Where could he ever find so delightful a mistress? What earthly caress could be compared to the air in which he moved, the breath of Mary? What mundane union or enjoyment could be weighed against that everlasting flower of desire which grew unceasingly, and yet was never over-blown? At this thought the
And when he had given all up to Mary-his body, his soul, his earthly goods, and spiritual chattels-when he stood before her stripped, bare, with all his prayers exhausted, there welled from his burning lips the Virgin's litanies, with their reiterated, persistent, impassioned appeals for heavenly succour. He fancied himself climbing a flight of pious yearnings, which he ascended step by step at each bound of his heart. First he called her 'Holy.' Next he called her 'Mother,' most pure, most chaste, amiable, and admirable. And with fresh ardour he six times proclaimed her maidenhood; his lips cooled and freshened each time that he pronounced that name of 'Virgin,' which he coupled with power, goodness, and fidelity. And as his heart drew him higher up the ladder of light, a strange voice from his veins spoke within him, bursting into dazzling flowers of speech. He yearned to melt away in fragrance, to be spread around in light, to expire in a sigh of music. As he named her 'Mirror of Justice,' 'Seat of Wisdom,' and 'Source of Joy,' he could behold himself pale with ecstasy in that mirror, kneeling on the warmth of the divine seat, quaffing intoxication in mighty draughts from the holy Source.
Again he would transform her, throwing off all restraint in his frantic love, so as to attain to a yet closer union with her. She became a 'Vessel of Honour,' chosen of God, a 'Bosom of Election,' wherein he desired to pour his being, and slumber for ever.* She was the 'Mystical Rose'-a great flower which bloomed in Paradise, with petals formed of the angels clustering round their queen, a flower so fresh, so fragrant, that he could inhale its perfume from the depths of his unworthiness with a joyful dilation of his sides which stretched them to bursting. She became changed into a 'House of Gold,' a 'Tower of David,' and a 'Tower of Ivory,' of inestimable richness, of a whiteness that swans might envy, and of lofty, massive, rounded form, which he would fain have encircled with his outstretched arms as with a girdle of submissiveness. She stood on the distant skyline as the 'Gate of Heaven,' a glimpse of which he caught behind her shoulders when a puff of wind threw back the folds of her veil. She rose in splendour from behind the mountain in the waning hour of night, like the 'Morning Star' to help all travellers astray, like the very dawn of Love. And when he had ascended to this height-scant of breath, yet still unsatiated-he could only further glorify her with the title of 'Queen,' with which he nine times hailed her, as with nine parting salutations from the censer of his soul. His canticle died joyfully away in those last ejaculations of triumph: 'Queen of virgins, Queen of all saints. Queen conceived without sin!' She, ever before him, shone in splendour; and he, on the topmost step, only reached by Mary's intimates, remained there yet another moment, swooning amidst the subtle atmosphere around him; still too far away to kiss the edge of her azure robe, already feeling that he was about to fall, but ever possessed by a desire to ascend again and again, and seek that superhuman felicity.
* Curiously enough I find no trace of 'Bosom of Election' in the Litany of the Blessed Virgin as printed in English Catholic works.-ED.
