Books: The Master Christian

M >> Marie Corelli >> The Master Christian

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"You are a severe judge!" said the Archbishop.

Cardinal Bonpre lifted his mild blue eyes protestingly.

"Severe? I? God forbid that I should be severe, or presume to sit in
judgment on any poor soul that sought my sympathy! I do not judge,--
I simply feel. And my feelings have for a long time, I confess, been
poignantly sorrowful."

"Sorrowful! And why?"

"Because the impression has steadily gained upon me that if our
Church were all it was originally intended to be by its Divine
Founder, we should at this time have neither heresies or apostasies,
and all the world would be gathered into the 'one fold under one
Shepherd.' But if we, who are its ministers, persist in occupying
ourselves more with 'things temporal' than 'things spiritual,' we
fail to perform our mission, or to show the example required of us,
and we do not attract, so much as we repel. The very children of the
present day are beginning to doubt our calling and election."

"Oh, of course there are, and always have been heretics and
atheists," said the Archbishop,--"And apparently there always will
be."

"And I venture to maintain that it is our fault that heretics and
atheists continue to exist," replied the Cardinal; "If our Divine
faith were lived divinely, there would be no room for heresy or
atheism. The Church itself supplies the loophole for apostasy."

The Archbishop's handsome face crimsoned.

"You amaze me by such an expression!" he said, raising his voice a
little in the indignation he could scarcely conceal--"you talk--
pardon me--as if you yourself were uncertain of the Church's ability
to withstand unbelief."

"I speak but as I think," answered the Cardinal gently. And I admit
I AM uncertain. In the leading points of reed I am very steadfastly
convinced;--namely, that Christ was divine, and that the following
of His Gospel is the saving of the immortal soul. But if you ask me
whether I think we do truly follow that Gospel, I must own that I
have doubts upon the matter."

"An elected favourite son of the Church should surely have no
doubts!" said the Archbishop.

"Ah, there you come back to the beginning from which we started,
when I ventured to object to your term 'prince of the Church.'
According to our Master, all men should be equal before Him;
therefore we err in marking differences of rank or favoritism in
questions of religion. The very idea of rank is anti-Christian."

At this the Archbishop began to look seriously annoyed.

"I am afraid you are indulging in very unorthodox ideas," he said
with impatience--"In fact I consider you altogether mistake your
calling and position."

These were the words which had reached the attentive ears of the
Patoux children on their way up to bed, and had caused Henri to
declare that the Archbishop and the Cardinal were quarrelling. Felix
Bonpre took the somewhat violent remark, however, with perfect
equanimity.

"Possibly I may do so," he responded peaceably. "We are all subject
to error. My calling, as I take it, is that of a servant of Christ,
whose instructions for work are plainly set down in His own words.
It is for me to follow these instructions as literally and exactly
as I can. With regard to my position, I am placed as the spiritual
head of a very small diocese, where the people for the most part
lead very innocent and harmless lives. But I should be selfish and
narrow in spirit if I allowed myself to limit my views to my own
circle of influence. My flock are mere rustics in intellectual
capacity, and have no conception of the manner in which the larger
tide of human events is flowing. Now and then one or two of the
people grow weary of their quiet pastures and woodlands,--and being
young, hopeful, and ardent, start forth into the great world, there
to seek fairer fortunes. Sometimes they come back to their old
homes. Far more frequently they never return. But those who do come
back are changed utterly. I recognise no more the young men and
maidens whom I confirmed in their faith, and laid my hands on in
blessing ere they fared forth to other lives and scenes. The men are
grown callous and worldly; without a heart,--without a thought,--
save for the gain or loss of gold. The women are--ruined!"

He paused a moment. The Archbishop said nothing.

"I love my people," went on the Cardinal pathetically--"No child is
baptised in our old Cathedral without my praying for its future
good,--without my hope that it may grow into that exquisite mingling
of the Divine and Human which our Lord taught us was the perfection
of life, and His desire to see fulfilled in those He called His own.
Yes,--I love my people!--and when any of them go away from me, and
then return to the scenes of their childhood broken-hearted, I
cannot meet them with reproach. My own heart is half broken to see
them thus cast down. And their sorrows have compelled me naturally
to meditate on the sorrows of others,--to consider what it is in the
world which thus corrodes the pure gold of innocence and robs life
of its greatest charm. For if Christ's spirit ruled us all, then
innocence should be held more sacred. Life should engender
happiness. I have studied, read, and thought long, upon these
matters, so that I not only feel, but know the truth of what I say.
Brother!--" and the Cardinal, strongly moved, rose suddenly and
confronted the Archbishop with a passionate gesture--"My great grief
is that the spirit of Christ does NOT rule the world! Christ is
being re-crucified by this generation! And the Church is looking on,
and silently permitting His second murder!"

