“I am rather religiously inclined,” said M. de Terremondre, “but I
still think that the words spoken in Notre Dame by Père Ollivier were
ill advised. And that is the general opinion.”
“Of course,” replied M. Lantaigne, “you blame him for having explained
this disaster as a lesson given by God against pride and infidelity.
You think him wrong in describing the favoured people as being suddenly
punished for their faithlessness and rebellion. Ought one, then, to
give up attempting to trace a cause for such terrible events?”
“There are,” answered M. de Terremondre, “certain conventions which
ought to be observed. The mere fact that the head of the State was
present made a certain reserve incumbent on him.”
“It is true,” said M. Lantaigne, “that this monk actually dared to
declare before the President and the ministers of the Republic, and
before the rich and powerful, who are either the authors or accomplices
of our shame, that France had failed in her age-long vocation, when she
turned her back on the Christians of the East who were being massacred
by thousands, and, like a coward, supported the Crescent against the
Cross. He dared to declare that this once Christian nation had driven
the true God from both its schools and its councils. This is the speech
that you consider a crime, you, Monsieur de Terremondre, one of the
leaders of the Catholic party in our department.”
M. de Terremondre protested that he was deeply devoted to the interests
of religion, but he still persisted in the opinion he had first held.
In the first place, he was not for the Greeks, but for the Turks,
or, if he could not go so far as that, he was at least for peace and
order. And he knew many Catholics who regarded the Eastern Church with
absolute indifference. Ought one, then, to give offence to them by
attacking perfectly lawful convictions? It is not incumbent on everyone
to be friendly towards Greece. The Pope, for one, is not.
“I have listened, M. Lantaigne,” said he, “with all the deference in
the world to your opinions. But I still think one ought to use a more
conciliatory style when one has to preach on a day which was one of
mourning and yet, at the same time, one full of a hope that bade fair
to bring about the reconciliation of opposing classes....”
“Especially while stocks are going up, thus proving the wisdom of the
course pursued by France and Europe on the Eastern question,” added M.
Bergeret, with a malicious laugh.
“Exactly so,” answered M. de Terremondre. “A Government which fights
the Socialists and in which religious and conservative ideas have made
an undeniable advance ought to be treated with respect. Our _préfet_,
M. Worms-Clavelin, although he is both a Jew and a freemason, shows
keen anxiety to protect the rights of the Church. Madame Worms-Clavelin
has not only had her daughter baptized, but has sent her to a Parisian
convent, where she is receiving an excellent education. I know this
to be the case, for Mademoiselle Jeanne Clavelin is in the same class
as my nieces, the d’Ansey girls. Madame Worms-Clavelin is patroness
of several of our institutions, and in spite of her origin and her
official position, she scarcely attempts the slightest concealment of
her aristocratic and religious sympathies.”
“I don’t doubt what you say in the least,” said M. Bergeret, “and
you might even go so far as to say that at the present time French
Catholicism has no stronger support than among the rich Jews.”
“You are not far wrong,” answered M. de Terremondre. “The Jews give
generously in support of Catholic charities.... But the shocking part
of Père Ollivier’s sermon is that he was ready, as it were, to imply
that God Himself was the original author and inspirer of this disaster.
According to his words, it would seem that the God of mercy Himself
actually set fire to the bazaar. My aunt d’Ansey, who was present at
the service, came away in a great state of indignation. I feel sure,
Monsieur l’abbé, that you cannot approve of such errors as these.”
Usually M. Lantaigne refused to rush into random theological
discussions with worldly-minded people who knew nothing about the
subject, and although he was an ardent controversialist, his priestly
habit of mind deterred him from engaging in disputes on frivolous
occasions, such as the present one. He therefore remained silent, and
it was M. Bergeret who replied to M. de Terremondre:
“You would have preferred then,” said he, “that this monk should make
excuses for a merciful God who had carelessly allowed a disaster to
happen in a badly-inspected point in His creation. You think that he
should have ascribed to the Almighty the sad, regretful, and chastened
attitude of a police inspector who has made a mistake.”
“You are making fun of me now,” said M. de Terremondre. “But was it
really necessary to talk about expiatory victims and the destroying
angel? Surely these are ideas that belong to a past age?”
“They are Christian ideas,” said M. Bergeret. “M. Lantaigne won’t deny
that.”
But as the priest was still silent, M. Bergeret continued:
“I advise you to read, in a book of whose teaching M. Lantaigne
approves, in the famous _Essai sur l’indifférence_, a certain theory
of expiation. I remember one sentence in it which I can quote almost
verbatim: “We are ruled,” said Lamennais, “by one law of destiny, an
inexorable law whose tyranny we can never avoid: this law is expiation,
the unbending axis of the moral world on which turns the whole destiny
of humanity.”
“That may be so,” said M. de Terremondre. “But is it possible that God
can have actually willed to aim a blow at honourable and charitable
women like my cousin Courtrai and my nieces Laneux and Felissay, who
were terribly burnt in this fire? God is neither cruel nor unjust.”
