LITERARY ATTEMPTS
I broke Captain Ormsby's advice to Father Letheby as gently as I could;
and I flatter myself I have the talent of putting things in as
roundabout a way as any professional diplomat. He took it badly. He is
clearly overworking himself, for he now becomes irritable on the
slightest provocation.
"Blocked everywhere!" he said, walking up and down his little room.
"Father Dan, you are right; and I am a fool. There is no use attempting
to do any good in Ireland."
Now, this was not exactly the conclusion I wanted him to come to; but we
have a national failing of generalizing from rather minute particulars.
"I'm not so sure of that," I said. "I think you have a fair share of
work to do here, and that you have done it and are doing it remarkably
well."
Absurd! There was not half enough to do to satisfy his Napoleonic
ambition. Nothing but the Vicariate of the whole of the Dark Continent
for this young man.
"Look here, Father Dan. My parochial work is over every day at four
o'clock; and you have taught me to finish the Office, even by
anticipation, before dinner. Now, what on earth is a young fellow to do
between four o'clock of a winter's evening and ten o'clock, when he
retires? Once in a month I dine at Campion's; but the rest of the time,
except when I run up to you--"
"And you don't come half enough, you, sir," I said. "I never saw
anything like the--pride of young fellows nowadays."
"That's all right, Father Dan," he replied, somewhat more calmly; "but
even with all your kindness, what in the world am I to do with my
leisure time?"
"Read, and read, and read," I said. "Have you not the whole ocean of
human knowledge to dip into?"
"Ah! _cui bono?_" he replied.
"_Cui bono?_ from you! I never thought I'd hear that fatal word again.
_Cui bono?_ from you! _Cui bono?_ from you!"
I was never so startled in my life. It was a dread revelation of
dissatisfaction and ennui, that might lead no one knew whither.
"_Cui bono?_" I said. "Is there any pleasure on this earth comparable to
the pleasure of acquiring knowledge? Is there any satisfaction equal to
the continuous pursuit of ideas--always coming up to them, and passing
them in the insatiable thirst and pursuit? Now, I see clearly that my
tastes are not your tastes, and I was wrong in forcing the studies of
the classics upon you. But take up philosophy, arrange a _horarium_ for
the evenings--so much time for reading, so much for thinking, so much
for writing--"
"Ah! there you've struck it," he broke in. "If I could only write, I
should always have an incentive, and a strong incentive for reading and
studying what I read."
"And why don't you write?" I repeated. "Paper is cheap; pens and ink
don't cost much--"
"Write for what, and for whom?" he cried.
"Write for the magazines," I said. "Write brisk, crisp, lively articles
for our reviews and periodicals; get paid for them; and then the
ineffable pleasure of seeing your own work in print!"
"And what if they were rejected contumeliously?"
"Impossible," I replied; "there is room and to spare for good writers.
Why, we are always crying out about the barrenness of our literature!"
He had gone over to a portfolio, and had taken out a few rolls of
manuscript, to each of which a letter was tagged. He handed them to me
without a word. It needed only a glance to see that if the editors had
used up all the polite words of the language, nevertheless, "Rejected!"
was written in capital letters on every page. I knew well what it meant
to a proud, sensitive spirit; and although it was only the usual
probation for literary novices, it might have a different effect from
successful training in the case of a thoughtful if irritable mind. I
pretended to read carefully the two essays, the three short stories, and
the half-dozen poems that had come back to the author's hands without
proofs, whilst I was rapidly turning over in my mind what I should say
or do; for the recollection of my own experience at his age led me to
believe that this was a critical moment for him. Happy the stupid souls
that can gaze, without the constant fretting of thought, into the fire
for hours together! Happy we, who, going down the decline of life, have
the brake put on by a merciful Providence, and the wheels move slowly,
and day blends with night, and night dawns to day, almost imperceptibly!
But thrice unhappy they in whose souls the mills of thought whirl round
and round without ceasing the wheelstones that grind together, if the
grist is not between! How often to dreaming poet and idealist has the
eternal fretting of the wheels become intolerable, and then--
"I shouldn't mind," he interjected on my reverie, "but these papers
issue such lamentable stuff! Such vapid essays, such aimless stories,
such bread-and-butter school-girl poetry,--'sing' and 'spring,' 'bird'
and 'heard,'--not an elevating idea or thought through the whole thing
from beginning to end; and then look at these: 'We consider your story
too long;' 'We regret that the style of your article is unsuited to our
pages;' 'We see some promise in your poem, but it is not quite up to the
level of our requirements;' 'Try blank verse.... We shall be glad to
hear from you again.' Did you ever hear such mockery, and these very men
printing such intolerable rubbish!"
