Dawn of All — Part 1, Chapter 7
(I)
"What I can't yet quite understand," said Monsignor, "is that point I mentioned the other day about Faith and Science.
I don't see where one ends and the other begins.
It seems to me that the controversy must be unending.
The materialist says that since Nature does all things, even the most amazing things must be done by her--that we shall be able to explain them all some day, when Science has got a little farther.
And the theologian says that some things are so evidently out of the reach of Nature that they must be done by a supernatural power.
Well, where's the point of reconciliation?"
Father Jervis was silent for a while.
* * * * * The two were sitting on the upper deck of an air-ship towards evening, travelling straight towards the setting sun.
He had grown almost accustomed to such views by now; and yet the sight that had been unrolling itself gradually during the last half-hour had held him fascinated for minute after minute.
They had taken ship in Rome after a day or two more of sight-seeing, and had moved up the peninsula by stages, changing boats soon after crossing the frontier, for one of the high-flying, more leisurely and more luxurious vessels on which the more wealthy classes travelled.
They were due in Lourdes that evening; and, ever since the higher peaks of the Pyrenees had come into sight, had moved over a vision of bewildering beauty.
To their left rose the mountains, forming, it seemed to them at the height at which they travelled, an enormous jagged and gigantic pile, hard-lined as steel, yet irradiated with long rays, patches, and pools of golden sunset-light alternated by amazing depths of the shadow whose tones ran from peacock to indigo.
Then from the feet of the tumbled pile there ran out what appeared a loosely flung carpet vivid and yet a soft green, patched here and there with white towns, embroideries of woodland, lines of silver water.
Yet this too was changing as they watched the shadows grow longer with almost visible movement.
New and strange colours, varying about a fixed note of blue according to the nature of that with which the earth was covered, slowly came into being.
Here, in front, now and again a patch of water glowed suddenly, three thousand feet beneath, as it met the shifting angle between the eye and the sun; and beyond, far out across the darkening plain, shone the remote line of the sea, itself ablaze with gold, and above and about in every quarter burned the enormous luminous dome of sky.
* * * * * "I can't put it all accurately," said Father Jervis at last.
"I mean I can't tell you off-hand all the tests that are exactly applied to every case.
But it's something like this.
.
.
."
He paused.
"Yes, tell me," said the other, still staring out at the softly rolling landscape.
"Well, first," began the old priest slowly, "in the last fifty years we've classified almost exhaustively everything that nature can do.
We know, for instance, for certain, that in certain kinds of temperaments body and mind are in far greater sympathy than in others; and that if, in such a temperament as this, the mind can be fully persuaded that such and such a thing is going to happen--a thing within the range of natural possibility, of course--it will happen, merely through the action of the mind upon the body."
"Give me an instance."
"Well" (he hesitated again) .
.
.
"well, I'm not a physician, and cannot define accurately; but there are certain nervous diseases--hysterical simulation, nervous affections such as St. Vitus' dance--as well, of course, as purely mental diseases, such as certain kinds of insanity---" "Oh, those," said the other contemptuously.
"Wait a minute.
These, I say, given the right temperament and receptiveness to suggestion, can be cured _instantaneously_."
"Instantaneously?"
"Certainly--given those conditions.
Then there are certain other diseases, very closely related to the nervous system, in which there have been changes of tissue, not only in the brain, but in the organs or the limbs.
And these, too, can be cured by mere natural suggestion; but--and this is the point--not instantaneously.
In cases of this kind, cured in this way, there is always needed a period, I won't say as long as, but proportionate to, the period during which the disease had been developing and advancing.
I forget the exact proportions now, but I think, so far as I remember, that at least two-thirds of the time is required for recovery by suggestion as was occupied by the growth of the disease.
Take _lupus_.
That certainly belongs to the class I'm speaking of.
Well, lupus has been cured in mental laboratories, but never instantaneously or anything like instantaneously."
"Go on, father."
"Finally, there are those physical states that have practically nothing to do directly with the nervous system at all.
