Chapter II: Part 2

“Well, this figure of a man, then, was kneeling in the air, that is the only way I can describe it––his face was turned towards me, but upwards. Now the most curious thing that struck me at the time was that he was, as it were, leaning at a sharp angle to one side; but it did not appear to be grotesque. Instead the world seemed tilted; the chestnut tree was out of the perpendicular; the wall out of the horizontal. The true level was that of the man.

“I know this sounds foolish, but it showed me how the world of spirits was the real world, and the world of sense comparatively unreal, just as the sorrow of the woman behind me was more real than the beams overhead.

“And again, compared with the kneeling figure, the chestnut tree and the gate seemed unsubstantial and shadowy. I know that men who see visions tell us that it is usually the other way. All I can say is that it was not so with me. This figure was kneeling, as I have said; his robe streamed away behind him––a great cloak––drawn tightly back from the shoulders, as if he were battling with a strong wind––the Wind of Grace, I suppose, that always blows from the Throne. His arms were stretched out in front of him, but opened sufficiently to let me see his face; and his face will be with me till I die, and please God afterwards. It was beardless, and bore the unmistakable character of a priest’s face.

“Now you know how close the intensest pain and the intensest joy lie together. Their lines so nearly meet. In this man’s face they did meet. Anguish and ecstasy were one. His eyes were open, his lips parted. I could not tell whether he was old or young. His face was ageless, as the faces of all are who look upon Him who inhabits eternity. He was praying. I can say no more than that. He had opened his heart to this woman’s sorrow. He had made it his own: and it met there, in petition if you wish to call it so, or in resignation if you prefer that name for it, or in adoration––you may call it what you will––all that is true, but each is inadequate––but that sorrow met there with his own purified will, which itself had become one with the eternal will of God. I tell you I know it.

“I looked at him, and in my ears was a sobbing from the room behind; but as I looked the glory of anguish deepened on his face, and the sobbing behind me slackened and ceased, and I heard a whispering and the name of God and of His Son, and then the sight before me had passed; and there stood the chestnut tree again as real and as beautiful as before; and when I turned the woman was standing up, and the light of conquest was in her eyes.

“She held out her hand to me, and I stooped and kissed it, but I dared not take it in my own, for she had been in heavenly places. I had seen her sorrow carried and laid before the throne of God by one greater than either of us, and something of his glory rested upon her.”

The old man’s voice ceased. When I turned to look at him he was looking steadily again at the iron gate in the wall, and his eyes were shining like the radiant air outside. “I do not know,” he said in a moment, “whether she is alive or dead, but I offered the Holy Sacrifice this morning for her peace in either state.”

------------------------------------------------------------------------

Poena Damni

------------------------------------------------------------------------

“All their sins stand before them, and produce in their essences
remorse, eternal despair and a hostile will against God. For such a
soul there is no remedy. It cannot come into the light of God....
Even if St. Peter had left many thousand keys upon earth, not a
single one of them could open Heaven for it.”

_A German Mystic._

------------------------------------------------------------------------

Poena Damni

WE were sitting at dinner one evening when the priest, who had been talkative, seemed to fall into a painful train of thought that silenced him. He grew more and more ill at ease, and was obviously relieved when I threw my cigarette away and he was able to propose a move to the next room. Presently his distress seemed to pass; and then, as we sat near the fireplace, he explained himself.

“I must ask your pardon,” he said, “but somehow I fell into a very dreadful train of thought. It was suggested to me, I think, by the red lamp on the table and the evening light through the windows, and the silver and glass. (You know the power of association!) I went through one of the most fearful moments of my life under just those circumstances.”

I was silent, as the priest seemed to have more to say.

“It has affected my nerves,” he said, “and it would be rather a relief to tell you. Would you mind if I did so?”

On my assurance that it would greatly interest me, he began.

“It is a fashion among those who do not really accept Revelation as revelation to believe in a kind of Universalism. Quite apart from authority, this doctrine contravenes, as you of course know, the reality of man’s free will. The incident of which I wish to tell you concerns the way in which I first caught a glimpse of that for myself.

“A good many years ago I made the acquaintance of a man in the West of England, under circumstances that I need not describe further than saying that he seemed to have confidence in me. He asked me to stay with him in his country house, and I went down from London for the inside of a week. I found him living the usual country life, fishing and so forth; for it was summer when I visited him. It was a fine old house that he lived in, surrounded by coverts. He had a charming wife and two or three children, and at first I thought him extremely happy and contented.

“Then I thought that I noticed that things were not so well with him. The cottages on his estate were ill-cared for, and that is always a bad sign. From one or two small signs, such as you can guess, I found that the tone among his servants was not what it should be; and one or two horrid pieces of cruelty came under my notice. I know this sounds as if I were a sort of spy, greedy for information; but all that I can say is, that these signs were unmistakable and obvious, and came to me, of course, unsought and unexpected. Then I saw that his domestic relations were not right. I do not know how else to describe all this than by saying that there seemed a kind of blight upon his surroundings. Nothing was absolutely wrong, and yet all was just wrong.