Startled by the force of this expression, the Archbishop sprang up
in his turn, his lips parted as if to speak--then--his angry glance
met the clear, calm, steadfast look of Felix Bonpre, and he
faltered. His eyes drooped--and his massive figure seemed for a
moment to shrink with a sort of abasement. Like an inspired apostle
the Cardinal stood, one hand outstretched,--his whole frame sentient
with the strong emotion which possessed him.

"You know that what I say is true," he continued in quieter but no
less intensely passionate accents--"You know that every day sees our
Master crowned with new thorns and exposed to fresh torture! You
know that we do nothing!--We stand beside Him in His second agony as
dumb as though we were unconscious of it! You know that we MIGHT
speak and will not! You know that we fear the ephemera of temporary
governments, policies, and social conventionalities, more than the
great, real, and terrible judgment of the world to come!"

"But all these things have been said before," began the Archbishop,
recovering a little from the confusion that had momentarily seized
him,--"And as I just now observed, you should remember that there
have always been heretics from the very beginning."

"Oh, I remember!" and the Cardinal sighed, "How is it possible that
any of us should forget! Heretics, whom we have tortured with
unheard-of agonies and burned in the flames, as a proof of our love
and sympathy with the tenderness of Christ Jesus!"

"You are going too far back in time!" said the Archbishop quickly.
"We erred in the beginning through excess of zeal, but now--now--"

"Now we do exactly the same thing," returned Bonpre--"Only we do not
burn physically our heretics, but morally. We condemn all who oppose
us. Good men and brave thinkers, whom in our arrogance we consign to
eternal damnation, instead of endeavouring to draw out the heart of
their mystery, and gather up the gems of their learning as fresh
proofs of the active presence of God's working in, and through all
things! Think of the Church's invincible and overpowering obstinacy
in the case of Galileo! He declared the existence of God to us by
the utterance of a Truth,--inasmuch as every truth is a new message
from God. Had he pronounced his theories before our divine Master,
that Master would have confirmed, not denied them! Have we one
single example of Christ putting to the torture any poor soul that
did not believe in Him? Nay--He Himself submitted to be tortured;
but for those who wronged Him, His prayer was only--'Father, forgive
them, for they know not what they do.' THEY KNOW NOT WHAT THEY DO!
The ministers of truth should rather suffer themselves than let
others suffer. The horrors of the Inquisition are a blot on
religious history; our Master never meant us to burn and torture men
into faith. He desired us to love and lead them into the way of life
as the shepherd leads a flock into the fold. I repeat again, there
would have been no room for atheism if we--we--the servants of
Christ, had been strictly true to our vocation."

By this time the Archbishop had recovered his equanimity. He sat
down and surveyed the up-standing figure of the Cardinal with
curiosity and a touch of pity.

"You think too much of these things," he said soothingly--"You are
evidently overwrought with study and excessive zeal. Much that you
say may be true; nevertheless the Church--OUR Church--stands firm
among overwhelming contradictions,--and we, its ministers, do what
we can. I myself am disposed to think that the multitude of the
saved is greater than the multitude of the lost."

"I envy you the consolation such a thought must give," responded the
Cardinal, as he resumed his seat opposite his visitor--"I, on the
contrary, have the pained and bitter sense that we are to blame for
all this 'multitude of the lost,' or at any rate that we could have
done more in the way of rescue than we have done." He paused a
moment, passing one hand across his forehead wearily. "In truth this
is what has for a long time weighed upon my mind, and depressed my
spirits even to the detriment of bodily health. I am nearing the
grave, and must soon give an account of my stewardship;--and the
knowledge of the increasing growth of evil in the world is almost
more than I can bear."

