Thursday's Serial: “Journal Spirituel” by Sœur Marie de Saint-Pierre (in French) - XIII.

 

26

Satan a trop grand peur de la Croix...

    Lettre du 5 janvier 1846

«...Voilà à peu près ce que Notre-Seigneur me fit entendre (hier et aujourd’hui).

Ce divin Maître me fit connaître que la terre que nous avions achetée à son divin Père par l’offrande de sa Sainte-Face, était une figure sensible de la terre des vivants que nous devions acheter pour un grand nombre d’âmes, avec la pièce divine et mystérieuse de sa Face adorable [1]. Ensuite, ce divin Pasteur me présenta un troupeau en me disant qu’il m’en faisait la bergère. Il me fit entendre que ses pauvres brebis étaient mordues par le serpent et qu’elles avaient une rage du blasphème; qu’il fallait que je les mène paître sur les terres de ses divins mystères afin qu’elles y trouvent leur guérison, et que je les loge dans les plaies adorables de son Sacré-Cœur, en les marquant à l’effigie de sa Sainte-Face. Notre-Seigneur me fit entendre que j’aurais beaucoup à souffrir à cause que ce troupeau de blasphémateurs était, d’une manière toute spéciale, sous la conduite du prince des démons. Notre-Seigneur me fit connaître que Lucifer laissait volontiers aux autres démons la conduite des autres troupeaux de pécheurs, comme par exemple les impudiques, les ivrognes, les avares... Mais les blasphémateurs sont son troupeau chéri.

—C’est lui — me fit entendre ce divin Sauveur —, qui vous donne tant de répugnance pour cette œuvre de réparation des blasphèmes. Mais, ne le craignez pas: saint Michel et les saints Anges vous protégeront. Avec ma Croix que je vous donne pour vous servir de houlette, vous deviendrez, par cette arme, terrible au démon.

Ensuite, Notre-Seigneur me fit entendre que c’était pour cette mission qu’il m’avait retirée du monde et appelée dans la sainte maison; et comme j’éprouvait une certaine inquiétude sur la véracité, craignant toujours l’illusion, Notre-Seigneur me dit :

—Soyez tranquille ! Satan a trop grand peur de la Croix pour en marquer ses opérations.

Dans une de mes oraisons dont j’ai oubliai la date, Notre-Seigneur m’a reprise de ce que j’avais négligé de prier pour la conversion des blasphémateurs, en me faisant voir que j’avais laissé le démon me tenter de défiance en sa miséricorde. Il semblait me dire :

—Ne vous ai-je pas donné l’exemple de prier pour eux lorsque j’étais sur la Croix ?

Et il me fit connaître qu’il avait de grands desseins de miséricorde sur cette classe de pécheurs, et qu’il voulait se servir de moi comme d’un instrument malgré mon indignité, pour l’accomplissement de ses desseins. Notre-Seigneur m’a fait connaître que cette œuvre [tendait à] la réparation des blasphèmes du saint Nom de Dieu, mais aussi des autres blasphèmes proférés contre la religion et contre l’Église; cependant, elle s’applique spécialement aux blasphèmes du saint Nom de Dieu».

 

[1] Allusion à la parcelle de terrain achetée par les Carmélites. Voir lettre du 29 octobre 1845.

 

 

27

La France devenue hideuse

    Lettre du 23 janvier 1846

«Je ne peux retenir mes larmes d’après ce que Notre-Seigneur vient de me dire, après L’avoir reçu dans la sainte communion. Voici les terribles paroles de ce divin Sauveur:

—La face de la France est devenue hideuse aux yeux de mon Père ; elle provoque sa justice ! Offrez-lui donc la Face de son Fils qui charme son Cœur, pour attirer sur cette France sa miséricorde ; sans quoi, elle sera châtiée. Là est son salut! c’est-à-dire en la Face du Sauveur. Voyez quelle preuve de ma bonté pour la France, qui ne me paie que d’ingratitude.

Alors j’ai dit: —Seigneur, est-ce bien vous qui ne donnez ces lumières ?

Notre-Seigneur m’a répondu:

—Auriez-vous pu vous les procurer vous-même dans la dernière communication? C’est exprès que je vous ai laissée depuis huit jours dans des ténèbres si profondes, afin de vous faire discerner mon opération.