Take a broken leg.
Of course the cure of a broken leg is affected by the state of the nervous system, since it depends upon the amount of vital energy, the state of the blood, and so on.
But there are distinct processes of change of tissue that are bound to take a certain fixed period.
You may--as has been proved over and over again in the mental laboratories--hasten and direct the action of the nervous energy, so that a man under hypnotic suggestion will improve more rapidly than a man who is not.
But no amount of suggestion can possibly effect a cure instantaneously.
Tuberculosis is another such thing; certain diseases of the heart---" "I see.
Go on."
"Well, then, science has fixed certain periods in all these various matters which simply cannot be lessened beyond a certain point.
And miracle does not begin--authorized miracle, I mean--unless these periods are markedly shortened.
Mere mental cures, therefore, do not come under the range of authorized miracle at all--though, of course, in many cases where there has been little or no suggestion, or where the temperament is not receptive, practically speaking, the miraculous element is most probably present.
In the second class--organic nervous diseases--no miracle is proclaimed unless the cure is instantaneous, or very nearly so.
In the third class, again, no miracle is proclaimed unless the cure is either instantaneous, or the period of it very considerably shortened beyond all known examples of natural cure by suggestion."
"And you mean to say that such cures are frequent?"
The old priest smiled.
"Why, of course.
There is an accumulation of evidence from the past hundred years which----" "Broken limbs?"
"Oh yes; there's the case of Pierre de Rudder, at Oostacker, in the nineteenth century.
That's the first of the series--the first, I mean, that has been scientifically examined.
It's in all the old books."
"What was the matter with him?"
"Leg broken below the knee for eight years."
"And how long did the cure take?"
"Instantaneous."
There was silence again.
Monsignor was staring out and downwards at the flitting meadow-land far below.
A flock of white birds moved across the darkening grey, like flying specks seen in the eye, yet it seemed with extraordinary slowness and deliberation, so great was the distance at which they flew.
He sighed.
"You can examine the records," said the priest presently; "and, better than that, you can examine some of the cases for yourself, and the certificates.
They follow still the old system which Dr. Boissarie began nearly a century ago."
"What about Zola?"
demanded Monsignor abruptly.
"I beg your pardon?"
"Zola, the great French writer.
I thought he had .
.
.
had advanced some very sharp criticisms of Lourdes."
"Er--when did he live?"
"Why, not long ago; nineteenth century, at the end."
Father Jervis shook his head, smiling.
"I've never heard of him," he said, "and I thought I knew Lourdes literature pretty well.
I'll enquire."
"Look," said the prelate suddenly; "what's that place we're coming to?"
He nodded forward with his head to where vast white lines and patches began to be visible on the lower slopes and at the foot of long spurs that had suddenly come into sight against the sunset.
"Why, that's Lourdes."
(II)
As the two priests came out next morning from the west doors of the tall church where they had said their masses, Monsignor stopped.
"Let me try to take it in a moment," he said.
* * * * * They were standing on the highest platform of the pile of three churches that had been raised over a hundred years ago, now in the very centre of the enormous city that had grown little by little around the sacred place.
Beneath them, straight in front, approached from where they stood by two vast sweeps of balustraded steps, lay the _Place_, perhaps sixty feet beneath, of the shape of an elongated oval, bounded on this side and that by the old buildings where the doctors used to have their examination rooms, now used for a hundred minor purposes connected with the churches and the grotto.
At the farther end of the Place, behind the old bronze statue of Mary, rose up the comparatively new _Bureau de Constatations_--a great hall (as the two had seen last night), communicating with countless consulting- and examination-rooms, where the army of State-paid doctors carried on their work.
The whole of the open Place between these buildings crawled with humanity--not yet packed as it would be by evening--yet already sufficiently filled by the two ever-flowing streams--the one passing downwards to where the grotto lay out of sight on the left, the other passing up towards the lower entrance of the great hall.
