Père Etienne, feeling that the struggle with Gzhatski was getting beyond
his strength, began to look round for help, and, as a first step, advised
Irene to hear some of the sermons that are preached on certain days at
most of the principal Roman churches. On the following Sunday, she made
her way to San Luigi dei Francesi, a church famous for the eloquence of
its preachers. The sermon was to be preached at four o’clock, before
Vespers. The organ was playing softly as Irene entered the splendid
edifice, with its magnificent marble pillars and bronze decoration.
Italian preachers in Rome usually speak from a broad covered rostrum,
lined with red cloth, in which frame the preacher, unable to restrain his
excitement, strides backwards and forwards, and gesticulates wildly,
alternately throwing himself into a chair, and rising again. These broad
rostrums are of very ancient origin; their prototype is still to be found
among the ruins of the Forum, where they served, in bygone days of the
Republic, as platforms from which the populace was addressed.
French preachers do not gesticulate. They mount a little winding
stairway, to a round narrow pulpit, with an umbrella-like baldaquin, in
which their little figures white-robed, and with black pelerines, look
like Chinese dolls. While the Italian priest, in his passionate ardour,
smites his chest and thunders at the congregation, his French brother
pronounces a calm, well-thought out speech, whose aim is to astonish by
its brilliant wit and its fine subtlety.
On this occasion, the sermon was on the subject of the cult of early
Christian martyrs. It was, indeed, rather an historical lecture than a
sermon. The preacher made a perfectly expressed and masterly exposition
of various facts hitherto unknown to Irene, about the catacombs; the high
honour in which the tombs of the first Christian martyrs were held, and
the respect shown even to false martyrs, _i.e._, to deceased Christians,
given out by their ambitious relatives as saints who had died for the
Faith. These falsifications had, according to the preacher, assumed such
enormous proportions, that it had been found necessary, in about the
second century, to organize a special commission with the purpose of
looking into the matter.
“Et comme un faux gentilhomme est exclu de l’armorial,” added the
preacher, a little irrelevantly, “ainsi ces faux martyrs furent bannis du
martyrologe.”
Irene listened with interest, but wondered a little how this scientific,
historical, slightly satirical lecture could touch or help the souls of
the listeners. In half an hour it was over, and Irene rose to go, when
suddenly the altar was brightly illuminated, the organ began to play, and
from the gallery floated the dulcet tones of the beautiful angel-voiced
choir. Irene had never heard such passionate romantic singing, except at
the opera. It awakened no religious inspiration in her; on the contrary,
closing her eyes in complete enjoyment, caressed by the softness of
those delicious waves of sound, she saw before her her once-idolized
singer Battestini, in the title rôle of Rubinstein’s “Demon.” The
unhappy “exiled spirit” was wandering in the desert, solitary, forsaken,
heartbroken, hopelessly in love!
“All the sorrow, all the suffering of life,” he sobbed passionately from
the gallery, “is caused by solitude. Live together in couples! Love,
caress, and comfort one another! And above all things, lose no time!
Enjoy the delights of love, while you can!”
The sound of dull, stifled sobbing fell on Irene’s ear. It emanated from
a grey-haired old man beside her, who had fallen on his knees and buried
his face in his hands.
“He weeps because it is too late for him to love,” concluded Irene, as
she glanced pityingly at the bent figure of the old man.
The service ended; the great doors opened, and the warm, golden, Roman
evening rushed into the church. Irene turned her steps homewards,
enjoying the blue sky, and the gay good-natured Sunday crowd that filled
the streets. Somewhere in the distance a military band was playing, the
air was full of laughter and merriment. Pretty children, in their best
frocks, and with little bare legs, were frolicking about to the evident
delight of their parents, who watched them with tender caressing smiles.
“How glorious, how beautiful life is!” thought Irene, still under the
impression of the singing. But having traversed two streets and turned
into the Piazza Venezia, she suddenly stopped short, horror-struck.
“But they did not sing about earthly love _at all_!” she exclaimed to
herself in complete confusion. “How could such thoughts ever be awakened
by their prayers? How did it happen? How came I to fall into such an
error?”
Irene was both amazed and ashamed, and decided to say nothing to Père
Etienne about her impressions of the service. This, however, was not as
easy as it seemed. The wily priest cross-examined her severely, and
of course, Irene ended by admitting everything. Père Etienne frowned.
He knew all about this tragic “Demon,” singing so passionately in the
desert—he had met him twice in the corridor, on the way to Irene’s room!
“You are far too impressionable,” he observed severely, “and music
evidently irritates your nerves. You will do better to attend the
lectures of Monsignor Berra, in the convent of the Ursulines.”