Père éternel, nous vous offrons la Face adorable de votre Fils bien-aimé, pour l’honneur et la gloire de votre saint Nom et pour le salut de la France!» [1]

Réparer, réparer…

 

    Lettre du 8 mars 1846

«Permettez-moi de vous ouvrir mon pauvre cœur, blessé par un glaive de douleur, à cause de la nouvelle application que Notre-Seigneur m’a donnée ce matin sur son précieux chef couronné d’épines et sur sa Face adorable qui est un butte aux outrages des ennemis de Dieu et de l’Église. Il m’a fait entendre de nouveau ses douloureuses plaintes! Et ce divin Sauveur me faisait entendre qu’Il cherchait dans notre maison des âmes pour cicatriser ses blessures en réparant les outrages qui lui sont faits et en appliquant sur ses divines plaies le vin de la compassion et l’huile de la charité. Et il me semblait que Notre-Seigneur me disait que si la Communauté s’appliquait à cet exercice de réparation, Il lui donnerait un baiser d’amour qui serait le gage du baiser éternel. Il me semble aussi, ma Révérende Mère, que Notre-Seigneur me disait de vous remercier de ce que vous aviez déjà fait pour Lui en cette œuvre de réparation des blasphèmes et qu’Il vous engageait à continuer. J’avais peine à prendre la résolution de parler de ces choses, à cause que je craignais l’illusion, et je disais à Notre-Seigneur que, malgré le désir que j’avais de Le voir glorifié, je n’aurais pourtant jamais voulu dire une chose qui fût seulement un simple effet de mon imagination. Mais il me semblait que Notre-Seigneur me pressait de plaider sa cause et de demander pour Lui du soulagement à ses cruelles douleurs. J’ai senti pendant près de deux heures la présence de ce divin Sauveur dans mon âme.

—Mon Sauveur, lui ai-je dit, ah! veuillez vous choisir un plus digne instrument. Cherchez une Thérèse ou une Gertrude.

Et les sanglots et les larmes ont un peu soulagé mon pauvre cœur. Cette journée a été pour moi pleine d’angoisse ; mais heureuses souffrances, puisqu’il me semblait que Notre-Seigneur me faisait connaître qu’en me voyant prendre part à ses peines et les partager avec lui, il en été consolé!

Oh! ma bonne et Révérende Mère, je vous demande en grâce, pour l’amour et la consolation de Notre-Seigneur que vous vouliez envoyer dans quelques-unes de nos maisons les prières de la Réparation des blasphèmes qui sont si agréables à Notre-Seigneur: aussi je les ai dites deux fois dans cette journée en priant ce divin Sauveur de les recevoir comme le précieux parfum que sainte Madeleine son amante Lui versa sur la tête quelques jours avant sa Passion.

Voilà à peu près, ma Révérende Mère, ce qui s’est passé dans mon âme. Il y avait cinq semaines que Notre-Seigneur n’avait rien opéré en moi d’extraordinaire: seulement j’étais toujours appliquée à la réparation des blasphèmes, en soupirant après la naissance de cette œuvre, toutefois dans une grande paix, m’occupant du troupeau dont la garde m’a été remise ; tous les jours je le mène paître dans les divines prairies des mystères de la vie et de la Passion du Bon Pasteur qui a donné sa vie pour ses brebis, afin qu’aucune d’elles ne périsse.». [2]

 

[1] Lettre du 23 janvier 1846.

[2] Lettre du 8 mars 1846.

 

 

28

Véronique et le bon Laron – Promesses

    Lettre du 12 mars 1846

«C’est pour obéir à Notre-Seigneur qui, je crois, m’a commandé d’écrire ce qu’Il m’a communiqué ce matin après la Sainte Communion, que je vais soumettre les lumières suivantes.

Notre-Seigneur m’a fait entendre que deux personnes Lui avaient rendu un signalé service pendant sa Passion. La première, c’est la pieuse Véronique qui a glorifié sa sainte humanité en essuyant sa Face adorable dans la route du Calvaire. La seconde est le bon Larron sur la Croix qui, de là comme d’une chaire, a pris la parole pour défendre la cause du Sauveur, confesser et glorifier sa divinité pendant qu’Il était blasphémé par son compagnon et par les Juifs. Notre-Seigneur m’a fait entendre que ces deux personnes étaient deux modèles pour ses défenseurs en l’œuvre de la réparation des blasphèmes: la pieuse Véronique le modèle des personnes de son sexe, qui ne sont pas préposées pour défendre sa cause à haute voix, mais pour essuyer sa Sainte-Face en réparant par la prière, les louanges et les adorations, les blasphèmes des pécheurs; mais que le bon Larron était le modèle de ses ministres qui devaient hautement et publiquement défendre sa cause en l’Œuvre de la Réparation.

Ensuite, ce divin Sauveur m’a fait remarquer les magnifiques récompenses dont il avait gratifié ces deux personnes, l’une en lui laissant son divin portrait, l’autre en lui donnant son céleste royaume, tant il avait eu pour agréables les services qu’elles Lui avaient rendus pendant la Passion. Ensuite Notre-Seigneur m’a promis que tous ceux qui défendraient sa cause en cette œuvre, par paroles, par prières ou par écrits, Il défendrait leur cause devant son Père et qu’Il leur donnerait son royaume; il me semblait qu’Il me disait de le promettre de sa part en toute assurance à ses ministres qui plaideraient sa cause en cette œuvre, et qu’Il promettait à ses épouses qui s’appliqueraient à honorer et essuyer sa Sainte-Face en réparant les blasphème des pécheurs en cette œuvre, qu’à l’heure de la mort, il essuierait la face de leurs âmes en effaçant les tâches du péché, et qu’Il leur rendrait leur beauté première.

