The Blasphemer

by Nigel Farndale

  Wetherby, fastidious and elongated in a double-breasted chalkstripe suit, considered the hateful object on his desk, one of the flatscreen computers that had recently become standard issue for members of staff at Trinity. He didn’t mind the laptop he was obliged to use, because that could be folded away and hidden, but the desktop was a permanent affront to his aesthetic sensibilities, squatting on his desk in a space that should be occupied by books. He moved his mouse so that the cursor was hovering over the first of six unopened emails, all from the same sender. She was still in Berlin, still waiting for a ‘discovery’ to fall into her lap, still letting him down. He should have known better than to entrust such delicate research to an undergraduate. And now she was becoming high maintenance, making emotional demands, declaring her devotion to him, expecting some level of commitment or reassurance from him in return. He enjoyed her company, enjoyed listening to her play the piano, enjoyed talking to her about the great composers. But he had no need of an acolyte at this stage in his career, not even one who allowed him to sleep with her. He hesitated then logged off. He knew what the emails said anyway. She had been sending them for the past two days, as well as leaving messages for him on his home answering machine.

  A rapid triple knock distracted him. A head framed by a thick bob of dyed blonde hair appeared around the door. ‘Dr Kennedy to see you,’ the secretary said.

  Wetherby stared at her over the rim of his half-glasses.

  ‘You had a meeting with him at eleven.’

  Wetherby rolled his eyeballs upwards in the manner of St Peter. ‘I remember now, I did. Show him in. Oh and …’ The head reappeared. ‘Could you check something for me regarding student visa applications?’

  ‘Sure.’

  ‘I believe foreign students need to obtain permission from the Home Office before they are allowed to travel abroad in term time on a student visa. Could you get chapter and verse on that for me? Find out what the implications are in terms of deportation. Thank you. And do send in Dr Kennedy.’

  As the secretary disappeared, Daniel appeared, grinning broadly. Wetherby eyed him, his gaze moving down his body then up, taking in the hipster jeans and the V-neck jumper worn over a blue-and-white-striped matelot shirt. ‘Danny,’ Wetherby said with undue emphasis as he rose from his chair and extended a hand. ‘How are you? Recovered from your ordeal?’

  ‘More or less. Good to be back at work.’ Daniel was distracted by the fireplace, a tall and wide construction made from puce and grey marble banded by diagonal seams of turquoise enamel. It soon became apparent that it was not the fireplace that had arrested his attention, or the bust of Dante on its mantel, or the white embossed invitation to a dinner at the House of Lords, but the small object almost hidden at the end behind a decanter: a frosted glass angel five inches tall. He picked it up and examined its hands pressed together in prayer, its wings extending vertically upwards above its head, the length again of its body. ‘I guess I was lucky,’ he continued, replacing the angel. ‘Not everyone walked away from that crash.’

  Wetherby was gliding across the room towards him. Without comment he moved the angel back to where it had been, three inches farther along the fireplace. ‘Anyway,’ he said rubbing his long, thin fingers together and bringing the small talk to an abrupt end. ‘What is this project you want to discuss?’

  ‘It would be easiest if I showed you.’

  As the two men walked side by side along the marble-floored corridor, the one looming over the other, neither spoke. ‘Can I ask you something?’ Daniel said into the silence. ‘You ever had an aesthetic experience?’

  ‘A strange question.’

  ‘I know, but … have you?’

  ‘Yes, I believe so.’

  ‘Listening to music, I presume.’

  Wetherby considered this for a moment. ‘I was fourteen. Bruckner’s Seventh at the Queen Elizabeth Hall. I felt overwhelmed, exalted, reduced to tears. That I interpreted as an aesthetic experience. My first.’

  ‘And what is going on when someone has an aesthetic experience, in the brain, I mean?’

  What is he up to, this flat-footed biologist? Why the sudden interest in philosophy?

  ‘Kant defined it as the free play of the cognitive faculties of imagination and understanding. It is intersubjective, as opposed to objective or subjective. Everyone who attends to a piece of music or a work of art in a disinterested way ought to have the same aesthetic experience.’

