promise for me was void; but the conditions of the promise, there was
the charm. Sometimes I think that if I could have put away from me all
my philosophical preoccupations, I would willingly have left everything
I possessed, for the sake of that peace, that security, that trust in
something outside ourselves, which is infinitely wise, infinitely
merciful, infinitely loving. But faith, belief, is not an act of
volition, it is the spiritual nature; it is the possession of children
and of simple folk.
To those who have looked into the nature of things, who with Epicurus
see man as only the momentary grouping together of a substance
essentially transient and mutable, life itself is the end, a life of
fine appreciations, retirement, and leisure, and a death that has no
awakening. We, too, love our neighbour; we, too, have charity toward the
bruised and broken lives about us; we, too, recommend all men to hide
their lives, to be moderate, to abhor that which is evil and cling to
that which is good. We are Christians without Christ.
My own grief was still with me, but a serene and hopeless resignation
had taken the place of despair. The memory of Drusilla and my child
haunted my waking moments, and daily thoughts, like vain phantoms
escaped for a brief moment from the shadowy realm of fabled Proserpina.
The past was part of my consciousness; as it is, I suppose of every man.
I began again to frequent the Prefect's palace, to listen to his mellow
wisdom which he cloaked in laughing phrase, as we passed easily from one
subject to another without exhausting any. Seneca's raillery was dull
beside his brother's; Seneca laughed at women and the comedy of manners,
to Gallio nothing was sacred, not even his philosophic brother. At the
same time I still continued to frequent the house of Caius, and the
society of the Christians. It placed me in an anomalous position, and
one day Gallio said laughingly that a friend had accused me of assisting
at the secret rites and orgies of the Christians, but that he had
replied I was more likely to frequent the pretty daughter of Caius. Then
I remembered the daughter of Caius, a young girl of extraordinary
beauty, with a perverse expression, blonde hair, and eyes like a cat,
that watched every movement with a stealthy curiosity. She seemed lonely
and out of place in that house of austere gravity.
"She is already famous as a beauty," said Gallio.
"I go there on business," I said with a smile, and willing to let him
believe what he would; and, I added, after a moment's thought: "she is
charming."
Gallio laughed, and then changed his tone quickly.
"I do not advise you to frequent that quarter of our delightful town,"
he said. "It is the haunt of the worst characters in Corinth, thieves,
sorcerers, and charlatans inhabit it. Even the house of Caius is not
free from suspicion; it is said that some of our ladies go there for
love-potions, or for other purposes."
I was thinking, and did not reply to the innuendo. Gallio watched me for
a moment curiously, in silence. I did not speak.
"I have bought a little masterpiece, a painting by Parrhasios of the
triumph of Bacchus. Come and see it; it only arrived from Athens this
morning."
* * * * *
The next time I visited the house of Caius I spoke to Paul of what
Gallio's suspicions were; a sullen glow filled his eyes.
"It is no new thing," he said; "on every side we are looked upon with
suspicion and distrust; we are poor, and live cheek by jowl with the
evil things of life, and therefore we are also evil. The rich, and those
in high places trample upon us; yet we shall be justified."
Pride filled him.
"In a little time you go away to Rome, and I to Jerusalem to carry alms
to the saints there, whom the Jews persecute. We are like two
travellers, who have met together in an inn, and spoken of their
travels; but at dawn they separate and go their several ways. Shall we
meet again? You are not one of us, but perchance God will lead you to
us. Be humble; put away all vain imaginings of the mind; love all
things; suffer all things."
He gazed at me sadly for a time.
"If you would but close your eyes and put out your hand trustfully, God
would lead you through the darkness. You are almost of us; and yet you
are not of us. There is a barrier which you cannot pass: you cannot
believe."
Then, again, after a moment's pause.
"You must not come here again."
He rose and left me. The last time I saw that small, bald head poised
upon the huge misshapen shoulder was when they were framed in the
doorway; then the curtain fell and he had gone. I sat a little while,
almost sorrowful. Then a small, delicate hand was slid into mine, and I
heard a soft voice whispering:
"You are going away. Take me with you."
