BEFORE perusing this work, it is as well that the reader should
understand M. Zola’s aim in writing it, and his views--as distinct from
those of his characters--upon Lourdes, its Grotto, and its cures. A short
time before the book appeared M. Zola was interviewed upon the subject by
his friend and biographer, Mr. Robert H. Sherard, to whom he spoke as
follows:
“‘Lourdes’ came to be written by mere accident. In 1891 I happened to be
travelling for my pleasure, with my wife, in the Basque country and by
the Pyrenees, and being in the neighbourhood of Lourdes, included it in
my tour. I spent fifteen days there, and was greatly struck by what I
saw, and it then occurred to me that there was material here for just the
sort of novel that I like to write--a novel in which great masses of men
can be shown in motion--_un grand mouvement de foule_--a novel the
subject of which stirred up my philosophical ideas.
“It was too late then to study the question, for I had visited Lourdes
late in September, and so had missed seeing the best pilgrimage, which
takes place in August, under the direction of the Peres de la
Misericorde, of the Rue de l’Assomption in Paris--the National
Pilgrimage, as it is called. These Fathers are very active, enterprising
men, and have made a great success of this annual national pilgrimage.
Under their direction thirty thousand pilgrims are transported to
Lourdes, including over a thousand sick persons.
“So in the following year I went in August, and saw a national
pilgrimage, and followed it during the three days which it lasts, in
addition to the two days given to travelling. After its departure, I
stayed on ten or twelve days, working up the subject in every detail. My
book is the story of such a national pilgrimage, and is, accordingly, the
story of five days. It is divided into five parts, each of which parts is
limited to one day.
“There are from ninety to one hundred characters in the story: sick
persons, pilgrims, priests, nuns, hospitallers, nurses, and peasants; and
the book shows Lourdes under every aspect. There are the piscinas, the
processions, the Grotto, the churches at night, the people in the
streets. It is, in one word, Lourdes in its entirety. In this canvas is
worked out a very delicate central intrigue, as in ‘Dr. Pascal,’ and
around this are many little stories or subsidiary plots. There is the
story of the sick person who gets well, of the sick person who is not
cured, and so on. The philosophical idea which pervades the whole book is
the idea of human suffering, the exhibition of the desperate and
despairing sufferers who, abandoned by science and by man, address
themselves to a higher Power in the hope of relief; as where parents have
a dearly loved daughter dying of consumption, who has been given up, and
for whom nothing remains but death. A sudden hope, however, breaks in
upon them: ‘supposing that after all there should be a Power greater than
that of man, higher than that of science.’ They will haste to try this
last chance of safety. It is the instinctive hankering after the lie
which creates human credulity.
“I will admit that I came across some instances of real cure. Many cases
of nervous disorders have undoubtedly been cured, and there have also
been other cures which may, perhaps be attributed to errors of diagnosis
on the part of doctors who attended the patients so cured. Often a
patient is described by his doctor as suffering from consumption. He goes
to Lourdes, and is cured. However, the probability is that the doctor
made a mistake. In my own case I was at one time suffering from a violent
pain in my chest, which presented all the symptoms of _angina pectoris_,
a mortal malady. It was nothing of the sort. Indigestion, doubtless, and,
as such, curable. Remember that most of the sick persons who go to
Lourdes come from the country, and that the country doctors are not
usually men of either great skill or great experience. But all doctors
mistake symptoms. Put three doctors together to discuss a case, and in
nine cases out of ten they will disagree in their diagnosis. Look at the
quantities of tumours, swellings, and sores, which cannot be properly
classified. These cures are based on the ignorance of the medical
profession. The sick pretend, believe, that they suffer from such and
such a desperate malady, whereas it is from some other malady that they
are suffering. And so the legend forms itself. And, of course, there must
be cures out of so large a number of cases. Nature often cures without
medical aid. Certainly, many of the workings of Nature are wonderful, but
they are not supernatural. The Lourdes miracles can neither be proved nor
denied. The miracle is based on human ignorance. And so the doctor who
lives at Lourdes, and who is commissioned to register the cures and to
tabulate the miracles, has a very careless time of it. A person comes,
and gets cured. He has but to get three doctors together to examine the
case. They will disagree as to what was the disease from which the
patient suffered, and the only explanation left which will be acceptable
to the public, with its hankering after the lie, is that a miracle has
been vouchsafed.
“I interviewed a number of people at Lourdes, and could not find one who
would declare that he had witnessed a miracle. All the cases which I
describe in my book are real cases, in which I have only changed the
names of the persons concerned. In none of these instances was I able to
discover any real proof for or against the miraculous nature of the cure.
Thus, in the case of Clementine Trouve, who figures in my story as
Sophie--the patient who, after suffering for a long time from a horrid
open sore on her foot, was suddenly cured, according to current report,
by bathing her foot in the piscina, where the bandages fell off, and her
foot was entirely restored to a healthy condition--I investigated that
case thoroughly. I was told that there were three or four ladies living
in Lourdes who could guarantee the facts as stated by little Clementine.
I looked up those ladies. The first said No, she could not vouch for
anything. She had seen nothing. I had better consult somebody else. The
next answered in the same way, and nowhere was I able to find any
corroboration of the girl’s story. Yet the little girl did not look like
a liar, and I believe that she was fully convinced of the miraculous
nature of her cure. It is the facts themselves which lie.
“Lourdes, the Grotto, the cures, the miracles, are, indeed, the creation
of that need of the Lie, that necessity for credulity, which is a
characteristic of human nature. At first, when little Bernadette came
with her strange story of what she had witnessed, everybody was against
her. The Prefect of the Department, the Bishop, the clergy, objected to
her story. But Lourdes grew up in spite of all opposition, just as the
Christian religion did, because suffering humanity in its despair must
cling to something, must have some hope; and, on the other hand, because
humanity thirsts after illusions. In a word, it is the story of the
foundation of all religions.”
To the foregoing account of “Lourdes” as supplied by its author, it may
be added that the present translation, first made from early proofs of
the French original whilst the latter was being completed, has for the
purposes of this new American edition been carefully and extensively
revised by Mr. E. A. Vizetelly,--M. Zola’s representative for all
English-speaking countries. “Lourdes” forms the first volume of the
“Trilogy of the Three Cities,” the second being “Rome,” and the third
“Paris.”