Irene agreed, and, on the appointed day, knocked at the small door of the
convent in the Via Flavia. The sister who answered her knock glanced at
the pass ticket in Irene’s hand, and led her through a quadrangle with
slim Gothic columns. Irene was astonished at the silence. Only a few
steps away was the crowded, noisy street—yet here reigned the stillness
of the grave. She raised the leather curtain with which the doors of
churches in Rome are always covered during the winter, and found herself
in a cold, damp, but very elegant chapel, filled with ladies, young
girls, and children. Men were not admitted here—only two abbots were
modestly hiding themselves in a corner.
The nuns, true to their traditions, did not show themselves at all, but
from somewhere on high came the sound of the organ, while the fresh young
voices of the convent school children sang the prayers.
“Well,” thought Irene with a smile, “at least this singing will not lead
me into temptation!”
After a short service, Monsignor Berra, a handsome, clever old man,
entered the pulpit. Expressing himself in that most elegant French that
was once spoken at the French Court, but that is now forgotten by all
except, perhaps, the clergy, he began a lecture on Esther.
Irene listened with pleasure to the subtle, clever, witty phrases of the
priest, punctuated by long quotations from Racine, whose name, however,
Berra did not mention, speaking of him only as “the most Christian of
all poets.” But as the lecture continued, it seemed to grow strangely
familiar to Irene, and suddenly she remembered what association it
awakened in her mind. A few days previously, Lady Muriel had taken her to
the Palazzo of the N⸺ Embassy, to see its famous, beautiful tapestries.
One of the rooms was lined entirely with scenes from the story of Esther,
embroidered after seventeenth-century designs. The figures, indeed,
represented neither Persians nor Jews, but simply French Marquises and
Viscounts, who had temporarily doffed their powdered wigs, and had amused
themselves by dressing up in Persian disguises.
“When I look at Esther,” the witty daughter of the Ambassador had
remarked to Irene, pointing to the tapestry, “I always wonder how
long she practised and rehearsed fainting, before carrying it out so
gracefully!”
Listening to Berra, Irene had quite this same impression of an
“imitation” Esther! Described by him, the primitive, passionate Jewess
became an affected lady of the Court of Louis XV., one of those numerous
favourites who knew well how to use their coquetry in order to manage, to
their perfect satisfaction, their own little affairs and those of all
their relatives and friends!
Towards the end of the lecture, the preacher abandoned his tone of
levity, and grew serious. In connection with Esther’s fervent prayer, he
remarked that if our prayers remain unanswered to-day, it is only because
they are so cold and proud.
“Imagine, Mesdames,” he said, “a beggar who would approach you in the
street, asking for alms, in a cold, proud voice, as though he were
demanding his due! Would you not be justly incensed? Would you not turn
away and rather bestow your bounty upon one who asks it humbly and in
tears? Pray then also to God like humble supplicants, trusting in His
mercy and goodness.”
Irene returned home, much impressed by these words. “Yes,” she
thought—she was undoubtedly to be counted among the proud beggars! She
knew her own virtues, and she considered she had a right to demand a
reward from God. How would it be if she were to change the nature of her
prayers? And, under the impulse of a new hope, she fell on her knees,
weeping, sobbing, praying: “Lord! I am but a humble supplicant! I resign
all my rights and privileges! I ask only for mercy! Send me happiness—and
if that is impossible, then give me at least rest, that spiritual rest
for which my soul hungers!”
Irene prayed passionately, and with bitter tears—but all the time, reason
was whispering in answer: “What are you asking? you know that you are
praying for the impossible. Happiness for you can take only one form,
that of love, love, love, that love of which you have been dreaming all
your life! But think a little—how is that possible at your age? Love
is nature’s method of continuing our race. That is why young girls are
gifted with such attractions for young men. At your age, to have children
is impossible—that is why beauty has been taken from you, and men pass
you by with indifference. You ask for spiritual rest, but that is only
attainable by people who have fulfilled the duties imposed on them by
nature. You were born to be a wife and a mother—Where is your husband?
Where are your children? Where is your family? God created the world on
a foundation of logical laws, and, however passionately you may pray, He
cannot change these laws.”
Irene arose in despair. Oh! that accursed helpless logic, that kills all
prayer and destroys all hope!
Time passed, and Irene’s nervousness increased day by day. Sermons,
church services, her disputes with Gzhatski, all this alike irritated
and enervated her. Père Etienne observed the poor woman with real pity,
but could devise no means of comforting or helping her. Happening on one
occasion to mention a famous convent at Assisi, which he thought Irene
might some day do well to visit with the object of retreat and prayer,
she caught at the idea. On the following day, strictly forbidding the
porter at the _pension_ to disclose her new address to _anyone_, and
without saying good-bye to Gzhatski, she left Rome.