It was the daughter of Caius, she clung to me and gazed appealingly at
me out of her precocious eyes.
"Take me away with you," she repeated. "I shall do anything for you;
only take me away, take me away. I cannot stay here. It will kill me.
They are so good and I am wicked; yes, I am very wicked. Some one told
me I was beautiful, and it pleased me. I want to go with you. I am
wicked. I want people to see that I am beautiful...."
* * * * *
Serenus began to roll up his manuscript.
"It is too dark to read the rest. But now you know the Christians. What
do you think of them?"
"I think as I have always thought," said Rufus; "all Jews are alike.
They are the enemies of the human race; their religion is one of
despair, and they do not hope to find salvation in this world. The East
is the home of all credulity and superstition. Come to dinner and let us
arrange to do something to-morrow. A hunt?"
"What happened to the girl?" enquired Marcus, stretching himself slowly.
Serenus looked over the sea, toward the fishing-boats, each of which
showed a light.
"Go down to the house, both of you, and bathe. I shall follow presently.
We shall dine sumptuously to-night; and, yes, to-morrow we shall hunt.
It will pass the time."
They left him. For a little while he sat watching the lights out at sea,
the spires of mist wreathing above the olives, the dance of fire-flies
over the sloping lawn. He sat motionless for some time; then he rose,
and sighed.
"A little pleasure, and then darkness and silence," he said.
He began to walk slowly toward the house. A path below him echoed with
the sound of footsteps and voices; looking through the low branches he
thought that he discovered in the uncertain light the figure and
features of Paul, surrounded by the slaves of the household.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
_TO MRS C. B. FAIRFAX_
IV
THE JESTERS OF THE LORD
------------------------------------------------------------------------
IV
THE JESTERS OF THE LORD
The fountain rose into the sunlight singing, broke flowering a moment,
and fell with a chime of sweetness into the basin. Francis looked at it
with delight. The fine mist of spray drifting from it made a little
rainbow in the court-yard.
"All things praise the Lord," he said; "but the voice of our sister the
water is clearest. She never ceases from her song through the hot day,
and all night she sings, from evening until dawn."
He gazed at it with the serene pleasure of a child. In the shadow of the
great curtain-wall his companions walked up and down, gesticulating,
suddenly vivacious and then as suddenly mute. A little group separated
from the others stood in the arch of the gateway overlooking Rome. Cool,
dark cypresses showed here and there among the bell-towers and
fortifications; and over all the broken lines of roof and belfry
wandered the liquid sunlight, diversifying the colours of the tiles
through a myriad gradations from dusky copper to pale gold, and ending
now and again in a sudden angle of deep gloom. Yet Francis saw nothing
but the water rising into the clear light.
"Beautiful thou art, and humble, and chaste, and very precious to us,"
he said. "Of all God's creatures thou art the most perfect, delighting
in his service, praising him for the light of the sun, and the sweet
air, as I praise him for thee, O sister water!"
He dipped his hand into the basin, and cool ripples were woven about his
long, thin fingers.
"These also are God's creatures," he said; "the shy fish who come and go
mysteriously among the stems of the lilies. They move obscurely through
the dim ways, and no man wonders at them; yet none of Arthur's knights
were arrayed in such golden mail."
And taking a piece of dry bread, which a beggar had given him, he broke
it into small crumbs, and strewed them upon the surface of the water;
and the fish came out from between the stems of the lilies, and nibbled
at the crumbs as the ripples moved them; but the crust of bread Francis
ate himself, and having eaten he drank a little water out of the palm of
his hand, and spoke again.
"Little fish," he said, "those knights of Arthur's court, who were
mailed in glittering armour, had each one his lady, whom he served in
all things; and no one of them meddled with the lady of another, because
as yet evil had not entered into their hearts; but they went through the
world succouring the afflicted, and the innocent, and the oppressed; and
doing all manner of wonderful deeds, being valiant men and strong, for
the glory of God, and the great honour of the lady whose livery they
wore. And the ladies, whom they served in all honourable ways, were fair
and pleasant to look upon, and moreover they were well-clad, having each
her golden ornaments, and jewels, and kerchiefs of lawn, and fine cloth
of Ypres; yea! having all things desirable about them, soft raiment, and
dainty food, and wide houses full of tapestries of Arras, with a gallery
for the musicians. But because of the luxury of their lives, and the
folly which ever prompts the soul of man to evil, they fell into sin,
and no virtue remained in them.
