Spiritual Adventures Part 7

When the boats went home with their fish, Lackland had only one thought: to go and see Mr. Curnock at St. Ives. He walked in from Carbis that evening, and found the minister alone in his study. Mr. Curnock respected him; he had gone steadily on, year after year, preaching whenever he was wanted, and though one or two people had complained that his sermons were not strictly orthodox, most of the people spoke well of him; many said that he had helped them. On that night he was very serious, and he seemed to be hesitating to say all that he had to say.

At last he admitted that it was the text in the Bible which was troubling him.

Mr. Curnock went up to his shelves and looked along them. 'I know,' he said, 'that many people have been needlessly disturbed about that saying. And, as the Bible does not tell us, we cannot be quite certain what that sin is. But if I can find one or two pa.s.sages that recur to me, in some of the people who have written about the Gospels, I think they will throw some light on the matter.' He took down a big black book, and turned over the pages. 'Here, for instance: "Not a particular _act_ of sin but a _state_ of wilful, determined opposition to the Holy Spirit, is meant." That is very much what I should imagine to be the truth. But it is a little vague, perhaps?'

'I don't thoroughly see it,' said Lackland. 'The Bible says "blasphemy against the Holy Ghost."'

'Well now,' said the minister, taking down another book, 'here is a translation from a Spaniard of the sixteenth century, who has been called "a Quaker before his time." He puts things quaintly, but I like him better than the formal people. Let me see: "Whence, considering that ..." No, that doesn't concern us; here it is: "do I come to understand that a man then sins against the Holy Spirit, when, with mental malignity he persuades men that the works of the Holy Spirit are the works of the devil, he being soul-convinced of the contrary." Is that clear?'

'That's clearer,' said Lackland.

'He goes on, on the next page,' said Mr. Curnock, '"And I understand that sin against the Holy Ghost that worked in Christ was inexcusable, for it could not spring save from the most depraved minds, obstinate in depravity."' Mr. Curnock shut the book, and put it back in its place.

'Now, do you see,' he said, sitting down by the table, 'this awful sin, such as it is, could not be sinned unconsciously; its very essence is that it is a deliberate rejection of what we know to be truth. I might almost say that to sin it, a man must make up his mind that he will do so.'

'I think I see,' said Lackland, staring before him; 'and I was wrong there, for certain: I never committed that sin. But, all the same, I don't feel quite clear yet.'

'Why is that?' said the minister.

'Have you never thought, sir,' said Lackland, 'that the only return we can make to G.o.d for his love to us, is to love him more than we love ourselves?'

'But certainly,' said Mr. Curnock.

'Well,' said Lackland, 'do you see it might be that a good Christian would think most of saving his own soul.'

'That is his duty,' said Mr. Curnock.

'But are they both true?' said Lackland.

'Both things you have said are perfectly true,' said Mr. Curnock; 'only, I see no contradiction between them.'

'Thank you, sir,' said Lackland, getting to his feet; 'I'll go and think it all over; I'm not very ready at thinking, I have to set my mind to things slowly; and you've given me a good lot to think over. Good-night, Mr. Curnock.'

'And now, my dear Lackland,' said the minister, as he opened the door of the house, 'above all, don't worry over a text which none of us are very sure about. Be certain of one thing, that G.o.d's mercy is infinite, and that he'll bring you through.'

Lackland walked slowly away from the door, along the terrace above the sea, and then more rapidly, as he came out on the rough path along the cliff. The wind blew sharply against him; the moon glittered in the sky, among a mult.i.tude of glittering stars; and he heard the sea screaming and tearing at the pebbles, as he sat down on the edge of the cliff, just before getting to Carbis Bay, and looked along the uneasy water, which quivered all over with little waves, hunching themselves up, one after another, and leaping forward, all in a white froth, as they struck upon the beach. 'They are like the lives of men,' thought Lackland; 'all that effort, a struggling onward, a getting to the journey's end: see, that wave is making for just that old tin can, and it has. .h.i.t it, and the can rolls over and remains, and the wave is gone.' He drew his breath in sharply, drawing up the salt smell of the sea into his nostrils, and sat there for a long time thinking.