Ensuite, il me semblait que Notre-Seigneur me disait:

—Écrivez ces promesses, car elles feront plus d’impression sur les esprits que tout ce que je vous ai déjà dit par rapport à cette œuvre, en raison de l’intérêt éternel qui s’y trouve engagé, intérêt que je ne condamne pas, puisque j’ai donné ma vie pour mériter aux pécheurs ce royaume du ciel.

Il me semblait aussi que Notre-Seigneur me disait :

—Si vous voulez garder ces choses secrètes, sans vouloir en parler, vous commettez une injustice.

Notre-Seigneur me parlait ainsi parce que j’hésitait à croire cette communication, car je crains toujours de me tromper.

Voilà à peu près, ma Révérende Mère, ce qui s’est passé dans mon âme. Ces dernières lumières que j’ai reçues m’ont toute bouleversée. J’éprouve une douleur intérieur et un feu qui me dévore; je n’ai qu’à m’anéantir devant Dieu, adorant ses divines opérations sur un chétif néant». [1]

Promesses…

 

    Lettre du 23 mars 1846

«...Ce divin Sauveur m’a fait entendre que l’Œuvre de la Réparation des blasphèmes était née de Lui et de l’Église son Épouse; qu’il fallait à sa naissance, produire l’autorité divine dont elle émane, afin qu’elle ait vie et qu’elle soit bien reçue des fidèles, sans quoi elle n’aurait point de succès. Notre-Seigneur me disait aussi qu’il fallait faire connaître le désir qu’Il a de voir cette œuvre s’établir, leur en faire la nature et ses précieux avantages. Et Il m’a dit:

—Tous ceux qui embrasseront cette œuvre et qui véritablement s’y dévoueront ne mourront pas de la mort éternelle. Je défendrai leur cause devant mon Père et je leur donnerai le royaume du ciel. Que ces promesses ne vous étonnent point, car cette œuvre est l’essence de la charité, et ceux qui ont la charité ont la vie. D’ailleurs, je leur accorderai des grâces de préservation.

Voilà deux fois que Notre-Seigneur me fait ces magnifiques promesses. Puissent-elles être reçues avec actions de grâce pour la plus grande gloire de Dieu et le salut des associés de l’Œuvre de la Réparation des blasphèmes! Que le Saint Nom de Dieu soit béni!». [2]

 

[1] Lettre du 12 mars 1846.

[2] Lettre du 23 mars 1846.

Wednesday's Good Reading: "Spirto ben nato, in cu’ si specchia e vede" by Michelangelo Buonarroti (in Italian)

     Spirto ben nato, in cu’ si specchia e vede
nelle tuo belle membra oneste e care
quante natura e ’l ciel tra no’ può fare,
quand’a null’altra suo bell’opra cede:
     spirto leggiadro, in cui si spera e crede
dentro, come di fuor nel viso appare,
amor, pietà, mercè, cose sì rare,
che ma’ furn’in beltà con tanta fede:
     l’amor mi prende e la beltà mi lega;
la pietà, la mercè con dolci sguardi
ferma speranz’ al cor par che ne doni.
     Qual uso o qual governo al mondo niega,
qual crudeltà per tempo o qual più tardi,
c’a sì bell’opra morte non perdoni?

Tuesday's Serial: "St. Martin’s Summer" by Rafael Sabatini (in English) - I.

 

CHAPTER I. THE SENESCHAL OF DAUPHINY

My Lord of Tressan, His Majesty’s Seneschal of Dauphiny, sat at his ease, his purple doublet all undone, to yield greater freedom to his vast bulk, a yellow silken undergarment visible through the gap, as is visible the flesh of some fruit that, swollen with over-ripeness, has burst its skin.

His wig—imposed upon him by necessity, not fashion—lay on the table amid a confusion of dusty papers, and on his little fat nose, round and red as a cherry at its end, rested the bridge of his horn-rimmed spectacles. His bald head—so bald and shining that it conveyed an unpleasant sense of nakedness, suggesting that its uncovering had been an act of indelicacy on the owner’s part—rested on the back of his great chair, and hid from sight the gaudy escutcheon wrought upon the crimson leather. His eyes were closed, his mouth open, and whether from that mouth or from his nose—or, perhaps, conflicting for issue between both—there came a snorting, rumbling sound to proclaim that my Lord the Seneschal was hard at work upon the King’s business.

Yonder, at a meaner table, in an angle between two windows, a pale-faced thread-bare secretary was performing for a yearly pittance the duties for which my Lord the Seneschal was rewarded by emoluments disproportionately large.