"Little fish, I am a knight of God; and I have chosen for my lady one
beyond all mortal women. She hath neither fine raiment, nor gold, nor
jewels; neither a covering for her head, nor shoes for her feet; neither
land nor castles; nay! not so much as a shelter against the ravening
beasts; nor do her serving-men bring her delicate meats in vessels of
gold and silver, nor do musicians play to her upon viols or psalteries,
nor hath she any treasure hidden in the ground. She goeth from door to
door, begging her bread through every city of the populous earth; and
the porters drive her from the gate with blows; and the children mock
her in the streets for being old, and lean, and ill-favoured; and the
dogs snarl at her heels. Yet all these things she endures patiently, nor
complains that men revile her, for God hath put much comfort in her
heart. I, also, little brother Francis, in my youth reviled her; for it
was then my pleasure to live sumptuously, to wear rich apparel, and to
pass my days with music and feasting; but when she revealed herself to
me I was overcome by her exceeding great beauty, and I lamented that I
had not followed after her all my days. Alas! it is the wickedness of
men that shows her as a vile and despicable thing; for having nothing
she possesses all things. God hath clothed her with virtues more
precious than rubies; he hath given her the wide earth and all the
pleasant ways thereof to be her home; he hath commanded the beasts that
they do her no hurt: nay! they are serviceable to her and fawn about her
feet; and God himself ministers to her, feeding her as he feeds the
birds of the air and the fish of the sea, and sweetening her food, so
that if it be but a dry crust it savours most excellently to her, even
as honey and manna in the mouth. Such is the excellence of my Lady
Poverty, with whom I shall always keep faith in this life. Little fish,
God hath given you the cool water to inhabit; and he hath clad you in
golden mail, delightful to the eyes of men; and when all the birds and
beasts and creeping things entered into the Ark, he preserved you in a
safe refuge beneath the tumult of the waters: yea! of all things, which
went not in with Noah, he preserved you in your multitudes though all
else perished. Little fish, I praise the Lord for you, because he hath
made you beautiful, and shown you infinite mercies."
But the fish, having eaten all the crumbs, swam back among the stems of
the lilies, and hung poised there in the shadowy waters, with undulating
motions, waving their delicate fins, and opening and shutting their
mouths. Francis considered them for a moment.
"Little fish," he said, "perchance it is the way that you praise the
Lord, being dumb and without reason; but men, to whom God hath given
such excellent gifts as speech and reason, have turned from him. I would
that they also might learn to praise him with great simplicity and joy
in their hearts."
He looked toward the gateway through which he saw the roofs and towers
of Rome, the city which had not accepted him, inhospitable, gay, given
over to the lusts of the flesh, the desire of the eyes, hungering
passionately after the tangible but transient pleasures of this
delightful world; a new Jerusalem, as stubborn and hard-hearted as the
old, but, like that, too, a chosen city of God, in which he had elected
to dwell and have his abiding place. Tears suffused his face as he
looked at it lying there calm and golden in the sunlight.
"I have not known how to draw them to me," he said. "Surely they would
have followed after me if I had spoken to them more joyfully. A little
thing delights them, and they will flock to see a dancer, a juggler, a
jester! We must become the jesters of God, amusing the hearts of men and
leading them toward spiritual joys."
A bell struck, and was answered from all the towers of Rome, until the
air pulsed with vibrations as if with a multitude of beating wings.
Francis moved slowly away toward the new buildings of the Lateran. Those
of his companions who were pacing up and down in the cool shadow of the
wall suddenly stopped and pointed to him.
"Look! Look!" they cried.
Some play of the wind carrying the fine drifting mist over the isolated
figure had clothed him for a moment in a glory of radiant colours. The
sound of the bell still trembling in the air, and the sudden iridescence
of spray in the sunlight, was to them a revelation. Hearing their voices
raised Francis went toward them.