No, he had not committed the sin against the Holy Ghost: G.o.d could still pardon him. But was it right, was it just, that G.o.d should pardon him?

One after another of the hard sayings of the Old Testament came into his mind: it was clearly impossible to fulfil every one of those obligations; he could but strive towards them, and fail, and fall back on the mercy of G.o.d. At that thought something rose up in him like a pride on behalf of G.o.d, and he said to himself: 'I will never ask G.o.d to stoop in order that I may rise.' As he said the words he looked round him; the aspect of the place, which he had known all his life, seemed to change, to become dim, to become mysteriously distinct, and he saw that he was sitting where he had sat with the evil spirit in his dream. He got up hastily and went indoors.

Night after night Seaward Lackland went out with the fishing-boats; he did his share of the work just as usual, took his share of the profits, slept by day, and sat awake by night; and, to all about him, he was the same man as before. But an ecstasy was growing up within him which kept his own ears shut to everything but one interior voice; he was meditating a great sacrifice; and a great happiness began to inhabit his soul. 'If G.o.d so loved the world,' he repeated, as he had repeated it on the night of his conversion, 'that he gave his only begotten Son ...' He brooded over the words, wondering if a mere man could imitate that supreme surrender. He was only a poor fisherman; the disciples had been that, and Jesus had called them to leave their fathers and their nets and follow him. Both his father and mother were dead; no one in the world depended on him; he was free to give up the world, if he chose, for G.o.d. The thought intoxicated him; he saw nothing but the thought, like a light beckoning to him in the darkness: perhaps calling him to destruction. The pride of a vast magnanimity thrilled through him: he would sin the one sin that G.o.d could not pardon, in order that G.o.d should deal with him according to his justice, and not according to his mercy. He would, as he had dreamed when a child, prefer G.o.d's honour to his own; he would give up heaven in order that G.o.d might be worthy of his own idea of him. I will sin, he said to himself, the sin against the Holy Ghost, and I will do it for the love of G.o.d.

When he had made up his mind, and was full of an exultant inner peace because of it, he still waited and pondered, not knowing quite how he would do the thing he had decided to do. It must be done publicly, and he must suffer for it here, as he was to suffer for it hereafter. It must be done in Carbis Chapel, when his turn came to preach there.

It was some time before his turn came, and he waited with a feverish impatience. He tried to think out what he should say, but he could not imagine anything that seemed to him sufficiently 'obstinate in depravity.' He remembered the phrase, 'when, with mental malignity, he persuades men that the works of the Holy Spirit are the works of the devil'; and he tried to work out an argument, at which he shuddered, which would seem to show Jesus as one working miracles with the help of Satan. At first he could not put two words together, but gradually the task became easier; strange arguments came into his head, which seemed almost plausible to himself; he wondered if it was actually the devil, for his own ends, helping him. He did not write down a word, though he was accustomed to write every word of his sermons; every word, as he thought it, stamped itself in his mind, like a seal pressed into burning wax.

The night before the Sunday on which he was to preach his last sermon, he lay in bed trying to sleep, but unable to close his eyes on the darkness that seemed to palpitate about him. He got out of bed, threw open the window, and leaned out. The night was quite black, he could see nothing, but he could hear the waves splashing upon the sand down below in the bay. A chill wind bit at his face, and made his body shiver. He shut the window, and lay down in bed again, staring for the dawn. He felt cold right through to the heart, and he felt horribly alone. By to-morrow night he would have cut himself adrift; he would be like that seaweed which the sea was tossing upon the sand, and dragging away from the sand. For G.o.d's sake he would have cast off G.o.d, and he had no other friend. To-morrow he would have none. His resolution never wavered, but he no longer wished the dawn to come quickly; he would have liked, when he saw the first light on the window-panes, to have held back the dawn.

