NOT ONLY did Christians in the ages of faith observe fasts with much greater intensity during the 40 days of Lent, they also abstained from legal proceedings, hunting and war under edicts of various rulers.

Dom Prosper Guéranger, in his “History of Lent, describes these times of calm and reflection which “ennobled the soul.”

In the 4th century, we have the Emperor Constantine the Great enacting, that no military exercises should be allowed on Sundays and Fridays, out of respect to our Lord Jesus Christ, who suffered and rose again on these two days, as also in order not to disturb the peace and repose needed for the due celebration of such sublime mysteries. The discipline of the Latin Church, in the 9th century, enforced everywhere the suspension of war, during the whole of Lent, except in cases of necessity. The instructions of Pope St. Nicholas the First to the Bulgarians recommend the same observance; and we learn, from a letter of St. Gregory the Seventh to Desiderius, Abbot of Monte Cassino, that it was kept up in the 11th century [Ibid. tom. x]. We have an instance of its being practised in our own country, in the 12th century, when, as William of Malmesbury relates, the Empress Matilda, Countess of Anjou, and daughter of King Henry, was contesting the right of succession to the throne against Stephen, Count of Boulogne. The two armies were in sight of each other;- but an armistice was demanded and observed, for it was the Lent of 1143.

Our readers have heard, no doubt, of the admirable institution called God’s Truce, whereby the Church, in the 11th century, succeeded in preventing much bloodshed. It was a law that forebade the carrying arms from Wednesday evening till Monday morning, throughout the year. It was sanctioned by the authority of Popes and Councils, and enforced by all Christian Princes. It was a continuing, during four days of each week of the year, the Lenten discipline of the suspension of war. Our saintly King, Edward the Confessor, gave a still greater extension to it, by passing a law, (which was confirmed by his successor, William the Conqueror,) that God’s Truce should be observed, without cessation, from the beginning of Advent to the Octave of Easter, from the Ascension to the Whitsuntide Octave; on all the Ember Days; on the Vigils of all feasts; and, lastly, every week, from None on Wednesday till Monday morning, which had been already prescribed.

In the Council of Clermont, held in 1095, Pope Urban the Second, after drawing up the regulations for the Crusades, used his authority in extending the God’s Truce, as it was then observed during Lent. His decree, which was renewed in the Council held the following year at Rouen, was to this effect: that all war proceedings should be suspended from Ash Wednesday to the Monday after the Octave of Pentecost, and on all Vigils and Feasts of the Blessed Virgin and the Apostles, over and above what was already regulated for each week, that is, from Wednesday evening to Monday morning.

Thus did the world testify its respect for the holy observances of Lent, and borrow some of its wisest institutions from the seasons and feasts of the liturgical year. The influence of this Forty-Days’ penance was great, too, on each individual. It renewed man’s energies, gave him fresh vigour in battling with his animal instincts, and, by the restraint it put upon sensuality, ennobled the soul. Yes, there was restraint everywhere; and the present discipline of the Church, which forbids the Solemnisation of Marriage, during Lent, reminds Christians of that holy continency, which, for many ages, was observed during the whole Forty Days as a precept, and of which the most sacred of the liturgical books – the Missal – still retains the recommendation. [bold added; citations removed]

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