Carmen Ariza Part 50

"But, Padre, she will." Juan was growing bolder. "And--and, Padre, I--I should like it if she would marry me. Ah, _Senor Padre_, already I adore her!"

Jose could not be angry. The faithful lad was deeply sincere. And the girl would reach the marriageable age of that country in all too short a time.

"But, Juan," he remonstrated, "you are too young! And Carmen--why, she is but a child!"

"True, Padre. But I am seventeen--and I will wait for her. Only say now that she shall be mine when the time comes. Padre, say it now!"

Jose was deeply touched by the boy's earnest pleading. He put his arm affectionately about the strong young shoulders.

"Wait, Juan, and see what develops. She is very, very young. We must all wait. And, meanwhile, do you serve her, faithfully, as you see Rosendo and me doing."

The boy's face brightened with hope. "Padre," he exclaimed, "I am her slave!"

Jose went back to his work with Carmen with his thought full of mingled conjecture and resolve. He had thus far outlined nothing for the girl's future. Nor had he the faintest idea what the years might bring forth. But he knew that, in a way, he was aiding in the preparation of the child for something different from the dull, animal existence with which she was at present surrounded, and that her path in life must eventually lead far, far away from the shabby, crumbling town which now const.i.tuted her material world. His task he felt to be tremendous in the responsibility which it laid upon him. What had he ever known of the manner of rearing children! He had previously given the question of child-education but scant consideration, although he had always held certain radical ideas regarding it; and some of these he was putting to the test. But had his present work been forecast while he lay sunken in despair on the river steamer, he would have repudiated the prediction as a figment of the imagination. Yet the gleam which flashed through his paralyzed brain that memorable day in the old church, when Rosendo opened his full heart to him, had roused him suddenly from his long and despondent lethargy, and worked a quick and marvelous renovation in his wasted life. Following the lead of this unusual child, he was now, though with many vicissitudes, slowly pa.s.sing out of his prison of egoism, and into the full, clear sunlight of a world which he knew to be far less material than spiritual.

With the awakening had come the almost frenzied desire to realize in Carmen what he had failed to develop within himself; a vague hope that she might fill the void which a lifetime of longing had expressed. A tremendous opportunity now presented. Already the foundation had been well laid--but not by earthly hands. His task was to build upon it; and, as he did so, to learn himself. He had never before realized more than faintly the awful power for good or evil which a parent wields over a child. He had no more than the slightest conception of the mighty problem of child-education. And now Carmen herself had shown him that real education must be reared upon a foundation _wholly spiritual_. Yet this, he knew, was just what the world's educators did not do. He could see now how in the world the religious instinct of the child is early quenched, smothered into complete or partial extinction beneath the false tutelage of parents and teachers, to whom years and adult stature are synonymous with wisdom, and who themselves have learned to see the universe only through the opaque lenses of matter and chance.

"If children were not falsely educated to know all manner of evil," he mused, "what spiritual powers might they not develop in adult life, powers that are as yet not even imagined! But their primitive religious instinct is regarded by the worldly-wise parent as but a part of the infant existence, which must soon give place to the more solid and real beliefs and opinions which the world in general regards as established and conventional, even though their end is death. And so they teach their children to make evil real, even while admonishing them to protect themselves against it and eventually so to rise as to overcome it, little realizing that the carnal belief of the reality of evil which a child is taught to accept permeates its pure thought like an insidious poison, and becomes externalized in the conventional routine existence of mind in matter, soul in body, a few brief years of mingled good and evil, and then darkness--the end here certain; the future life a vague, impossible conjecture."