It resembled an amphitheatre, and the more so, since the roofs of the buildings on every side, as well as the slope up which the steps rose to the churches, adapted now as they were to accommodate at least three hundred thousand spectators, were already beginning to show groups and strings of onlookers who came up here to survey the city.
On the right, beyond the Place, lay the old town, sloping up now, up even to the medieval castle, which fifty years ago had stood in lonely detachment, but now was faced on hill-top after hill-top, at its own level, by the enormous nursing homes and hostels, which under the direction of the Religious Orders had gradually grown up about this shrine of healing, until now, up to a height of at least five hundred feet, the city of Mary stood on bastion after bastion of the lower slopes of the hills, like some huge auditorium of white stone, facing down towards the river and the Holy Place.
Finally, on the left, immediately to the left of the two priests who stood silently looking, fifty feet below, ran the sweep of the Gave, crossed by innumerable bridges which gave access to the crowding town beyond the water, where once had been nothing but meadowland and the beginning of the great southern plain of France.
There was an air of extraordinary peace and purity about this place, thought Monsignor.
Whiteness was the predominating colour--whiteness beneath, and whiteness running up high on the right on to the hills--and above the amazing blue of the southern sky.
It was high and glorious summer about them, with a breeze as intoxicating as wine and as fresh as water.
From across the Place they could hear the quick flapping of the huge Mary banner that flew above the hall, for there were no wheels or motors here to crush out the acuteness of the ear.
The transference of the sick from the hostels above the town was carried out by aeroplanes--great winged decks, with awnings above and at the sides, that slid down as if on invisible lines, to the entrance of the other side of the hall, whence after a daily examination by the doctors they were taken on by hand-litters to the grotto or the bathing-pools.
* * * * * Monsignor heard a step behind him as he stood and looked, still pathetically bewildered by all that he saw, and still struggling, in spite of himself, with a new upbreak of scepticism; and turning, saw Father Jervis in the act of greeting a young monk in the Benedictine habit.
"I knew we should meet.
I heard you were here," the old man was exclaiming.
"You remember Monsignor Masterman?"
They shook hands, and Monsignor was not disappointed in his friend's tact.
"Father Adrian absolutely haunts Lourdes nowadays," went on Father Jervis.
"I wonder his superiors allow him.
And how's the book getting on?"
The monk smiled.
He was an exceedingly pleasant person to look upon, with a thin, refined face and large, startlingly blue eyes.
He shook his head as he smiled.
"I'm getting frightened," he said.
"I cannot see with the theologians in all points.
Well, the least said, the soonest mended."
Father Jervis' face had fallen a little.
There was distinct anxiety in his eyes.
"When will the book be out?"
he asked quickly.
"I'm revising for the last time," said the other shortly.
"And you, Monsignor?
.
.
.
I had heard of your illness."
"Oh, Monsignor's nearly himself again.
And will you take us into the Bureau?"
asked the old priest.
The young monk nodded.
"I shall be there all day," he said.
"Ask for me at any time."
"Monsignor wants to see for himself.
He wants to see a case straight through.
Is there anything----" "Why, there's the very thing," interrupted the monk.
(He fumbled in his pocket a moment.
) "Yes, here's the leaflet that was issued last night."
(He held out a printed piece of paper to Monsignor.
) "Read that through."
The prelate took it.
"What's the case?"
he asked.
"The leaflet will give you the details.
It's decay of the optic nerve--a Russian from St. Petersburg.
Both eyes completely blind, the nerves destroyed, and he saw light yesterday for the first time.
He'll be down from the Russian hospice about eleven.
We expect a cure to-day or to-morrow."
"Well," said Father Jervis, "we mustn't detain you.
Then, if we look in about eleven?"
The monk nodded and smiled as he moved off.
"Certainly," he said.
"At eleven then."
Monsignor turned to his friend.
"Well?"
Father Jervis shook his head.
"It's a sad business," he said.
"That's Dom Adrian Bennett.
He's very daring.
He's had one warning from Rome; but he's so extraordinarily clever that it's very hard to silence him.
He's not exactly heretical; but he will work along lines that have already been decided."
