The matter, as I soon perceived, was not at all so simple as in the
first flush of discovery it appeared to be. But one excellent effect it
had, and that was to make Sunday, which had been the dullest, the most
interesting, day of the week, while I went from church to church in
search of my confessor. In almost every case I could tell at once that
I had not found him, and I was on the point of giving up the whole idea
as hopeless, when one Sunday evening I went to St. Mary Magdalene’s.
The clergyman who took the service was already well past middle-age.
He was delicate and ascetic-looking, with a peculiar expression
on his worn face, as of one who had had to make a fight against
something――possibly it had only been ill-health――and who had come out
of the struggle victorious if not unscarred. He preached a sermon which
may have been slightly vague, but which appealed to my imagination.
Even the weakness of his voice and the almost colourlessness of his
manner had the curious effect of making what he said to me more real.
Listening to him was like listening to a spirit, to a disembodied
voice; and through all there flickered a kind of nervous exaltation,
like a tremulous, uncertain flame. There were no signs of that mental
and imaginative poverty which had so frequently discouraged me. But he
struck me, above all, as a man who had been unhappy, and therefore,
if he had found peace, there must be some reason for it. I returned
to hear him several times, and although my first impression was not
strengthened, it was not effaced. I persuaded Owen to come with me to
hear him, but Owen did not like him at all.
Far from shaking me in my view, this unfavourable opinion helped to
confirm me. Not through any perversity, but simply because I knew the
person I was in search of would not particularly appeal to Owen. I
did not want a purely reasonable being, I did not perhaps even want
one whom Owen would consider quite healthy――I wanted one who would
understand. That night I wrote a letter to Henry Applin, asking if I
might come to him, and, if I might, would he tell me when.