Part 40 (2/2)
He was in agony, and suddenly, as though he had come to overlook his ministers, and to see if his orders were carried out, the executioner himself entered on the scene. Durtal did not see him, but felt him, and it was indescribable. Since he had the impression of a real demoniac presence, his whole soul trembled and desired to fly, like a terrified bird that clings to the window-panes.
And it fell back exhausted; then unlikely as it may appear, the parts of his life were inverted, the body was upright, and held its own, commanding the terrified soul, repressed this panic in a furious tension.
Durtal perceived very plainly and clearly for the first time the distinction, the separation of the soul from the body, and for the first time also, he was conscious of the phenomenon of a body, which had so tortured its companion by its needs and wants, to forget all its hatred in the common danger, and hinder her who resisted it, the habit of sinking.
He saw that in a flash, and suddenly all vanished. It seemed that the Demon had taken himself off, the wall of darkness which encompa.s.sed Durtal opened, and light issued from all parts; with an immense impulse the ”Salve Regina,” springing up from the choir, swept aside the phantoms, and put the goblins to flight.
The elevated cordial of this chant restored him. He took courage, and began again to hope that this frightful desertion might cease; he prayed, and his pet.i.tions found vent; he understood that they were at last heard.
The Office was at an end; he gained the guest-house, and when he appeared so worn out and pale before Father Etienne and the oblate, they cried: ”What is the matter with you?”
He sank on a chair, and endeavoured to describe to them the terrible Calvary he had climbed. ”This has lasted,” he said, ”for more than nine hours; I wonder that I have not gone mad;” and he added, ”Yet I never could have believed that the soul could suffer so much.”
The face of the father was illuminated. He pressed Durtal's hands and said,
”Rejoice, my brother, you have been treated here like a monk.”
”How is that?” said Durtal, surprised.
”Yes, this agony, for there is no other word to define the horror of the state, is one of the most serious trials which G.o.d inflicts on us; it is one of the operations of the purgative life. Be happy, for it is a great grace which Jesus does to you.”
”And this proves that your conversion is good,” affirmed the oblate.
”G.o.d! But it was not He at any rate who insinuated doubts about the Faith, who caused to be born in me that madness of scruples, who raised in me that spirit of blasphemy, who caressed my face with disgusting apparitions.”
”No, but He allows it. It is frightful, I know it,” said the guest-master. ”G.o.d conceals Himself, and however you may call on Him, He does not answer you. You think yourself deserted, yet He is very near you; and while He effaces Himself, Satan advances. He twists you about, places a microscope over your faults, his malice gnaws your brain like a dull file, and when to all this are joined, to try you to the utmost, impure visions....”
The Trappist stopped; then, speaking to himself, he said, slowly,
”It would be nothing to be in presence of a real temptation, of a true woman in flesh and bone, but these appearances on which imagination works, are horrible!”
”And I used to think there was peace in the cloister!”
”No, we are here on this earth to strive, and it is just in the cloister that the Lowest works; there, souls escape him, and he will at all price conquer them. No place on earth is more haunted by him than a cell, no one is more hara.s.sed than a monk.”
”A story which is told in the Lives of the Fathers in the Desert, is typical from this point of view. One demon only was charged to watch a town; and he went to sleep while two or three hundred demons who had orders to guard a monastery had no rest, but behaved themselves, here is the place for the phrase, like very devils.
”And indeed, the mission to increase the sin of the towns is a sinecure, for Satan holds them, though they are not aware of it; all then he has to do is to torment them so as to take from them trust in G.o.d, since all obey him without his taking the least trouble about it.
”And so he keeps his legions to besiege convents where resistance is determined. And indeed, you see the way in which he conducts the attack.”
”Ah!” exclaimed Durtal, ”it is not he who makes you suffer the most; for what is worse than scruples, worse than temptations against purity, or against the Faith, is the supposed abandonment of Heaven; no, nothing can describe that.”
”That is what mystical theology calls 'the Night Obscure,'” answered M.
Bruno.
And Durtal exclaimed,
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