“At first I thought that I myself was depressed or jaundiced in some way; but at last I could not continue to believe that; and on the Friday of my stay, the last day, I became finally certain that something was horribly wrong with the man himself. Then that evening he opened his heart to me, so far as it was possible for him to do so.

“His wife, with the two daughters, had left us after dessert and gone into the garden, and we remained in the dining-room. The windows looked to the west, across a smooth sloping lawn, with the lake at the end; beyond that rose up a delicate birch wood, and beyond that again a soft green sky, where the sun had set, deepening into a liquid evening blue overhead, in which a star or two glimmered. I could see, as I looked out, the white figures of his wife and daughters against the shining surface of the lake at the end of the lawn.

“After he had lit his cigarette, and had a glass or two of wine, suddenly he opened his heart to me, and told me an appalling story that I could not tell you. I sat and watched his strong sinewy hand rise and fall with the cigarette, under the red lamp-light; I glanced at his quiet well-bred face with the downcast eyes and the long moustache, and I wondered whether it was possible really for such a tale to be true; but he spoke with a restrained conviction that left no room for doubt. What I gathered from the story was this;––that he had identified himself, his whole will, his whole life practically, with the cause of Satan. I could not detect as he talked that he had ever seriously attempted to detach himself from that cause. It has been said that a saint is one who always chooses the better of the two courses open to him at every step; so far as I could see this man had always chosen the worse of the two courses. When he had done things that you and I would think right, he had always done them for some bad reason. He had been continuously aware, too, of what was happening. I do not think that I have ever heard such a skilful self-analysis. Now and then, as I saw the gulf of despair towards which his talk was leading, I interrupted him, suggesting alleviations of the horror––suggesting that he was pessimistic––that he had acted often under misconceptions––and the like; but he always met me with a quiet answer that silenced me. In fact,” said the priest, who was beginning to tremble a little, “I have never thought it possible that a heart could be so corrupt and yet retain so much knowledge and feeling.

“When he had finished his story he looked at me for a moment, and then said:

“‘Lately I have seen what I have lost, and what I shall lose; and I have told you this to ask if the Christian Gospel has any hope for such as I am.’

“Of course I answered as a Christian priest must answer, for I honestly thought that here was the greatest miracle of God’s grace that I had ever seen. When I had finished I lifted my eyes from the cloth and looked up. His fingers, while I was speaking, had been playing with an apostle spoon, but as I looked up he looked up too, and our eyes met.”

As the priest said this, he got up, and leaned his head against the high oak mantelpiece, and was silent a moment. Then he went on:

“God forgive me if I was wrong––if I am wrong now––but this is what I think I saw.

“Out of his eyes looked a lost soul. As a symbol, or a sign, too, his eyes shone suddenly with that dull red light that you may see sometimes in a dog’s eyes. It was the _poena damni_ of which I had read, which shone there. It was true, as he had said, that he was seeing clearly what he had lost and would lose; it was the gate of heaven opening to one who could not enter in. It was the chink of light under the door to one who cried, ‘Lord, Lord, open to me,’ but through the door there came that answer, ‘I know you not.’ Ah! it was not that he had never known before what God was, and His service and love; it was just his condemnation that he had known: that he had seen, not once or twice but again and again, the two ways, and had, not once nor twice but again and again, chosen the worse of those two; and now he was powerless.

“I tell you I saw this for a moment. There was this human face, so well-bred, with its delicate lines, looking almost ethereal in the soft red light of the lamp: behind him, between the windows hung a portrait of an ancestor, some old Caroline divine in ruff and bands. Through the windows was that sweet glory of evening––with the three figures by the lake. Here, between us, was the delicate soothing luxury of cleanliness and coolness and refreshment, such as glass and silver and fruit suggest: and there for one second in this frame of beauty and peace looked the eyes of one who desired even a drop of living water to cool his tongue, for he was tormented in a flame.

“And I saw all this; and then the room began to swim and whirl, and the table to tilt and sway, and I fell, I suppose, forward, and sank down on to the floor. When I recovered there were the men in the room, and the anxious face of my host looking down on me.

“I had to return to town the next morning. I wrote to him a long letter the following week, saying that I had been ill on the evening on which he had given me his confidence: and that I had not said all that I could say: and I went on, giving the lie to what I had thought I had seen, speaking to him as I should speak to any soul who was weary of sin and desired God.