"But you are not to blame," said the Archbishop wonderingly,--"In
your own diocese you have fulfilled your duty; more than this is not
expected of you. You have done your best for the people you serve,--
and reports of your charities and good works are not lacking--"

"Do not credit such reports," interrupted the Cardinal, almost
sternly,--"I have done nothing--absolutely nothing! My life has been
too peaceful,--too many undeserved blessings have been bestowed upon
me. I much fear that the calm and quiet of my days have rendered me
selfish. I think I should long ago have sought some means of
engaging in more active duties. I feel as if I should have gone into
the thick of the religious contest, and spoken and fought, and
helped the sick and wounded of the mental battle,--but now--now it
is too late!"

"Nothing is too late for one in your position," said the Archbishop-
-"You may yet sit in St. Peter's chair!"

"God forbid!" ejaculated Bonpre fervently--"I would rather die! I
have never wished to rule,--I have only sought to help and to
comfort. But sixty-eight years of life weigh heavily on the
faculties,--I cannot wear the sword and buckler of energetic
manhood. I am old--old!--and to a certain extent, incapacitated for
useful labour. Hence I almost grudge my halcyon time spent among
simple folk,--time made sweet by all the surroundings of Nature's
pastoral loveliness;--the sorrow of the wider world knocks at my
heart and makes it ache! I feel that I am one of those who stand by,
idly watching the Master's second death without one word of
protest!"

The archbishop listened in silence. There was a curious shamed look
upon his face, as if some secret sin within himself had suddenly
been laid bare in all its vileness to the light of day. The golden
crucifix he wore moved restlessly with a certain agitated quickness
in his breathing, and he did not raise his eyes, when, after a
little pause, he said--

"I tell you, as I told you before, that you think too much; you are
altogether too sensitive. I admit that at the present day the world
is full of terrible heresies and open blasphemy, but this is part of
what we are always bound to expect,--we are told that we must
'suffer for righteousness' sake--'"

"We!" said the Cardinal--"Yes, WE! that is, OURSELVES;--the Church--
WE think, when we hear of heresies and blasphemies that it is we who
are 'suffering for righteousness' sake,' but in our egotism we
forget that WE are not suffering at all if we are able to retain our
faith! It is the very heretics and blasphemers whom we condemn that
are suffering--suffering absolute tortures--perchance 'for
righteousness' sake'!"

"Dare we call a heretic 'righteous'?" enquired the Archbishop--"Is
he not, in his very heresy, accursed?"

"According to our Lord, no one is accursed save traitors,--that is
to say those who are not true. If a man doubts, it is better he
should admit his doubt than make a pretence of belief. The persons
whom we call heretics may have their conception of the truth,--they
may say that they cannot accept a creed which is so ignorant of its
own tenets as to condemn all those who do not follow it,--inasmuch
as the very Founder of it distinctly says--'If any man hear my words
and believe not, I judge him not; for I came not to judge the world,
but to save the world.' Now we, His followers, judge, but do not
save. The atheist is judged by us, but not rescued from his
unbelief; the thinker is condemned,--the scientist who reveals the
beauty and wisdom of God as made manifest in the composition of the
lightning, or the germinating of a flower, is accused of destroying
religion. And we continue to pass our opinion, and thunder our
vetoes and bans of excommunication against our fellowmen, in the
full front of the plain command 'Judge not, that ye be not judged'!"

"I see it is no use arguing with you," said the Archbishop, forcing
a smile, with a vexation the smile could not altogether conceal,--
"You are determined to take these sayings absolutely,--and to fret
your spirit over the non-performance of imaginary duties which do
not exist. This Church is a system,--founded on our Lord's teaching,
but applied to the needs of modern civilization. It is not humanly
possible to literally obey all Christ's commands."

"For the outside world I grant it may be difficult,--but for the
ministers of religion, however difficult it may be, it should be
done," replied the Cardinal firmly. "I said this before, and I
deliberately maintain it. The Church IS a system,--but whether it is
as much founded on the teaching of our Lord, who was divine, as on
the teaching of St. Paul, who was NOT divine, is a question to me of
much perplexity."

"St. Paul was directly inspired by our Lord," said the Archbishop--
"I am amazed that you should even hint a doubt of his apostleship!"

"I do not decry St. Paul," answered Bonpre quietly--"He was a gifted
and clever man, but he was a Man--he was not God-in-Man. Christ's
doctrine leaves no place for differing sects; St. Paul's method of
applying that doctrine serves as authority for the establishment of
any and every quarrelsome sect ever known!"

"I cannot agree with you," said the Archbishop coldly.

