The Absolute at Large

by Karel Čapek

  “Oh, but why?” said Mr. Bondy. “Does it really mean such mischief? Even if all this were true . . . is it such a disaster?”

  “Bondy, my Karburator is a terriffic thing. It will overturn the whole world, mechanically and socially. It will cheapen production to an unbelievable extent. It will do away with poverty and hunger. It will some day save our planet from freezing up. But, on the other hand, it hurls God as a by-product into the world. I implore you, Bondy, don’t underrate what it means. We aren’t used to reckoning with God as a reality. We don’t know what His presence may bring about—say, socially, morally, and so on. Why, man, this thing affects the whole of human civilization!”

  “Wait a minute !” said Bondy thoughtfully. “Perhaps there’s some charm or other that would exorcise it. Have you called in the clergy?”

  “What kind of clergy?”

  “Any kind. The denomination probably makes no difference in this case, you know. Perhaps they could do something to stop it.”

  “Oh, that’s all superstition!” burst out Marek. “Leave me alone with your parsons! Catch me giving them a chance to make a miraculous shrine out of my cellar! Me, with my views!”

  “Very well,” declared Mr. Bondy. “Then I’ll call them in myself. You never can tell. . . . Come, it can’t do any harm, anyway. After all, I haven’t anything against God. Only He oughtn’t to interfere with business. Have you tried negotiating with Him in a friendly spirit?”

  “No,” admitted the engineer.

  “That was a mistake,” said Bondy dryly. “Perhaps you could come to some agreement with Him. A proper formal contract, in something like this style: ‘We guarantee to produce You discreetly and continuously to an extent to be fixed by mutual agreement; in return for which You pledge yourself to refrain from any divine manifestations within such and such a radius from the place of origin.’ What do you think—would He consider these terms?”

  “I don’t know,” answered Marek uneasily. “He seems to have a decided inclination in favour of becoming independent of matter once more. Still, perhaps . . . in His own interests . . . He might be willing to listen. But don’t ask me to do it.”

  “Very well, then!” Bondy agreed. “I’ll send my own solicitor. A very tactful and capable fellow. And then again . . . er . . . . one might perhaps offer Him some church or other. After all, a factory cellar and its surroundings are rather . . . well . . . undignified quarters for Him. We ought to ascertain His tastes. Have you tried yet?”

  “No; it would suit me best to flood the cellar with water.”

  “Gently, Marek, gently. I’m probably going to buy this invention. You understand, of course, that . . . I’ll send my experts over first . . . we’ll have to look into the business a little further. Perhaps it’s only poisonous fumes, after all. And if it actually turns out to be God Himself, that’s all right. So long as the Karburator really works.”

  Marek got up. “And you wouldn’t be afraid to install the Karburator in the M.E.C. works?”

  “I’m not afraid,” said Bondy, rising, “to manufacture Karburators wholesale. Karburators for trains and ships. Karburators for central heating, for houses, offices, factories, and schools. In ten years’ time all the heating in the world will be done by Karburators. I’ll give you three percent of the gross profits. The first year it will only be a few millions, perhaps. Meanwhile you can move out, so that I can send my men along. I’ll bring the Suffragan Bishop up to-morrow morning. See that you keep out of his way, Rudy. I don’t like seeing you about here in any case. You are rather abrupt, and I don’t want to offend the Absolute to start with.”

  “Bondy,” Marek whispered, horror-stricken. “I warn you for the last time. It means letting God loose upon this world!”

  “Then,” said G. H. Bondy, with dignity, “He will be personally indebted to me to that extent. And I hope that He won’t show me any ill-feeling.”

  CHAPTER V

  BISHOP LINDA

  ABOUT a fortnight after New Year’s Day, Marek was sitting in Bondy’s business office.

  “How far have you got?” Bondy had just asked, raising his head from some papers over which he was bending.

  “I’ve finished,” said the engineer. “I’ve given your engineers detailed drawings of the Karburator. That bald-headed fellow—what’s his name——”

  “Krolmus.”

  “Yes, Krolmus has simplified my atomic motor amazingly—the transformation of electronic energy into motor power, you know. He’s an able fellow, my boy, is Krolmus. And what other news is there?”

  G. H. Bondy went on writing assiduously.

  “We’re building,” he said after a while. “Seven thousand bricklayers on the job. A factory for Karburators.”

  “At Vysočany. And we’ve increased our share capital. A billion and a half. Our new invention’s getting into the papers. See for yourself,” he added, tipping half a hundredweight of Czech and foreign papers into Marek’s lap, then buried himself in the documents on his desk.

  “I haven’t been for a fortnight,” said Marek gloomily.

  “Haven’t been where?”

  “I haven’t been to my little factory out at Břevnov for a fortnight. I—I daren’t go there. Is anything being done there?”

  “Mphm.”

  “And what about my Karburator?” asked Marek, controlling his anxiety.

  “It’s still running.”

  “And what about . . . the other thing?”

  The Chief sighed and laid down his pen. “Do you know that we had to have Mixa Street closed?”

  “Why?”

  “People kept going there to pray. Whole processions of them. The police tried to disperse them, and seven people lost their lives. They let themselves be knocked over like sheep.”

