The Master-Christian. Marie Corelli

      Angela laughed.

      "Poor de Lorgne! Yes—I have heard that Mr. Leigh excels in everything that is distinctly English—riding, shooting, and all that kind of thing. He is not effeminate."

      "Few Englishmen are," said the Abbe,—"And yet to my mind there is something not altogether English in this man. He has none of the heavy British mental and physical stolidity. He is strong and muscular certainly,—but also light and supple,—and with that keen, intellectual delicate face of his, he is more of the antique Greek type than like a son of Les Isles Sans-Soleil."

      "Sans-Soleil," echoed Angela, "But there is plenty of sunshine in

       England!"

      "Is there? Well, I have been unfortunate,—I have never seen any,—" and the Abbe gave a shrug of half regret, half indifference. "It is very curious the effect that this so brave England has upon me! In crossing to its shores I suffer of course from the mal de mer—then when I arrive exhausted to the white cliffs, it is generally raining—then I take train to London, where it is what is called black fog; and I find all the persons that I meet either with a cold, or going to have a cold, or just recovering from a cold! It is not lively—the very funerals are dull. And you—this is not your experience?"

      "No—frankly I cannot say it is," replied Angela, "I have seen rain and fog in Rome that cannot be surpassed for wretchedness anywhere. Italy is far more miserable in cold weather than England. I passed a summer once in England, and it was to me like a glimpse of Paradise. I never saw so many flowers—I never heard so many birds—(you know in Italy we kill all the singing birds and eat them), and I never met so many kind and gentle people."

      "Well!—perhaps the religious sects in England are responsible for the general feeling of depression in the English atmosphere," said the Abbe with a light laugh, "They are certainly foggy! The one round Sun of one Creed is unknown to them. I assure you it is best to have one light of faith, even though it be only a magic lantern,—a toy to amuse the children of this brief life before their everlasting bedtime comes—" He broke off abruptly as a slow step was heard approaching along the passage, and in another moment Cardinal Bonpre entered the room.

      "Ah, le bien aime Felix!" cried Vergniaud, hastening to meet him and clasp his outstretched hand, bowing slightly over it as he did so, "I have taken the liberty to wait for you, cher Monseigneur, being anxious to see you—and I understand your stay in Paris will not be long?"

      "A few days at most, my dear Abbe",—replied the Cardinal, gently pressing the hand of Vergniaud and smiling kindly. "You are well? But surely I need not ask—you seem to be in the best of health and spirits."

      "Ah, my seeming is always excellent," returned the Abbe, "However, I do not fare badly. I have thrown away all hard thinking!"

      "And you are happier so?"

      "Well, I am not quite sure! There is undoubtedly a pleasure in analysing the perplexities of one's own mind. Still, on the whole, it is perhaps better to enjoy the present hour without any thought at all."

      "Like the butterflies!" laughed Angela.

      "Yes,—if butterflies DO enjoy their hour,—which I am not at all prepared to admit. In my opinion they are very dissatisfied creatures,—no sooner on one flower than off they go to another. Very like human beings after all! But I imagine they never worry themselves with philosophical or religious questions."

      "And do you?" enquired Bonpre, smiling, as he sat down in the easy chair his niece placed for him.

      "Not as a rule!—" answered Vergniaud frankly, with a light laugh—"But I confess I have done a little in that way lately. Some of the new sciences puzzle me,—I am surprised to find how closely they approach to the fulfilment of old prophecies. One is almost inclined to believe that there must be a next world and a future life."

      "I think such belief is now placed beyond mere inclination," said the

       Cardinal—"There is surely no doubt of it."

      Vergniaud gave him a quick side-glance of earnest scrutiny.

      "With you, perhaps not—" he replied—"But with me,—well!—it is a different matter. However, it is really no use worrying one's self with the question of 'To be, or not to be.' It drove Hamlet mad, just as the knotty point as to whether Hamlet himself was fat or lean nearly killed our hysterical little boy, Catullus Mendes. It's best to leave eternal subjects like God and Shakespeare alone."

      He laughed again, but the Cardinal did not smile.

      "I do not agree with you, Vergniaud," he said—"I fear it is because we do not think sufficiently for ourselves on the One eternal subject that so much mischief threatens us at the present time. To take gifts and ignore the Giver is surely the blackest ingratitude, yet that is what the greater part of humanity is guilty of in these days. Never was there so much beholding and yet ignoring of the Divine as now. Science is searching for God, and is getting closer to Him every day;—the Church remains stationary and refuses to look out beyond her own pale of thought and conventional discipline. I know,—" and the Cardinal hesitated a moment, "I know I can speak quite plainly to you, for you are what is called a freethinker—yet I doubt whether you are really as free as you imagine!"

      The Abbe shrugged his shoulders.

      "I imagine nothing!" he declared airily, "Everything is imagined for me nowadays,—and imagination itself is like a flying Geni which overtakes and catches the hair of some elusive Reality and turns its face round, full-shining on an amazed world!"

      "A pretty simile!" said Angela Sovrani, smiling.

      "Is it not? Almost worthy of Paul Verlaine who was too 'inspired' to keep either his body or his soul clean. Why was I not a poet! Helas!—Fact so much outweighs fancy that it is no longer any use penning a sonnet to one's mistress's eyebrow. One needs to write with thunderbolts in characters of lightning, to express the wonders and discoveries of this age. When I find I can send a message from here to London across space, without wires or any visible means of communication,—and when I am told that probably one of these days I shall be able at will to SEE the person to whom I send the message, reflected in space while the message is being delivered,—I declare myself so perfectly satisfied with the fairy prodigies revealed to me, that I have really no time, and perhaps no inclination to think of any other world than this one."

      "You are wrong, then," said the Cardinal, "Very wrong, Vergniaud. To me these discoveries of science, this apparent yielding of invisible forces into human hands, are signs and portents of terror. You remember the line 'the powers of heaven shall be shaken'? Those powers are being shaken now! We cannot hold them back;—they are here, with us;—but they mean much more than mere common utility to our finite selves. They are the material declarations of what is spiritual. They are the scientific proofs that Christ's words to 'THIS generation,' namely, this particular phase of creation,—are true. 'Blessed are they which have not seen and yet believed,' He said;—and many there are who have passed away from us in rapt faith and hope, believing not seeing, and with whom we may rejoice in spirit, knowing that all must be well with them. But now—now we are come upon an age of doubt in the world—doubt which corrodes and kills the divine spirit in man, and therefore we are being forced to SEE that we may believe,—but the seeing is terrible!"

      "Why?"

      "Because in the very beholding of things we remain blind!" answered the Cardinal, "Our intense selfishness obscures the true light of every fresh advance. We accept new marvels of knowledge, as so much practical use to us, and to the little planet we live on,—but we do not see that they are merely reflections of the Truth from which they emanate. The toy called the biograph, which reflects pictures for us in a dazzling and moving continuity, so that we can see scenes of human life in action, is merely a hint to us that every scene of every life is reflected in a ceaseless moving panorama SOMEWHERE in the Universe, for the beholding of SOMEONE,—yes!—there must be Someone who so elects to look upon everything, or such possibilities of reflected scenes would not be,—inasmuch as nothing exists without a Cause for existence. The wireless telegraphy is