"I do not expect to be agreed with"--and Bonpre smiled a little--"An
opinion which excites no opposition at all is not worth having! I am
quite honest in my scruples, such as they are;--I do not think we
fit, as you say, the Church system to the needs of modern
civilization. On the contrary, we must fail in many ways to do this,
else there would not be such a crying out for help and comfort as
there is at present among all Christian peoples. We no longer speak
with a grand certainty as we ought to do. We only offer vague hopes
and dubious promises to those who thirst for the living waters of
salvation and immortality,--it is as if we did not feel sure enough
of God ourselves to make others sure. All this is wrong--wrong! It
forebodes heavy punishment and disaster. If I were younger, I could
express perhaps my meaning more clearly,--but as it is, my soul is
weighted with unutterable thoughts,--I would almost call them
warnings,--of some threatening evil; . . . and today--only this
afternoon--when I sat for an hour in the Cathedral yonder and
listened to the music of the great organ--"

The Archbishop started.

"What did you say?"

The Cardinal repeated his words gently,--

"I said that I sat in the Cathedral and listened to the music of the
great organ--"

"The great organ!" interrupted the Archbishop,--"You must have been
dreaming! You could not possibly have heard the great organ,--it is
old and all out of gear;--it is never used. The only one we have for
service just now is a much smaller instrument in the left-hand
choir-chapel,--but no person could have played even on that without
the key. And the key was unobtainable, as the organist is absent
from the town to-day."

The Cardinal looked completely bewildered.

"Are you quite sure of this?" he asked falteringly.

"Sure--absolutely sure!" declared the Archbishop with a smile--"No
doubt you thought you heard music; overwrought nerves often play
these tricks upon us. And it is owing to this same cause that you
are weary and dispirited, and that you take such a gloomy view of
the social and religious outlook. You are evidently out of health
and unstrung;--but after you have had sufficient rest and change,
you will see things in quite a different aspect. I will not for a
moment believe that you could possibly be as unorthodox as your
conversation would imply,--it would be a total misconception of your
true character," and the Archbishop laughed softly. "A total
misconception," he repeated,--"Why, yes, of course it would be! No
Cardinal-Archbishop of Holy Mother Church could bring such
accusations against its ministry as you would have suggested, unless
he were afflicted by nervous depression, which, as we all know, has
the uncomfortable effect of creating darkness even where all is
light. Do you stay long in Rouen?"

"No," replied the Cardinal abstractedly, answering the question
mechanically though his thoughts were far away--"I leave for Paris
to-morrow."

"For Paris? And then?"

"I go to Rome with my niece, Angela Sovrani,--she is in Paris
awaiting my arrival now."

"Ah! You must be very proud of your niece!" murmured the Archbishop
softly--"She is famous everywhere,--a great artist!--a wonderful
genius!"

"Angela paints well--yes," said the Cardinal quietly,--"But she has
still a great deal to learn. And she is unfortunately much more
alone now than she used to be,--her mother's death last year was a
terrible blow to her."

"Her mother was your sister?"

"My only sister," answered the Cardinal--"A good, sweet woman!--may
her soul rest in peace! Her character was never spoilt by the social
life she was compelled to lead. My brother-in-law, Prince Sovrani,
kept open house,--and all the gay world of Rome was accustomed to
flock thither; but now--since he has lost his wife, things have
changed very much,--sadness has taken the place of mirth,--and
Angela is very solitary."

"Is she not affianced to the celebrated Florian Varillo?"

A fleeting shadow of pain darkened the Cardinal's clear eyes.

"Yes. But she sees very little of him,--you know the strictness of
Roman etiquette in such matters. She sees little--and sometimes--so
I think--knows less. However, I hope all will be well. But my niece
is over sensitive, brilliantly endowed, and ambitious,--at times I
have fears for her future."

"Depression again!" declared the Archbishop, rising and preparing to
take his leave--"Believe me, the world is full of excellence when we
look upon it with clear eyes;--things are never as bad as they seem.
To my thinking, you are the last man alive who should indulge in
melancholy forebodings. You have led a peaceful and happy life,
graced with the reputation of many good deeds, and you are generally
beloved by the people of whom you have charge. Then, though celibacy
is your appointed lot, heaven has given you a niece as dear to you
as any child of your own could be, who has won a pre-eminent place
among the world's great artists, and is moreover endowed with beauty
and distinction. What more can you desire?"

He smiled expansively as he spoke; the Cardinal looked at him
steadfastly.

