"For money, Your Eminence?"
The Cardinal shook, as though flapping his wings, laughed, and slapped
his knee--and again lost himself in loving contemplation of my nose.
This dumb reverence, to which I replied with redoubled zest, began to
wield a peculiar influence upon me. I purposely tell you all this in
detail in order that you may understand my wish at that moment: to
begin cavorting about, to sing like a cock, to tell my best Arkansas
anecdote, or simply to invite His Eminence to remove his regalia and
play a game of poker!
"Your Eminence...."
"I love Americans, Mr. Wondergood."
"Your Eminence! In Arkansas they tell a story...."
"Ah, I see, you want to get down to business? I understand your
impatience. Money matters should never be postponed. Is that not so?"
"It depends entirely upon one's concern in these matters, Your
Eminence."
The square face of the Cardinal grew serious, and in his eyes there
gleamed for a moment a ray of loving reproach:
"I hope you are not vexed at my long dissertation, Mr. Wondergood. I
love so much the history of our great city that I could not forego the
pleasure...the things you see before you are not Rome. There is no
Rome, Mr. Wondergood. Once upon a time it was the Eternal City, but
to-day it is simply a large city and the greater it grows the further
it is from eternity. Where is that great Spirit which once illumined
it?"
I shall not narrate to you all the prattle of this purple parrot, his
gently-cannibal look, his grimaces and his laughter. All that the old
shaven monkey told me when it finally grew weary was:
"Your misfortune is that you love your fellow beings too much...."
"Love your neighbor...."
"Well, let neighbors love each other. Go on teaching that but why
do _you_ want to do it? When one loves too well one is blind to the
shortcomings of the beloved and still worse: one elevates these faults
to virtues. How can you reform people and make them happy without
realizing their shortcomings or by ignoring their vices? When one
loves, one pities and pity is the death of power. You see, I am quite
frank with you, Mr. Wondergood, and I repeat: love is weakness.
Love will get the money out of your pocket and will squander it...on
rouge! Leave love to the lower classes. Let them love each other.
Demand it of them, but you, you have risen to greater heights, gifted
with such power!..."
"But what can I do, Your Eminence? I am at a loss to understand it
all. From my childhood on, especially in church, I have had it drummed
into me that one must love his neighbor, and I believed it. And so...."
The Cardinal grew pensive. Like laughter, pensiveness was becoming to
him and rendered his square face immovable, filling it with dignity
and lonely grief. Leaning forward with his lips compressed and
supporting his chin upon his hand, he fixed his sharp, sleepy eyes
upon me. There was much sorrow in them. He seemed to be waiting for
the conclusion of my remark, and not having patience to do so, sighed
and blinked.
"Childhood, yes"...he mumbled, still blinking sorrowfully.
"Children, yes. But you are no longer a child. Forget this lesson. You
must acquire the heavenly gift of forgetfulness, you know."
He gnashed his white teeth and significantly scratched his nose with
his thin finger, continuing seriously:
"But it's all the same, Mr. Wondergood. You, yourself cannot
accomplish much.... Yes, yes! One must _know_ people to make them
happy. Isn't that your noble aim? But the Church alone _knows_
people. She has been a mother and teacher for thousands of years. Her
_experience_ is the only one worth while, and, I may say, the only
reliable one. As far as I know your career, Mr. Wondergood, you are
an experienced cattle man. And you know, of course, what _experience_
means even in the matter of handling such simple creatures as...."
"As swine...."
He was startled--and suddenly began to bark, to cough, to whine: he
was laughing again.
"Swine? that's fine, that's splendid, Mr. Wondergood, but do not
forget that one finds the devil, too, in swine!"
Ceasing his laughter he proceeded:
"In teaching others, we learn ourselves. I do not contend that all the
methods of education and training employed by the Church were equally
successful. No, we often made mistakes, but every one of our mistakes
served to improve our methods...we are approaching perfection, Mr.
Wondergood, we are approaching perfection!"
I hinted at the rapid growth of rationalism which, it seemed to me,
threatened to destroy the "perfection" of the Church, but Cardinal X.
again flapped his wings and almost screeched with laughter.
"Rationalism! You are a most talented humorist, Mr. Wondergood! Tell
me, was not the celebrated Mark Twain a countryman of yours? Yes,
yes! Rationalism! Just think a moment. From what root is this word
derived and what does it mean--_ratio_? _An nescis, mi filis quantilla
sapientia rigitur orbis?_ Ah, my dear Wondergood! To speak of ratio on
this earth is more out of place than it would be to speak of a rope in
the home of a man who has just been hanged!"
I watched the old monkey enjoying himself and I enjoyed myself too.
I studied this mixture of a monkey, parrot, penguin, fox, wolf--and
what not? And it was really funny: I love merry suicides. For a long
time we continued our fun at the expense of _ratio_ until His Eminence
calmed himself and assumed the tone of a teacher:
"As anti-Semitism is the Socialism of fools...."
"And are you familiar...?"
"I told you we are approaching perfection!... So is rationalism the
wisdom of fools. The wise man goes further. The ratio constitutes the
holiday dress of a fool. It is the coat he dons in the presence of
others, but he really lives, sleeps, works, loves and dies without
any ratio at all. Do you fear death, Mr. Wondergood?"