“Indeed I thought it most possible, as I wrote the letter, that I had had a horrible delusion; and that all could be well with him. I got an answer of a few lines, saying that he must apologise for having troubled me with such a story; adding that he had greatly exaggerated his own sin; that he too had been over-excited and unwell: and that he too trusted in a God of Love––and begging me not to refer to the conversation again.”

The priest sat down again.

“Now you may of course accept this version of it, if you will. I only would to God that I could too.”

------------------------------------------------------------------------

“Consolatrix Afflictorum”

------------------------------------------------------------------------

“Should it be burdensome for thee ... she will for thy sake herself
raise me up when I chance to fall, and console me when sorrowing.”

_St. Leander of Seville._

------------------------------------------------------------------------

“Consolatrix Afflictorum”

THE following letter will explain itself.

The original was read to me by my friend on one of those days during my stay with him; and he allowed me, at my request, to make a copy. The sermon referred to in the first sentence of the letter was preached in a foreign watering-place on Christmas Day.

“VILLA––––
“_December 29, 18––_

“Reverend and Dear Sir,

“I listened with great attention to your sermon on Christmas Day; I
am getting on in years, and I am an invalid; so you will understand
that I have few friends––and I think none who would not think me mad
if I told them the story that I am proposing to tell you. For many
years I have been silent on this subject; since it always used to be
received with incredulity. But I fancy that you will not be
incredulous. As I watched you and listened to you on Christmas Day,
I thought I saw in you one to whom the supernatural was more than a
beautiful and symbolical fairy-story, and one who held it not
impossible that this unseen should sometimes manifest itself. As you
reminded us, the Religion of the Incarnation rests on the fact that
the Infinite and the Eternal expresses Himself in terms of space and
time; and that it is in this that the greatness of the Love of God
consists. Since then, as you said, the Creation, the Incarnation,
and the Sacramental System alike, in various degree, are the
manifestation of God under these conditions, surely it cannot be
‘materialistic’ (whatever that exactly means), to believe that the
‘spiritual’ world and the personages that inhabit it sometimes
express themselves in the same manner as their Maker. However, will
you have patience with me while I tell you this story? I cannot
believe that such a grace should be kept in darkness.

“I was about seven years old when my mother died, and my father left
me chiefly to the care of servants. Either I must have been a
difficult child, or my nurse must have been a hard woman: but I
never gave her my confidence. I had clung to my mother as a saint
clings to God: and when I lost her, it nearly broke my heart. Night
after night I used to lie awake, with the firelight in the room,
remembering how she would look in on her way to bed; when at last I
slept it seems to me now as if I never did anything but dream of
her; and it was only to wake again to that desolate emptiness. I
would torture myself by closing my eyes, and fancying she was there;
and then opening them and seeing the room empty. I would turn and
toss and sob without a sound. I suppose that I was as near the limit
that divides sanity from madness as it is possible to be. During the
day I would sit on the stairs when I could get away from my nurse,
and pretend that my mother’s footsteps were moving overhead, that
her door opened, that I heard her dress on the carpet: again I would
open my eyes, and in self-cruelty compel myself to understand that
she was gone. Then again I would tell myself that it was all right:
that she was away for the day, but would come back at night. In the
evenings I would be happier, as the time for her return drew nearer;
even when I said my prayers I would look forward to the moment, into
which I had cheated myself in believing, when the door would open,
after I was in bed, and my mother look in. Then as the time passed,
my false faith would break down, and I would sob myself to sleep,
dream of her, and sob myself awake again. As I look back it appears
to me as if this went on for months: I suppose, however, in reality,
it could not have been more than a very few weeks, or my reason
would have given way. And at last I was caught on the edge of the
precipice, and drawn lovingly back to safety and peace.

“I used to sleep alone in the night-nursery at this time, and my
nurse occupied a room opening out of it. The night-nursery had two
doors, one at the foot of my bed, and one at the further end of the
room, in the corner diagonally opposite to that in which the head of
my bed stood. The first opened upon the landing, and the second into
my nurse’s room, and this latter was generally kept a few inches
open. There was no light in my room, but a night-light was kept
burning in the nurse’s room, so that even without the firelight my
room was not in total darkness.

“I was lying awake one night (I suppose it would be about eleven
o’clock), having gone through a dreadful hour or two of misery,
half-waking and half-sleeping. I had been crying quietly, for fear
my nurse should hear through the partly opened door, burying my hot
face in the pillow. I was feeling really exhausted, listening to my
own heart, and cheating myself into the half-faith that its throbs
were the footsteps of my mother coming towards my room; I had raised
my face and was staring at the door at the foot of my bed, when it
opened suddenly without a sound; and there, as I thought, my mother
stood, with the light from the oil-lamp outside shining upon her.
She was dressed, it seemed, as once before I had seen her in London,
when she came into my room to bid me good-night before she went out
to an evening party. Her head shone with jewels that flashed as the
firelight rose and sank in the room, a dark cloak shrouded her neck
and shoulders, one hand held the edge of the door, and a great jewel
gleamed on one of her fingers. She seemed to be looking at me.