"I desire nothing!" he answered--"I never have desired anything! I
told you before that I consider I have received many more blessings
than I deserve. It is not any personal grief which at present
troubles me,--it is something beyond myself. It is a sense of
wrong,--an appeal for truth,--a cry from those who are lost in the
world,--the lost whom the Church might have saved!"

"Merely fancy!" said the Archbishop cheerily--"Like the music in the
Cathedral! Do not permit your imagination to get the better of you
in such matters! When you return from Rome, I shall be glad to see
you if you happen to come through Normandy on your way back to your
own people. I trust you will so far honour me?"

"I know nothing of my future movements," answered the Cardinal
gently,--"But if I should again visit Rouen, I will certainly let
you know, and will, if you desire it, accept your friendly
hospitality."

With this, the two dignitaries shook hands and the Archbishop took
his leave. As he picked his way carefully down the rough stairs and
along the dingy little passage of the Hotel Poitiers, he was met by
Jean Patoux holding a lighted candle above his head to show him the
way.

"It is dark, Monseigneur," said Patoux apologetically.

"It is very dark," agreed Monseigneur, stumbling as he spoke, and
feeling rather inclined to indulge in very uncanonical language. "It
is altogether a miserable hole, mon Patoux!"

"It is for poor people only," returned Jean calmly--"And poverty is
not a crime, Monseigneur."

"No, it is not a crime," said the stately Churchman as he reached
the door at last, and paused for a moment on the threshold,--a broad
smile wrinkling up his fat cheeks and making comfortable creases
round his small eyes--"But it is an inconvenience!"

"Cardinal Bonpre does not say so," observed Patoux.

"Cardinal Bonpre is one of two things--a saint or a fool! Remember
that, mon Patoux! Bon soir! Benedicite!"

And the Archbishop, still smiling to himself, walked leisurely
across the square in the direction of his own house, where his
supper awaited him. The moon had risen, and was clambering slowly up
between the two tall towers of Notre Dame, her pure silver radiance
streaming mockingly against the candle Jean Patoux still held in the
doorway of his inn, and almost extinguishing its flame.

"One of two things--a saint or a fool," murmured Jean with a
chuckle--"Well!--it is very certain that the Archbishop is neither!"

He turned in, and shut his door as far as it would allow him to do
so, and went comfortably to bed, where Madame had gone before him.
And throughout the Hotel Poitiers deep peace and silence reigned.
Every one in the house slept, save Cardinal Bonpre, who with the
Testament before him, sat reading and meditating deeply for an hour
before retiring to rest. A fresh cause of anxiety had come upon him
in the idea that perhaps his slight indisposition was more serious
than he had deemed. If, as the Archbishop had said, there could have
been no music possible in the Cathedral that afternoon, how came it
that he had heard such solemn and entrancing harmonies? Was his mind
affected? Was he in truth imagining what did not exist? Were the
griefs of the world his own distorted view of things? Did the Church
faithfully follow the beautiful and perfect teachings of Christ
after all? He tried to reason the question out from a different and
more hopeful standpoint, but vainly;--the conviction that
Christianity was by no means the supreme regenerating force, or the
vivifying Principle of Human Life which it was originally meant to
be, was borne in upon him with increasing certainty, and the more he
read the Gospels, the more he became aware that the Church--system
as it existed was utterly opposed to Christ's own command, and
moreover was drifting further and further away from Him with every
passing year.

"The music in the Cathedral may have been my fancy," he said,--"But
the discord in the world sounds clear and is NOT imagination. A
casuist in religion may say 'It was to be';--that heresies and
dissensions were prophesied by Christ, when He said 'Because
iniquity shall abound, the love of many shall grow cold';--but this
does not excuse the Church from the sin of neglect, if any neglects
exists. One thing we have never seemed to thoroughly understand, and
this is that Christ's teaching is God's teaching, and that it has
not stopped with the enunciation of the Gospel. It is going on even
now--in every fresh discovery of science,--in every new national
experience,--in everything we can do, or think, or plan, the Divine
instruction steadily continues through the Divine influence imparted
to us when the Godhead became man, to show men how they might in
turn become gods. This is what we forget and what we are always
forgetting; so that instead of accepting every truth, we quarrel
with it and reject it, even as Judaea rejected Christ Himself. It is
very strange and cruel;--and the world's religious perplexities are
neither to be wondered at nor blamed,--there is just and grave cause
for their continuance and increase."