Clare Avery Part 31

Mrs Tremayne had never opened her lips; and leaving her in the study, Blanche wandered into the parlour, where Clare and Lysken were seated at work.

"I marvel what Master Tremayne would have!" said Blanche, sitting down in the window, and idly pulling the dead leaves from the plant which stood there. "He saith 'tis our own fault that we will not to be saved, and yet in the self breath he addeth that the will so to be must needs be given us of G.o.d."

Lysken looked up.

"Methinks we are all willing enow to be saved from punishment," she said. "What we be unwilling to be saved from is sin."

"'Sin'--alway sin!" muttered Blanche. "Ye be both of a story. Sin is wickedness. I am not wicked."

"Sin is the disobeying of G.o.d," replied Lysken. "And saving thy presence, Blanche, thou art wicked."

"Then so art thou!" retorted Blanche.

"So I am," said Lysken. "But I am willing to be saved therefrom."

"Prithee, Mistress Elizabeth Barnevelt, from what sin am I not willing to be saved?"

"Dost truly wish to know?" asked Lysken in her coolest manner.

"Certes!"

"Then--pride."

"Pride is no sin!"

"I love not gainsaying, Blanche. But I dare in no wise gainsay the Lord. And He saith of pride, that it is an abomination unto Him, and He hateth it." [Proverbs six, verse 16; and sixteen verse 5.]

"But that is ill and sinful pride," urged Blanche. "There is proper pride."

"It seemeth to my poor wits," said Lysken, "that a thing which the Lord hateth must be all of it improper."

"Why, Lysken! Thus saying, thou shouldst condemn all high spirit and n.o.ble bearing!"

"'Blessed are the poor in spirit.' There was no pride in Christ, Blanche. And thou wilt scarce say that He bare Him not n.o.bly."

"Why, then, we might as well all be peasants!"

"I suppose we might, if we were," said Lysken.

"Lysken, it should be a right strange world, where thou hadst the governance!"

"Very like," was Lysken's calm rejoinder, as she set the pin a little further in her seam.

"What good is it, prithee, to set thee up against all men's opinion?

[What are now termed 'views' were then called 'opinions.'] Thou shalt but win scorn for thine."

"Were it only mine, Blanche, it should be to no good. But when it is G.o.d's command wherewith mine opinion runneth,--why then, the good shall be to hear Christ say, 'Well done, faithful servant.' The scorn I bare here shall be light weight then."

"But wherefore not go smoothly through the world?"

"Because it should cost too much."

"Nay, what now?" remonstrated Blanche.

"I have two lives, Blanche: and I cannot have my best things in both.

The one is short and pa.s.sing; the other is unchangeable, and shall stand for ever. Now then, I would like my treasures for the second of these two lives: and if I miss any good thing in the first, it shall be no great matter."

"Thou art a right Puritan!" said Blanche disgustedly.

"Call not names, Blanche," gently interposed Clare.

"Dear Clare, it makes he difference," said Lysken. "If any call me a Papist, 'twill not make me one."

"Lysken Barnevelt, is there aught in this world would move thee?"

"'In this world?' Well, but little, methinks. But--there will be some things in the other."

"What things?" bluntly demanded Blanche.

"To see His Face!" said Lysken, the light breaking over her own. "And to hear Him say, 'Come!' And to sit down at the marriage-supper of the Lamb,--with the outer door closed for ever, and the woes, and the wolves, and the winter, all left on the outside. If none of these earthly things move me, Blanche, it is because those heavenly things will."

And after that, Blanche was silent.

Note 1. The Gentiles (saith Saint Augustine), which seem to be of the purer religion, say, We worship not the images, but by the corporal image we do behold the signs of the things which we ought to worship.

And Lactantius saith, The Gentiles say, We fear not the images, but them after whose likeness the images be made, and to whose names they be consecrated. And Clemens saith, That serpent the Devil uttereth these words by the mouth of certain men: We, to the honour of the invisible G.o.d, worship visible images.--(Third Part of the Homily on Peril of Idolatry: references in margin to Augustine Ps. 135; Lactantius l. 2.

Inst.; Clem., L. S ad Jacob.) Here are the "Fathers" condemning as Pagan the reasoning of modern Papists.

Note 2. "Credit et defendit que in eucharistia sive altaris sacramento verum et naturalem Christi corpus ac verus et naturalis Christi sanguis sub speciebus panis et vini vere non est; et quod _ibi est materialis panis et materiale vinum_ tantum absque veritati et presentia corporis et sanguinis Christi."--Indictment of Reverend Lawrence Saunders, January 30, 1555; Harl. MS. 421, folio 44.

"Tenes et defendes in prout quod in eucharistia sive sacramento altaris verum naturalem et realem Christi corpus ac verus naturalis et realis Christi sanguis sub speciebus panis et vini vere non est, sed _post consecratione remanet substantia panis et vini_."--Indictment of Reverend Thomas Rose, May 31, 1555; Harl. MS. 421, folio 188.

Note 3. There is the initial M on the pedestal of one or more of these black Virgins, which of course the priests interpret as Mary. This is certainly not the case. It has been suggested that it stands for Maia, a name of the Tuscan G.o.ddess. May it not be the initial of Mylitta, "the Mediatrix," one of the favourite names of the great original G.o.ddess?

Note 4. See Hislop's _Two Babylons_, pages 22, 122, 491, et aliis; and Shepheard's _Traditions of Eden_, page 117, note (where many references are given), and page 188.

CHAPTER TEN.

COUNSEL'S OPINION.

"A cross of gold, of silver, or of wood, Or of mean straw, hid in each shape of life; Some trial working for eternal good, Found in our outward state or inward strife."

"Bab! Art thou yonder?"

"Is it Jennet?"