The air of that vast apartment was disturbed by the sounds of Monsieur de Tressan’s slumbers, the scratch and splutter of the secretary’s pen, and the occasional hiss and crackle of the logs that burned in the great, cavern-like fireplace. Suddenly to these another sound was added. With a rasp and rattle the heavy curtains of blue velvet flecked with silver fleurs-de-lys were swept from the doorway, and the master of Monsieur de Tressan’s household, in a well filled suit of black relieved by his heavy chain of office, stepped pompously forward.

The secretary dropped his pen, and shot a frightened glance at his slumbering master; then raised his hands above his head, and shook them wildly at the head lackey.

“Sh!” he whispered tragically. “Doucement, Monsieur Anselme.”

Anselme paused. He appreciated the gravity of the situation. His bearing lost some of its dignity; his face underwent a change. Then with a recovery of some part of his erstwhile resolution:

“Nevertheless, he must be awakened,” he announced, but in an undertone, as if afraid to do the thing he said must needs be done.

The horror in the secretary’s eyes increased, but Anselme’s reflected none of it. It was a grave thing, he knew by former experience, to arouse His Majesty’s Seneschal of Dauphiny from his after-dinner nap; but it was an almost graver thing to fail in obedience to that black-eyed woman below who was demanding an audience.

Anselme realized that he was between the sword and the wall. He was, however, a man of a deliberate habit that was begotten of inherent indolence and nurtured among the good things that fell to his share as master of the Tressan household. Thoughtfully he caressed his tuft of red beard, puffed out his cheeks, and raised his eyes to the ceiling in appeal or denunciation to the heaven which he believed was somewhere beyond it.

“Nevertheless, he must be awakened,” he repeated.

And then Fate came to his assistance. Somewhere in the house a door banged like a cannon-shot. Perspiration broke upon the secretary’s brow. He sank limply back in his chair, giving himself up for lost. Anselme started and bit the knuckle of his forefinger in a manner suggesting an inarticulate imprecation.

My Lord the Seneschal moved. The noise of his slumbers culminated in a sudden, choking grunt, and abruptly ceased. His eyelids rolled slowly back, like an owl’s, revealing pale blue eyes, which fixed themselves first upon the ceiling, then upon Anselme. Instantly he sat up, puffing and scowling, his hands shuffling his papers.

“A thousand devils! Anselme, why am I interrupted?” he grumbled querulously, still half-asleep. “What the plague do you want? Have you no thought for the King’s affairs? Babylas”—this to his secretary—“did I not tell you that I had much to do; that I must not be disturbed?”

It was the great vanity of the life of this man, who did nothing, to appear the busiest fellow in all France, and no audience—not even that of his own lackeys—was too mean for him to take the stage to in that predilect role.

“Monsieur le Comte,” said Anselme, in tones of abject self-effacement, “I had never dared intrude had the matter been of less urgency. But Madame the Dowager of Condillac is below. She begs to see Your Excellency instantly.”

At once there was a change. Tressan became wide-awake upon the instant. His first act was to pass one hand over the wax-like surface of his bald head, whilst his other snatched at his wig. Then he heaved himself ponderously out of his great chair. He donned his wig, awry in his haste, and lurched forward towards Anselme, his fat fingers straining at his open doublet and drawing it together.

“Madame la Douairiere here?” he cried. “Make fast these buttons, rascal! Quick! Am I to receive a lady thus? Am I—? Babylas,” he snapped, interrupting himself and turning aside even as Anselme put forth hands to do his bidding. “A mirror, from my closet! Dispatch!”

The secretary was gone in a flash, and in a flash returned, even as Anselme completed his master’s toilet. But clearly Monsieur de Tressan had awakened in a peevish humour, for no sooner were the buttons of his doublet secured than with his own fingers he tore them loose again, cursing his majordomo the while with vigour.

“You dog, Anselme, have you no sense of fitness, no discrimination? Am I to appear in this garment of the mode of a half-century ago before Madame la Marquise? Take it off; take it off, man! Get me the coat that came last month from Paris—the yellow one with the hanging sleeves and the gold buttons, and a sash—the crimson sash I had from Taillemant. Can you move no quicker, animal? Are you still here?”

Anselme, thus enjoined, lent an unwonted alacrity to his movements, waddling grotesquely like a hastening waterfowl. Between him and the secretary they dressed my Lord the Seneschal, and decked him out till he was fit to compare with a bird of paradise for gorgeousness of colouring if not for harmony of hues and elegance of outline.

Babylas held the mirror, and Anselme adjusted the Seneschal’s wig, whilst Tressan himself twisted his black mustachios—how they kept their colour was a mystery to his acquaintance—and combed the tuft of beard that sprouted from one of his several chins.

He took a last look at his reflection, rehearsed a smile, and bade Anselme introduce his visitor. He desired his secretary to go to the devil, but, thinking better of it, he recalled him as he reached the door. His cherished vanity craved expression.

