"stop there," i cried; "why that is the ontological argument of st. anselm, adopted afterwards by a soldier philosopher like yourself, called descartes. there's nothing new under the sun. it is wonderful how modern artists can refurbish our old masters and make wonderful pictures from them!"
"quite so," he replied, "in lieu of yourselves. there, now, i am always too precipitate; pardon me, sir, if i am too bold; but you catholics have a wonderful talent for burying your treasures in napkins. have you any treatise on the immortality of the soul in english, and in such a style as this?"
"i am afraid," i replied, as i looked askance at the volume, "that just now i cannot mention one. but go on, if it does not tire you. time is the cheapest thing we have in ireland."
he continued:—
"'the inward world, that is indeed more splendid and admirable than the outward, needs another heaven than the one above us, and a higher world than that the sun warms; therefore, we say justly, not a second earth, or globe, but a second world beyond this universe.'
"gione interrupted me: 'and every virtuous and wise man is a proof of another world.'
"'and,' continued nadine quickly, 'every one who undeservedly suffers.'
"'yes,' i answered; 'that is what draws our thread of life through a long eternity. the threefold echo of virtue, truth, and beauty, created by the music of the spheres, calls us from this hollow earth to the neighborhood of the music. why and wherefore were these desires given us? merely that, like a swallowed diamond, they should slowly cut through our earthly covering. wherefore were we placed upon this ball of earth, creatures with light wings, if instead of soaring with our wings of ether, we are to fall back into the earth-clods of our birth?... is an angel to be imprisoned in the body to be its dumb servant, its stove-warmer and butler, its cuisinier and porter at the door of the stomach? shall the ethereal flame merely serve to fill the circular stove with life's warmth, obediently burn and warm, then become cold and extinguished?'"
"very good, indeed," i interrupted. "he knows how to put things in a virile way.'
"'the discrepancy between our wishes and our relations, between the soul and the earth, remains a riddle if we continue; and if we cease to live, a blasphemy. strangers, born upon mountains, we consume in lowly places, with unhealthy heimweh (home-sickness). we belong to higher regions, and an eternal longing grows in our hearts at music, which is the kuhreigen of our native alps....'
"'from hence what follows?' asked the chaplain (a kantian).
"'not that we are unhappy, but that we are immortal; and this world within us demands and manifests a second without us.... i cannot tell how painful, how monstrous and horrible the thought of an annihilating death, of an eternal grave, now appeared to me. men often bear their errors, as their truths, about in words, and not in feeling; but let the believer in annihilation place before him, instead of a life of sixty years, one of sixty minutes; then let him look on the face of a beloved being, or upon a noble or wise man, as upon an aimless hour-long appearance; as a thin shadow that melts into light and leaves no trace; can he bear the thought? no! the supposition of imperishableness is always with him; else there would hang always before his soul, as before mahomet's in the fairest sky, a dark cloud; and, as cain upon the earth, an eternal fear would pursue him. yes, if all the woods upon this earth were groves of pleasure; if all the valleys were kampaner valleys; if all the islands were blessed, and all the fields elysian; if all eyes were cheerful and all the hearts joyful,—yes, then—no! even then, had god, through this very blessedness, made to our spirits the promise, the oath of eternal duration! but, now, o god! when so many houses are houses of mourning, so many fields battlefields, so many cheeks pale, when we pass before so many eyes red with weeping or closed in death: oh! can the grave, that haven of salvation, be the last swallowing, unyielding whirlpool? no, the trampled worm dares raise itself towards its creator, and say, "thou durst not create me only to suffer!"'"
i was listening with closed eyes to the reading, the quiet rhythm of the sentences, and the calm, deep music of his voice, sounding ineffably soothing, when a quaver, then a break in his voice, just as he repeated the last words, made me look toward him. the calm, strong man was weeping silently; and just then he broke into a paroxysm of sobs that shook his strong frame as by a palsy. dear lord! what hidden grief there is in the world! who would ever dream that the calm exterior of this reasoning, cultivated atheist concealed such hidden fires? it was no time to talk; i let the poor fellow alone. after a few moments he dried his eyes, and said:—
"i am quite ashamed of this snivelling, father. i shouldn't have attempted to read this. it always upsets me."
"never mind, my poor boy," i said. "it is good for men sometimes to weep." i thought in my own mind, my little child will be in safe hands.
"now, put it aside," i said gently, "and let us talk."
"one sentence more, father, just to get over this weakness."
"'ah, carlson (carlson stands for myself), upon what a beautiful world do you throw your immeasurable gravestone, that no time can lift. your difficulties, which are founded on the necessary uncertainties of men, if solved, would only have the effect to destroy our faith; which is the solution of a thousand other difficulties; without which our existence is without aim, our pains without solution, and the godlike trinity within our breasts three avenging angels. from the formless earthworm up to the beaming human countenance; from the chaos of the first day up to the present age of the world; from the first faint motion of the heart to its full, bold throbbing in the breast of manhood, the invisible hand of god leads, protects, and nourishes the inward being; the nursling of the outward educates and polishes and makes it beautiful—and wherefore? that when it stands as a demigod in the midst of the ruins of the temple of the body, the blow of death may prostrate it forever, that nothing shall remain from the corpse-veiled, the mourning and mantled immeasurable universe, but the eternally sowing, never harvesting, solitary spirit of the world! one eternity looking despairingly at the other; and in the whole spiritual universe no end, no aim! and all these contradictions and riddles, whereby not merely the harmony, but the very strings of creation are tangled, must we take, merely on account of the difficulties, that, indeed, our annihilation cannot solve? beloved carlson! into this harmony of the spheres, that is not over, but ever around us, will you bring your shrieking discord? see how gently and touchingly the day departs, and how holily the night comes! oh, can you not believe that even thus our spirits shall arise from the dust, as you once saw the full moon arise over the crater of vesuvius?'
