact that the writer evidently intends to deal with the subject of Gentile conversion, with which the representation that Cornelius was already a proselyte would somewhat clash. ”

“ This fact seemed the more extraordinary because it was known to be the miser’s custom to lock up his sister at night in a bedroom with iron-barred windows.
As he grew older, Cornelius, constantly robbed, and always fearful of being duped by men, came to hate mankind, with the one exception of the king, whom he greatly respected. He fell into extreme misanthropy, but, like most misers, his passion for gold, the assimilation, as it were, of that metal with his own substance, became closer and closer, and age intensified it. ”

“ In 1825, appointed Director of the Academy of Painting at Munich. In 1841, summoned to Berlin by the King of Prussia, for whom Cornelius designed the “Shield of Faith,” presented by his Majesty to his godson, the Prince of Wales. Cornelius paints with the passionate sensibility and delicate perception of a true poet. His copious imagination is never at fault, and his ability to produce is as striking as his faculty of conception. Yet he never oversteps the modesty of nature, or the confines of true art. ”

“ We recognise in the case of Cornelius the working of that great principle of the kingdom of God often enunciated by the great Master: "To him that hath shall be given, and he shall have more abundantly," "If any man will do His will, he shall know of the doctrine"; or, to put it in other language, that God always bestows more grace upon the man who diligently uses and improves the grace which he already possesses; a principle which indeed we see constantly exemplified in things pertaining to this world as well as in matters belonging to the spiritual life. Thus it was with Cornelius. ”

“ I. An account given us of this Cornelius, who and what he was, who was the first-born of the Gentiles to Christ. We are here told that he was a great man and a good man—two characters that seldom meet, but here they did; and where they do meet they put a lustre upon each other: goodness makes greatness truly valuable, and greatness makes goodness much more serviceable. 1. Cornelius was an officer of the army, v. 1. He was at present quartered in Cesarea, a strong city, lately re-edified and fortified by Herod the Great, and called Cesarea in honour of Augustus Cæsar. ”