Jose determined that Carmen's education should be spiritual, largely because he knew, const.i.tuted as she was, it could not well be otherwise. And he resolved that from his teachings she should glean nothing but happiness, naught but good. With his own past as a continual warning, he vowed first that never should the mental germ of fear be planted within this child's mind. He himself had cringed like a coward before it all his desolate life. And so his conduct had been consistently slavish, specious, and his thought stamped with the brand of the counterfeit. He knew not how much longer he must struggle with it. But he knew that, if he would progress, the warfare must go on, until at length he should put it under his feet. His mind still bore the almost ineradicable mold of the fear deeply graven into it by the ignorant opinions, the worldly, material, unspiritual beliefs of his dear but unwise parents. His life had been hedged with baleful shadows because of it; and over every bright picture there hung its black draping. As he looked back over the path along which he had come, he could see every untoward event, every unhappiness and bitter disappointment, as the externalization of fear in some form, the germ of which had been early planted in the fertile soil of his plastic brain. Without it he might have risen to towering heights. Under its domination he had sunk until the swirling stream of life had eddied him upon the desolate sh.o.r.es of Simiti. In the hands of the less fearful he had been a puppet. In his own eyes he was a fear-shaped manikin, the shadow of G.o.d's real man. The fear germ had multiplied within him a billionfold, and in the abundant crop had yielded a mental depression and deep-seated melancholy that had utterly stifled his spirit and dried the marrow of his bones.

They were not pleasant, these thoughts. But now Jose could draw from them something salutary, something definite to shape and guide his work with Carmen. She, at least, should not grow up the slave of fearsome opinions and beliefs born of dense ignorance. Nor should the baseless figments of puerile religious systems find lodgment within her clear thought. The fear element, upon which so much of so-called Christian belief has been reared, and the d.a.m.nable suggestions of h.e.l.l and purgatory, of unpardonable sin and endless suffering, the stock-in-trade of poet, priest and prelate up to and overlapping our present brighter day, should remain forever a closed volume to this child, a book as wildly imaginative and as unacceptable as the fabled travels of Maundeville.

"I believe," he would murmur to himself, as he strolled alone in the dusk beside the limpid lake, "that if I could plant myself firmly on the Scriptural statement that G.o.d is love, that He is good; and if I could regard Him as infinite mind, while at the same time striving to recognize no reality, no intelligence or life in things material, I could eventually triumph over the whole false concept, and rise out of beliefs of sickness, discord, and death, into an unalterable consciousness of good only."

He had made a beginning when he strove to realize that man is not separated from G.o.d; that G.o.d is not a far-off abstraction; and that infinite mind is, as Carmen insisted, "everywhere."

"It is only the five physical senses that tell us evil is real," he reflected. "Indeed, without their testimony we would be utterly unconscious of evil! And I am convinced that their testimony is specious, and that we see, hear, and feel only in thought, or in belief. We think the sensations of seeing, hearing, and feeling come to us through the medium of these senses as outward, fleshly contrivances, which in some way communicate with the mind and bridge the gulf between the material and the mental. In reality, we do but see, hear and feel _our own thoughts_! The philosophers, many of them, said as much centuries ago. So did Jesus. But--the human mind has been mesmerized, simply mesmerized!"

These things he pondered day by day, and watched to see them wrought out in the life of Carmen. "Ah, yes," he would sometimes say, as spiritual ideas unfolded to him, "you evolve beautiful theories, my good Jose, and you say many brave things. But, when the day of judgment comes, as it did when Juan brought you the news of the revolution, then, alas! your theories fly to pieces, and you find yourself very human, very material, and your G.o.d hidden behind the distant clouds. When the test comes, you find you cannot prove your beliefs."

Yet the man did not often indulge in self-condemnation, for somehow he knew his ideas were right. When he realized the character and specious nature of evil, and realized, too, that "by thy words thou shalt be justified, and by thy words thou shalt be condemned," he knew that the stirring up of evil by good, and the shaking of the ancient foundations of carnal belief within his mentality, might mean fiery trials, still awaiting him. And yet, the crown was for him who should overcome. Overcome what? The false opinions of mankind, the ignorant beliefs in matter and evil. For what, after all, is responsible for all the evil in this world of ours? What but a false concept of G.o.d?

"And if I keep my nose buried forever in matter, how can I hope to see G.o.d, who is Spirit? And how can I follow the Christ unless I think as he thought?" he said.

But it was in the cla.s.sroom with Carmen that he always received his greatest stimulus.

"See, Padre dear," she said one day, "if I erase a wrong figure and then set down the right one instead, I get the right answer. And it is just like that when we think. If we always put good thoughts in the place of the bad ones, why, everything comes out right, doesn't it?"

