In Catholic countries, sir, religion is the national drama; the priests are the principal performers, the populace the audience; and whether the piece concludes with a Don Giovanni plunging in flames, or the beatification of a saint, the applause and the enjoyment is the same.
I feared my destiny was to be the former. I knew nothing of the Bishop, and hoped nothing from his visit; but my hopes began to rise in proportion to the visible fears of the society. I argued, with the natural malignity of wretchedness, “If they tremble, I may exult.” When suffering is thus weighed against suffering, the hand is never steady; we are always disposed to make the balance incline a little on our own side.
The Bishop came early, and passed some hours with the Superior in his own apartment. During this interval, there was a stillness in the house that was strongly contrasted with its previous agitation. I stood alone in my cell—stood, for I had no seat left me. I said to myself, “This event bodes neither good or evil to me. I am not guilty of what they accuse me of. They never can prove it—an accomplice with Satan!—the victim of diabolical delusion!—Alas! my only crime is my involuntary subjection to the delusions they have practised on me. This man, this Bishop, cannot give me freedom, but he may at least do me justice.” All this time the community were in a fever—the character of the house was at stake—my situation was notorious. They had laboured to represent me as a possessed being beyond their walls, and to make me appear as one within them. The hour of trial approached. For the honour of human nature—from the dread of violating decency—from the dread of apparently violating truth, I will not attempt to relate the means they had recourse to the morning of the Bishop’s visitation, to qualify me to perform the part of a possessed, insane, and blasphemous wretch. The four monks I have before mentioned, were the principal executioners (I must call them so).—Under pretence that there was no part of my person which was not under the influence of the demon, …
This was not enough. I was deluged almost to suffocation with aspersions of holy water. Then followed, etc. …
The result was, that I remained half-naked, half-drowned, gasping, choking, and delirious with rage, shame, and fear, when I was summoned to attend the Bishop, who, surrounded by the Superior and the community, awaited me in the church. This was the moment they had fixed on—I yielded myself to them. I said, stretching out my arms, “Yes, drag me naked, mad—religion and nature alike violated in my abused figure—before your Bishop. If he speaks truth—if he feels conscience—woe be to you, hypocritical, tyrannical wretches. You have half-driven me mad!—half-murdered me, by the unnatural cruelties you have exercised on me!—and in this state you drag me before the Bishop! Be it so, I must follow you.”
As I uttered these words, they bound my arms and legs with ropes, carried me down, and placed me at the door of the church, standing close to me. The Bishop was at the altar, the Superior near him; the community filled the choir. They flung me down like a heap of carrion, and retreated as if they fled from the pollution of my touch. This sight struck the Bishop: He said, in a loud voice, “Rise, unhappy, and come forward.”
I answered, in a voice whose tones appeared to thrill him, “Bid them unbind me, and I will obey you.”
The Bishop turned a cold and yet indignant look on the Superior, who immediately approached and whispered him. This whispering consultation was carried on for some time; but, though lying on the ground, I could perceive the Bishop shook his head at every whisper of the Superior; and the end of the business was an order to unbind me. I did not fare much the better for this order, for the four monks were still close to me. They held my arms as they led me up the steps to the altar. I was then, for the first time, placed opposite to the Bishop. He was a man, the effect of whose physiognomy was as indelible as that of his character.—The one left its impress on the senses, as strongly as the other did on the soul. He was tall, majestic, and hoary; not a feeling agitated his frame—not a passion had left its trace on his features. He was a marble statue of Episcopacy, chiselled out by the hand of Catholicism—a figure magnificent and motionless. His cold black eyes did not seem to see you, when they were turned on you. His voice, when it reached you, did not address you, but your soul. Such was his exterior:—for the rest, his character
