The Master-Christian. Marie Corelli

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СКАЧАТЬ they can do things—things that will last. Their persistent self-credulity is astonishing,—considering the advance the world has made in science, and the overwhelming proofs we are always getting of the fact that we are only One of an eternal procession of many mighty civilizations, all of which have been swept away with everything they have ever learnt, into silence,—so that really all we do, or try to do, amounts to doing nothing in the end!"

      "That is your creed, I know," said Angela Sovrani with a faint sigh,

       "But it is a depressing and a wretched one."

      "I do not find it so," responded the Abbe, complacently looking at a fine diamond ring that glittered on the little finger of his plump white hand, "It is a creed which impresses upon us the virtue of being happy during the present moment, no matter what the next may bring. Let each man enjoy himself according to his temperament and capabilities. Do not impose bounds upon him—give him his liberty. Let him alone. Do not try to bamboozle him with the idea that there is a God looking after him. So will he be spared much disappointment and useless blasphemy. If he makes his own affairs unpleasant in this world', he will not be able to lift up his hands to the innocent skies, which are only composed of pure ether, and blame an impossible Large Person sitting up there who can have no part in circumstances which are entirely unknown outside the earth's ridiculously small orbit."

      He smiled kindly as he spoke, and looked paternally at "the Sovrani," who flushed with a sudden warmth that sent a wave of pale rose over her face, and made her cheeks the colour of the flower she wore.

      "How cruel you are!" she said,—"How cold—how didactic! You would give each man his freedom according to habit and temperament,—no matter whether such habit and temperament led to crime or otherwise,—you would impose upon him no creed,—no belief in anything higher than himself,—and yet—you remain in the Church!"

      The Abbe laughed softly.

      "Chere Sovrani! You are angry—deliciously angry! Impulsively, enthusiastically, beautifully vexed with me! I like to see you so,—you are a woman of remarkable genius, and yet you are quite a little child in heart,—a positive child, with beliefs and hopes! I should not wonder if you even believed that love itself is eternal!—that most passing of phantoms!—yes—and you exclaim against me because I venture to think for myself? It is appalling that I should think for myself and yet remain in the Church? My dear lady, you might just as well, after unravelling the dirty entanglement of the Dreyfus case, have turned upon our late friend Faure and exclaimed 'And yet you remained President!'"

      Angela's violet eyes glowed.

      "He was not allowed to remain President," she said.

      "No, he was not. He died. Certainly! And I know you think he would not have died if he had done his best to clear the character of an innocent man. To women of your type, it always seems as if God—the Large Person up above—stepped in exactly at the right moment. It would really appear as if it were so at times. But such things are mere coincidences."

      "I do not believe in coincidences," said Angela decisively, "I do not believe in 'chance' or 'luck', or what you call 'fortuitous' haphazard arrangements of any sort. I think everything is planned by law from the beginning; even to the particular direction in which a grain of dust floats through space. It is all mathematical and exact. And the moving Spirit—the Divine Centre of things, whom I call God,—cannot dislodge or alter one particle of the majestic system without involving the whole in complete catastrophe. It is our mistake to 'chance' things—at least, so I think. And if I exclaim against you and say,—"Why do you remain in the Church?' it is because I cannot understand a man of conscience and intellect outwardly professing one thing while inwardly he means another. Because God will take him in the end at his own interior valuation, not at his outward seeming."

      "Uncomfortable, if true," said the Abbe, still smiling. "When one has been at infinite pains all one's life to present a charmingly virtuous and noble aspect to the world, it would be indeed distressing if at the last moment one were obliged to lift the mask . . ."

      "Sometimes one is not given the chance to lift it," interposed Angela, "It is torn off ruthlessly by a force greater than one's own. 'Call no man happy till his death,' you know."

      "Yes, I know," and the Abbe settled himself in his chair more comfortably;—he loved an argument with "the Sovrani", and was wont to declare that she was the only woman in the world who had ever made him wish to be a good man,—"But that maxim can be taken in two ways. It may mean that no man is happy till his death,—which I most potently believe,—or it may mean that a man is only JUDGED after his death, in which case it cannot be said to affect his happiness, as he is past caring whether people think ill or well of him. Besides, after death it must needs be all right, as every man is so particularly fortunate in his epitaph!"

      Angela smiled a little.

      "That is witty of you," she said, "but the fact of every man having a kindly-worded epitaph only proves goodness of heart and feeling in his relatives and friends—"

      "Or gratitude for a fortune left to them in his will," declared the Abbe gaily, "or a sense of relief that the dear creature has gone and will never come back. Either motive, would, I know, inspire me to write most pathetic verses! Now you bend your charming brows at me,—mea culpa! I have said something outrageous?"

      "Not from the point of view at which YOU take life," said Angela quietly, "but I was just then thinking of a cousin of mine,—a very beautiful woman; her husband treated her with every possible sort of what I should term civil cruelty,—polite torture—refined agony. If he had struck her or shot her dead it would have been far kinder. But his conduct was worse than murder. He finally deserted her, and left her penniless to fight her own way through the world. Then he died suddenly, and she forgot all his faults, spoke of him as though he had been a model of goodness, and lives now for his memory, ever mourning his loss. In her case the feeling of regret had nothing to do with money, for he spent all her fortune and left her nothing even of her own. She has to work hard for her living now,—but she loves him and is as true to him as if he were still alive. What do you say to that?"

      "I say that the lady in question must be a charming person!" replied the Abbe, "Perfectly charming! But of course she is deceiving herself; and she takes pleasure in the self-deception. She knows that the man had deserted her and was quite unworthy of her devotion;—but she pretends to herself that she does NOT know. And it is charming, of course! But women will do that kind of thing. It is extraordinary,—but they will. They all deceive themselves in matters of love. Even you deceive yourself."

      Angela started.

      "I?" she exclaimed.

      "Yes—you—why not?" And the Abbe treated her to one of his particularly paternal smiles. "You are betrothed to Florian Varillo,—but no man ever had or ever could have all the virtues with which you endow this excellent Florian. He is a delightful creature,—a good artist—unique in his own particular line,—but you think him something much greater than even artist or man—a sort of god, (though the gods themselves were not impeccable) only fit to be idealised. Now, I am not a believer in the gods,—but of course it is delightful to me to meet those who are."

      "Signor Varillo needs neither praise nor defence," said Angela with a slight touch of hauteur, "All the world knows what he is."

      "Yes, precisely! That is just it,—all the world knows what he is,—" and the Abbe rubbed his forehead with an air of irritation, "And I am vexing you by my talk, I can see! Well, well!—You must forgive my garrulity;—I admit my faults—I am old—I am a cynic—I talk too much—I have a bad opinion of man, and an equally bad opinion of the Forces СКАЧАТЬ