Of course, he never thought of the poor editor, leaning over his chair
in a brown study, biting the pen-handle, and wondering how he can please
"A Constant Subscriber," who objects to the rather light nature of the
articles he is now giving to the public; or, "Sacerdos," who does not
like poetry; or, "Senex," who asks sarcastically: Is he putting himself
in rivalry with the "Edinburgh" or "Quarterly," or who the mischief
cares one brass pin about "Aristotle's Constitution of Athens;" and
wouldn't he give them something light and agreeable to help to digest
their dinners? Oh no! he only thought then and there that there should
be an _auto da fe_,--a summary crematory process of all the editors
under the sun.
"Look here, young man," said I, at last, "there is only one thing for
you to do. You must write a book."
"Look here, Father Dan," said he, "I'm not in much humor for joking. Any
priest that would attempt to write a book nowadays should have the
spirit of the martyrs, who stepped onto the sands in the Coliseum and
saw the brutal Romans in the _auditorium_ and wild beasts in the cages
beneath!"
"Well, my dear boy," I replied, "you _will_ write the book; but for
goodness' sake write it in your present humor, before the fires die
down."
He laughed.
"Write a book? What in the world should I write about? The world is
deluged and drowned by books. And if I wrote it, who could or would
publish it? Imagine me hawking around a wretched manuscript from
publisher to publisher, until it was tattered, yellow, and
undecipherable. Why, the big London fellows accept only ten MSS. out of
five hundred on the average, and you know I cannot publish at my own
risk."
"Who the mischief spoke about publishing?" I replied, trying to keep up
the flame; "I only asked you to write. Write, write, write, and leave
the publishing to God."
"And what am I to write about? Every subject under the sun is threshed
out and threadbare, from the origin of ideas down to the microbe of
typhoid fever. Not at all; the world is grown too wise for books; we
must devise something else."
"It is not many days ago," I replied, "since I heard you lament the
awful and culpable defects in our popular Catholic literature. Hadn't
you to fall back upon that barbarous book to enlighten Ormsby on the
existence of his immortal soul?"
"Barbarous? I wish to heaven that I could write anything half as good.
But, as you see, there are whole fields of literature yet untrodden by
us, but where heretics and others are reaping rich harvests. Yet, who
would dare make the attempt? Don't you know that the ablest professors
in your own time in Maynooth never ventured into print? They dreaded the
chance shots from behind the hedge from the barrels of those masked
banditti, called 'critics.'"
"Dear me, how you do run on! One would think you had the MS. cut and dry
in your pocket, you talk so glibly about publishers and critics. Can't
you write the book first and then take circumstances as they occur?"
"Well, go on, suggest a subject, sir."
"Now, this is rather sudden, young man. Give me one day, and I'll give
you a list of subjects that would bewilder you! Only promise me you'll
take one up."
"All right!" said he; "I promise. Hallo! where are you taking those
papers?"
"I'm taking them home for the present. They are confiscated to the
Crown."
He looked at them wistfully, as if they were going to the holocaust, as
we might imagine the great mother of the Maccabees watched half with
pain, half with pride, wholly with resignation, her sons mount the
funeral pyre.
[Illustration: "It broke in my fingers and revealed the little dreams
and ambitions of nearly forty years ago."]
"Never fear," I replied, "they won't go up the chimney. At least, I'll
answer for the prose. I'm not so sure about the poetry. Now, good day!
I'll keep you to your promise."
And I did, but with what cost to myself. I had to search in the
cemeteries of the past for the skeletons of designs, once gladly
adopted, then as gladly laid to rest. At last, I found, hidden away
amongst episcopal documents, dispensations, etc., a yellow, frayed
paper, tied up in string that once was red, but now was white and
fragile. It broke in my fingers and revealed the little dreams and
ambitions of nearly forty years ago. Need I say they never ripened, or
came within even measurable distance of perfection. They were three
large quarto sheets, and they were darkened thus:--
A. M. D. G.
_Subjects for Articles and Papers to be written, wholly or partially,
during the Coming Years_.
