One Snowy Night Part 25

"Didst thou ignorantly imagine us without it?"

"I thought," replied Gerhardt in his quiet manner, "that you could scarcely have too much of it."

"What is thy calling?"

"While in this country, I have followed the weaver's craft."

"Art thou a lettered man?"

"I am."

"Try him," said one of the Bishops. A Latin book was handed up to Gerhardt, from which he readily construed some sentences, until the Council declared itself satisfied on that point. This man before them, whatever else he might be, was no mere ignorant peasant.

"Are the rest of thy company lettered men?"

"No. They are mostly peasants."

"Have they gone about preaching, as thou hast?"

"The men have done so."

"And how can ignorant peasants teach abstruse doctrines?"

"I do not think they attempted that. They kept to the simple doctrines."

"What understandest thou by that?" Gerhardt was beginning to answer, when the Bishop of Winchester interposed with another question. He was Prince Henry of Blois, the brother of King Stephen, and a better warrior than a cleric. "Art thou a priest?"

"I am not."

"Go on," said the Bishop of Lincoln, who led the examination. "What meanest thou by the faith of Christ? What dost thou believe about Christ?"

Gerhardt's reply on this head was so satisfactory that the Bishop of Worcester--not long appointed--whispered to his brother of Winchester, "The man is all right!"

"Wait," returned the more experienced and pugnacious prelate. "We have not come to the crux yet."

"You call yourselves Christians, then?" resumed Lincoln.

"Certainly we are Christians, and revere the doctrines of the Apostles."

"What say you of the remedies for sin?"

"I know of one only, which is the blood of Christ our Lord."

"How!--are the sacraments no remedies?"

"Certainly not."

"Is sin not remitted in baptism?"

"No."

"Is not the blood of Christ applied to sinners in the holy Eucharist?"

"I utterly refuse such a doctrine."

"What say you of marriage? is that a sacrament?"

"I do not believe it."

"Ha! the man is all right, is he?" whispered old Winchester satirically to his young neighbour, Worcester.

"Doth not Saint Paul term marriage '_sacramentum magnum_'?"

"He did not write in Latin."

This was awkward. The heretic knew rather too much.

"Are you aware that all the holy doctors are against you?"

"I am not responsible for their opinions."

"Do you not accept the interpretation of the Church?"

What his Lordship meant by this well-sounding term was a certain bundle of ideas--some of them very illiterate, some very delicate hair-splitting, some curious even to comicality,--gathered out of the writings of a certain number of men, who a.s.suredly were not inspired, since they often travesty Scripture, and at times diametrically contradict it. Having lived in the darkest times of the Church, they were extremely ignorant and superst.i.tious, even the best of them being enslaved by fancies as untrue in fact as they were unspiritual in tone.

It might well have been asked as the response, Where is it?--for no Church, not even that of Rome herself, has ever put forward an authorised commentary explanatory of holy Scripture. Her "interpretation of the Church" has to be gathered here and there by abstruse study, and so far as her lay members are concerned, is practically received from the lips of the nearest priest. Gerhardt, however, did not take this line in replying, but preferred to answer the Bishop's inaccurate use of the word Church, which Rome impudently denies to all save her corrupt self. He replied--

"Of the true Church, which is the elect of G.o.d throughout all ages, fore-ordained to eternal life? I see no reason to refuse it."

The Scriptural doctrine of predestination has been compared to "a red rag" offered to a bull, in respect of its effect on those--whether votaries of idols or lat.i.tudinarianism--who are conscious that they are not the subjects of saving grace. To none is it more offensive than to a devout servant of the Church of Rome. The Bishop took up the offence at once.

"You hold that heresy--that men are fore-ordained to eternal life?"

"I follow therein the Apostle Paul and Saint Austin."

This was becoming intolerable.

"Doth not the Apostle command his hearers to 'work out their own salvation'?"

"Would it please my Lord to finish the verse?"

It did not please my Lord to finish the verse, as that would have put an extinguisher on his interpretation of it.

"These heretics refuse to be corrected by Scripture!" he cried instead, as a much more satisfactory thing to say.

Gerhardt's quiet answer was only heard by those near him--"I have not been so yet."

This aggravating man must be put down. The Bishop raised his voice.