  ‘And what’s the difference between an aesthetic experience and a religious experience?’

  Ah.

  Wetherby eyed Daniel suspiciously, inclining his head as they walked. ‘Are they the same, you mean? I think not. A religious experience takes the form of a revelation, an epiphany, a vision and so on.’

  ‘And have you ever had one? A vision, I mean. Is that where your belief comes from?’

  Wetherby came to a halt alongside a marble statue of Locke. ‘Sadly no, I do not believe I have. Like Kierkegaard I have had to make a leap of faith.’ He started walking again. ‘Credo quia absurdum, as Tertullian put it. I believe it because it is absurd, also sometimes translated as certum est quia impossibile est, it is certain because it is impossible. I have come to the view that God does not reveal himself to those of us who are actively looking for him. He appears in the peripheral vision, when you are not expecting him, when you are not trying.’

  ‘Like the way to remember a word is to stop trying to remember it? Think of another subject and the word will come to you?’

  Of course not, little man. ‘Something like that.’ Wetherby began walking again. ‘The Lord likes to keep us on our toes, reveal Himself at times of his choosing, in unexpected ways.’

  ‘Won’t do it on demand, you mean?’

  ‘A God who could not help revealing himself would not be a terribly impressive God, would he? Anyway, what has prompted your sudden interest in visions? Planning one of your mocking lectures, are you? Or a paper that pokes fun at we simpletons who splash around in the shallow waters of faith?’

  They had reached the heavy oak door leading out on to the quadrangle. Though Wetherby was a step in front, it was Daniel who opened it.

  ‘No, not at all,’ Daniel said. ‘Far from it. Your religion must be a great consolation to you. I’m just …’ His brow creased. A thought.

  Wetherby wondered whether Daniel had realized at last that whenever the two men were together they played pre-assigned roles. Master and pupil. Wetherby always liked to give him the impression he was being tested. This habit of waiting for doors to be opened for him was part of that.

  ‘It’s just I’ve been giving the subject a lot of thought,’ Daniel continued, ‘from a biological perspective. There’s a theory doing the rounds that the irrationality of religion is a by-product of our inbuilt urge to fall in love, the temporary fanaticism and mania of falling in love, I mean. The neurally active chemicals produced by someone in love are the same as those produced by someone obsessed with the idea of God.’

  ‘Yes, I have heard that. It is possible, I suppose …You could say the same of music, of course. What is the part of the brain that releases dopamine?’

  ‘The name of it? Um, the, um …’ Daniel clicked his fingers. ‘Nucleus accumbens. It regulates our moods.’

  ‘Exactly, but it also regulates the way we experience music.’They stood to one side as a student in a wheelchair trundled past, then they cut across the lawn, a privilege of dons. ‘Although I said aesthetic and religious experiences are not the same, I do think there is one connection. You almost have to become childlike to have them.’

  ‘As in naive?’

  ‘As in innocent. Open. Curious. Part of what convinced me of the truth of Christianity was a tour I embarked upon as a seventeen-year-old – not exactly a Grand Tour but certainly a cultural one, through France, Austria and Italy. There seemed to be so much beauty associated with the church. The sonatas of Bach. The frescoes of Giotto. The statues of Michelangelo. All the great composers
and artists seemed to claim God had guided their hands, that their genius was God-given. And I came to see why. Wittgenstein described Mozart and Beethoven as “the true sons of God”. I am not sure about Beethoven, some of the late bagatelles perhaps, but when I listen to Mozart I do hear the divine. His music is angelic. Perfectly poised. To be lost in it is to be lost in oneself. Everything in his music is ecstatic. Change the position of a single chord and the whole thing falls to pieces. That is why it moves you. And if music does not move you, if it does not inwardly reduce you to your knees, what is the point of it? I am trying to say, I suppose, that when I listen to Mozart I have my proof of God. I have my certitude.’