“I sat up in bed in a moment, amazed but not frightened, for was it
not what I had so often fancied? and I called out to her:

“‘Mother, mother!’

“At the word she turned and looked on to the landing, and gave a
slight movement with her head, as if to some one waiting there,
either of assent or dismissal, and then turned to me again. The door
closed silently, and I could see in the firelight, and in the faint
glimmer that came through the other door, that she held out her arms
to me. I threw off the bedclothes in a moment, and scrambled down to
the end of the bed, and she lifted me gently in her arms, but said
no word. I too said nothing, but she raised the cloak a little and
wrapped it round me, and I lay there in bliss, my head on her
shoulder, and my arm round her neck. She walked smoothly and
noiselessly to a rocking-chair that stood beside the fire and sat
down, and then began to rock gently to and fro. Now it may be
difficult to believe, but I tell you that I neither said anything,
nor desired to say anything. It was enough that she was there. After
a little while I suppose I fell asleep, for I found myself in an
agony of tears and trembling again, but those arms held me firmly,
and I was soon at peace; still she spoke no word, and I did not see
her face.

“When I woke again she was gone, and it was morning, and I was in
bed, and the nurse was drawing up the blind, and the winter sunshine
lay on the wall. That day was the happiest I had known since my
mother’s death; for I knew she would come again.

“After I was in bed that evening I lay awake waiting, so full of
happy content and certainty that I fell asleep. When I awoke the
fire was out, and there was no light but a narrow streak that came
through the door from my nurse’s room. I lay there a minute or two
waiting, expecting every moment to see the door open at the foot of
my bed; but the minutes passed, and then the clock in the hall below
beat three. Then I fell into a passion of tears; the night was
nearly gone, and she had not come to me. Then, as I tossed to and
fro, trying to stifle my crying, through my tears there came the
misty flash of light as the door opened, and there she stood again.
Once again I was in her arms, and my face on her shoulder. And again
I fell asleep there.

“Now this went on night after night, but not every night, and never
unless I awoke and cried. It seemed that if I needed her desperately
she came, but only then.

“But there were two curious incidents that occurred in the order in
which I will write them down. The second I understand now, at any
rate; the first I have never altogether understood, or rather there
are several possible explanations.

“One night as I lay in her arms by the fire, a large coal suddenly
slipped from the grate and fell with a crash, awaking the nurse in
the other room. I suppose she thought something was wrong, for she
appeared at the door with a shawl over her shoulders, holding the
night-light in one hand and shading it with the other. I was going
to speak, when my mother laid her hand across my mouth. The nurse
advanced into the room, passed close beside us, apparently without
seeing us, went straight to the empty bed, looked down on the
tumbled clothes, and then turned away as if satisfied, and went back
to her room. The next day I managed to elicit from her, by
questioning, the fact that she had been disturbed in the night, and
had come into my room, but had seen me sleeping quietly in bed.

“The other incident was as follows. One night I was lying half
dozing against my mother’s breast, my head against her heart, and
not, as I usually lay, with my head on her shoulder. As I lay there
it seemed to me as if I heard a strange sound like the noise of the
sea in a shell, but more melodious. It is difficult to describe it,
but it was like the murmuring of a far-off crowd, overlaid with
musical pulsations. I nestled closer to her and listened; and then I
could distinguish, I thought, innumerable ripples of church bells
pealing, as if from another world. Then I listened more intently to
the other sound; there were words, but I could not distinguish them.
Again and again a voice seemed to rise above the others, but I could
hear no intelligible words. The voices cried in every sort of
tone––passion, content, despair, monotony. And then as I listened I
fell asleep. As I look back now, I have no doubt what voices those
were that I heard.

“And now comes the end of the story. My health began to improve so
remarkably that those about me noticed it. I never gave way, during
the day at any rate, to those old piteous imaginings; and at night,
when, I suppose, the will partly relaxes its control, whenever my
distress reached a certain point, she was there to comfort me. But
her visits grew more and more rare, as I needed her less, and at
last ceased. But it is of her last visit, which took place in the
spring of the following year, that I wish to speak.

“I had slept well all night, but had awakened in the dark just
before the dawn from some dream which I forget, but which left my
nerves shaken. When in my terror I cried out, again the door opened,
and she was there. She stood with the jewels in her hair, and the
cloak across her shoulders, and the light from the landing lay
partly on her face. I scrambled at once down the bed, and was lifted
and carried to the chair, and presently fell asleep. When I awoke
the dawn had come, and the birds were stirring and chirping, and a
pleasant green light was in the room; and I was still in her arms.
It was the first time, except in the instance I have mentioned, that
I had awakened except in bed, and it was a great joy to find her
there. As I turned a little I saw the cloak which sheltered us
both––of a deep blue, with an intricate pattern of flowers and
leaves and birds among branches. Then I turned still more to see her
face, which was so near me, but it was turned away; and even as I
moved she rose and carried me towards the bed. Still holding me on
her left arm she lifted and smoothed the bedclothes, and then laid
me gently in bed, with my head on the pillow. And then for the first
time I saw her face plainly. She bent over me, with one hand on my
breast as if to prevent me from rising, and looked straight into my
eyes; and it was not my mother.