He was to preach in the evening, and in the morning he sat in the chapel and heard the minister from St. Ives telling of the mercy of G.o.d. His text was: 'I say unto you that likewise joy shall be in heaven over one sinner that repenteth, more than over ninety and nine just persons which need no repentance.' He spoke of salvation for all; not a word was said about that one exception. Lackland felt a bitter smile twitching at the corners of his lips.

At night he made his own tea as usual, and walked up and down the room, often looking at the clock, until it was time to go across to the chapel. He saw the people pa.s.sing his window on their way; some of them looked in, saw him, and nodded in a friendly manner. He looked again at the clock; now it was time for him to go, and he went into a corner of the room, knelt down, and prayed to G.o.d for strength to deny him. Then he walked rapidly across to the chapel.

The chapel was very full, it seemed to him oppressively hot, and he felt the blood flushing his forehead. Many of the people remembered afterwards that they had noticed something strange in his manner from the moment in which he set foot on the steps of the pulpit. They were quick to recognise the outward signs of a flame lighted within; and they antic.i.p.ated a fine sermon. His first prayer was very short, but it was like a last confession. Each word seemed to live with a sharp, painful life of its own; the words cried out, and called down heaven for an answer. The text was a verse out of the twenty-fourth chapter of St.

Matthew: 'Then if any man shall say unto you, Lo, here is Christ, or there; believe it not.' It was not the first time he had chosen a strange text. He began slowly, and with an unusual solemnity. It seemed to him that they were not understanding him aright. As he went on, his voice, which had at first been low, grew louder; he spoke as if he were hurrying through some message which had been laid upon him to deliver; yet with the calmness of one who has mastered his own fever. He was speaking the most terrible words they had ever heard, and they were at first too bewildered even to think. As he went on, they began to look at one another, wondering if he were mad or they; one or two women near the door got up quietly and went out; men stirred in their seats; a great shudder went through the whole congregation. Blasphemies such as they had never dreamed of filled their ears, dazed their senses; and Seaward Lackland stood there calmly, like a martyr, one of them said afterwards; the sweat stood out on his forehead, but he spoke in an even voice: was it Seaward Lackland or was it the devil who stood there denying G.o.d, denying the Holy Spirit? There were those who looked up at the ceiling above them, thinking that the roof would fall in and bury them with the blasphemer. But as heaven did not stir in its own defence, it was for them to a.s.sume the defence of heaven. An old cla.s.s leader stood up in his pew, near the communion-rail, and turning his back on the preacher, said in a loud voice: 'I entreat you all to listen to this man no longer, but to go instantly home, and pray G.o.d Almighty to forgive you for what you have heard this day.' Lackland stood silent, and every one in the chapel got up and went quickly out, the old cla.s.s-leader the last; and Lackland was left alone in the chapel, standing before the open Bible in the pulpit. He fell on his knees and covered his face with his hands: 'O G.o.d, forgive me,' he prayed, 'for what I have done for thee to-day.'

From that day Seaward Lackland was an outcast in the village. The mates with whom he shared the boat and the nets refused to go to sea in his company, lest they should share a judgment reserved for him, and all be drowned together. He accepted his fate without protest, and, as one thing after another slipped out of his hands, made no complaint. When there was nothing else for him to do, he drove a cart which used to carry the fish from the boats to the salting-cellars, and afterwards from the cellars to the railway station, where they were sent in barrels to the nearest port for Genoa and Leghorn. He was too poor now to live in his cottage, and housed with some others as poor as himself, in a half-fallen shanty on the way to Lelant. Even his housemates mocked him, and held themselves more decent folks than he. It was thought that his brain had weakened, for he became more and more eccentric in his ways, and got to talk with himself, for hours together, in a low voice, but with the gestures of one explaining something to an unseen disputant.