“Wait!” said he. “There is a letter must be written. The King’s business may not suffer postponement—not for all the dowagers in France. Sit down.”

Babylas obeyed him. Tressan stood with his back to the open door. His ears, strained to listen, had caught the swish of a woman’s gown. He cleared his throat, and began to dictate:

“To Her Majesty the Queen-Regent—” He paused, and stood with knitted brows, deep in thought. Then he ponderously repeated—“To Her Majesty the Queen Regent—Have you got that?”

“Yes, Monsieur le Comte. ‘To Her Majesty the Queen Regent.’”

There was a step, and a throat-clearing cough behind him.

“Monsieur de Tressan,” said a woman’s voice, a rich, melodious voice, if haughty and arrogant of intonation.

On the instant he turned, advanced a step, and bowed.

“Your humblest servant, madame,” said he, his hand upon his heart. “This is an honour which—”

“Which necessity thrusts upon you,” she broke in imperiously. “Dismiss that fellow.”

The secretary, pale and shy, had risen. His eyes dilated at the woman’s speech. He looked for a catastrophe as the natural result of her taking such a tone with this man who was the terror of his household and of all Grenoble. Instead, the Lord Seneschal’s meekness left him breathless with surprise.

“He is my secretary, madame. We were at work as you came. I was on the point of inditing a letter to Her Majesty. The office of Seneschal in a province such as Dauphiny is helas!—no sinecure.” He sighed like one whose brain is weary. “It leaves a man little time even to eat or sleep.”

“You will be needing a holiday, then,” said she, with cool insolence. “Take one for once, and let the King’s business give place for half an hour to mine.”

The secretary’s horror grew by leaps and bounds.

Surely the storm would burst at last about this audacious woman’s head. But the Lord Seneschal—usually so fiery and tempestuous—did no more than make her another of his absurd bows.

“You anticipate, madame, the very words I was about to utter. Babylas, vanish!” And he waved the scribbler doorwards with a contemptuous hand. “Take your papers with you—into my closet there. We will resume that letter to Her Majesty when madame shall have left me.”

The secretary gathered up his papers, his quills, and his inkhorn, and went his way, accounting the end of the world at hand.

When the door had closed upon him, the Seneschal, with another bow and a simper, placed a chair at his visitor’s disposal. She looked at the chair, then looked at the man much as she had looked at the chair, and turning her back contemptuously on both, she sauntered towards the fireplace. She stood before the blaze, with her whip tucked under her arm, drawing off her stout riding-gloves. She was a tall, splendidly proportioned woman, of a superb beauty of countenance, for all that she was well past the spring of life.

In the waning light of that October afternoon none would have guessed her age to be so much as thirty, though in the sunlight you might have set it at a little more. But in no light at all would you have guessed the truth, that her next would be her forty-second birthday. Her face was pale, of an ivory pallor that gleamed in sharp contrast with the ebony of her lustrous hair. Under the long lashes of low lids a pair of eyes black and insolent set off the haughty lines of her scarlet lips. Her nose was thin and straight, her neck an ivory pillar splendidly upright upon her handsome shoulders.

She was dressed for riding, in a gown of sapphire velvet, handsomely laced in gold across the stomacher, and surmounted at the neck, where it was cut low and square, by the starched band of fine linen which in France was already replacing the more elaborate ruff. On her head, over a linen coif, she wore a tall-crowned grey beaver, swathed with a scarf of blue and gold.

Standing by the hearth, one foot on the stone kerb, one elbow leaning lightly on the overmantel, she proceeded leisurely to remove her gloves.

The Seneschal observed her with eyes that held an odd mixture of furtiveness and admiration, his fingers—plump, indolent-looking stumps—plucking at his beard.

“Did you but know, Marquise, with what joy, with what a—”

“I will imagine it, whatever it may be,” she broke in, with that brusque arrogance that marked her bearing. “The time for flowers of rhetoric is not now. There is trouble coming, man; trouble, dire trouble.”

Up went the Seneschal’s brows; his eyes grew wider.

“Trouble?” quoth he. And, having opened his mouth to give exit to that single word, open he left it.

She laughed lazily, her lip curling, her face twisting oddly, and mechanically she began to draw on again the glove she had drawn off.

“By your face I see how well you understand me,” she sneered. “The trouble concerns Mademoiselle de La Vauvraye.”

“From Paris—does it come from Court?” His voice was sunk.

She nodded. “You are a miracle of intuition today, Tressan.”

He thrust his tiny tuft of beard between his teeth—a trick he had when perplexed or thoughtful. “Ah!” he exclaimed at last, and it sounded like an indrawn breath of apprehension. “Tell me more.”

“What more is there to tell? You have the epitome of the story.”

“But what is the nature of the trouble? What form does it take, and by whom are you advised of it?”

“A friend in Paris sent me word, and his messenger did his work well, else had Monsieur de Garnache been here before him, and I had not so much as had the mercy of this forewarning.”