  “I feared as much, I feared as much,” muttered Marek in despair.

  “We’ve blocked the street with barbed wire,” Bondy went on. “We had to clear the people out of the neighbouring houses—religious manifestations all over them, you know. A commission of the Ministries of Health and Education is occupying them now.”

  “I expect,” said Marek with a breath of relief, “that the authorities will prohibit my Karburator.”

  “Oh, no they won’t,” said G. H. Bondy. “The Clerical party are making a fearful row about your Karburator, and for that very reason the progressive parties have taken it under their wing. In reality no one knows what it’s all about. It’s evident that you don’t read the papers, man. It’s developed into a quite needless attack upon clericalism, and the Church happens to have a little right on its side in this case. That confounded Bishop informed the Cardinal Archbishop——”

  “What Bishop?”

  “Oh, some Bishop by the name of Linda, quite a sensible man in other respects. You see, I took him up there as an expert, to inspect the wonderworking Absolute. His inspection lasted a full three hours, and he spent the whole time in the cellar, and . . .”

  “He got religion?” burst out Marek.

  “Not a bit of it! Perhaps, he’s had too long a training with God, or else he’s a more hard-baked atheist than you; I don’t know. But three days later he came to me and told me that from the Catholic standpoint God cannot be brought into the matter, that the Church absolutely rejects and forbids the pantheistic hypothesis as heresy. In short, that this isn’t any legal, duly recognized God, supported by the authority of the Church, and that, as a priest, he must declare it false, perverse, and heretical. He talked very reasonably, did his Reverence.”

  “So he wasn’t conscious of any supernatural manifestations down there?”

  “He underwent them all: illuminations, miraculous powers, ecstasy, everything. He doesn’t deny, either, that these things happen there.”

  “Well, then, tell me, how does he explain it?”

  “He simply doesn’t. He said that the Church does not explain, but merely prescribes or prohibits. In short, he definitely refused to compromise the Church with any new and untrie
d God. At least, that’s what I understood him to mean. Do you know that I’ve bought that church up on the White Mountain?”

  “Why?”

  “It’s the nearest one to Břevnov. It cost me three hundred thousand, man. Both in writing and by word of mouth I offered it to the Absolute down in the cellar to induce it to move over there. It’s quite a pretty baroque church; and besides, I expressed my readiness to undertake any necessary alterations. And here’s a queer thing: just a few steps from the church, at No. 457, there was a fine case of ecstasy the night before last—one of our erectors; but in the church itself nothing miraculous happened, nothing whatever. There was even one case right out in Vokovice and two in Košiře, while at the Petřin wireless station there’s practically an epidemic of religion. All the wrieless operators on duty up there are sending out ecstatic messages of their own accord, a sort of new gospel to the world at large: God coming down again to the earth to ransom it, and so forth. Just imagine the scandal! Now the progressive papers are going for the Post Office, and the fur’s fairly flying. They’re screaming about Clericalism showing its horns, and rubbish of that kind. Nobody as yet suspects that this has any connection with the Karburator. Marek,” Bondy added in a whisper, “I’ll tell you something, but it’s a dead secret. A week ago it attacked our Minister for War.”

  “Whom!” cried Marek.

  “Hush, quietly. The Minister for War. He ‘saw the light’ all of a sudden in his villa at Dejvice. The following morning he assembled the garrison of Prague, talked to them about eternal peace, and exhorted the troops to become martyrs. Of course he had to resign at once. The papers stated that his health had suddenly broken down. And that’s how matters stand, my friend.”

  “In Dejvice already!” groaned the engineer. “It’s terrible, Bondy, the way it’s spreading.”

  “It’s amazing,” said Bondy. “The other day a man shifted his piano from the infected Mixa Street area out to Pankrác. In twenty-four hours the whole house was down with it.”

  Here the Chairman was interrupted. A servant entered to announce a caller in the person of Bishop Linda. Marek hurriedly rose to take his leave, but Bondy forced him to resume his seat, saying, “Just sit still and say nothing. The Bishop’s really a charming man.” At that moment the Suffragan Bishop Linda came into the room.

  He was a small, jolly person with gold spectacles and a comical mouth puckered up in clerical fashion in pleasant childish folds. Bondy introduced Marek to him as the owner of the ill-omened cellar at Břevnov. The Bishop rubbed his hands with delight while the wrathful engineer spluttered out something about being “delighted to have the honour,” with a dogged expression that said clearly, “Confound you for a canting humbug!” The Bishop pursed his lips and turned quickly to Bondy.

  He began briskly, without beating about the bush. “I’ve come to you on a very delicate errand. Very delicate indeed,” he repeated with relish. “We have been discussing your . . . ahem . . . your affair in the Consistory. His Eminence, the Archbishop, wishes to settle this regrettable incident with as little publicity as possible. You understand. This objectionable business about the miracles. Oh, I’m sorry. I have no wish to hurt the feelings of Mr. . . . er . . . the proprietor . . .”

  “Please go on,” Marek conceded gruffly.

  “Well, then, in a word, the whole scandal. His Eminence declares that from the standpoint of both reason and faith there can be nothing more offensive than this godless and blasphemous perversion of the laws of Nature. . . .”