"Dear me!
He seems very charming."
"Certainly.
He is most charming, and utterly sincere.
He's got the entree everywhere here.
He is a first-rate scientist, by the way.
But, Monsignor, I'd sooner not talk about him.
Do you mind?"
"But what's his subject?
Tell me that."
"It's the miraculous element in religion," said the priest shortly.
"Come, we must go to our coffee."
(III)
The hall was already crowded in every part as the two priests looked in at the lower end a few minutes before eleven o'clock.
It was arranged more or less like a theatre, with a broad gangway running straight up from the doors at one end to the foot of the stage at the other.
The stage itself, with a statue of Mary towering at the back, communicated with the examination-rooms behind the two doors, one on either side of the image.
"What's going on?"
whispered Monsignor, as he glanced up first on this side and that, at the array of heads that listened, and then at the two figures that occupied the stage.
"It's a doctor lecturing on a cure.
This goes on nearly all day.
We must get round to the back somehow."
As they passed in at last from the outside through the private door through which the doctors and privileged persons had access behind the stage, they heard a storm of clapping and voices from the direction of the public hall on their right.
"That's finished then.
Follow me, Monsignor."
They went through a passage or two, after their guide--a young man in uniform--seeing as they went, through half-open doors here and there, quite white rooms, glimpses of men in white, and once at least a litter being set down; and came at last into what looked like some kind of committee-room, lighted by tall windows on the left, with a wide horseshoe table behind which sat perhaps a dozen men, each wearing on his left breast the red and white cross which marked them as experts.
Opposite the examiners, but half hidden from the two priests by the back of his tall chair, sat the figure of a man.
Their guide went up to the end of the table, and almost immediately they saw Father Adrian stand up and beckon to them.
"I've kept you two chairs," he whispered when they came up.
"And you'd better wear these crosses.
They'll admit you anywhere."
(He pointed to the two red and white badges that hung over the backs of their chairs.
) "Are we in time?"
"You're a little late," whispered the monk.
Then he turned again towards the patient, a typical fair-haired, bearded Russian with closed eyes, who at that moment was answering some question put to him by the presiding doctor in the centre.
The monk turned again.
"Can you understand Russian?"
Monsignor shook his head.
"Well, I'll tell you afterwards," said the other.
* * * * * It seemed very strange to be sitting here, in this quiet room, after the rush and push of the enormous crowds through which they had made their way this morning.
The air of the room was exceedingly business-like, and not in the least even suggestive of religion, except in the matter of a single statue of Our Lady of Lourdes on a bracket on the wall above the President's head.
And these dozen men who sat here seemed quietly business-like too.
They sat here, men of various ages and nationalities, all in the thin white doctor's dress, with papers spread before them, and a few strange instruments scattered here and there, leaning forward or leaning back, but all intently listening to and watching the Russian, who, still with closed eyes, answered the short questions put to him continuously by the President.
There seemed no religious excitement even in the air; the atmosphere was one, rather, of simple science.
There seemed something faintly familiar in all this to the man who had lost his memory.
.
.
.
Certainly he had known of Lourdes as soon as it was mentioned to him, and he seemed now to remember that some such claim to be perfectly scientific had always been made by the authorities of the place.
But he had supposed, somehow, that the claim was a false one.
.
.
.
The Russian suddenly rose.
"Well!"
whispered Monsignor sharply as the doctors began to talk.
The monk smiled.
"He's just said an interesting thing.
The President asked him just now whether he had seen anything of the crowds as he came down this morning."
"Yes?"
"He said that people looked like trees moving about.
.
.
.
Oh no!
he didn't know he was making a quotation.
Look!
he's going down to the grotto.
He'll be back in half an hour to report."
Monsignor leaned back in his chair.
"And you tell me that the optic nerves were destroyed?"
The monk looked at him in wide-eyed wonder.
"Certainly.
He was examined on Tuesday, when he came.
To-day's Friday."
"And you believe he'll be cured?"
"I shall be very much surprised if he's not."
