Part 11 (1/2)

This too was a place of burial, but no longer, as though opposite a tomb at the bottom of a dark cavern, but rather a cemetery where birds sang in the sun among the branches, you might have thought yourself in the country, twenty miles from Paris.

The decoration of this bright chapel tried, however, to be gloomy; it was like those wine shops whose walls are made to look like those of caves, with false stones painted in the imitation plaster. Only the height of the nave manifested the childishness of the imposture, and declared the vulgarity of the deception.

At the end was an altar above a smooth waxed floor, and on either side of it a grating with a black veil. According to the rule of Saint Francis, all the ornaments, the crucifix, the candlesticks, the tabernacle, were of wood, no object was to be seen in metal, no flower, the only luxury in the chapel consisted of two modern stained windows, one of which represented Saint Francis, the other Saint Clare.

Durtal thought the sanctuary airy and delightful, but he only stayed there a few minutes, for there was not here, as at the Carmelites, an absolute solitude, a sombre peace; here there were always two or three Poor Clares trotting about the chapel, who looked at him while they were arranging the chairs, and seemed surprised at his presence.

They were annoying to him, and he feared he was the same to them, so much so that he went away; but this short stay was enough to efface, or at least to lessen the funereal impression of the neighbouring convent.

Durtal returned home, at once much appeased and much disquieted--much appeased in regard to his temptations, much disquieted about what he should do next.

He felt rising in him, and increasing ever more and more, the desire to have done with these strifes and fears, but he grew pale when he thought of reversing his life, once for all.

But if he still had hesitation and fear, he had no longer the firm intention of resisting; he now accepted in principle the idea of a change of existence, only he tried to r.e.t.a.r.d the day, and put off the hour; he tried to gain time.

Then like people who grow angry at having to wait, on other days he wished to put off the inevitable moment no longer, and cried within himself that this must end; anything rather than remain as he was.

Then as this desire did not seem heard, he grew discouraged, would no longer think of anything, regretted the time past, and deplored that he felt himself carried along by such a current.

And when he was rather more cheerful, he tried again to examine himself.

”In fact I do not at all know how I stand,” he thought; ”this flux and reflux of different wishes alarms me, but how have I come to this point, and what is the matter with me?” What he felt, since he became more lucid, was so intangible, so indefinite, and yet so continuous that he was obliged to give up understanding it. Indeed every time he tried to examine his soul, a curtain of mist arose, and hid from him the unseen and silent approach of he knew not what. The only impression which he carried with him as he rose, was that it was less that he advanced towards the unknown, but that this unknown invaded him, penetrated him, and little by little took possession of him.

When he spoke to the abbe of this state, at once cowardly and resigned, imploring and fearful, the priest only smiled.

”Busy yourself in prayer, and bow down your back,” he said one day.

”But I am tired of bending my back, and of trampling always on the same spot,” cried Durtal. ”I have had enough of feeling myself taken by the shoulders and led I know not where, it is really time that in one way or another this situation came to an end.”

”Plainly.” And standing up, and looking him in the face, the abbe said, impressively,

”This advance towards G.o.d which you find so obscure and so slow is, on the contrary, so luminous and so rapid that it astonishes me, only as you yourself do not move, you do not take account of the swiftness with which you are borne along.

”Before long you will be ripe, and then without need to shake the tree you will fall off of yourself. The question we have now to answer is into what receptacle we must put you, when at last you fall away from your life.”

CHAPTER VII.

”But ... but ...” thought Durtal, ”we must at any rate come to an understanding; the abbe wearies me with his quiet a.s.sumptions, his receptacle in which he must place me. He does not, I suppose, think of making me a seminarist or a monk; the seminary, at my age, is devoid of interest, and as to the convent, it is attractive from the mystical point of view, and even enticing from the artistic standpoint, but I have not the physical apt.i.tudes, still less the spiritual predispositions to shut myself up for ever in a cloister; but putting that aside, what does he mean?

”On the other hand he has insisted on lending me the works of Saint John of the Cross, and has made me read them; he has then an aim, for he is not a man to feel his way as he walks, he knows what he wishes and where he is going; does he imagine that I am intended for the perfect life, and does he intend to put me on my guard by this course of reading against the disillusions which, according to him, beginners experience?

His scent seems to fail him there. I have a very horror of bigotry, and pious polish, but though I admire, I do not feel at all drawn towards the phenomena of Mysticism. No, I am interested in seeing them in others, I like to see it all from my window, but will not go downstairs, I have no pretension to become a saint, all that I desire is to attain the intermediate state, between goody-goodiness and sanct.i.ty. This is a frightfully low ideal, perhaps, but in practice it is the only one I am capable of attaining, and yet!

”Then these questions have to be faced! If I am mistaken and am obeying false impulses, I am, as I advance, on the verge of madness. How, except by a special grace, am I to know whether I am in the right way, or walking in the dark towards the abyss? Here, for instance, are those conversations between G.o.d and the soul so common in the mystical life; how can one be sure that this interior voice, these distinct words not heard with bodily ears, but perceived by the soul in a clearer fas.h.i.+on than if they came by the channels of sense, are true, how be sure that they emanate from G.o.d, not from our imagination or from the devil himself?

”I know, indeed, that Saint Teresa treats this matter at length in her 'Castles of the Soul,' and that she points out the signs by which we can recognize the origin of the words, but her proofs do not seem to me always as easy to discern as she thinks.

”'If these expressions come from G.o.d,' she says, 'they are always accompanied by an effect, and bring with them an authority which nothing can resist; thus a soul is in affliction, and the Lord simply suggests the words ”trouble not thyself,” and at once the whirlwind pa.s.ses, and joy revives. In the second place, these words leave an indissoluble peace of mind, they engrave themselves on the memory, and often cannot be effaced.'

”'In the other case,' she continues, 'if these words proceed from imagination or from the demon, none of these effects are produced, a kind of uneasiness, anguish and doubt torments you, moreover the expressions evaporate in part, and fatigue the soul which endeavours in vain to recall them in their entirety.'