The fashionable ladies wish to take him up and
make a lion of him; the superstitious kiss the hem of his garment and
believe that he can work miracles, or, in a sudden revulsion, they
jeer him and drive him away with stones. And what a panorama of
ecclesiastical life in Italy! What a collection of priests and monks and
prelates, and with what inevitableness one after another turns the cold
shoulder on the volunteer who dares to assert that the test of religion
is conduct! There is an air of mystery, of intrigue, of secret messages
passing to and fro--the atmosphere of craft which has hung round the
ecclesiastical institution so many, many centuries. Few scenes in modern
romance can match Benedetto's interview with the Pope--he pathetic
figure who, you feel, is in sad truth a prisoner, not of the Italian
Government, but of the crafty, able, remorseless cabal of cardinals who
surround him, dog him with eavesdroppers, edit his briefs, check his
benign impulses, and effectually prevent the truth from penetrating to
his lonely study. Benedetto's appeal to the Pope to heal the four wounds
from which the Church is languishing is a model of impassioned argument.
Pages:
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25