“Garnache?” quoth the Count. “Who is Garnache?”

“The emissary of the Queen-Regent. He has been dispatched hither by her to see that Mademoiselle de La Vauvraye has justice and enlargement.”

Tressan fell suddenly to groaning and wringing his hands a pathetic figure had it been less absurd.

“I warned you, madame! I warned you how it would end,” he cried. “I told you—”

“Oh, I remember the things you told me,” she cut in, scorn in her voice. “You may spare yourself their repetition. What is done is done, and I’ll not—I would not—have it undone. Queen-Regent or no Queen-Regent, I am mistress at Condillac; my word is the only law we know, and I intend that so it shall continue.”

Tressan looked at her in surprise. This unreasoning, feminine obstinacy so wrought upon him that he permitted himself a smile and a lapse into irony and banter.

“Parfaitement,” said he, spreading his hands, and bowing. “Why speak of trouble, then?”

She beat her whip impatiently against her gown, her eyes staring into the fire. “Because, my attitude being such as it is, trouble will there be.”

The Seneschal shrugged his shoulders, and moved a step towards her. He was cast down to think that he might have spared himself the trouble of donning his beautiful yellow doublet from Paris. She had eyes for no finery that afternoon. He was cast down, too, to think how things might go with him when this trouble came. It entered his thoughts that he had lain long on a bed of roses in this pleasant corner of Dauphiny, and he was smitten now with fear lest of the roses he should find nothing remaining but the thorns.

“How came the Queen-Regent to hear of—of mademoiselle’s—ah—situation?” he inquired.

The Marquise swung round upon him in a passion.

“The girl found a dog of a traitor to bear a letter for her. That is enough. If ever chance or fate should bring him my way, by God! he shall hang without shrift.”

Then she put her anger from her; put from her, too, the insolence and scorn with which so lavishly she had addressed him hitherto. Instead she assumed a suppliant air, her beautiful eyes meltingly set upon his face.

“Tressan,” said she in her altered voice, “I am beset by enemies. But you will not forsake me? You will stand by me to the end—will you not, my friend? I can count upon you, at least?”

“In all things, madame,” he answered, under the spell of her gaze. “What force does this man Garnache bring with him? Have you ascertained?”

“He brings none,” she answered, triumph in her glance.

“None?” he echoed, horror in his. “None? Then—then—”

He tossed his arms to heaven, and stood a limp and shaken thing. She leaned forward, and regarded him stricken in surprise.

“Diable! What ails you?” she snapped. “Could I have given you better news?”

“If you could have given me worse, I cannot think what it might have been,” he groaned. Then, as if smitten by a sudden notion that flashed a gleam of hope into this terrifying darkness that was settling down upon him, he suddenly looked up. “You mean to resist him?” he inquired.

She stared at him a second, then laughed, a thought unpleasantly.

“Pish! But you are mad,” she scorned him. “Do you need ask if I intend to resist—I, with the strongest castle in Dauphiny? By God! sir, if you need to hear me say it, hear me then say that I shall resist him and as many as the Queen may send after him, for as long as one stone of Condillac shall stand upon another.”

The Seneschal blew out his lips, and fell once more to the chewing of his beard.

“What did you mean when you said I could have given you no worse news than that of his coming alone?” she questioned suddenly.

“Madame,” said he, “if this man comes without force, and you resist the orders of which he is the bearer, what think you will betide?”

“He will appeal to you for the men he needs that he may batter down my walls,” she answered calmly.

He looked at her incredulously. “You realize it?” he ejaculated. “You realize it?”

“What is there in it that should puzzle a babe?”

Her callousness was like a gust of wind upon the living embers of his fears. It blew them into a blaze of wrath, sudden and terrific as that of such a man at bay could be. He advanced upon her with the rolling gait of the obese, his cheeks purple, his arms waving wildly, his dyed mustachios bristling.

“And what of me, madame?” he spluttered. “What of me? Am I to be ruined, gaoled, and hanged, maybe, for refusing him men?—for that is what is in your mind. Am I to make myself an outlaw? Am I, who have been Lord Seneschal of Dauphiny these fifteen years, to end my days in degradation in the cause of a woman’s matrimonial projects for a simpering school-girl? Seigneur du Ciel!” he roared, “I think you are gone mad—mad, mad! over this affair. You would not think it too much to set the whole province in flames so that you could have your way with this wretched child. But, Ventregris! to ruin me—to—to—”

He fell silent for very want of words; just gaped and gasped, and then, with hands folded upon his paunch, he set himself to pace the chamber.

Madame de Condillac stood watching him, her face composed, her glance cold. She was like some stalwart oak, weathering with unshaken front a hurricane. When he had done, she moved away from the fireplace, and, beating her side gently with her whip, she stepped to the door.