I. MENTAL PHILOSOPHY.
I. The Influence of Plato on the Early Christian Church.
II. The Influence of Aristotle on the Mediæval Church.
III. The Neo-Platonists.
IV. The Argument in St. Augustine on the Immortality
of the Soul. (Is it Tenable?)
V. The Atomic Theory of Democritus, and the Modern Discoveries
in Astronomy.
VI. The Influence of the Inductive Philosophy on Modern
Disbelief.
VII. Was Spinoza an Atheist?
VIII. Is Descartes the Father of Modern Rationalism?
IX. St. Anselm's Proof of the Existence of God.
X. The Cosmological Argument of St. John Damascene.
XI. The Argument from Intuition.
XII. Aspects of Modern Pantheism.
XIII. Christian Idealism.
XIV. Malebranche and Fénelon.
XV. Boëthius.
XVI. Catholic Philosophers of the Nineteenth Century.
XVII. The Connection between Soul and Body (Tertullian).
XVIII. The Chaldæan Doctrine of the Soul ([Greek: essamenos pyriryr]).
XIX. The Idea of Personality.
XX. The Identification of Life and Motion.
XXI. Maine de Biran.
XXII. The Popularization of Catholic Philosophy.
II. ECCLESIASTICAL HISTORY.
I. The Alexandrian School.
II. The Writings of Clement.
III. Origen, and his Works.
IV. Ephrem the Syrian, and his Works.
V. The Apologists.
VI. The Three Cappadocians.
VII. Julian and his Contemporaries.
VIII. The Council of Nicæa.
IX. St. Augustine and the Donatists.
X. The Saints of the Catacombs.
XI. The Discipline of the Secret.
XII. The Libyan and Nitrean Anchorites
XIII. The Stylites.
XIV. Communion in the Early Church.
XV. Mediævalism.
XVI. The Case of Honorius.
XVII. Hildebrand.
XVIII. Alexander VI. and Savonarola.
XIX. Origin and Spread of Monasticism.
XX. The Influence of the Irish Monks on the Continent
of Europe.
XXI. Schools of Philosophy.
XXII. Port-Royal, Pascal, Nicole, Arnauld.
XXIII. The Rise and Progress of Jansenism.
XXIV. Gallicanism and National Churches.
Rather a large order, I thought, as I looked with pitying eyes on the
far vision of a curly-headed young priest of forty years ago, and
thought of the day-dreams of youth; and what a very slender precipitate
of work fell from the vast effervescence of the idealism of
inexperience. There remained another page of projected inspiration on
the scope and meaning of Holy Scripture; but this I put aside. I found
my knowledge, little as it was, was derived from such obsolete and
antique commentators as á Lapide, Maldonatus, Estius, and the _Triplex_;
and I was ashamed to produce such fossilized literature to the advanced
thinkers of the present day. I did not like to face this ordeal:--
"Then you haven't heard of the new schools of interpretation? You know
that the great thinkers of Germany, Bahrdt, and Semler, and Eichhorn,
have upset all our preconceived ideas about the Bible. The Wolfian ideas
have been expanded and developed; and advanced Catholic apologists have
set themselves to the task of reconciling our ancient traditions with
the discoveries of modern science. The tremendous advances made by
philological scientists and experts during these last years--"
I don't say, indeed, that my curate would indulge in this affectation,
for he is rather disposed to take the old, unlearned modes of saving
souls and going with them to Heaven, than the new, brilliant mimetism of
a world that knows not God. But still I know he would think it waste of
time to pursue such studies, until the modern _Luciferi_ tell us exactly
what they have placed beyond the borderland of conjecture, and into the
certain and unshaken fields of mathematical demonstration. So I left my
Scriptural syllabus at home.
He looked slightly appalled at the large schedule of science I showed
him. I reassured him by telling him I insisted positively on his taking
only one subject in each department.
"The grand mistake," I declared, "made by us, Catholics, is in taking
too wide, too bird's-eye a view of human history and philosophy, instead
of mapping them into sections, as the astronomical photographers are
mapping the skies from the Papal Observatory in Rome to the Lick
Observatory in California. What we want most is sectional treatises on
single subjects. Now, what you are to give us is not a vast diorama from
Thales to Rosmini, and from the persecutions of Julian to the
_Kulturkampf_ of Bismarck, but a neat etching of some particular persons
and events, and a clear photograph of some practical point of Catholic
philosophy. If you throw in a few side-lights from the errors of
non-Catholic thinkers, so much the better. Now, look it over carefully;
as the strolling player declares--'You pays your money, and you takes
your choice.'"