  They had reached the bronze statue of Charles Darwin that guarded the entrance of the Zoology Department. It depicted the naturalist as an old man, seated and distinguished with his wing collar, bald head and flowing beard. At his feet were a pile of bronze books and rolled-up maps. He was frowning. ‘Been thinking for some time now that we don’t make enough of our connection with Darwin,’ Daniel said, pausing to stare up at the statue. ‘Follow me.’ He led the way through the building, down the stairs and along a dark corridor to a basement door marked DRY STORE. He turned lights on, felt in his pockets for keys and opened the door. Once inside, he flicked more lights. After a brief delay they came on, illuminating long tables laden with prehistoric bones and fossils. Along the length of the walls were glass cases filled with stuffed monkeys, specimens preserved in fluid and, in the centre of one display, a giant mammoth skull. ‘I love this place,’ Daniel said. ‘No one ever comes here. Darwin himself collected most of it … Let me ask you another question. What was Darwin famous for?’

  ‘I believe he was the great-uncle of Ralph Vaughan Williams.’

  Daniel grinned. ‘I was thinking more in terms of his trip to the Galápagos Islands in the Beagle.’

  Wetherby ducked his head slightly to clear the doorframe. There was something about Daniel’s manner which he found especially annoying today. He was being ingratiating. That was it. Hadn’t stopped smiling. The smiling was making Wetherby want to punch him.

  ‘Much of this collection is from that trip,’ Daniel continued. ‘And I think members of the public would pay good money to see it, if they knew about it. We could make it an interactive experience, with computer graphics and holograms. Get school parties coming in. We could call it “The Darwin Experience”, or, and this is what I really wanted to try out on you …’ He held his arms above his head and spread them wide, miming a sign, ‘ “On the Side of the Apes: a Journey through Darwinian Evolution by Natural Selection”.’

  ‘But what Disraeli said was: “The question is this: is man an ape or an angel? I, my Lord, I am on the side of the angels.” ’

  ‘I know.’

  ‘So why misquote him? I don’t understand.’

  ‘It’s a play on …’ Daniel caught Wetherby suppressing a grin. ‘Look, it doesn’t matter. The point is, it could be the first thing visitors see through the door. You could have it here …’ He pointed to a space above the doorway. ‘A painting of Disraeli standing up in the Sheldonian with the quote underneath it. Look, I’ve done some sketches.’ Daniel laid out a sketchbook showing different sections and vistas. ‘Obviously I’d get these all mocked up as a virtual reality tour, so you can see what it will look like as you walk from room to room. I know there’s this bequest to the college and I just thought … Of course, I’d need to do a presentation to the Senate. The museum would draw in different departments. History. Theology. Biology. Political science. Philosophy. The Courtauld could loan us some quattrocento paintings of angels. This was one of the reasons I wanted to run it past you first. I know about your interest in angelology … We could present it as a joint idea, you coming from the one direction, me the other. I see it as an antidote to all the misinformation that is being pumped into schools by the Creationists. Did you know, there is a Creation Museum in Ohio that has a model of Stone Age children playing with a pet dinosaur?’

  ‘What is wrong with that?’

  ‘What’s wrong with that! Dinosaurs went extinct almost … Oh I see. You were joking.’

  Wetherby’s fingers were tapping his chin. ‘A better quote to have above the door might be “Monkeys make men. Men make angels.” ’

  ‘That’s good. Who said it?’

  ‘Darwin. Notebook B.’

  Daniel looked embarrassed.

  Wetherby took pleasure in this. ‘You see this as an exercise in atheistic propaganda?’

  ‘Not at all. I see it as a way of stimulating debate, getting students thinking about the subject. We could inaugurate it with a reconstruction of the Disraeli debate, only do it here at the Union. You could propose the motion, I could oppose it. Or the other way round, depending on what the motion was.’

  ‘But I would win, and that would never do. Fashion dictates that the atheist must always win.’

  Daniel gave a short, dry laugh. ‘So how would you win then? What would be your clincher?’

  ‘I would win because there is no poetry in your idea of man as a lumbering robot servicing the interests of his genes. People like poetry. Consider the profession of faith: “All that is, seen and unseen.” Is that not poetic?’Wetherby was enjoying himself, savouring the polite tension and the academic one-upmanship. ‘God cannot be found by looking through a microscope, or a telescope. That would be like unravelling a human brain in order to find thoughts and feelings.’ He picked up a small, yellowing bone and held it at arm’s length to see it better, feeling its weight as if contemplating using it as a club.

