Changing Images of Roman Catholic Religious Orders in the Nineteenth Century

Abstract

‘“Camelot-Camelot:” said I to myself “I don’t seem to remember hearing of it before. Name of the asylum, likely.”’ so said Mark Twain’s Connecticut Yankee at King Arthur’s Court. But the irony is that the joke is now on Twain. In examining The Discovery of the Asylum, David J. Rothman has persuasively argued that the American asylum which developed in the 1820s and 1830s served a dual purpose. It would create the correct desirable attitudes within its inmates and by virtue of its success, set an example of right action to the larger society. The well-ordered asylum would exemplify the proper principles of social organisation and thus insure the safety of the republic and promote its glory. My purpose is to suggest that the monastery in Europe served a similar purpose. Europeans faced similar social and political problems to Americans and the rediscovery of monasticism paralleled the growth of American institutions and served a similar purpose in the public arena. In the process a more tolerant and sympathetic attitude towards religious orders emerged.