“There was one moment of blinding shock and sorrow, and I gave a
great sob, and would have risen in bed, but her hand held me down,
and I seized it with both my own, and still looked in her eyes. It
was not my mother, and yet was there ever such a mother’s face as
that? I seemed to be looking into depths of indescribable tenderness
and strength, and I leaned on that strength in those moments of
misery. I gave another sob or two as I looked, but I was quieter,
and at last peace came to me, and I had learnt my lesson.

“I did not at the time know who she was, but my little soul dimly
saw that my own mother for some reason could not at that time come
to me who needed her so sorely, and that another great Mother had
taken her place; yet, after the first moment or so, I felt no anger
or jealousy, for one who had looked into that kindly face could have
no such unworthy thought.

“Then I lifted my head a little, I remember, and kissed the hand
that I held in my own, reverently and slowly. I do not know why I
did it, except that it was the natural thing to do. The hand was
strong and white, and delicately fragrant. Then it was withdrawn,
and she was standing by the door, and the door was open; and then
she was gone, and the door was closed.

“I have never seen her since, but I have never needed to see her,
for I know who she is; and, please God, I shall see her again; and
next time I hope my mother and I will be together; and perhaps it
will not be very long; and perhaps she will allow me to kiss her
hand again.

“Now, my dear sir, I do not know how all this will appear to you; it
may seem to you, though I do not think it will, merely childish.
Yet, in a sense, I desire nothing more than that, for our Saviour
Himself told us to be like children, and our Saviour too once lay on
His Mother’s breast. I know that I am getting an old man, and that
old men are sometimes very foolish; but it more and more seems to me
that experience, as well as His words, tells me that the great
Kingdom of Heaven has a low and narrow door that only little
children can enter, and that we must become little again, and drop
all our bundles, if we would go through.

“That, dear and Reverend Sir, is my story. And may I ask you to
remember me sometimes at the altar and in your prayers? for surely
God will ask much from one to whom He has given so much, and as yet
I have nothing to show for it; and my time must be nearly at an end,
even if His infinite patience is not.

“Believe me,

“Yours faithfully,

“–––– ––––.”

------------------------------------------------------------------------

The Bridge over the Stream

------------------------------------------------------------------------

“Lo, I am free! I choose the pain thou bearest:
Thou art the messenger of one who waits;
Thou wilt reveal the hidden face thou wearest
When my feet falter at the Eternal Gates.”
_Old Foes._

------------------------------------------------------------------------

The Bridge over the Stream

WE were at tea one afternoon on the little low, tiled platform that marked the site of an old summer-house. Tall hurdles covered with briar-roses on the further side of the path fenced off the rest of the garden from us, and the sun had just sunk below the level of the house, throwing both ourselves and the garden into cool shadow. The servant had brought out the tea-things, but he presently returned with something of horror on his face. The old man looked up and saw him.

“What is it, Parker?” he asked.

“There’s been an accident, sir. Tom Awcock at the home farm has been drawn into some machine, and they say he must lose both arms, and maybe his life.”

The old man turned quite white, and his eyes grew larger and brighter.

“Is the doctor with him?” he asked, in a perfectly steady voice.

“Yes, sir, and they’ve sent a message, Would you be good enough to step down? The rector’s away, and Tom’s mother’s crying terrible. But not yet, sir. About seven o’clock, they say. It won’t be over till then, and there’s no immediate danger.”

“Tell them I will be there at seven,” said the clergyman.

Parker went back to the house, and presently we heard the footsteps of a child running down the drive towards the farm.

“How shocking it is!” I said in a moment or two.

“Ah!” said the old man, smiling, “I have learnt my lesson. It is not really so shocking as you think. Does that sound very hard?”

I said nothing, for it seemed to me that all the consolations of religion could not soften the horror of such things. If such agonies are necessary as remedies or atonements, at least they are terrible.

“I learnt my lesson,” the old man went on, “down the road there outside the hedge––down by the bridge. Would you like to hear it? Or are you tired of an old dreamer’s stories?” and he smiled at me.