  Daniel said, ‘That’s from a quagga. Very rare.’

  Wetherby laid the bone down gently on a case containing beetles, cockroaches and locusts stuck down with pins. He let out a long sigh. ‘You know, I almost envy you your Enlightenment certainties. Life is so much messier when you have to accommodate the numinous and the mystical. Messier, but more human. Our intellect craves certainty, our nature craves mystery. Are you familiar with Sir John Tavener?’

  Daniel nodded.

  Wetherby was sure he was bluffing. ‘Sir John refers to “the angel of inspiration” and talks of having “auditory visions” in which music is dictated to him. Blake spoke of something similar …You look shocked.’

  ‘You’ve reminded me of something.’ Daniel sounded distant.

  Wetherby raised his eyebrows but Daniel, looking as if he had seen a wraith, did not take the prompt. ‘Well?’ Wetherby said.

  ‘There was a Canadian neurosurgeon in the fifties who performed surgery on the brains of epileptic patients. He found that when he stimulated certain areas of the temporal lobe with electronics, his patients began to hear voices and see ghost-like apparitions. This prompted Aldous Huxley to ask if there was a part of the brain from which the probing electrode could elicit “Blake’s Cherubim”. It was staring me in the face. I can’t think why I didn’t …’

  Wetherby removed his glasses, breathed on them, rubbed them and put them back on. ‘Even if you were blessed with a divine intervention you would not accept it,’ he said. ‘Such is the arrogance of the scientist. You would explain it away. Murder in order to dissect.’

  ‘The dissection of an angel, now that I would like to see.’

  ‘Milton believed their vital organs were evenly dispersed throughout their bodies, so that they were all heart, all head, all eye, all ear.’

  ‘As a Catholic, you believe in them presumably?’

  ‘Angels? You do not have to be a Roman Catholic. Angels profess no single confession.’

  ‘You’ve lost me.’

  ‘All three of the monotheistic religions, the Abrahamic ones at least, share the same angels. Belief in the same angels, I mean.’

  Daniel made an apologetic face. ‘Didn’t know that.’

  ‘Islam, Christianity and Judaism. The archangel Gabriel being the … your generation would call him “the Daddy”.’

  ‘Wetherby!’ Daniel was laughing. ‘We’re the same gener
ation!’

  ‘We are?’ It struck Wetherby that Daniel was wrestling with something, something that he wanted to get out in the open. It was to do with his falseness of tone, his pretence at nonchalance. He studied him narrowly, watching him chew on his lip. ‘What, may I ask, has aroused your curiosity in angels?’

  Daniel hesitated, backing up against a cabinet containing glass models of jellyfish, sea anemones and gastropods. ‘What would you do if you heard that someone had seen one?’

  ‘That would depend.’

  ‘On whether there were witnesses?’

  ‘Yes, and how reliable the witnesses were. I might inform the appropriate authority at Westminster Cathedral. It could be something the Vatican would need to investigate. But there are thousands of claims made each year, and almost all prove to be false or fraudulent. The Vatican has a whole department dedicated to unmasking fake miracles and sightings of angels.’

  ‘Seriously? That’s hilarious! So only Vatican-approved fake miracles and angels are allowed? I suppose they don’t want to flood the market. Devalue the currency.’

  Daniel led the way to the far end of the display cabinets. ‘Come and look at this.’ He pointed to a taxidermic duck-billed platypus. ‘The bill of a duck, the tail of a beaver, the paws of an otter. Preposterous in evolutionary terms. Like it’s thrown together from leftovers. When this little fellow was first brought over from Tasmania at the end of the eighteenth century, European naturalists assumed it was an elaborate fraud …’

  ‘When in fact it was proof that God has a sense of humour.’

  ‘Or proof that evolution works through random mutation – the natural world trying on different things to see what fits.’

  Wetherby exhaled noisily. ‘Perhaps you are right. Perhaps that is why God makes angels, immaterial beings whose identity resides in the world of thought. The unseen world. The abstract world. They are creatures that can’t be explained away by scientists.’