How many times had not the Litany of the Virgin, recited in common in the seminary chapel, left the young man with broken limbs and void head, as if from some great fall! And since his departure from the seminary, Abbe Mouret had grown to love the Virgin still more. He gave to her that impassioned cult which to Brother Archangias savoured of heresy. In his opinion it was she who would save the Church by some matchless prodigy whose near appearance would entrance the world. She was the only miracle of our impious age-the blue-robed lady that showed herself to little shepherdesses, the whiteness that gleamed at night between two clouds, her veil trailing over the low thatched roofs of peasant homes. When Brother Archangias coarsely asked him if he had ever espied her, he simply smiled and tightened his lips as if to keep his secret. Truth to say, he saw her every night. She no longer seemed a playful sister or a lovely pious maiden; she wore a bridal robe, with white flowers in her hair; and from beneath her drooping eyelids fell moist glances of hopeful promise that set his cheeks aglow. He could feel that she was coming, that she was promising to delay no longer; that she said to him, 'Here I am, receive me!' Thrice a day when the
During the month of May the young priest's expectation was fraught with joyful hope. To La Teuse's grumblings he no longer paid the slightest attention. If he remained so late praying in the church, it was because he entertained the mad idea that the great golden Virgin would at last come down from her pedestal. And yet he stood in awe of that Virgin, so like a princess in her mien. He did not love all the Virgins alike, and this one inspired him with supreme respect. She was, indeed, the Mother of God, she showed the fertile development of form, the majestic countenance, the strong arms of the Divine Spouse bearing Jesus. He pictured her thus, standing in the midst of the heavenly court, the train of her royal mantle trailing among the stars; so far above him, and of such exceeding might, that he would be shattered into dust should she deign to cast her eyes upon him. She was the Virgin of his days of weakness, the austere Virgin who restored his inward peace by an awesome glimpse of Paradise.
That night Abbe Mouret remained for over an hour on his knees in the empty church. With folded hands and eyes fixed on the golden Virgin rising planet-like amid the verdure, he sought the drowsiness of ecstasy, the appeasement of the strange discomfort he had felt that day. But he failed to find the semi-somnolence of prayer with the delightful ease he knew so well. However glorious and pure Mary might reveal herself, her motherhood, the maturity of her charms, and the bare infant she bore upon her arm, disquieted him. It seemed as if in heaven itself there were a repetition of the exuberant life, through which he had been moving since the morning. Like the vines of the stony slopes, like the trees of the Paradou, like the human troop of Artauds, Mary suggested the blossoming, the begetting of life. Prayer came but slowly to his lips; fancies made his mind wander. He perceived things he had never seen before-the gentle wave of her chestnut hair, the rounded swell of her rosy throat. She had to assume a sterner air and overwhelm him with the splendour of her sovereign power to bring him back to the unfinished sentences of his broken prayer. At last the sight of her golden crown, her golden mantle, all the golden sheen which made of her a mighty princess, reduced him once more to slavish submission, and his prayer again flowed evenly, and his mind became wrapped in worship.
In this ecstatic trance, half asleep, half awake, he remained till eleven o'clock, heedless of his aching knees, fancying himself suspended in mid air, rocked to and fro like a child, and yielding to restful slumber, though conscious of some unknown weight that oppressed his heart. Meanwhile the church around him filled with shadows, the lamp grew dim, and the lofty sprays of leafage darkened the tall Virgin's varnished face.
When the clock, about to strike, gave out a rending whine, a shudder passed through Abbe Mouret. He had not hitherto felt the chill of the church upon his shoulders, but now he was shivering from head to foot. As he crossed himself a memory swiftly flashed through the stupor of his wakening-the chattering of his teeth recalled to him the nights he had spent on the floor of his cell before the Sacred Heart of Mary, when his whole frame would quiver with fever. He rose up painfully, displeased with himself. As a rule, he would leave the altar untroubled in his flesh and with Mary's sweet breath still fresh upon his brow. That night, however, as he took the lamp to go up to his room he felt as if his throbbing temples were bursting. His prayer had not profited him; after a transient alleviation he still experienced the burning glow which had been rising in his heart and brain since morning. When he reached the sacristy door, he turned and mechanically raised the lamp to take a last look at the tall Virgin. But she was now shrouded in the deep shadows falling from the rafters, buried in the foliage around her whence only the golden cross upon her crown emerged.
XV
Abbe Mouret's bedroom, which occupied a corner of the vicarage, was a spacious one, having two large square windows; one of which opened above Desiree's farmyard, whilst the other overlooked the village, the valley beyond, the belt of hills, the whole landscape. The yellow-curtained bed, the walnut chest of drawers, and the three straw- bottomed chairs seemed lost below that lofty ceiling with whitewashed joists. A faint tartness, the somewhat musty odour of old country houses, ascended from the tiled and ruddled floor that glistened like a mirror. On the chest of drawers a tall statuette of the Immaculate Conception rose greyly between some porcelain vases which La