“Now I know you think that I am hard––that I am a little apart maybe from human life––that I cannot understand the blind misery of those who suffer in ignorance; yet you would be the first, I believe, to think that Mrs. Awcock’s consolations are unreal, and that when she tells me that she knows there is a wise purpose behind, she is only repeating what is proper to say to a clergyman. But that is not so; that old threadbare sentence is intensely real to these people, and, I hope, to myself too. For there is nothing that I desire more than to be a child like them. It is the apparent purposelessness that distresses you: it is the certainty of a deliberate purpose that comforts me. Well, shall I tell you what I saw?”

I was a little distressed at what looked like callousness, but I told him I would like to hear the story.

“I was standing one evening––it would be about five years ago––in the field down there near the stream. You remember the bridge there, over which the road goes, just outside the hedge. I love running water, and I went slowly up and down by the side of the beck. There were children on the road, coming back from school, and they stopped on the bridge to look at the water, as children and old men will. They did not see me, as the field is a little below the road, and besides their backs were turned to me. I could see a pink frock or two, and a pair of stout bare legs. Two girls were taking their brother home––he was between them, a hand clasped by each of the sisters. I suppose the eldest girl would be about nine, and the boy five. They were talking solemnly, and I could hear every word.

“Why are children always supposed to be gay? There is no solemnity in the world to be compared to the solemnity of a little boy, or of his sister who has charge of him.

“One of the girls said, ‘Look, Johnny, there are little fishes down there.’

“‘When I am a man’––––Johnny began, very slowly.

“‘Look, Johnny,’ said the other girl, ‘there’s a blue flower.’

“Up to this I remember every word. But then I began to watch Johnny.

“The girls went on talking, but they leaned over more, and I could not hear them plainly. Johnny stealthily withdrew a hand from each of his sisters, and began to look for a stone to throw at the fishes or the blue flower, I suppose; for man is lord of Creation. I could see him presently through the hedge digging patiently with his fingers and loosening a stone that was firm in the road. And at that moment I heard a far-away shout and the distant bark of a dog.

“The evening was wonderfully still: every leaf hung quiet: and there were far-off clouds heaping themselves up in the west, tower over tower. We had a thunderstorm that night, I remember. The brook was quiet, just slipping noiselessly from pool to pool.

“Still Johnny was digging and the girls were talking. Then out of the village above us came again far-off noises. I could hear a rumble and the clatter of hoofs, then a cry or two more, and the nearer terrified yelp of a dog. But the girls were intent on the brook––and Johnny on the stone.

“Even now I did not understand what was happening: but I grew uneasy––and with great difficulty, for I was an old man even then, tried to scramble up the high bank by the bridge. As I reached the top I saw that one of the girls had gone. She had run, I suppose, off the bridge down by the side of the road. The other girl was still standing––but looking in a frightened way up the hill. Down the hill came the loud rumble of a cart and the clatter of hoofs, terribly near.

“The girl by the side of the road began to scream to her sister, who darted off, and then remembered Johnny and turned. Johnny got up too and ran to the parapet and stood against it.

“I was shouting too by now, through the hedge: but I could do nothing more, nothing more, because the hedge was high and thick, and I was an old man. Then in a moment I remembered that shouting would only distract them, and I stopped. It was useless. I could do absolutely nothing. But it was very hard.

“Then I saw the galloping body of a horse through the branches, with a butcher’s cart that rocked behind him. There was no one on the cart.

“Now there was room for the cart to pass the boy safely. By the wheelmarks, which I looked at afterwards, there were three clear feet––if only the boy had stood still.

“The girls seemed petrified as they stood, one in act to run, the other crouching and hiding her face against the hedge. The cart was now within ten yards, as I could see, though I was still staring at Johnny. Then this is what I saw.

“Somewhere behind him over the parapet of the bridge there was a figure. I remember nothing about it except the face and the hands. The face was, I think, the tenderest I have ever seen. The eyes were downcast, looking upon the boy’s head with indescribable love, the lips were smiling. One hand was over the boy’s eyes, the other against his shoulder behind. In a moment the memory of other stories I had heard came to mind––and I gave a sob of relief that the boy was safe in such care.

“But as the iron hoofs and rocking wheels came up, the hand on the boy’s shoulder suddenly pushed him to meet them; and yet those tender eyes and mouth never flinched, and the child took a step forward in front of the horse, and was beaten down without a cry: and the cart lurched heavily, righted itself, and dashed on out of sight.

“When the cloud of dust had passed, the little body lay quiet on the road, and the two girls were clinging to one another, screaming and sobbing, but there was nothing else.

“I was as angry at first as an old man could be. I nearly (may He forgive me for it now!) cursed God and died. But the memory of that tender face did its work. It was as the face of a mother who nurses her first-born child, as the face of a child who kisses a wounded creature, it was as I think the Father’s Face itself must have been, which those angels always behold, as He looked down upon the Sacrifice of His only Son.

“Will you forgive me now if I seemed hard a few minutes ago? Perhaps you still think it was hardness that made me speak as I did. But, for myself, I hope I may call it by a better name than that.”

