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 VISION

477

VISIONS

From Africa found an asylum among ilic Visigothe, and Euric's miniwtor, Loo, was a Catholic.

Wlien King Clovis and his Krankish followers accepted Cathohcism, Clovis undertook to drive the "heretics" out of Gaul. The Cathohe clergy made comnion cause with the Franks and Alaric II (485- 507) took severe measures against them, but was not otherwise a persecutor of the Church. In 507 Alaric was defeated and .'ilain by Clovis. Almost all of Visigothic Gaul now fell to the Franks, the last remnant during the reign of Amalaric (526-31). The seat of government was transferred to Si)ain where Toledo became the capital. The succeeding era was fairly peaceful. The Cathohcs received unlimited tolerance, so that the Church constantly increased in strength while the Visigothic nation and kingdom grew steadily weaker. The nobility enthroned and deposed kings at pleasure; of thirty- five kings seventeen were murdered or deposed. Arianism, isolated after the destruction of the Ostro- gothic and Vandalic kingdoms, constantly declined but was revi\ed during the reign of Leovigild (.'JIJS- 86). His son Hermenigild revolted against him but was defeated and beheaded. Later narratives repre- sent Hermenigild as a martyr for Catholicism, his wife, a Frankish princess, having converted him, but contemporary authorities say nothing of it. Leovigild made a vain effort to win the Catholics by a conciliatory confession of faith drawn up by an Arian synod at Toledo. His son Reccared (58(3- 601) became a Catholic and the Visigoths soon followed his example. With this began the amalga- mation of Roman and German elements in Spain. In law and politics the Romans became Gothic, the Goths in social hfe and religion became Roman. The Catholic Church was the national and established Church, while connexion with Rome ceased almost entirely. The court of highest instance was the nationalcouncil at Toledo. The king appointed the bishops and convoked the council. But the constant struggles of the royal house with the secular and spiritual aristocracy caused the downfall of the nation. From the middle of the seventh century the Arabs were masters of North Africa. In 711 they forced their way into Spain under Tarik. King Roderick was defeated at Jerez de la Frontera, and the Arabs acquired almost the whole of Spain. The Romans and Goths coalesced, forming the Spanish nation which succeeded later in driving the Arabs out of the peninsula.

Abchbach, Gesch. der Weslgoten (Frankfort, 1827); Dahn, Die Kinige der Germanen, V. VI (Wurzburg, 1870-71); Bradi^y, The Goths (London, 1898); Hodgkin, Italy and her Invaders: I. The Visigothic Invasion (London, 1880); Schmidt, Gesch. der deutschen Stammen. I (Berlin. 1905-07), ii, lii; Gobres. Kirche u. Stoat im Weslgolenreich in Theolagische Sludien u. Kritiken (1893), 708-34; Shaw, The Fall of the Visigothic Power in Spain in English His- torical Retien; XXI

Klemens Loffler. Vision, Beatific. See Beatific Vision; Heaven.

Visions. — This article will deal not with natural but with supernatural visions, that is, visions due to the direct intervention of a power superior to man. Cardinal Bona (De discret. spir., xv, n. 2) distinguishes between visions and apparitions. There is an appari- tion when we do not know that the figure which we see relates to a real being, a vision when we connect it with a real being. With most mystics we shall consider these terms as synonymous. Since St. Augustine (De gen. ad litt., 1. XII, vii, n. 16) mystical wTiters have agreed in dividing visions into corporeal, imaginative, and intellectual.

(1) Corporeal vision is a supernatural manifesta- tion of an object to the eyes of the body. It may take place in two ways: either a figure really present externally strikes the retina and there determines the physical phenomenon of the vision; or an agent super- ior to man directly modifies the visual organ and

produces in the composite a sensation equivalent to that which an external object would produce. Accord- ing to the authorities the first is the usual manner; it corresponds to the invincible belief of the seer, e. g. Bernadette at Lourdes; it imphes a minimum of miraculous intervention if the vision is prolonged or if it is common to several persons. But the presence of an external figure may be understood in two ways. Sometimes the very substance of the being or the person will be presented; sometimes it will be merely an appearance consisting in a certain arrangement of luminous rays. The first may be true of living per- sons, and even, it would seem, of the now glorious bodies of Christ and the Blessed Virgin, which by the eminently probable supernatural phenomenon of multilocation may become present to men without leaving the abode of glory. The second is realized in the corporeal apparition of the unresurrected dead or of pure spirits.

(2) Imaginative vision is the sensible representation of an object by the action of the imagination alone, without the aid of the visual organ. Sometimes the subject is aware that the object exists only in his imagination, that it is a purely reproduced or com- posite image. Sometimes he projects it invincibly without, which is the case in supernatural hallucina- tion. In natural imaginative vision the imagination is stirred to action solely by a natural agent, the will of the subject, an internal or an external force, but in supernatural imaginative vision an agent superior to man acts directly either on the imagination itself or on certain forces calculated to stir the imagination. The sign that these images come from God lies, apart from their particular vividness, in the lights and graces of sincere sanctity which accompany them, and in the fact that the subject is powerless to define or fix the elements of the vision. Such efforts most frequently result in the cessation or the abridgement of the vision. Imaginative apparitions are ordinarily of short duration, either because the human organism is unable to endure for a long time the violence done to it, or imaginative visions soon give place to intel- lectual visions. This kind of visions occur most fre- quently during sleep; such were the dreams of Pharao and Nabuchodonosor (Gen., xh; Daniel, ii). Cardinal Bona gives several reasons of expediency for this frequency: during sleep the soul is least divided by multiphcity of thoughts, it is more passive, more inclined to accept, and less inclined to dispute; in the silence of the senses the images make a more vivid impression.

It is often difficult to decide whether the vision is corporeal or imaginative. It is certainly corporeal (or extrinsic) if it produces external effects, such as the burnt marks left on objects by the passing of the devil. It is imaginative if, for example, the image persists after one has closed one's eyes, or if there are no traces of the external effects which ought to have been produced, such as when a ball of fire appears above a person's head without injuring it. The time most conducive to these visions is the state of ecstasy, when the exercise of the external senses is suspended. However, although the question has been discussed among mystics, it seems that they may also be pro- duced outside this state. This is the opinion of Alvarez de Paz (De grad. contemp., 1., V, pt. Ill, cii, t. 6) and of Benedict XIV (De servorum Dei beatif., 1. Ill, 0. i, n. 1). Imaginative vision may be either representative or symbolic. It is representative when it presents an image of the ver>' object intended to be made known: such may have been the apparition to Blessed Joan of Arc of St. Catherine and St. Margaret, if it was not (which is more probable) a luminous vision. It is symbolic when it indicates the object by means of a sign: such were the apparition of a ladder to Jacob, the apparition of the sun, moon, and stars to the Patriarch Joseph, as were also numerous