Part 17 (2/2)
”Yes, my child, but He told us plainly WHY He suffered. It was that we might learn to follow Him, and that there should be less suffering for the future. And surely we have not obeyed Him, or there could not be so much pain and difficulty in the world as there is now.”
”If He come again, you think He would be grieved and disappointed in His followers?” queried Manuel softly.
”If He came again, I fear He would not find much of His teaching in any of the creeds founded on His name! If He came again, then indeed might the churches tremble, totter and fall!”
”If He came again,” pursued Manuel, still in the same soft, even voice, ”how do you think He would come?”
”'Watch ye therefore for ye know not when He cometh,'” murmured the Cardinal,--”My dear child, I think if He came again it would be perhaps in the disguise of one who is poor and friendless 'despised and rejected of men,' as when He first glorified the earth by His presence; and I fear that in such plight He would find Himself, as before, unwelcome.”
Manuel made no reply just then, as they had arrived at home. The servant who admitted them told them that Donna Sovrani had a visitor in her studio,--so that the Cardinal and his young attendant went straight to their own apartments.
”Read to me, Manuel,” then said Bonpre, seating himself near the window, and looking out dreamily on the rich foliage of the woods and gra.s.sy slopes that stretched before him, ”Find something in the Gospels that will fit what we have seen to-day. I am tired of all these temples and churches!--these gorgeous tombs and reliquaries; they represent penances and thank-offerings no doubt, but to me they seem useless. A church should not be a shrine for worldly stuff, unless indeed such things are used again for the relief of poverty and suffering; but they are not used; they are simply kept under lock and key and allowed to acc.u.mulate,--while human creatures dwelling perhaps quite close to these shrines, are allowed to die of starvation. Did you think this when you spoke to the priest who was offended with you to-day?”
”Yes, I thought it,” replied Manuel gently, ”But then he said I was a heretic. When one loves G.o.d better than the Church is one called a heretic?”
Cardinal Bonpre looked earnestly at the boy's inspired face,--the face of a dreaming angel in its deep earnestness.
”If so, then I am heretic,” he answered slowly, ”I love the Creator as made manifest to me in His works,--I love Him in every flower which I am privileged to look upon,--I find Him in every art and science,--I wors.h.i.+p Him in a temple not made with hands,--His own majestic Universe! Above all churches,--above all formulated creeds and systems I love Him! And as declared in the divine humanity of Christ I believe in, and adore Him! If this makes me unworthy to be His priest and servant then I confess my unworthiness!”
He had spoken these words more to himself than Manuel, and in his fervour had closed his eyes and clasped his hands,--and he almost fancied that a soft touch, light as a falling rose-leaf, had for a second rested on his brow. He looked up quickly, wondering whether it was Manuel who had so touched him,--the boy was certainly near him,--but was already seated with the Testament open ready to read as requested. The Cardinal raised himself in his chair,--a sense of lightness, and freedom, and ease, possessed him,--the hopeless and tired feeling which had a few minutes since weighed him down with an undefinable languor was gone,--and his voice had gained new strength and energy when he once more spoke.
”You have found words of our Lord which will express what we have seen to-day?” he asked.
”Yes,” replied Manuel, and he read in a clear vibrating tone, ”Woe unto you scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites; because ye build the tombs of the prophets and garnish the sepulchres of the righteous.” Here he paused and said, while the Cardinal gazed at him wonderingly, ”Is not that true of Paris? There is their great Pantheon where most of their prophets lie,--their poets and their teachers whom they wronged and slandered in their lifetime--”
”My child,” interrupted Bonpre gently, ”Poets and so-called teachers are not always good men. One named Voltaire, who scoffed at G.o.d, and enunciated the doctrine of materialism in France, is buried there.”
”Nevertheless he also was a prophet,” persisted Manuel, in his quiet, half-childlike, half-scholarly way, ”A prophet of evil. He was the incarnation of the future spirit of Paris. He lived as a warning of what was to come,--a warning of the wolves that were ready to descend upon the Master's fold. But Paris was then perhaps in the care of those 'hirelings' who are mentioned here as caring not for the sheep.”
He turned a few pages and continued reading.
”'Well hath Esais prophesied of you, hypocrites, as it is written, This people honoureth me with their lips but their heart is far from me.
Howbeit in vain do they wors.h.i.+p me, TEACHING FOR DOCTRINE THE COMMANDMENTS OF MAN.'”
He emphasised the last few words and looked up at the Cardinal, then he went on.
”'Whosoever will come after me let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow me. For whosoever will save his life shall lose it, but whosoever shall lose his life for my sake the same shall save it.'”
”Yes,” said Cardinal Bonpre fervently, ”It is all there!--'Whosoever will come after me let him deny himself,' LET HIM DENY HIMSELF! That is the secret of it. Self-denial! And this age is one of self-indulgence.
We are on the wrong road, all of us, both Church and laity,--and if the Master should come He will not find us watching, but sleeping.”
He broke off, as at that moment a knock came at the door and a servant entered the room bringing him a letter. It was from the Abbe Vergniaud, and ran as follows:--
”TRES CHER MONSIGNEUR! I preach the day after tomorrow at Notre Dame de Lorette, and if you wish to do a favour to a dying man you will come and hear me. I am moved to say things I have never said before, and it is possible I may astonish and perchance scandalise Paris. What inspires me I do not know,--perhaps your well-deserved reproach of the other day--perhaps the beautiful smile of the angel that dwells in Donna Sovrani's eyes,--perhaps the chance meeting with your Rouen foundling on the stairs as I was flying away from your just wrath. He had been gathering roses in the garden, and gave me one with a grace in the giving which made the flower valuable. It still lives and blooms in a gla.s.s on my writing-table at which I have been jotting down the notes of what I mean to say. WHAT I MEAN TO SAY! There is more in those words than there seems, if you could but guess all! I shall trust to the day itself for the necessary eloquence. The congregation that a.s.sembles at the Lorette is a curious and a mixed one. 'Artistes' of the stage and the cafe chantant are among the wors.h.i.+ppers;--dames of rank and fas.h.i.+on who wors.h.i.+p the male 'artistes,' and the golden youth of Paris who adore the very points of the shoes of the female ones,--are generally there also. It is altogether what 'perfide Albion,' or Dame Grundee would call a 'fast' audience. And the fact that I have arranged to preach there will draw a still greater mixture and 'faster' quality, as I am, alas!--a fas.h.i.+on in preachers. I pray you to come, or I shall think you have not forgiven me!
”VERGNIAUD.”
Cardinal Bonpre folded the letter and put it aside with a curious feeling of compa.s.sion for the writer.
”Yes, I will go,” he thought, ”I have never heard him preach, though I know by report that he is popular. I was told once that he seems to be possessed by a very demon of mockery, and that it is this spirit which makes his attraction for the people; but I hope it is something more than that--I hope--” Here interrupting his meditations he turned to Manuel.
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