Grace
Two gentlemen who were in the lavatory at the time
tried to lift him up: but he was quite helpless. He lay curled up at the
foot of the stairs down which he had fallen. They succeeded in turning
him over. His hat had rolled a few yards away and his clothes were smeared
with the filth and ooze of the floor on which he had lain, face downwards.
His eyes were closed and he breathed with a grunting noise. A thin stream
of blood trickled from the corner of his mouth.
[...; Mr Power and others bring Mr. Kernan, the victim, back to his
home and later visit him in his bedroom while he recovers from
a bitten tongue incurred in the accident.]
-So were going to
wash the pot together, said Mr Cunningham.
A thought seemed
to strike him. He turned suddenly to the invalid and said:
-Dye know what,
Tom, has just occurred to me? You might join in and wed have a four-handed
reel.
-Good idea, said
Mr Power. The four of us together.
Mr Kernan was silent.
The proposal conveyed very little meaning to his mind, but, understanding
that some spiritual agencies were about to concern themselves on his behalf,
he thought he owed it to his dignity to show a stiff neck. He took no
part in the conversation for a long while, but listened, with an air of
calm enmity, while his friends discussed the Jesuits.
-I havent such a
bad opinion of the Jesuits, he said, intervening at length. Theyre an
educated order. I believe they mean well, too.
-Theyre the grandest
order in the Church, Tom, said Mr Cunningham, with enthusiasm. The General
of the Jesuits stands next to the Pope.
-Theres no mistake
about it, said Mr MCoy, if you want a thing well done and no flies about,
you go to a Jesuit. Theyre the boyos have influence. Ill tell you a
case in point
.
-The Jesuits are
a fine body of men, said Mr Power.
[...]
-O, its just a retreat,
you know, said Mr Cunningham. Father Purdon is giving it. Its for business
men, you know.
-He wont be too
hard on us, Tom, said Mr Power persuasively.
-Father Purdon? Father
Purdon? said the invalid.
-O, you must know
him, Tom, said Mr Cunningham, stoutly. Fine, jolly fellow! Hes a man
of the world like ourselves.
[...]
-Pope Leo XIII, said
Mr Cunningham, was one of the lights of the age. His great idea, you know,
was the union of the Latin and Greek Churches. That was the aim of his
life.
-I often heard he
was one of the most intellectual men in Europe, said Mr Power. I mean,
apart from his being Pope.
-So he was, said
Mr Cunningham, if not the most so. His motto, you know, as Pope,
was Lux upon Lux - light upon light.
-No, no, said Mr
Fogarty eagerly. I think youre wrong there. It was Lux in Tenebris,
I think - Light in Darkness.
-O yes, said Mr MCoy,
Tenebrae.
-Allow me, said Mr
Cunningham positively, it was Lux upon Lux. And Pius IX his predecessors
motto was Crux upon Crux - that is, Cross upon Cross - to
show the difference between their two pontificates.
The inference was
allowed.
[...]
The transept of the
Jesuit Church in Gardiner Street was almost full; and still at every moment
gentlemen entered from the side door and, directed by the lay-brother,
walked on tiptoe along the aisles until they found seating accommodation.
The gentlemen were all well dressed and orderly. The light of the lamps
of the church fell upon an assembly of black clothes and white collars,
relieved here and there by tweeds, on dark mottled pillars of green marble
and on lugubrious canvases. The gentlemen sat in the benches, having hitched
their trousers slightly above their knees and laid their hats in security.
They sat
well back and gazed formally at the distant speck of red light which was
suspended before the high altar.
[...]
A powerful-looking
figure, the upper part of which was draped with a white surplice, was
observed to be struggling up into the pulpit.
[...]
Father
Purdon developed the text with resonant assurance. [...] He told his hearers
that he was there that evening for no terrifying, no extravagant purpose;
but as a man of the world speaking to his fellow-men. He came to speak
to business men and he would speak to them in a business-like way. If
he might use the metaphor, he said, he was their spiritual accountant;
and he wished each and every one of his hearers to open his books, the
books of his spiritual life, and see if they tallied accurately with conscience.
Jesus Christ was
not a hard taskmaster. He understood our little failings, understood the
weakness of our poor fallen nature, understood the temptations of this
life. We might have had, we all had from time to time, our temptations:
we might have, we all had, our failings. But one thing only, he said,
he would ask of his hearers. And that was: to be straight and manly with
God. If their accounts tallied in every point to say:
-Well, I have verified
my accounts. I find all well.
But if, as might
happen, there were some discrepancies, to admit the truth, to be frank
and say like a man:
-Well, I have looked
into my accounts. I find this wrong and this wrong. But, with Gods grace,
I will rectify this and this. I will set right my accounts.
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