"What is it, my brothers?" he asked of them.
They received him almost with adoration.
"We saw you troubled, and in thought," answered Brother Egidio; "and
then, suddenly, as the bells ceased, we saw a glory shine about you, and
heard a great beating of wings."
But Francis remembering the doubts which had afflicted him a moment
before, cast himself at the feet of Brother Egidio.
"I command you, in the name of holy obedience, that when I return you
say to me: Francis, son of Pietro Bernardone, because of your doubt you
are contemptible, and in no wise deserving of God's mercy."
Then, rising, he went toward the palace with a serene countenance.
Having watched Francis enter into the palace, the eleven companions
continued to pace up and down in the cool shadow of the wall, and to
discourse to each other upon grave matters.
"How is it, Brother Bernard," said Egidio, "that astrologers are able to
foretell all things that will happen to a man in his journey through
life?"
"It is in this wise," said Brother Bernard, who had all the wisdom of
the schools, "the earth is the centre of the universe, which consists of
a number of concentric spheres, all turning, as it were, upon the axle
of the earth; the first is the sphere of the elements, which is enclosed
by the sphere of the moon; beyond these, in order, circle the six
spheres of Mercury, Venus, the Sun, Mars, Jupiter and Saturn, all
turning about the earth; the next sphere is that wherein the fixed stars
are set like jewels, and beyond that is the _Primum Mobile_, whence
motion is born and governed. Last of all is the Empyrean, and there in a
blaze of light God sits enthroned, and all the spheres make a celestial
music about his feet.
"Now it is from the order and motion of these spheres that astrologers
get that devilish wisdom whereby they are enabled to foretell the
future. For each one of the spheres is governed by a distinct angelical
company, who influence all things under their control; so that, having
ascertained the nature of such angels as control the sphere of any
particular planet, we are enabled to judge of the nature and disposition
of any mortal born under their influence; thus it happens that those who
are been under Mercury are of an alert and capricious disposition, and
may be given to thieving; while those who are born under Venus are lewd
and wanton in their motions, given over to the lusts of the flesh; and
those influenced by Mars will be great warriors, men of mettle,
hot-tempered, and quick to shed blood. Moreover, by the conjunctions and
opposition of planets, by comets and portents in the sky, those skilled
in the signs are even able to foretell whether a man shall die in his
youth with all his sins heavy upon him, or in old age when his flagging
pulses have made him less prone to sin and warned him to repentance; and
we may see men, to whom astrologers have predicted a long life, pursuing
a course of infamy well on into their old age, for they know that there
is time left for repentance, whereby they may yet save their souls. Such
is the lamentable wisdom, which came to us through the transgression of
Adam."
They continued in silence a little way, pondering these things; and then
Bernard spoke again.
"In all things," he said, "we may read the infinite mercies and wisdom
of God. For even as he has made the earth the centre of the universe, so
he has made man the centre of all created things. Round the throne of
God are the Seraphim and Cherubim singing His eternal praise, and next
to them are the Thrones, who carry the orders of God unto the
Dominations. These last are the mighty powers who held back the sun and
moon in their courses, at the prayer of Joshua; and they inhabit the
_Primum Mobile_, whence all the planets are moved from east to west.
Beneath these, are the Virtues and Powers, ruling the planetary spheres;
and finally come the three orders of Princedoms, Archangels, and Angels;
and to each Angel is given the guidance of one soul. Now in this order I
have followed the teaching of Dionysius rather than of Gregory, since
the former was the pupil of St Paul, and therefore of greater authority.
"Many rebellious angels, driven out with Lucifer, and the host who
writhe in Hell beneath our feet, making the earth tremble, inhabit the
sphere of the elements, and ride upon all storms, ruling the thunder and
lightning, and opening the flood-gates, and loosening the tempests of
hail; and God hath given them power over the wicked to lead them to
destruction, but, before the prayers of the holy, their power is only an
empty noise. How little is the worth of man! Yet all these immortal
spirits are concerned in his salvation. And God hath set Jerusalem in
the centre of earth's habitable hemisphere, so that from there the means
of salvation might radiate into all countries, and gather up all
peoples. And yet again is man the centre of created things, for God hath
made him lord and master of the earth, and of all the birds and beasts
therein; though, indeed, when he fell from Paradise in the person of
Adam, he decreased in excellence and became subject to sin and death."