M. Lantaigne gripped his breviary under his left arm and made a
movement as if to go away. Then, changing his mind, he turned towards
M. de Terremondre and lifting his right hand said solemnly:
“God was neither cruel nor unjust towards these women when, in His
mercy, He made them sacrificial offerings and types of the Victim
without stain or spot. But since even Christians have lost, not only
the sentiment of sacrifice, but also the practice of contrition,
since they have become utterly ignorant of the most holy mysteries of
religion, before we utterly despair of their salvation, we must expect
warnings still more terrible, admonitions still more urgent, portents
of still greater significance. Good-bye, Monsieur de Terremondre. I
leave you with M. Bergeret, who, having no religion at all, at any rate
avoids the misery and shame of an easy-going faith, and who will play
at the game of refuting your arguments with the feeble resources of the
intellect unsupported by the instincts of the heart.”
When he had finished his speech, he walked away with a firm, stiff gait.
“What is the matter with him?” said M. de Terremondre, as he looked
after him. “I believe he has a grudge against me. He is very difficult
to get on with, although he is a man worthy of all respect. The
incessant disputes he engages in have soured his temper and he is at
loggerheads with his Archbishop, with the professors at the college,
and with half the clergy in the diocese. It is more than doubtful
if he will get the bishopric, and I really begin to think that, for
the Church’s sake, as well as for his own, it is better to leave him
where he is. His intolerance would make him a dangerous bishop. What a
strange notion to approve of Père Ollivier’s sermon!”
“I also approve of his sermon,” said M. Bergeret.
“It’s quite a different matter in your case,” said M. de Terremondre.
“You are merely amusing yourself. You are not a religious man.”
“I am not religious,” said M. Bergeret, “but I am a theologian.”
“On my side,” said M. de Terremondre, “it may be said that I am
religious, but not a theologian; and I am revolted when I hear it said
in the pulpit that God destroyed some poor women by fire, in order that
He might punish our country for her crimes, inasmuch as she no longer
takes the lead in Europe. Does Père Ollivier really believe that, as
things now are, it is so very easy to take the lead in Europe?”
“He would make a great mistake if he did believe it,” said M. Bergeret.
“But you are, as you have just been told, one of the leading members of
the Catholic party in the department, and therefore you ought to know
that your God used in Biblical times to show a lively taste for human
sacrifices and that He rejoiced in the smell of blood. Massacre was
one of His chief joys, and He particularly revelled in extermination.
Such was His character, Monsieur de Terremondre. He was as bloodthirsty
as M. de Gromance, who, from the beginning of the year to the end,
spends his time in shooting deer, partridges, rabbits, quails, wild
ducks, pheasants, grouse and cuckoos—all according to the season. So
God sacrificed the innocent and the guilty, warriors and virgins, fur
and feather. It even appears that He savoured the blood of Jephthah’s
daughter with delight.”
“There you are wrong,” said M. de Terremondre. “It is true that she was
dedicated to Him, but that was not a sacrifice of blood.”
“They argue so, I know,” said M. Bergeret; “but that is just out of
regard for your sensitiveness. But, as a matter of actual fact, she
was butchered, and Jehovah showed Himself a regular epicure for
fresh meat. Little Joas, who had been brought up in the temple, knew
perfectly well the way in which this God showed His love for children,
and when good Jehosheba began to try on him the kingly fillet, he was
much disturbed, and asked this pointed question:
‘Must then a holocaust to-day be offered,
And must I now, as once did Jephthah’s daughter,
By death assuage the fervent wrath of God?’[10]
[10] Est-ce qu’en holocauste aujourd’hui présenté,
Je dois, comme autrefois la fille de Jephté,
Du Seigneur par un mort apaiser la colère?
“At this time Jehovah bears the closest resemblance to His rival
Chamos; he was a savage being, compact of cruelty and injustice. This
was what he said: ‘You may know that I am the Lord by the corpses laid
out along your path.’ Don’t make any mistake about this, Monsieur de
Terremondre—in passing down from Judaism to Christianity, He still
retains His savagery, and about Him there still lingers a taste for
blood. I don’t go so far as to say that in the present century, at
the close of the age, He has not become somewhat softened. We are
all, nowadays, gliding downwards on an inclined plane of tolerance
and indifference, and Jehovah along with us. At any rate, He has
ceased to pour out a perpetual flood of threats and curses, and at the
present moment He only proclaims His vengeance through the mouth of
Mademoiselle Deniseau, and no one listens to her. But His principles
are the same as of old, and there has been no essential change in His
moral system.”
“You are a great enemy to our religion,” said M. de Terremondre.
“Not at all,” said M. Bergeret. “It is true that I find in it what I
will call moral and intellectual stumbling-blocks. I even find cruelty
in it. But this cruelty is now an ancient thing, polished by the
centuries, rolled smooth like a pebble with all its points blunted.
It has become almost harmless. I should be much more afraid of a new
religion, framed with scrupulous exactitude. Such a religion, even if
it were based on the most beautiful and kindly morality, would act
at first with inconvenient austerity and painful accuracy. I prefer
intolerance rubbed smooth, to charity with a fresh edge to it. Taking
one thing with another, it is Abbé Lantaigne who is in the wrong, it
is I who am wrong, and it is you, Monsieur de Terremondre, who are
right. Over this ancient Judaic-Christian religion so many centuries
of human passions, of human hatreds and earthly adorations, so many
civilisations—barbaric or refined, austere or self-indulgent, pitiless
or tolerant, humble or proud, agricultural, pastoral, warlike,
mercantile, industrial, oligarchical, aristocratic, democratic—have
passed, that all is now rolled smooth. Religions have practically no
effect on systems of morality and they merely become what morality
makes them....”