------------------------------------------------------------------------

In the Convent Chapel

------------------------------------------------------------------------

“In her all longings mix and meet;
Dumb souls through her are eloquent;
She feels the earth beneath her feet
Vibrate in passionate intent;
Through her our tides of feeling roll
And find their God within her soul.”
_The Contemplative Soul._

------------------------------------------------------------------------

In the Convent Chapel

ONE evening about this time, on coming indoors for tea, I found the old man seated at the open door that looked on to the lawn, with a book on his knees, and his finger between the pages. He held the book towards me as I came near him, and showed me the title, “The Interior Castle.”

“I have just been reading,” he said, “Saint Teresa’s description of the difference between the intellectual and the imaginative vision. It is curious how she fails really to express it, except to any one who happens to have had a glimpse already for himself of what she means. I suppose it is one of the signs of reality in the spiritual world that no one can ever describe so much as he knows.”

I sat down.

“I am afraid I don’t understand a word you are saying,” I answered smiling.

For answer he opened the book and read Saint Teresa’s curious gasping incoherent sentences––at least so I thought them.

“Still,” I said, “I am afraid––––”

“Oh,” he said almost impatiently, “surely you know now; indeed you know it, but do not recognise it.”

“Can you give me any sort of instance?” I asked.

He thought for a moment or two in silence; and then––––

“I think I can,” he said, “if you are sure it will not bore you.”

He poured out tea for us both, and then began:

“Most of the tales I have told you are of the imaginative vision, by which I do not mean that the vision is in any way unreal or untrue, which is what most people mean by ‘imaginative,’ but only that it presents itself in the form of a visible picture. It seems chiefly the function of the imagination to visualise facts, and it is an abuse of that faculty to employ it chiefly in visualising fancies. But it is possible for spiritual facts to represent themselves vividly and clearly to the intellect instead, so that the person to whom the intellectual vision is given does not, so to speak, ‘see’ anything, but only ‘apprehends’ something to be true. However, this will become more clear presently.

“Some years ago I took my annual holiday in the form of a solitary walking tour. I will not tell you where I went, as there are others concerned in this story who would dislike intensely to be publicly spoken of in the way that I shall have to speak of them; but it is enough to say that I came at last to a little town towards sunset. My object in coming to this place was to visit a convent of enclosed nuns whose reputation for holiness was very great. I carried with me a letter of introduction to the Reverend Mother, which I knew would admit me to the chapel. I left my bag at the inn, and then walked down to the convent, which stood a little way out of the town.

“The lay sister who opened the door to me asked me to come into the parlour while she told the Reverend Mother; and after waiting a few minutes in the prim room with its bees-waxed floor and its religious engravings and objects, a wonderfully dignified little old lady, with a quiet wrinkled face, came in with my letter open in her hand. We talked a few minutes about various things, and I had a glass of cowslip wine in a thick-lipped wineglass.

“She told me that the convent was a very ancient foundation, that it had been a country house ever since the Dissolution of the Religious Houses, until about twenty years ago, when it had been acquired for the community. There still remained of the old buildings part of the cloisters, with the south transept of the old church, which was now the chapel; the whole, with a wall or two, forming the courtyard through which I had come. Behind the house lay the garden, on to which the window of the parlour looked; and as I sat I could see a black cross or two marking the nuns’ graveyard. I made inquiries as to the way the time of the community was spent.

“‘Our object,’ said the old lady, ‘is perpetual intercession for sinners. We have the great joy of the Blessed Sacrament amongst us in the chapel, and, except during the choir offices and Mass, there is always a nun kneeling before It. We look after one or two ladies incurably ill, who have come to end their days with us, and we make our living by embroidery.’

“I asked how it was that she could receive strangers if the order was an enclosed one.

“‘The lay sisters and myself alone can receive strangers. We find that necessary.’

“After a little more talk I asked whether I might see the chapel, and she took me out into the courtyard immediately.

“As we walked across the grass she pointed out to me the cloisters, now built up into a corridor, and the long ruined wall of the old nave which formed one side of the quadrangle. A grave-faced and stout collie dog had joined us at the door, and we three went together slowly towards the door in the centre of the west wall of the restored transept. The evening sun lay golden on the wall before us and on the ruined base of the central tower of the old church, round which jackdaws wheeled and croaked.”

The old priest broke off and turned to me, with his eyes burning:

“What a marvellous thing the Religious Life is,” he said, “and above all the Contemplative Life! Here were these nuns as no doubt they and their younger sisters are still, without one single thing that in the world’s opinion makes life worth living. There is practically perpetual silence, there are hours to be spent in the chapel, no luxuries, no amusements, no power of choice, they are always rather hungry and rather tired, at the very least. And yet they are not sacrificing present happiness to future happiness, as the world always supposes, but they are intensely and radiantly happy ‘now in this present time.’ I don’t know what further proof any one wants of Who our Lord is than that men and women find the keenest, and in fact their only joy, in serving Him and belonging to Him.