“Au revoir, Monsieur de Tressan,” said she, mighty cool, her back towards him.

At that he halted in his feverish stride, stood still and threw up his head. His anger went out, as a candle is extinguished by a puff of wind. And in its place a new fear crept into his heart.

“Madame, madame!” he cried. “Wait! Hear me.”

She paused, half-turned, and looked at him over her shoulder, scorn in her glance, a sneer on her scarlet mouth, insolence in every line of her.

“I think, monsieur, that I have heard a little more than enough,” said she. “I am assured, at least, that in you I have but a fair-weather friend, a poor lipserver.”

“Ah, not that, madame,” he cried, and his voice was stricken. “Say not that. I would serve you as would none other in all this world—you know it, Marquise; you know it.”

She faced about, and confronted him, her smile a trifle broader, as if amusement were now blending with her scorn.

“It is easy to protest. Easy to say, ‘I will die for you,’ so long as the need for such a sacrifice be remote. But let me do no more than ask a favour, and it is, ‘What of my good name, madame? What of my seneschalship? Am I to be gaoled or hanged to pleasure you?’ Faugh!” she ended, with a toss of her splendid head. “The world is peopled with your kind, and I—alas! for a woman’s intuitions—had held you different from the rest.”

Her words were to his soul as a sword of fire might have been to his flesh. They scorched and shrivelled it. He saw himself as she would have him see himself—a mean, contemptible craven; a coward who made big talk in times of peace, but faced about and vanished into hiding at the first sign of danger. He felt himself the meanest, vilest thing a-crawl upon this sinful earth, and she—dear God!—had thought him different from the ruck. She had held him in high esteem, and behold, how short had he not fallen of all her expectations! Shame and vanity combined to work a sudden, sharp revulsion in his feelings.

“Marquise,” he cried, “you say no more than what is just. But punish me no further. I meant not what I said. I was beside myself. Let me atone—let my future actions make amends for that odious departure from my true self.”

There was no scorn now in her smile; only an ineffable tenderness, beholding which he felt it in his heart to hang if need be that he might continue high in her regard. He sprang forward, and took the hand she extended to him.

“I knew, Tressan,” said she, “that you were not yourself, and that when you bethought you of what you had said, my valiant, faithful friend would not desert me.”

He stooped over her hand, and slobbered kisses upon her unresponsive glove.

“Madame,” said he, “you may count upon me. This fellow out of Paris shall have no men from me, depend upon it.”

She caught him by the shoulders, and held him so, before her. Her face was radiant, alluring; and her eyes dwelt on his with a kindness he had never seen there save in some wild daydream of his.

“I will not refuse a service you offer me so gallantly,” said she. “It were an ill thing to wound you by so refusing it.”

“Marquise,” he cried, “it is as nothing to what I would do did the occasion serve. But when this thing ‘tis done; when you have had your way with Mademoiselle de La Vauvraye, and the nuptials shall have been celebrated, then—dare I hope—?”

He said no more in words, but his little blue eyes had an eloquence that left nothing to mere speech.

Their glances met, she holding him always at arm’s length by that grip upon his shoulders, a grip that was firm and nervous.

In the Seneschal of Dauphiny, as she now gazed upon him, she beheld a very toad of a man, and the soul of her shuddered at the sight of him combining with the thing that he suggested. But her glance was steady and her lips maintained their smile, just as if that ugliness of his had been invested with some abstract beauty existing only to her gaze; a little colour crept into her cheeks, and red being the colour of love’s livery, Tressan misread its meaning.

She nodded to him across the little distance of her outstretched arms, then smothered a laugh that drove him crazed with hope, and breaking from him she sped swiftly, shyly it almost seemed to him, to the door.

There she paused a moment looking back at him with a coyness that might have become a girl of half her years, yet which her splendid beauty saved from being unbecoming even in her.

One adorable smile she gave him, and before he could advance to hold the door for her, she had opened it and passed out.

Monday's Illustrated Word: "Science Vs. Sorcery" by unknown writer (in English)

 art by Joe Orlando and Wally Wood - Captain Science #5 - Youthful, August 1951.

 

 

Saturday's Good Reading: “Os Sapos... Até Quando os Sapos?” by Plinio Corrêa de Oliveira (in Portuguese)

 

“Folha de S. Paulo”, 16 de outubro de 1983

 

Não parece que nossa opinião pública esteja sendo familiarizada com uma alternativa que, entretanto, a publicidade vai impondo cada vez mais a todos os homens.

A divulgação de tal alternativa vem sendo feita em escala universal, por um slogan com aparência de mero jogo de palavras: “better red than dead”. Todos já entenderam: é melhor tornar-se vermelho, aceitar a imposição humilhante do regime comunista, conformar-se com a organização moral, social e econômica anticristã que lhe é inerente, a assumir os riscos do bombardeio atômico.