Jose smiled at the apt comparison. "Of course, _chiquita_," he replied. "Only in your algebra you know which are the right figures to put down. But how do you know which thoughts are right?"

"I always know, Padre. I can't make even the least mistake about the thoughts. Why, it is easier to mistake with figures than it is with thoughts."

"How is that, little one?"

"Because, if you always think G.o.d _first_, you can never think wrong.

Now can you? And if you think of other things first you are almost sure to think of the wrong thing, is it not so, Padre?"

The priest had to admit the force of her statement.

"And, you know, Padre dear," the girl went on, "when I understand the right rule in algebra, the answer just comes of itself. Well, it is so with everything when we understand that G.o.d is the right rule--you call Him principle, don't you?--well, when we know that He is the only rule for everything, then the answers to all our problems just come of themselves."

Aye, thought Jose, the healing works of the great Master were only the "signs following," the "answers" to the people's problems, the sure evidence that Jesus understood the Christ-principle.

"And when you say that G.o.d is the right rule for everything, just what do you mean, _chiquita_?"

"That He is everywhere," the girl replied.

"That He is infinite and omnipresent good, then?" the priest amplified.

"He is good--and everywhere," the child repeated firmly.

"And the necessary corollary of that is, that there is no evil," Jose added.

"I don't know what you mean by corollary, Padre dear. It's a big word, isn't it?"

"I mean--I think I know how you would put it, little one--if G.o.d is everywhere, then there is nothing bad. Is that right?"

"Yes, Padre. Don't you see?"

a.s.suredly he saw. He saw that a fact can have no real opposite; that any predicated opposite must be supposition. And evil is the supposition; whereas good is the fact. The latter is "plus," and the former "minus." No wonder the origin of evil has never been found, although humanity has struggled with the problem for untold ages!

Jesus diagnosed evil as a lie. He gave it the minus sign, the sign of nothingness. The world has tried to make it positive, something. From the false sense of evil as a reality has come the equally false sense of man's estrangement from G.o.d, through some fict.i.tious "fall"--a curse, truly, upon the human intellect, but not of G.o.d's infliction.

For false belief always curses with a reign of discord, which endures until the belief becomes corrected by truth. From the beginning, the human race has vainly sought to postulate an equal and opposite to everything in the realm of both the spiritual and material. It has been hypnotized, obsessed, blinded, by this false zeal. The resultant belief in "dualism" has rendered hate the equal and opposite of Love, evil the equal and opposite of Good, and discord the eternal opponent of Harmony. To cope with evil as a reality is to render it immortal in our consciousness. To know its unreality is to master it.

"Throughout life," Jose mused, "every positive has its negative, every affirmation its denial. But the opposites never mingle. And, moreover, the positive always dispels the negative, thus proving the specious nature of the latter. Darkness flees before the light, and ignorance dissolves in the morning rays of knowledge. Both cannot be real. The positive alone bears the stamp of immortality. Carmen has but one fundamental rule: _G.o.d is everywhere_. This gives her a sense of immanent power, with which all things are possible."

Thus with study and meditation the days flowed past, with scarcely a ripple to break their quiet monotony. Rosendo came, and went again. He brought back at the end of his first month's labors on the newly discovered deposit some ninety _pesos_ in gold. He had reached the bedrock, and the deposit was yielding its maximum; but the yield would continue for many months, he said. His exultation overleaped all bounds, and it was with difficulty that Jose could bring him to a consideration of the problems still confronting them.

"I think, Rosendo," said the priest, "that we will send, say, thirty _pesos_ this month to Cartagena; the same next month; and then increase the amount slightly. This method is sure to have a beneficial effect upon the ecclesiastical authorities there."

"Fine!" e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed Rosendo. "And how will you send it, Padre?"

Jose pondered the situation. "We cannot send the gold direct to the Bishop, for that would excite suspicion. Ma.s.ses, you know, are not paid for in gold dust and nuggets. And we have no money. Nor could we get the gold exchanged for bills here in Simiti, even if we dared run the risk of our discovery becoming known."

