“No,” said he, “the mother of Saint Louis was Blanche of Castille.
Saint Radegonde was an earlier queen.”
“Well, she cannot be allowed to perform her conjuring tricks in the
county town. And you, my dear Lacarelle, you ought to make her father
understand—this Deniseau, I mean to say—that he has nothing to do but
to give a good flogging to his daughter and put her under lock and key.”
Lacarelle smoothed his Gallic moustaches.
“Monsieur _le préfet_, I advise you to go and see this Deniseau girl.
She is interesting. She will give you a private sitting quite to
yourself.”
“You can’t mean it, Lacarelle! Fancy my going to be instructed by a
little hussy that my Government is on the point of collapse!”
M. _le préfet_ Worms-Clavelin was not credulous. He only thought of
religion from a political point of view. He had inherited no creed
from his parents, who were aliens to every superstition, as they were
to every land. His soul had sucked none of the nourishment of the past
from any soil. He remained empty, colourless, unfettered. Through
metaphysical incompetency and the instinctive feeling for action and
acquisition, he clung to tangible truth, and in all good faith believed
himself to be a positivist. Having but lately drunk his bocks in
the cafés at Montmartre in the company of chemists with political
opinions, he still preserved a blind trustfulness in scientific
methods, which he in his turn extolled in the lodges to the leading
spirits among the freemasons. He enjoyed embellishing his political
intrigues and administrative expedients with the fair appearance of
sociological experiment. And the more useful science was to him the
better he appreciated it. “I profess,” said he in all sincerity, “that
unquestioning faith in facts which constitutes the scientist, the
sociologist.” And it was just because he only believed in facts and
because he professed the creed of positivism that the affair of the
Sibyl began to worry him.
His private secretary, M. Lacarelle, had said to him: “This young
woman has cured a road-mender and a bailiff. These are facts. She has
pointed out the place where they would discover a treasure, and they
really found in that place a trap-door to the opening of a subterranean
passage. That is a fact. She foretold the failure of the vines. That is
a fact.”
M. _le préfet_ Worms-Clavelin had the instinct of mockery and a sense
of humour, but this word _fact_ exercised a spell over his mind; and
it occurred vaguely to his memory that doctors like Charcot had made
observations in the hospitals on sick people gifted with extraordinary
powers. He remembered certain curious phenomena of hysteria and cases
of second sight. He wondered whether Mademoiselle Deniseau were not a
sufficiently interesting hysteric patient for her to be handed over to
the experts in mental cases, which would rid the town of her.
He thought:
“I might give an official order for the consignment of this girl to
an asylum, as in the case of any person whose mental derangement
forms a danger to public order and personal safety; but the enemies
of the government would squeal like polecats, and I can already hear
lawyer Lerond charging me with unlawful committal. The plot must be
unravelled, if the clericals of the county town have concocted one. For
it is not to be endured that Mademoiselle Deniseau should declare every
day, as the mouthpiece of Saint Radegonde, that the Republic is sinking
into the mire. I grant that some regrettable deeds have been done.
Certain partial changes will force themselves on us, especially in
national representation, but, thank God, the government is still strong
enough for me to support it.”
X
Abbé Lantaigne, principal of the high seminary, and M. Bergeret,
professor of literature, were seated in conversation on a bench on
the Mall, according to their custom in summer. On every subject they
were opposed in opinion; never were two men more different in mind
and character. But they were the only people in the town who took an
interest in general ideas. This fellow-feeling united them. While
philosophising beneath the quincunxes when the weather was fine, they
consoled each other, one for the loneliness of celibacy, the other for
the vexations of domestic life; both for their professional cares and
for the unpopularity each alike shared.
On this particular day they could see from the bench where they sat the
monument of Jeanne d’Arc still shrouded in wrappings. The Maid having
once slept a night in the town, at the house of an honest dame called
la Gausse, in 189– the municipality, with the concurrence of the State,
had caused a monument to be raised to commemorate this stay. This
monument, the work of two artists, the one a sculptor and the other
an architect, both natives of the district, displayed the Maid fully
armed, standing, meditative, on a high pedestal.
The date of the unveiling was fixed for the following Sunday. The
Minister of Education was expected, and it was reckoned that there
would be a lavish distribution of crosses of honour and academic
decorations. The townsfolk thronged the Mall to gaze at the linen which
covered the bronze figure and the stone pedestal. Outsiders installed
themselves on the ramparts. On the booths set up under the quincunxes
the refreshment-sellers were nailing up bands of calico bearing the
legends: _Véritable bière Jeanne d’Arc._—_Café de la Pucelle._
At sight of this, M. Bergeret remarked that one ought to rejoice in
this concourse of citizens assembled to pay honour to the liberator of
Orleans.
