The Dawn of All
Page 43
(VII)
It was on the last morning of their stay at Thurles thatMonsignor had an opportunity of seeing something of the realcharacter of the place.
The lay monk came to him again, as he was finishing breakfast,and abruptly suggested it.
"I shall be very happy," said Monsignor.
* * * * *
Certainly his stay had done him good in some indefinable mannerwhich he could not altogether understand. Each morning he hadtalked; but there was no particular argument which he couldrecall that had convinced him. Indeed, the monk had told him morethan once that bare intellectual argument could do nothing exceptclear the ground of actual fallacies. Certainly the points hadbeen put to him clearly and logically. He perceived now that, sofar as reason was concerned, Christian society could not dootherwise than silence those who attacked the very foundations ofits existence; and he also understood that this was completelyanother matter from the charge that men had been accustomed tobring against the Church, that she "would persecute if she hadthe power." For it was not the Church in any sense that usedrepression; it was the State that did so; and as Dom Adrian hadpointed out, this was of the very essence of all civilgovernment. But this was not new to him. Rather his stay inThurles had, by quieting his nervous system, made it possible forhim to elect to follow his reason rather than his feelings. Hisfeelings were as before. Still in the bottom of his consciousnesshe felt that the Christ which he had known was other than theChrist who now reigned on earth. But now he had been enabled tomake the decision over which he had previously hesitated; he hadsufficiently recovered at least so far as to go back to his workand to do what seemed to be the duty to which his reason pointed,and in action at least to ignore his feelings. This much had beendone. He did not yet understand by what means.
* * * * *
A car waited in the little court to which the two came down. Themonk beckoned him to enter, and they moved off.
"This quarter of the monastery," began the monk abruptly, "isentirely of the nature you have seen. It is composed of flats andapartments throughout, for the simple retreats, such as your own.Each Father who is employed in this kind of work has his round ofvisits to make each day."
"How many monks are there altogether, Father, in Thurles?"
"About nine thousand."
". . I beg your pardon?"
"About nine thousand. Of these about six thousand live a purelyContemplative Life. No monk undertakes any work of this kinduntil he has been professed at least fifteen years. But theregulations are too intricate to explain just now."
"Where are we going first----"
"Stay, Monsignor" (the monk interrupted him by a hand on hisarm). "We are just entering the northern quarter. It is theserious cases that are dealt with here."
"Serious?"
"Yes; where there is a complete breakdown of mental powers. Thatbuilding there is the first of the block of the gravest cases ofall--real mania."
Monsignor leaned forward to look.
They were passing noiselessly along the side of a great square;but there was nothing to distinguish the building indicated fromthe rest. It just stood there, a tall pile of white stone; andthe top of a campanile rose above it.
"You have worked there, Father?"
"I worked there for two years," said the monk tranquilly. "It isdistressing work at first. Would you care to look in?"
Monsignor shook his head.
"Yes, it is distressing work, but there are great consolations.Two out of every three cases at least are cured, and we have acertain number of vocations from the patients."
"Vocations!"
"Certainly. Mania in the majority of cases is nothing else thanpossession. In fact some authorities are inclined to say that itis exceptional to find it otherwise. And in the other cases it isgenerally the force of an exceptionally strong will that has lostits balance, and is powerful enough to disregard all ordinarychecks of reason and common sense and human emotion. Well, acharacter like that is capable of a good deal. Each case is, ofcourse, completely isolated in this department as in all others.It is incredible to think that less than a hundred years ago suchpatients were herded together. The system now, of course, is tosurround them with completely healthy conditions and completelyself-restrained attendants. That gradually rebuilds the physicaland nervous conditions, and exorcism is not administered untilthere is sufficient reserve force for the patient partly, at anyrate, to cooperate."
Monsignor was silent. Again he felt bewilderment at the amazingsimplicity and common sense of it all.
"I am taking you," said the monk presently, "to the centralquarter--to the monastery proper. It is there that the main bodyof the monks live. The church is remarkable. It is the thirdlargest monastic church in the world. . . . We are just enteringthe quarter now," he added.
Monsignor leaned forward as the air darkened, and was in time tosee the great gates swinging slowly together again as if to meetafter the car had passed. It was still twilight as they sped on,and he perceived that they were passing, with that extreme andnoiseless swiftness with which they had come, up some kind oftunnel lit by artificial light. Then again there was a rush ofdaylight and the car stopped.
"We must go on foot here," said the monk, and opened the door.
The priest, still marvelling, stepped out after him, and followedthrough a postern door; and then, as he emerged, understood moreor less the arrangement of the buildings.
He stood on the edge of an enormous courtyard, perhaps fivehundred yards across. This was laid down with a lawn, crossed inevery direction with paved paths. But that at which he chieflystared was a church whose like he had never set eyes on before.It was the sanctuary end, obviously, that faced him; the fartherend ran back into the high walls, pierced here and there by lowdoors, with which the court was surrounded. The church itselfrose perhaps two hundred feet from floor to roof. It was straightfrom end to end, the line broken only by a tall, severe tower atthe point where it joined the wall of the court; and runninground it, jutting out in a continuous block, like a platform, wasa low building, plainly containing chapels. The whole was ofwhite stone, unrelieved by carving of any kind. Enormous narrowlancet windows showed above the line of chapels, springingperhaps forty feet from the ground, and rising to a lineimmediately below the roof. The whole gave an impression ofastounding severity and equally astounding beauty. It had thekind of beauty of a perfectly bare mountain or of an iceberg. Itwas graceful and yet as strong as iron; it was cold, and yetobviously alive.
"Yes," said the monk, as they went across the court, "It isimpressive, is it not? It is the monastic church proper. Itcan hold, if necessary, ten thousand monks. But you will seewhen we look in.
"The court we are now in is surrounded by cloisters. There arejust nine thousand cells; there are, perhaps, fifty unoccupiednow. Each cell, as you know, is a little house in itself, withthree or four rooms and a garden; so we need space. Thecemeteries are beyond the cloisters. We bury, as you know, in thebare earth without a coffin."
It was like the creation of a dream, thought the priest as hewalked with his guide, listening to the quiet talk. He had seensome of these facts in the book that Father Jervis had lent him;but they had meant little to him. Now he began to understand, andonce more a kind of inexplicable terror began to affect him.
But as, five minutes later, he stood in the high western galleryof the church, and saw that enormous place stretching beyondcalculation to where thin clear glass sanctuary windows rose ina group, like sword-blades, above the white pavement before thealtar; as he saw the ranks of stalls running up, tier abovetier, and understood that, all told, they numbered ten thousand,one third of them on this side of the screen, in the laybrothers' choir, and two thirds beyond; as he imagined what itmust be to watch this congregation of elect souls stream in,each with his lantern in his hand, through the countless doorsthat ended each little narrow gangway that disappeared among thestalls; as he pictured the thunder of the unemotional Carthusianpl
ain-song--as he saw all this with his bodily eyes standingsilent beside the silent monk, and began little by little totake in what it all meant, and what this world must be in whichsuch a condition of things was accepted--a world whereContemplatives at last were honoured as the kings of the earth,and themselves controlled and soothed the lives of whom theworld had despaired; as his imagination ran out still farther,and he remembered that this was but one of innumerable houses ofthe kind--as he began to be aware of all this, and of what itsignified as regards the civilization in which he foundhimself--his terror began to pass, and to give place to an awe,and to a kind of exaltation, such as neither Rome nor Lourdesnor London had been able even to suggest. . . .