"gione took his hand and said:—
"'amongst us all, will you alone be tormented with this despairing faith?'
"two hot drops fell from his blinded eyes; he looked at the mountains, and said:—
"'i can bear no annihilation but my own. my heart is of your opinion; my head will slowly follow.'"
"and that, sir," said ormsby, closing the book and putting it into his side pocket, "is just where i am. my heart is with you; if only my head would follow. put bittra for gione, and you will understand my emotion."
"even that won't do," i said; "the head might follow, and you might be as far from us as ever."
"i don't understand," he said in a bewildered way. "surely all that's wanting now is a conviction of the truth of your teaching?"
"there's your grave mistake," i replied; "conviction is not faith. there are thousands of your countrymen filled with conviction of the truths of catholicity; but they are as far outside the church as a confucian or a buddhist. faith is not a matter to be acquired by reading or knowledge. it is a gift, like the natural talent of a great painter or musician—a sixth sense, and the pure gratuity of the all-wise and the all-good."
this appeared to him to be a revelation which he could not comprehend; it seemed to be such an inevitable logical sequence—conviction and profession.
"i am attracted by everything," he said, "in your church. the whole thing appears to be such a well-connected scheme, so unlike the religion in which i was born and educated, where you had to be forever searching after a missing link. and then your church seems to be founded on love—love of a supernal kind, of course, and almost unintelligible; but it is the golden chain in the string of pearls. you will have noticed how rapidly sometimes the mind makes comparisons. well, often, at our station over there, i have thought, as i searched the sea, that we protestants look at god through the large end of a telescope and throw him afar off, and make him very small and insignificant; whilst you look at him through the narrower end, and magnify him and bring him near. our god—that is, the god in whom i was taught to believe—is the god of sinai, and our christ is the historic christ; but that won't do for a humanity that is ever querulous for god, and you have found the secret."
i was quite astonished at the solemn, thoughtful manner in which this young fellow spoke, and his words were so full of feeling and self-sympathy for his great privation. he was silent for a long time, smoking freely, whilst i was pondering many things, mostly in humility for our slow appreciation of the great gift of divine faith. at last, he said:—
"i do not quite follow you, sir, in your remark about a sixth sense; for this is not a question of sense, but of the soul."
we were now getting into deep water, and when an old gentleman hasn't opened a book of philosophy for nearly thirty years, he may be well excused for a certain timidity in approaching these deep questions. but, "keep to the metaphorical" has always been a great rule of mine, which never failed me.
"let me explain," i said. "have you ever been to an ophthalmic hospital or a blind asylum?"
"yes," he replied, "principally abroad."
"well," i continued, "you might have noticed various forms of the dread disease of blindness. some are cases of cataract; in some the entire ball is removed; some have partial sight behind the ugly film. but the most pathetic case to my mind is that of the young boy or girl who comes toward you, looking steadily at you with large, luminous eyes, the iris perfectly clear, the pupil normally distended, and even the white of the eye tinged with that delicate blue that denotes perfect health in the organ; but in one moment the truth flashes upon you—that poor patient is stone-blind. now, where's the disease?"
"the optic nerve is destroyed," he answered promptly.
"precisely. and now, if you were to pour in through the dark canal of the pupil the strongest sunlight, or even the flash of your electric searchlight, would it make any difference, do you think?"
"none," he said, "so far as sight was concerned; but it might possibly paralyze the brain."
"precisely. and if you, my dear young friend, were pouring, till the crack of doom, every kind of human light—philosophical, dogmatic, controversial—upon the retina of the soul without the optic nerve of faith, you will be blind, and go blind to your grave."
somehow this appeared to be a relief, though it looked like discouragement.
"it is something to know," he said, "that the fault is not altogether my own. but," after a pause, "this demands a miracle."
"quite so. a pure light from god. and that is the reason that my excellent curate is storming the citadels of heaven for you by that terrible artillery—the prayers of little children. and if you want to capture this grace of god by one tremendous coup, search out the most stricken and afflicted of my flock (bittra has a pretty good catalogue of them), and get him or her to pray for you, and very soon the sense of faith will awaken within you, and you will wonder that you were ever blind."
"ten thousand thanks," he said, rising; "i had no anticipations of so pleasant and instructive an evening."
"you were told to expect to meet a funny old fellow," i said, "with as many quips, and cranks, and jests, as old jack falstaff?"
"well," he said, pulling his mustache nervously, "i should not like to put it so brusquely."
"of course not. but there lies a big mistake, my dear boy. democritus was as much a philosopher as heraclitus, and he lived fifty years longer. there is a good deal of philosophy behind a laugh, and we put our gargoyles on the outside of our churches."
"indeed, i must say, from a long experience," he replied, "and a grateful experience, that your men are the most cheerful class i have met,—if i except our own sailors,—although the comparison sounds grotesque. and," he said hesitatingly, "that just reminds me; if i may take the freedom of showing my gratitude in a small way, permit me to say to you as pastor, what i have already hinted to himself, that your most excellent curate will involve himself in a great deal of trouble and possible expense if he perseveres in that matter of the fishing-boat. indeed, i have been working the matter for him, because his heart is set on it; but i have misgivings. i'm not sure that i am quite right in mentioning the matter to you, sir; but i am really anxious, and i speak from long experience."
he lighted another cigar at the door, and i returned to think somewhat anxiously whether i had done credit to catholic philosophy. but my thoughts would revert to these last words of ormsby's. what if father letheby should get into a bad mess, and everything so promising? how little these young men reflect what a trouble they are to their old pastors!