One day as he was racing up the hill by the side of his cart, urging on the horses, his foot slipped, and he fell under the near wheel, which had crushed into his breast-bone before the horses could be stopped. He was carried back, and laid on his ragged bed; and was just able to ask those about him to fetch the minister from St. Ives. He was not quite dead when the minister came, and he said 'Amen,' simply, to the prayer which the minister offered up for him. Then, as he seemed anxious to say something, the minister stooped down, and, to help him, said: 'Perhaps you want to tell us why you sinned against G.o.d ...' he was going to add, 'and that you repent of it, and hope for salvation,' but the dying man, in a very faint but ecstatic voice, said: 'Because I loved G.o.d more than I loved myself'; and so died, with a great joy on his face. But the minister shook his head sorrowfully, not understanding what he meant.

EXTRACTS FROM THE JOURNAL OF HENRY LUXULYAN.

When Henry Luxulyan died in Venice, a few years ago, he left a written request that all his papers should be sent to me under seal. He was a townsman of mine, and that, I think, had been almost the only link between us, though I had known him from childhood, and we used to meet, more or less accidentally, and at long intervals, all through his life.

As a boy he had few friends; he did not seek them; and I was never sure that he looked upon me as in any real sense a friend. It was always vaguely supposed that he was very clever, and as he took part in no boyish games, and did not ride, or swim, or even walk much, but seemed to brood, and linger, and be thinking, it was supposed that he had interests of his own, and would one day be or do something remarkable.

He was never communicative about anything, but once or twice in later years, he spoke to me of his historical studies, and I gathered that he was making researches (for a book, I supposed) into the life of Attila: a subject remote and gloomy enough, I thought, to be naturally attractive to him. For some years I lost sight of him altogether, and then, to my surprise, met him at the house of a German Baron and his wife, who were settled in London, where they entertained lavishly. It was the last house at which I had ever expected to meet him; though indeed the Baroness was a woman of considerable learning, and very intelligent and sympathetic. I found that he had become her librarian, and was living in the house. He looked ill and restless. Whenever I dined at the house, he was always there. I noticed that the Baroness treated him more like a friend than a librarian; appealing to him on every occasion as if he had the management of the whole household. I never had much private talk with him, but he seemed glad to see me, and referred sometimes, but never very definitely, to his work, which I encouraged him to persevere with. He seemed almost pathetically alone; but I remembered that he had never cared to be otherwise. The nervous restlessness which I had observed in him was more marked every time that I saw him; and it was with no surprise that I heard he had broken down, and was in Venice, trying to recover. But it was in Venice that he took the fever of which he died.

I never knew why he left that strange request that his papers should be sent to me; nor was there any message among them, or the least indication of what he wanted me to do with them. Most of them were concerned with the life of Attila, but there were not three properly finished chapters; and the ma.s.s of fragments, quotations, references, tentative notes, mutually destructive and unresolved conjectures, baffled my utmost endeavours, and remained for me, and I fear must always remain, so much lost labour, like an enigma of which the key is missing. But in the midst of these papers, thrust as if hurriedly into one of the bundles, so that the string had cut into the outer leaves of loose ma.n.u.scripts, there was a thin book bound in parchment, almost filled with Luxulyan's close, uneasy writing. It was a journal, many times begun and relinquished, ending with a date not many days before his death. Between the pages were two letters, in a woman's handwriting.

I burnt the letters without reading them; then I read the journal.

What I print here is printed with but few omissions; only I have changed the names, and not left any allusion, as far as I know, to circ.u.mstances which it is likely that any one could easily identify. For the omissions I make myself wholly responsible; as, indeed, for the printing of the journal at all. It seems to me a genuine doc.u.ment; odd, disconcerting, like the man who wrote it; profoundly disconcerting to me, on reading it, as I discovered the real subterranean being whom I had known, during his lifetime, only by a few, scarcely perceptible outlines on the surface. Such as it is, I give it here, reserving till afterwards something more which I shall have to say by way of comment or epilogue.