He thought that question of inductive philosophy very nice. He had read
something about it in Macaulay. He liked that Platonic question very
much. It bordered upon poetry and mysticism Then St. Augustine! That
would be charming. He had always such a love for St. Augustine! But
Fénelon? The "dove of Cambrai" _versus_ the "eagle of Meaux!" What a
delightful idea! No good housekeeper, at a cheap sale, was ever so
puzzled. Finally, we decided that, in philosophy, he was to take up the
question of "Modern Aspects of Pantheism;" and in Ecclesiastical History
he selected "The Cappadocians."
"But what about books?" he asked in dismay. "I haven't a single book on
these blessed subjects."
"Buy them," I said. "Every good workman buys his tools and materials."
"I have a strong suspicion, Father Dan," he said, "that this is all a
practical joke. Why, that means a whole library. And if I had money,
which I have not, I do not know the name of a single blessed Catholic
author on these subjects."
"Why, my dear fellow, there are hundreds. Let me see! On the Fathers,
Basil and the two Gregories. Let me see! Haven't you--my memory is
failing--haven't you Cardinal Newman's essays on these Fathers?"
"Well? You don't want me to give a verbatim version of Cardinal Newman,
surely, do you?"
"Let me see! Why, we have hundreds of English Catholic writers on these
subjects. What in the world is becoming of my memory? Why, we have whole
libraries in the English language on these subjects! Isn't there Alzog
and--and--Darras?--"
"I have Darras," he cried triumphantly.
"Well, look it up, and see all you can get about St. Basil."
"But their writings! Wouldn't it be nice to give Greek extracts from
their sermons and homilies?"
"'T would indeed. Well, I'll look up all the old catalogues I have kept,
and let you know about books of reference. Meanwhile, commence somewhere
by way of preface. Now, what are you going to do about that
fishing-boat? Ormsby says it is certainly a troublesome and may be a
perilous enterprise!"
"It's gone too far now to draw back," said Father Letheby. "The Board
has yielded at last, thanks to Ormsby himself."
"They'll advance all the money?"
"No; two thirds; four hundred pounds."
"That's very kind of them; and no interest, no security. I did not think
Boards could be so generous."
"No, indeed. They have full security to be paid back, principal and five
per cent interest, in less than five years."
"By Jove! You are a clever fellow. And where have you got all this Midas
wealth?"
He asked me to be good enough to move with him to the window. True
enough, even under the cold light, the broad sea stretched sparkling
before us, with all its magic and glamour, but unruffled and unploughed
by even one Nautilus-sail of busy man.
"There," he cried, "there lie the gold mines of Ireland, unworked and
neglected. In these depths is wealth enough to make Kilronan a busy
emporium of merchandise for half the world!"
"I see. And the other two hundred? Where do they come from?"
"Subscribed by twenty merchants, who have taken shares in the boat."
"And you never asked your old pastor to invest in this patriotic bank.
Shame! Shame! And I wanted a little return as well as the rest of the
world."
He laughed.
"The mackerel fishery alone," he continued, in a calculating way, "is
worth a hundred pounds each for each boat in the Manx and French
fishing-fleets that anchor off our shores every year, and take our
wealth back to their thriving villages. I calculate another cool hundred
on cod, haak, etc. I think we shall pay back the Board's loan in three
years, besides paying handsome dividends to our shareholders. The boat
is in the hands of a Belfast firm. She will be ready by the first of
May. On that day she will be christened the 'Star of the Sea,' and will
make her first run to the fishing-fleet."
"And what about the shirt-factory?"
"That's all right, too," he said, though his face grew a little clouded.
"I shall have twenty sewing-machines in full swing by the middle of
April. The manager was here and dined with me last Thursday; he's a fine
fellow. He assures me that, after the initial expenses are over, the
girls can earn from eight to ten shillings a week easily."
"By Jove! That's good. That will be a great help to the poor people."
"Yes; he sends the shirts here, ready and cut for sewing, by the new
system of scientific shirt-making. Then all they have to do is to tack
them together with the machines."
"God bless you!" I said fervently. "You're a wonderful fellow."
I was sorry that I gave him Ormsby's message of warning.