“The archivist of the department, M. Mazure,” added he, “stands out
from the crowd. He has written a memoir to prove that the famous
historical tapestry, representing the meeting at Chinon, was not made
about 1430 in Germany, as was believed, but that it came at that period
from some studio of Flemish France. He submitted the conclusions of his
memoir to M. _le préfet_ Worms-Clavelin, who called them eminently
patriotic and approved of them. He expressed a hope that he would see
the author of this discovery receiving the insignia of an officer of
the Academy beneath Jeanne’s statue. It is also rumoured that in his
speech at the unveiling M. _le préfet_ will say, with his eyes turned
towards the Vosges, that Jeanne was a daughter of Alsace-Lorraine.”
Abbé Lantaigne, caring but little for a joke, made no reply and kept
a grave face. In principle he regarded these celebrations in honour
of Jeanne d’Arc as praiseworthy. Two years before he had himself
pronounced at Saint-Exupère a panegyric on the Maid, and had declared
her the type of the good Frenchwoman and the good Christian. He found
no subject for jest in a solemnity which was a glorification of faith
and country. As a patriot and a Christian, he only regretted that the
bishop and his clergy would not take the first place in it.
“The thing,” said he, “that ensures the continuity of the French
nation, is neither kings nor presidents of the Republic, neither
provincial governors nor _préfets_, neither officers of the crown nor
officials of the present government; it is the episcopacy which, from
the first apostles to the Gauls down to the present day, has continued,
without break, change, or diminution, and forms, so to say, the solid
web of the history of France. The power of the bishops is spiritual
and stable. The power of the kings, legitimate but transitory, is
decrepit from its birth. On its continuance that of the nation does
not depend. The nation is a spiritual conception inseparable from the
moral and religious idea. But, although absent in the body from the
celebrations that are being arranged for here, the clergy will be
present at them in spirit and in truth. Jeanne d’Arc is ours, and it is
vain for unbelievers to try and steal her from us.”
M. BERGERET: “It is, however, very natural that this simple
girl, having become a symbol of patriotism, should be claimed by all
patriots.”
M. LANTAIGNE: “I cannot imagine—I have told you so
before—nationality without religion. Every duty comes from God, the
duty of the citizen no less than that of others. If God be ignored the
call of duty is stilled. If it is a right and a duty to defend one’s
native land against the foreigner, it is not in virtue of any pretended
rights of man which never existed, but in conformity with the will of
God. This conformity appears in the stories of Jael and Judith. It
shines clearly in the book of the Maccabees. It can be read in the
deeds of the Maid.”
M. BERGERET: “Then you believe, monsieur l’abbé, that Jeanne
d’Arc received her mission from God Himself? That will land you in
numberless difficulties. I will only submit to you one of these,
because it is inherent in the nature of your beliefs. It relates to
the voices and apparitions which manifested themselves to the peasant
of Domremy. Those who grant that Saint Catherine really appeared to
Jacquot d’Arc’s daughter, in company with Saint Michael and Saint
Marguerite, will find themselves, I fancy, much embarrassed when it
has been proved to them that this Saint Catherine of Alexandria never
existed, and that her history is in reality only a rather poor Greek
romance. Now this fact was proved as early as the seventeenth century,
not by the freethinkers of the period, but by a learned doctor of the
Sorbonne, Jean de Launoy, a man of piety and good life. The judicious
Tillemont, although so submissive to the Church, rejected the biography
of Saint Catherine as an absurd fable. Is not that a difficulty,
monsieur l’abbé, for those who believe that the Voices of Jeanne d’Arc
came from Heaven?”
M. LANTAIGNE: “The martyrology, monsieur, worthy of all
reverence as it is, is not an article of faith; and it is permissible,
in imitation of Doctor de Launoy and Tillemont, to cast doubts on the
existence of Saint Catherine of Alexandria. For my part, I am not
inclined to go so far, and I hold such an absolute denial as rash.
I recognise that the biography of this saint has come to us from
the East overlaid everywhere with fabulous details, but I believe
that these embellishments have been laid over a solid foundation.
