CHAPTER XIII

WHAT HE BELIEVED


We are not obliged to sound the Bishop of D---- on the score
of orthodoxy. In the presence of such a soul we feel ourselves
in no mood but respect. The conscience of the just man should
be accepted on his word. Moreover, certain natures being given,
we admit the possible development of all beauties of human virtue
in a belief that differs from our own.

What did he think of this dogma, or of that mystery? These secrets
of the inner tribunal of the conscience are known only to the tomb,
where souls enter naked. The point on which we are certain is,
that the difficulties of faith never resolved themselves into
hypocrisy in his case. No decay is possible to the diamond.
He believed to the extent of his powers. "Credo in Patrem,"
he often exclaimed. Moreover, he drew from good works that amount
of satisfaction which suffices to the conscience, and which whispers
to a man, "Thou art with God!"

The point which we consider it our duty to note is, that outside
of and beyond his faith, as it were, the Bishop possessed an excess
of love. In was in that quarter, quia multum amavit,--because he
loved much--that he was regarded as vulnerable by "serious men,"
"grave persons" and "reasonable people"; favorite locutions of our
sad world where egotism takes its word of command from pedantry.
What was this excess of love? It was a serene benevolence
which overflowed men, as we have already pointed out, and which,
on occasion, extended even to things. He lived without disdain.
He was indulgent towards God's creation. Every man, even the best,
has within him a thoughtless harshness which he reserves for animals.
The Bishop of D---- had none of that harshness, which is peculiar
to many priests, nevertheless. He did not go as far as the Brahmin,
but he seemed to have weighed this saying of Ecclesiastes: "Who knoweth
whither the soul of the animal goeth?" Hideousness of aspect,
deformity of instinct, troubled him not, and did not arouse
his indignation. He was touched, almost softened by them.
It seemed as though he went thoughtfully away to seek beyond
the bounds of life which is apparent, the cause, the explanation,
or the excuse for them. He seemed at times to be asking God to
commute these penalties. He examined without wrath, and with the
eye of a linguist who is deciphering a palimpsest, that portion
of chaos which still exists in nature. This revery sometimes
caused him to utter odd sayings. One morning he was in his garden,
and thought himself alone, but his sister was walking behind him,
unseen by him: suddenly he paused and gazed at something on the ground;
it was a large, black, hairy, frightful spider. His sister heard
him say:--

"Poor beast! It is not its fault!"

Why not mention these almost divinely childish sayings of kindness?
Puerile they may be; but these sublime puerilities were peculiar
to Saint Francis d'Assisi and of Marcus Aurelius. One day he
sprained his ankle in his effort to avoid stepping on an ant.
Thus lived this just man. Sometimes he fell asleep in his garden,
and then there was nothing more venerable possible.

Monseigneur Bienvenu had formerly been, if the stories anent
his youth, and even in regard to his manhood, were to be believed,
a passionate, and, possibly, a violent man. His universal suavity
was less an instinct of nature than the result of a grand conviction
which had filtered into his heart through the medium of life,
and had trickled there slowly, thought by thought; for, in a character,
as in a rock, there may exist apertures made by drops of water.
These hollows are uneffaceable; these formations are indestructible.

In 1815, as we think we have already said, he reached his seventy-fifth
birthday, but he did not appear to be more than sixty. He was
not tall; he was rather plump; and, in order to combat this tendency,
he was fond of taking long strolls on foot; his step was firm,
and his form was but slightly bent, a detail from which we do not
pretend to draw any conclusion. Gregory XVI., at the age of eighty,
held himself erect and smiling, which did not prevent him from
being a bad bishop. Monseigneur Welcome had what the people term
a "fine head," but so amiable was he that they forgot that it was fine.

When he conversed with that infantile gayety which was one of his charms,
and of which we have already spoken, people felt at their ease with him,
and joy seemed to radiate from his whole person. His fresh and
ruddy complexion, his very white teeth, all of which he had preserved,
and which were displayed by his smile, gave him that open and easy
air which cause the remark to be made of a man, "He's a good fellow";
and of an old man, "He is a fine man." That, it will be recalled,
was the effect which he produced upon Napoleon. On the first encounter,
and to one who saw him for the first time, he was nothing, in fact,
but a fine man. But if one remained near him for a few hours,
and beheld him in the least degree pensive, the fine man became
gradually transfigured, and took on some imposing quality,
I know not what; his broad and serious brow, rendered august
by his white locks, became august also by virtue of meditation;
majesty radiated from his goodness, though his goodness ceased not
to be radiant; one experienced something of the emotion which one
would feel on beholding a smiling angel slowly unfold his wings,
without ceasing to smile. Respect, an unutterable respect,
penetrated you by degrees and mounted to your heart, and one felt
that one had before him one of those strong, thoroughly tried,
and indulgent souls where thought is so grand that it can no longer
be anything but gentle.

As we have seen, prayer, the celebration of the offices of religion,
alms-giving, the consolation of the afflicted, the cultivation
of a bit of land, fraternity, frugality, hospitality, renunciation,
confidence, study, work, filled every day of his life. Filled is
exactly the word; certainly the Bishop's day was quite full to the brim,
of good words and good deeds. Nevertheless, it was not complete
if cold or rainy weather prevented his passing an hour or two in his
garden before going to bed, and after the two women had retired.
It seemed to be a sort of rite with him, to prepare himself for
slumber by meditation in the presence of the grand spectacles of the
nocturnal heavens. Sometimes, if the two old women were not asleep,
they heard him pacing slowly along the walks at a very advanced
hour of the night. He was there alone, communing with himself,
peaceful, adoring, comparing the serenity of his heart with the
serenity of the ether, moved amid the darkness by the visible
splendor of the constellations and the invisible splendor of God,
opening his heart to the thoughts which fall from the Unknown.
At such moments, while he offered his heart at the hour when
nocturnal flowers offer their perfume, illuminated like a lamp amid
the starry night, as he poured himself out in ecstasy in the midst
of the universal radiance of creation, he could not have told himself,
probably, what was passing in his spirit; he felt something take
its flight from him, and something descend into him. Mysterious
exchange of the abysses of the soul with the abysses of the universe!

He thought of the grandeur and presence of God; of the future eternity,
that strange mystery; of the eternity past, a mystery still
more strange; of all the infinities, which pierced their way into
all his senses, beneath his eyes; and, without seeking to comprehend
the incomprehensible, he gazed upon it. He did not study God;
he was dazzled by him. He considered those magnificent conjunctions
of atoms, which communicate aspects to matter, reveal forces by
verifying them, create individualities in unity, proportions in extent,
the innumerable in the infinite, and, through light, produce beauty.
These conjunctions are formed and dissolved incessantly;
hence life and death.

He seated himself on a wooden bench, with his back against a
decrepit vine; he gazed at the stars, past the puny and stunted
silhouettes of his fruit-trees. This quarter of an acre,
so poorly planted, so encumbered with mean buildings and sheds,
was dear to him, and satisfied his wants.

What more was needed by this old man, who divided the leisure
of his life, where there was so little leisure, between gardening
in the daytime and contemplation at night? Was not this narrow
enclosure, with the heavens for a ceiling, sufficient to enable
him to adore God in his most divine works, in turn? Does not this
comprehend all, in fact? and what is there left to desire beyond it?
A little garden in which to walk, and immensity in which to dream.
At one's feet that which can be cultivated and plucked; over head
that which one can study and meditate upon: some flowers on earth,
and all the stars in the sky.