  “I beg your pardon!” Marek broke out disgustedly. “Would you mind leaving the laws of Nature to us? After all, we don’t interfere with your dogmas!”

  “You are mistaken,” cried the Bishop gaily. “Quite mistaken. Science without dogma is only a heap of doubts. What is worse, your Absolute opposes the laws of the Church. It contradicts the doctrine of the holy sacraments. It does not regard the traditions of the Church. It seriously violates the doctrine of the Trinity. It pays no attention to the apostolic succession. It does not even submit to the rites of exorcism. And so on. In short, it behaves itself in a manner which we must severely discountenance.”

  “Come, come,” suggested Bondy propitiatingly. “Up to the present its behaviour has been very . . . dignified.”

  The Bishop raised his finger warningly.

  “Up to the present; but we don’t know how it will behave next. Look here, Mr. Bondy,” he suddenly said in a confidential tone, “it is to your interest that there should be no unpleasantness. To our interest, too. You would like to settle it quickly, like a practical business man. So should we, as the representatives and servants of the Lord. We cannot permit the rise of some new God or possibly a new religion.”

  “Thank Heaven,” Mr. Bondy sighed with relief. “I knew we should come to an agreement.”

  “Splendid!” cried the Bishop, his eyes sparkling with happiness through his spectacles. “An agreement, that’s the thing. The venerable Consistory decided that in the interests of the Church it would place your . . . er . . . Absolute provisionally under its patronage. It would attempt to bring it into harmony with Catholic doctrine. It would proclaim the premises in Břevnov known as No. 1651 a miraculous shrine and place of pilgrimage. . . .”

  “Oho!” growled Marek, and leaped to his feet.

  “Permit me,” said the Bishop with an imperious motion. “A miraculous shrine and place of pilgrimage—with certain conditions, of course. The first condition is that on the aforesaid premises the production of the Absolute should be limited to the smallest possible quantity, and that it should be only weak, almost innocuous, very much diluted Absolute, whose manifestations would be less uncontrollable and more irregular, rather as at Lourdes. Otherwise we cannot assume the responsibility.”

  “Very well,” agreed Mr. Bondy. “And what else?”

  “Further,” continued the Bishop, “it is to be manufactured only from coal obtained at Male Svantovice. As you know, there is a miraculous shrine of the Virgin in that district, so that with the aid of this particular coal we might establish at No. 1651 Břevnov a centre for the worship of Our Lady.”

  “Undoubtedly,” assented Mr. Bondy. “Anything more?”

  “In the third place, you must bind yourself not to manufacture the Absolute at any other place or time.”

  “What?” cried G. H. Bondy, “and our Karburators——”

  “—Will never come into operation, with the exception of the one at Břevnov, which remains the property of the Holy Church, and will be under her management.”

  “Nonsense,” protested G. H. Bondy. “The Karburators shall be manufactured. In three weeks’ time ten of them will be erected. In the first six months there will be twelve hundred. In the course of a year, ten thousand. Our arrangements have gone as far as that already.”

  “And I tell you,” said the Bishop quietly and sweetly, “that at the end of that year not a single Karburator will be running.”

  “Why not?”

  “Because mankind, whether believers or unbelievers, cannot do with a real and active God. We simply cannot, gentlemen. It is out of the question.”

  “And I tell you,” Marek interposed vehemently, “that the Karburator shall be made. I’m in favour of them myself now. I mean to have them precisely because you don’t want them. In spite of you, my Lord Bishop, in spite of all superstition, in spite of all Rome! And I mean to be the first to cry”—here the engineer took breath, then burst out with unmelodious enthusiam—“Success to the Perfect Karburator!”

  “We shall see,” said the Bishop with a sigh. “You gentlemen will live to be convinced that the venerable Consistory was right. In a year’s time you will stop the manufacture of the Absolute of your own accord. But, oh, the damage, the devastation it will bring to pass in the meantime! Gentlemen, in the name of Heaven, do not imagine that the Church brings God into the world. The Church merely confines Him and controls Him. And you two unbelievers are loosing Him upon the earth like a flood. Th
e ship of Peter will survive even this deluge; like the Ark of Noah, it will ride out this inundation of the Absolute—but your modern society,” cried the Bishop with a mighty voice, “that will pay the price!”

  CHAPTER VI

  THE BOARD-MEETING

  “GENTLEMEN”—it was G. H. Bondy addressing the meeting of the Board of Directors of the M.E.C. (the Metallo-Electrical Company) held on February 20th—“I have to inform you that one building of our new group of factories at Vysočany has been completed and began production yesterday. In a very few days the standardized production of Karburators will be in full swing, beginning with eighteen finished machines per day. In April we expect to turn out sixty-five per day; by the end of July two hundred per day. We have laid down fifteen kilometres of private line, chiefly for our coal supply. Twelve boiler furnaces are now being erected. We have begun the building of new quarters for our workmen.”

  “Twelve boiler furnaces?” Dr. Hubka, the leader of the opposition, asked at a venture.

  “Yes, twelve for the time being,” confirmed Bondy.