“Well, I remember that something of this sort was in my mind as I went across the courtyard beside this motherly old lady with her happy quiet face. She had been over fifty years in Religion, my friend had told me.

“At the door she stopped.

“‘I will not come in,’ she said, ‘but you will find me in the parlour when you come out.’

“And she turned and went back, with the collie walking slowly beside her, his golden plumed tail raised high against her black habit.

“The door was partly open, but a thick curtain hung beyond. I pushed it quietly aside and stepped in. It seemed very dark at first, in contrast to the brilliant sunshine outside; but I presently saw that I was kneeling before a high iron-barred screen, in which was no door. On the left, in the further corner of the chapel, glimmered a blue light in a silver lamp before a statue of our Lady.

“Opposite me rose up the steps before the high altar; but not far away, because, as you remember, the chapel had once been the transept of a church, and the east wall, in the centre of which the high altar stood, was longer than both the south wall where a second altar stood, and the modern brick wall that closed it on the north. A slender crucifix in black and white and six thin tapers rose above the altar, and high above stood the Tabernacle closed by a white silk curtain, before which flickered a tiny red spark.

“I said a prayer or two, and then I noticed for the first time a dark outline rising in the centre of the space before the altar. For a moment I was perplexed, and then I saw that it was the nun whose hour it was for intercession. Her back was turned to me as she knelt at the faldstool, and her black veil fell in rigid lines on to her shoulders, and mingled with her black serge habit below. There she knelt perfectly motionless, praying. I had not, and have not, a notion as to her age. She might have been twenty-five or seventy.

“As I knelt there I thought deeply, wondering as to the nun’s age, how long she had been professed, when she would die, whether she was happy; and, I am afraid, I thought more of her than of Him Who was so near. Then a kind of anger seized me, as I compared in my mind the life of a happy good woman in the world with that of this poor creature. I pictured the life, as one so often sees it in homes, of a mother with her children growing up about her, her hands busy with healthy home work, her life glorified by a good man’s love; as she grows older, passing from happy stage to happy stage, comforting, helping, sweetening every soul she meets. Was it not for this that women––and men too, I thought, rebuking myself––were made? Then think of the sour life of the cloister––as loveless and desolate as the cold walls themselves! And even, I thought, even if there is a strange peculiar joy in the Religious Life––even if there is an absence of sorrows and anxieties such as spoil the happiness of many lives in the world––yet, after all, surely the Contemplative Life is useless and barren. The Active Life may be well enough, if the prayers and the discipline issue in greater efficiency, if the priest is more fervent when he ministers outside, and the sister of charity more charitable. Yes, I thought, the active Religious Life is reasonable enough; but the Contemplative––––! After all it is essentially selfish, it is a sin against society. Possibly it was necessary when the wickedness of the world was more fierce, to protest against it by this retirement; but not now, not now! How can the lump be leavened if the leaven be withdrawn? How can a soul serve God by forsaking the world which He made and loves?”...

“And so,” said the priest, turning to me again, “I went on––poor ignorant fool!––thinking that the woman who knelt in front of me was less useful than myself, and that my words and actions and sermons and life did more to advance God’s kingdom than her prayers! And then––then––at the moment when I reached that climax of folly and pride, God was good to me and gave me a little light.

“Now, I do not know how to put it––I have never put it into words before, except to myself––but I became aware, in my intellect alone, of one or two clear facts. In order to tell you what those facts were I must use picture language; but remember they are only translations or paraphrases of what I perceived.

“First I became aware suddenly that there ran a vital connection from the Tabernacle to the woman. You may think of it as one of those bands you see in machinery connecting two wheels, so that when either wheel moves the other moves too. Or you may think of it as an electric wire, joining the instrument the telegraph operator uses with the pointer at the other end. At any rate there was this vital band or wire of life.

Now in the Tabernacle I became aware that there was a mighty stirring and movement. Something within it beat like a vast Heart, and the vibrations of each pulse seemed to quiver through all the ground. Or you may picture it as the movement of a clear deep pool when the basin that contains it is jarred––it seemed like the movement of circular ripples crossing and recrossing in swift thrills. Or you may think of it as that faint movement of light and shade that may be seen in the heart of a white-hot furnace. Or again you may picture it as sound––as the sound of a high ship-mast with the rigging, in a steady wind; or the sound of deep woods in a July noon.

The priest’s face was working, and his hands moved nervously.

“How hopeless it is,” he said, “to express all this! Remember that all these pictures are not in the least what I perceived. They are only grotesque paraphrases of a spiritual fact that was shown me.