Diga-se a verdade. O conteúdo desse slogan consiste em que a vida — sim, a vida terrena — é o bem supremo do homem. De onde se infere que o amor à Fé, à independência pátria, à dignidade pessoal, à honra, tem de ser menor do que o amor à vida. Imbecis todos os mártires e todos os guerreiros que até aqui entenderam o contrário. E em confronto com os quais eram menoscabados como poltrões os que, para salvar a própria pele, renegavam a Fé, fugiam do campo de batalha, ou aquiesciam vilmente a qualquer insulto.

A velha tábua de valores foi invertida. Os mártires e os heróis de guerra, que figuravam com destaque nas fileiras de escol da humanidade, devem ser vistos daqui por diante como idiotas. Como idiotas, também, os moralistas, os oradores, os poetas que realçavam aos olhos do povo a suposta sublimidade com que aqueles imbecis corriam ao holocausto. Cumpre calar afinal os velhos ditirambos ao heroísmo religioso ou civil. Pois o elogio da imbecilidade arrasta os fracos a segui-la.

Pelo contrário, viva os poltrões. Chegou para eles a era da glória. A prevalecer o “better red than dead”, eles constituem o creme mais fino da humanidade. Formam a grei securitária e astuta dos endeusadores do egoísmo.

É a apoteose de Sancho Pança. Para que este século terminasse coerente com o longo processo de decadência no qual ele estava engajado quando despertou para a História, seria mesmo necessário que ele descesse assim tão baixo...

Vejo alguém a dizer-me: “Se não caminharmos para a apoteose de Sancho Pança, chegaremos forçosamente à de D. Quixote. É isto que o senhor quer, Dr. Plinio?” Ao que eu não hesitaria em responder que, enquanto católico, contesto terminantemente que o gênero humano se reduza a um conjunto de Quixotes e de Sanchos. E que diante dos passos dos homens, só duas vias se abrem: a do esquálido e desvairado “herói” manchego, e a de seu abdominal e vulgar escudeiro. Fala-se tanto, hoje, em terceira via, Terceiro Mundo etc. Nesta matéria, quase ninguém se lembra de uma opção diferente, a qual evite igualmente a morte e sobretudo a capitulação diante do moloch soviético.

Em um nível supremamente elevado, é óbvio que, para além da alternativa posta por Cervantes, estão as vias sacrossantas do heroísmo cristão. Sim, do heroísmo cristão como a Igreja sempre o ensinou, e ao qual a História deve seus lances mais sábios, mais esplendorosos e mais propícios ao bem espiritual e temporal dos homens.

Hoje, contudo, não quero situar-me nesse plano, mas em outro muitíssimo menos elevado. Porém digno da mais séria atenção.

Pergunto: não dispõem os homens de um meio para evitar ao mesmo tempo a destruição atômica e a catástrofe da entrega ao comunismo?

Tenho em mãos um estudo substancioso sobre o meio, a meu ver altamente conducente a esse feliz resultado. Trata-se de “The grain weapon”, do Sr. Dermot Healy, tese que o autor apresentou para doutoramento na Universidade de Aberdeen, Escócia (Centrepieces, No. 1, 1982, 50 p.p.).

Em síntese o autor sustenta — e prova — que:

a) os dirigentes russos sempre se mostraram muito sensíveis à ameaça do embargo feita pelos Estados Unidos. Pois a produção alimentar dos soviéticos é insuficiente, tanto para a população quanto para os próprios animais;

b) o embargo acarretaria necessariamente um pauperismo generalizado, com suas sequelas de manifestações de descontentamento, greves, agitações etc.

Se tal embargo se prolongasse, penso que a queda do regime seria inevitável. E... o espectro do bombardeio atômico se afastaria. Em consequência — comento — a alternativa entre capitulação ou morte cairia em frangalhos [...].

A tal propósito, comento eu, a causa única do insucesso desse embargo consiste na avidez de lucro de dinossáuricas companhias capitalistas. Ou seja, para aumentar seus lucros, e portanto seu capital, tais companhias não hesitam em fornecer meios de vitória ao inimigo inexorável de todas as formas de graus de capitalismo e de lucro. Em matéria de suicídio, nada de mais insano nem mais rejeitável.

A par desse exemplo deplorável, Dermot Healy faz, entretanto, menção de um fato realmente luminoso: a única oposição de relevo à venda de cereais foi feita pelo sindicato de estivadores norte-americanos, os quais, durante certo período, se negaram a carregar grãos com destino à Rússia.

Esses trabalhadores mostraram mais bom-senso, melhor noção de seus deveres e de seus direitos, do que... a “saparia”, isto é, a burguesia endinheirada, nada hostil ao comunismo, porém muito hostil ao anticomunismo.

Os sapos, sempre os sapos a se destruírem infatigavelmente a si próprios, indiferentes ou até antipáticos aos que, como os estivadores, procuram defender a ordem de coisas sem a qual os sapos... nem sequer seriam sapos!