what disquieted him still more than the need of helps to feeling, was that his shameless senses rebelled at the contact of religious ideas. He floated like wreckage between Licentiousness and the Church, they each threw him back in turn, obliging him as he approached one to return at once to that which he had left, and he was inclined to ask if he were not a victim to some mystification of his lower instincts, seeking to revive themselves, without his consciousness, by the cordial of a false piety.
In fact he had often seen realized in himself that unclean miracle, when he had left St. Severin, almost in tears. Insensibly, without connection of ideas, without any welding together of sensations, without the explosion of a spark, his senses took fire, and he was powerless to let them burn themselves out, to resist them.
He loathed himself afterwards, and it was high time. Then came the reverse movement; he longed to run to some chapel, there to wash and be clean, and he was so disgusted with himself that now and then he went as far as the door and dared not enter.
At other times, on the contrary, he rebelled against himself, and cried in fury: "It is monstrous, I have in fact spoiled for myself the only pleasure that remained to me—the flesh. Once I amused myself without blame, now I pay for my poor debauches with torments. I have added one more weariness to existence—would that I could undo it."
He lied to himself in vain, trying to justify himself by suggesting doubts.
"Suppose all this were not true, if there were nothing in it, if I were deceiving myself, what if the freethinkers were right?"
But he was obliged to be sorry for himself, for he felt distinctly to the bottom of his soul, that he held unshaken the certitude of true Faith.
"These discussions are miserable, and the excuses I make for my filthinesses are odious," he said to himself, and a flame of enthusiasm sprang up within him.
How doubt the truth of dogmas, how deny the divine power of the Church, for she commands assent?
First she has her superhuman art and her mysticism, then she is most wonderful in the persistent folly of conquered heresies. All since the world began have had the flesh as their spring-board. Logically and humanly speaking they should have triumphed, for they allowed man and woman to satisfy their passions, saying to themselves there was no sin in these, even sanctifying them as the Gnostics, rendering homage to God by the foulest uncleanness.
All have suffered shipwreck. The Church, unbending in this matter, has remained upright and entire. She orders the body to be silent, and the soul to suffer, and contrary to all probability, humanity listens to her, and sweeps away like a dung-heap the seductive joys proposed to her.
Again, the vitality of the Church is decision, which preserves her in spite of the unfathomable stupidity of her sons. She has resisted the disquieting folly of the clergy, and has not even been broken up by the awkwardness and lack of ability in her defenders, a very strong point.
"No, the more I think of her," he cried, "the more I think her prodigious, unique, the more I am convinced that she alone holds the truth, that outside her are only weaknesses of mind, impostures, scandals. The Church is the divine breeding ground, the heavenly dispensary of souls; she gives them suck, nourishes them, and heals them; she bids them understand, when the hour of sorrow comes, that true life begins, not at birth, but at death. The Church is indefectible, before all things admirable, she is great—
"Yes, but then we must follow her directions and practise the sacraments she orders!"
And Durtal, shaking his head, gave himself no further answer.
CHAPTER III.
Before his conversion he had said like all unbelievers: "If I believed that Jesus Christ is God, and that eternal life is not a decoy, I would not hesitate to change all my habits, to follow as far as possible the rules of religion, and, in any case, to live chaste." And he was surprised that people he knew, who were in these conditions, did not maintain an attitude higher than his own. He who had so long indulgently forgiven himself became singularly intolerant, so soon as he had to do with a Catholic.
He now understood the injustice of his judgments, and confessed that between faith and practice was a gulf difficult to overpass.
He did not like to discuss this question with himself, but it returned and took possession of him all the same, and he was obliged to admit the meanness of his arguments, the despicable reasons for his resistance.
He was still honest enough to say: "I am no longer a child; if I have Faith, if I admit Catholicism, I cannot conceive it as lukewarm and unfixed, warmed up again and again in the saucepan of a false zeal. I will have no compromise or truce, no alternations of debauch and communions, no stages of licentiousness and piety, no, all or nothing; to change from top to bottom, or not change at all."
Then he drew back in alarm, endeavoured to escape the part he was about to take, endeavoured to exculpate himself, cavilling for hours, invoking the most wretched motives for remaining as he was, and not budging a jot.
"What am I to do? If I do not obey orders, which I feel with increasing force, I am preparing for myself a life of uneasiness and remorse, for I know well I ought not to remain for ever on the threshold, but to penetrate into the sanctuary and stay there. And if I make up my mind—no indeed—for then I must bind myself to a heap of observances, bend to a series of rules, assist at mass on Sunday, abstain on Friday, live like a bigot, and look like a fool."
And then to help his revolt, he thought of the air, the look of people who frequented the churches; for two men who looked intelligent and clean, how many were without doubt rascals and impostors!
Almost all had a side-long look, an oily voice, downcast eyes, immovable spectacles, clothes like sacristans as if of black wood, almost all told thin beads ostentatiously, and with more strategy and more knavery than the wicked, took toll from their neighbours on leaving God.
The devout women were still less reassuring, they invaded the church, walking about as if quite at home, disturbing everybody, upsetting chairs, knocking against you without begging pardon; then they knelt down with much ado, in the attitude of contrite angels, murmured interminable paternosters, and left the church more arrogant and sour than before.
"It is not encouraging to have to mix with this flock of pious geese," he exclaimed.
But soon, against his will, he made answer to himself: "You have nothing to do with others, were you more humble, these people would certainly seem less offensive; at any rate they have the courage you lack, they are not ashamed of their faith, and are not afraid to kneel to God in public."
And Durtal remained dumfounded, for he had to admit that the riposte struck home. It was clear his humility was at fault, but what was worse, he could not free himself from human respect.
He was afraid of being taken for a fool; the prospect of being seen on his knees, in church, made his hair stand on end; the idea, that, if he ever had to communicate, he would have to rise and go to the altar in the sight of all, was intolerable to him.
"If that moment ever come it will be hard to bear," said he; "and yet I am an idiot, for what have I to do with the opinion of people I do not know?" but much as he might repeat that his alarms were absurd, he could not get over them, or free himself from the fear of ridicule.
"After all," he said, "even if I decide to jump the ditch, to confess and communicate, that terrible question of the senses would always have to be resolved. I must determine to fly the lusts of the flesh, and accept perpetual abstinence. I could never attain to that.
"Without counting that in any case, the time would be ill-chosen were I now to make such an effort, for never have I been so tormented as since my conversion; Catholicism unfortunately excites unclean suggestions when I prowl about it, without entering."
And to this exclamation another answered