There was a stir by the door as the Russian disappeared.
A young, bright-eyed doctor looked in and nodded, and the next instant a brancardier appeared, followed by a litter.
"But how have you time to examine all these thousands of cases?"
asked the prelate, watching the litter advance.
"Oh, not one in a hundred comes through to us here.
Besides, this is only one of a dozen committee-rooms.
It's only the most sensational cases--where there's real organic injury of a really serious kind--that ever come at all before the highest courts.
Cases, I mean, where, if there's a cure, the publication of the miracle follows as a matter of course.
.
.
.
What's this case, I wonder?"
he ended sharply, glancing down at the printed paper before him, and then up again at the litter that was being arranged.
Monsignor looked too at the paper that lay before him.
Some thirty paragraphs, carefully numbered, dated, and signed, gave, as it seemed, a list of the cases to be examined.
"Number fourteen," murmured the monk.
Number fourteen, it appeared, was a case of fractured spine--a young girl, aged sixteen; a German.
The accident had happened four months before.
The notes, signed by half a dozen names, described the complete paralysis below the waist, with a few other medical details.
Monsignor looked again at the girl on the other side of the table, guarded by the brancardiers and a couple of doctors, while the monk talked to him rapidly in Latin.
He saw her closed eyes and colourless lips.
"This case has attracted a good deal of attention," whispered the monk.
"The Emperor's said to be interested in it, through one of the ladies of the Court, whose servant the girl was.
It's interesting for two or three reasons.
First, the fracture is complete, and it's marvellous she hasn't died.
Then it's been taken up as a kind of test case by a group of materialists in Berlin.
They've taken it up, because the girl has declared again and again that she is perfectly certain she will be cured at Lourdes.
She claims to have had a vision of Our Lady, who told her so.
Her father's a freethinker, by the way, and has only finally allowed her to come so that he can use her as an argument afterwards."
"Who has examined her?"
asked Monsignor sharply.
"She was examined last night on her arrival, and again this morning.
Dr. Meurot, the President here" (he indicated with his head the doctor who sat three places off, who was putting his questions rapidly to the two attending physicians)--"Dr. Meurot examined her himself early this morning.
This is just the formal process before she goes to the grotto.
The fracture is complete.
It's between the eleventh and twelfth dorsal vertebrae."
"And you think she'll be cured?"
The monk smiled.
"Who can tell?"
he said.
"We've only had one case before, and the papers on that are not quite in order, though it's commonly believed to be genuine."
"But it's possible?"
"Oh, certainly.
And her own conviction is absolute.
It'll be interesting."
"You seem to take it pretty easily," murmured the prelate.
"Oh, the facts are established a hundred times over--the facts, I mean, that cures take place here which are not even approached in mental laboratories.
But---" He was interrupted by a sudden movement of the brancardiers.
"See, they're removing her," he said.
"Now, what'll you do, Monsignor?
Will you go down to the grotto, or would you sooner watch a few more cases?"
"I think I'd sooner stay here," said the other, "at least for an hour or two."
(IV)
It was the hour of the evening procession and of the Benediction of the Sick.
All day long the man who had lost his memory had gone to and fro with his companions, each wearing the little badge that gave them entrance everywhere; they had lunched with Dr. Meurot himself.
If Monsignor Masterman had been impressed by the social power of Catholicism at Versailles, and by its religious reality in Rome, he was ten thousand times more impressed by its scientific courage here in Lourdes.
For here religion seemed to have stepped down into an arena hitherto (as he fancied) restricted to the play of physical forces.
She had laid aside her oracular claims, her comparatively unsupported assertions of her own divinity; had flung off her robes of state and authority and was competing here on equal terms with the masters of natural law--more, she was accepted by them as their mistress.
For there seemed nothing from which she shrank.
She accepted all who came to her desiring her help; she made no arbitrary distinctions to cover her own incapacities.
Her one practical desire was to heal the sick; her one theoretical interest to fix more and more precisely, little by little, the exact line at which nature ended and supernature began.