April 5.--I have been talking with the doctor to-day, and he tells me that my nerves are seriously out of order. There, of course, he is quite right, and he tells me nothing I did not know already. Only, why tell me? That is just what it does me no good to think about. If I am to keep in even so shaky an equilibrium as this, which at least might be worse, it is essential for me to forget there is any danger. What folly, to be a doctor and honest!

For my part, I was quite frank with him. I told him it was terrible, to be alone and to think about death every day of one's life. He put out a soothing hand professionally, and began to say something about 'with care' and 'I see no reason why,' and so forth; 'no reason why, with care, you should not live, well----' 'How long,' I interrupted him, as he hesitated. 'Thirty years, forty years,' he said confidently, 'why not? I tell you there is no reason why you should not die an old man.'

And he thought he was comforting me! I only said, 'It is horrible.' 'In heaven's name,' he said, with real amazement, 'what is horrible?' I told him: this dwindling away, this continual losing of all the forces that hold one to life, this inevitable encroachment of the other thing, the darkness; and the uncertainty of it all, except the ending. 'Come now,'

he said, as if he were arguing with a child, 'be reasonable; you don't expect to live for ever?' 'That is just it,' I said; and then I put it to him: 'don't you find it horrible to think of?' 'I never think of it,'

he said. 'I have to see to it every day. One accustoms oneself to the things one sees every day. You brood over it because it is hidden away from you.'

He said that as if he was saying something fine, courageous, even intelligent.

I shivered as he spoke so lightly of seeing people die every day, and I said, 'You think nothing of it!' 'To me,' he said, more seriously, 'it is the one quite natural thing in the world. One is tired, one lies down, one sleeps. And even if one isn't conscious of being tired, there is nothing so good as sleep.' It struck me that he was quoting from Marcus Aurelius, in a sort of roundabout way, and I let him go on talking; but when he looked at me and said: 'I have never met any one before who worried over the thought that he would have to die when he was seventy, eighty, ninety: how do you know you won't live to be ninety?' the simplicity of the man struck me as being laughable; a child could have reasoned better, and I said: 'If I live to be ninety I shall never have pa.s.sed a day without thinking about death, and I know that I am logically right in never losing sight of the only thing in the world which is of infinite importance. You call it morbid, but what if only I am wide awake, after all, and you others are walking straight into a pit with your eyes shut?' It was then that he repeated that my nerves were seriously out of order. He told me that I must find distraction. In other words, I must shut my eyes from time to time. Well, there is no doubt about it. That is what I must try to do. But how?

April 6.--I suppose it is only because I am nervous, and because the doctor told me I must not live so much by myself, but I am beginning to think again about Clare, and I had not thought of her for a long time.

When one has lived with a woman, in the same house with her, every day and every night for three years: think, there are one thousand and ninety-five days in three years! well, something remains, in the very look and touch of the furniture, in the treacherous blank of the mirrors, which forget nothing, and hide so much, something that will never wholly go; and I must not expect to release my senses, as I have released my mind and my will, from the power of that woman.

Only, the less I think about her the better; and there is no danger of my wanting her back again. That would be singularly inconvenient, if, as I can but suppose, she is perfectly happy with that ordinary person whom she had the curious taste to prefer to me. One must guard against being ridiculous, even when one is alone with oneself, and I am content to seem no hero to this serviceable valet, my journal; but it is partly the incapacity of good taste in them that makes women so intolerable.

There are men of whom I have said to myself: Now, if Clare fell in love with this man, or that man, it would seem to me so natural, so legitimate; I could almost despise her for not submitting to a fascination which is insensitive not to feel. But a poseur, a fop, a cad; one of those men whom every man sees through at the first hand-shake; a sleek flatterer, whose compliments are vulgarities; the shopman air of 'inquire within upon everything'; yes, that is the man who takes his choice of women. Is vulgarity a curable thing? and will the vulgarity of women ever be cultured out of them?

I once tried to believe that there are women and women; but I have never found that the 'and' meant anything essential.

April 7.--I dined out at night, with my Jew friends, the Kahns, whom I have not cared to see for so long; and the distraction has done me good.