For the Alcalde was already nosing about in an effort to ascertain the source of the gold with which Rosendo had just cancelled his debt and purchased further supplies. Jose now saw that, under existing conditions, it would be utterly impossible for Rosendo to obtain t.i.tles to mineral properties through Don Mario. He spent hours seeking a solution of the involved problem. Then, just before Rosendo departed again for the mountains, Jose called him into the parish house.

"Rosendo, I think I see a way. Bring me one of the paper boxes of candles which you have just purchased from Don Mario."

"Carumba! Padre," queried the surprised Rosendo, as he returned with the box, "and what is this for?"

"I merely want to get the name of the firm which sold the candles. The Empresa Alemania, Barranquilla. Good! Now listen. I have a method that is roundabout, but certainly promises much. I will write to the firm, appointing them my agents while I pose as Jose Rincon, miner. The agency established, I will send them our gold each month, asking them to return to me its equivalent in bills, deducting, of course, their commission. Then I will send these bills, or such part as we deem wise, to Wenceslas. Each month Juan, who will be sworn to secrecy, will convey the gold to Bodega Central in time to meet Captain Julio's boat. The captain will both deliver the gold to the Empresa Alemania, and bring back the bills in exchange. Then, from Simiti, and in the regular manner, I will send the small packet of bills to Wenceslas as contributions from the parish. We thus throw Don Mario off the scent, and arouse no suspicion in any quarter. As I receive mail matter at various times, the Alcalde will not know but what I also receive consignments of money from my own sources. I think the plan will work out. Juan already belongs to us. What, then, is there to fear?"

And so, as it was arranged, it worked out. Juan reveled in the honor of such intimate relations with the priest and Rosendo, and especially in the thought that he was working in secret for the girl he adored.

By the time Rosendo returned again from Guamoco, Jose had sent his first consignment of money to the Bishop, carefully directing it to Wenceslas, personally, and had received an acknowledgment in a letter which caused him deep thought.

"To further stimulate the piety of your communicants," it read, "and arouse them to more generous contributions to our glorious cause, you will inform them that, if their monetary contributions do not diminish in amount for the coming year, they will be made partic.i.p.ants in the four solemn Novenas which will be offered by His Grace, the Bishop of Cartagena. Moreover, if their contributions increase, the names of the various contributors will be included in the one hundred Ma.s.ses which are to be offered in December at the Shrine of Our Lady of Chiquinquia for their spiritual and temporal welfare. Contributors will also have a High Ma.s.s after death, offered by one of His Grace's a.s.sistants, as soon as the notification of death is received here. In addition to these, His Grace, always mindful of the former importance of the parish of Simiti, and acknowledging as its special patron the ever blessed Virgin, has arranged to bestow the episcopal blessing upon an image of the Sacred Heart, which will be shipped to his faithful children in Simiti when the amount of their contributions shall have met the expense thereof. Let us keep ever in mind the pious words of the Bl. Margaret Mary, who has conveyed to us the a.s.surance which she received directly from Our Blessed Lord that He finds great joy in beholding His Sacred Heart visibly represented, that it may touch the hard hearts of mankind. Our blessed Saviour promised the gracious Margaret Mary that He would pour out abundantly of His rich treasure upon all who honor this image, and that it shall draw down from heaven every blessing upon those who adore and reverence it. Inform your parishioners that the recital of the offering, 'O, Sacred Heart of Jesus, may it be everywhere adored!' carries a hundred days'

indulgence each time.

"You will bear in mind that the General Intention for this month is The Conversion of America. Though our Church is founded on the Rock, and is to last forever, so that the gates of h.e.l.l shall never prevail against her, nevertheless she has been called upon to withstand many a.s.saults from her enemies, the advocates of _modernism_, in the land of liberal thought to our north. These a.s.saults, though painful to her, can never be fatal to her spiritual life, although they unfortunately are so to many of her dear children, who yield to the insidious persuasions of the heretics who do the work of Satan among the Lord's sheep. New and fantastic religions are springing up like noxious weeds in America of the north, and increasing infidelity is apparent on every hand.