"And for how long a time," enquired one of the younger brethren, "was
Adam in Paradise?"
"For little more than six hours," answered Bernard, with assurance.
"It was a very short time," said the brother simply.
But Egidio was troubled; he touched Bernard upon the arm.
"Beware, little sheep of the Lord," he said gently, "lest thy great
learning make thee mad, and turn to pride in thy heart."
II
As the Cardinal Giovanni di San Paolo entered the audience, the Pope was
dictating a letter to his secretary. He spoke in a low, clear voice, so
clear that it was audible at the end of the long room.
"Among all the princes of the earth," said Innocent, "we have always
cherished with a particular affection your own person; and the more so
since the kingdom which you have inherited is, by the will of your
predecessors, subject and tributary to the Roman Church. Therefore
redeem the promise of your father liberally and without delay. Your
eternal salvation will be the better assured, and there will be added to
it even such temporal benefits as the apostolic protection is able to
secure. In acting otherwise you would offend the Creator. He chastiseth
those who do evil unto his Church, but more particularly those who
detain unjustly the wealth of St Peter."
He motioned the Cardinal toward him, and taking half a lemon squeezed it
into a cup and drank it. He had a youthful but rather fleshy face, at
once legal and military in its character. The features were fine, with a
distinctly Roman nobility: a long narrow nose, almost straight except
where it jutted slightly from the brows; fine lustrous eyes, set a
little too close together; a small mouth, with thin, rather drooping
lips, and a double chin. The well-chiselled nostrils dilated sensitively
from time to time, otherwise the whole face was calm, impassive,
hieratic. He began, without any prelude, to speak to the Cardinal of
their business.
"I have spoken to many of the cardinals about these penitents of Assisi.
Their opinion is that the rule is too severe, and such an ideal beyond
all human strength."
"Your Holiness, I have also urged this view upon Francis, but, in the
simplicity of his heart, he replies that his rule is taken from the
Gospels: 'If thou wilt be perfect, go and sell that thou hast, and give
to the poor, and follow me. Take nothing for your journey, neither
staff, nor scrip, nor shoes, nor money. If any man will come after me,
let him deny himself, and take up his cross and follow me.' They have
vowed to follow this ideal of evangelical perfection. How can we
withstand them before the world?"
"My heart has been moved towards them," answered Innocent. "I do not
mistrust their piety, nor doubt the grace by which God has confirmed
them in their design. They may be steadfast until their death; whereas
others coming after may relax the rule, and their weakness become a
fable in the world."
"I doubt not that the rule will be relaxed," answered the Cardinal;
"their aim is too vague, too ideal in many ways: complete poverty,
complete obedience, and the preaching of these virtues. And yet, Holy
Father, I have been drawn to these men. By them I feel that many souls
shall be led to God."
"You believe that the rule will be relaxed; and yet you say that we
cannot modify this rule because it consists of definite precepts taken
from the Gospels?"
"Your Holiness," replied the Cardinal, "if we say that it is impossible
for a man to follow the precepts of Christ, we blaspheme. Time modifies
all things; and in the meanwhile these men will draw unto themselves a
great deal of popular sentiment. They are willing to give us the most
absolute obedience, to be our servants in all things, provided we
approve their desire to live according to the standard of evangelical
perfection. Surely we should approve their piety."
"Similar efforts have failed," answered Innocent. "It is two years since
I approved the mission of Durando d'Huesca, and for those two years the
bishops have not ceased to complain of his followers. This fraternity
has a similar constitution. Both confess the Catholic faith; both desire
to give all they have to the poor, to live themselves in poverty without
care for the morrow, having nothing but their daily bread and a cloak;
both are open to receive lay members among them."