Neither Launoy nor Tillemont is infallible. It is not certain that
Saint Catherine never existed, and if by chance historic proof of
her non-existence were established, that would give way before the
theological testimony to the contrary, furnished by the miraculous
appearances of this saint authenticated by the Ordinary and solemnly
recognised by the Pope. For, after all, good logic requires that truths
of the scientific plane should yield to truths of a higher order.
But we are not yet in a position to know the opinion of the Church
as to the Maid’s apparitions. Jeanne d’Arc has not been canonised,
and the miracles wrought for her or by her are open to discussion: I
neither deny nor affirm them, and it is a purely human vision which
makes me perceive in the history of this marvellous girl the hand of
God stretched out over France. Truth to tell, though, that vision is
powerful and penetrating.”
M. BERGERET: “If I have rightly understood you, monsieur
l’abbé, you do not consider the strange event at Fierbois as an
attested miracle, when Jeanne, as they say, pointed out a sword
concealed in the wall. And you are not certain that the Maid, as she
herself declared, brought back a child to life at Lagny. You know my
opinions, and for my part I should give a natural interpretation to
these two facts. I suppose that the sword was fastened to the wall of
the Church as a votive offering, and was consequently visible. As for
the child that the Maid raised from the dead for the time necessary for
the administration of baptism, and who died again after having been
brought to the font, I confine myself to reminding you that there was
near Domremy a Notre-Dame-des-Aviots whose particular function it was
to endow still-born children with a few hours of life. I suspect that
the memory of Notre-Dame-des-Aviots had a good deal to do with the
illusions that possessed Jeanne d’Arc when she believed, at Lagny, that
she had raised a new-born child from the dead.”
M. LANTAIGNE: “There is much uncertainty in these
explanations, monsieur. And rather than adopt them, I suspend my
judgment, which inclines, I confess, towards the miraculous side, at
least with respect to Saint Catherine’s sword. For the passage is
precise: the sword was _in_ the wall, and it was necessary to excavate
to find it. Neither is it impossible, again, that God, upon the
efficacious prayers of a virgin, should have given life back to a child
that had died without having received baptism.”
M. BERGERET: “You speak, monsieur l’abbé, of ‘the efficacious
prayers of a virgin.’ Do you then grant, in accordance with the belief
of the Middle Ages, that there was some virtue, some peculiar power, in
Jeanne d’Arc’s virginity?”
M. LANTAIGNE: “Clearly virginity is pleasing to God, and Jesus
Christ rejoices in the triumph of His virgins. A young girl turned
Attila and his Huns back from Lutetia; a young girl delivered Orleans
and caused the lawful king to be crowned at Rheims.”
The priest having thus expressed himself, M. Bergeret seized on his
words in a way of his own.
“Exactly,” said he. “Jeanne d’Arc was a mascotte.”
But Abbé Lantaigne did not hear. He rose and said:
“France’s destined rôle in Christendom is not yet achieved. I foresee
that ere long God will yet again work His will through the nation which
has been the most faithful and the most faithless to Him.”
“And so it is,” answered M. Bergeret, “that, as in the profligate times
of King Charles VII., we behold the rise of prophetesses. Our town
indeed holds one of them, who is making a happier start than Jeanne,
since Jacquot d’Arc’s daughter was regarded as mad by her parents, and
Mademoiselle Deniseau finds a disciple in her own father. Still I do
not believe that her good luck will be great and lasting. Our _préfet_,
M. Worms-Clavelin, is somewhat wanting in good breeding, but he is less
of a simpleton than Baudricourt, and it is no longer the custom for the
heads of the State to give audience to prophetesses. M. Félix Faure
will not be advised by his confessor to test Mademoiselle Deniseau.
Here, perhaps, you may reply, monsieur l’abbé, that the influence of
Bernadette of Lourdes is stronger in our days than that of Jeanne
d’Arc ever was. The latter overthrew some hundreds of starving and
panic-stricken English; Bernadette has set countless pilgrims on the
march and drawn thousands of millions to a mountain in the Pyrenees.
And my revered friend, M. Pierre Laffitte, assures me that we have
entered on an era of positive philosophy.”
“As for what happens at Lourdes,” said Abbé Lantaigne, “without
becoming latitudinarian or falling into excessive credulity, I reserve
my opinion on a point upon which the Church has made no pronouncement.
But henceforth I see a triumph for religion in this crowd of pilgrims,
just as you yourself see in it a defeat for materialistic philosophy.”