"For my part," he added, glancing with a smile about the
delicately-stuccoed walls of the pavilion, through the windows of which
climbing roses shed their petals on the rich mosaics transferred from a
Roman bath, "for my part, when I remember that 'tis to Jesus of Nazareth
I owe the good roof over my head and the good nags in my stable; nay,
the very venison and pheasants from my preserves, with the gold plate I
eat them off, and above all the leisure to enjoy as they deserve these
excellent gifts of the Creator--when I consider this, I say, I stand
amazed at those who would rob so beneficent a deity of the least of his
privileges.--But why," he continued again after a moment, as Odo
remained silent, "should we vex ourselves with such questions, when
Providence has given us so fair a world to enjoy and such varied
faculties with which to apprehend its beauties? I think you have not
seen the Venus Callipyge in bronze that I have lately received from
Rome?" And he rose and led the way to the house.
This conversation revealed to Odo a third conception of the religious
idea. In Piedmont religion imposed itself as a military discipline, the
enforced duty of the Christian citizen to the heavenly state; to the
Duke it was a means of purchasing spiritual immunity from the
consequences of bodily weakness; to the Bishop, it replaced the panem et
circenses of ancient Rome. Where, in all this, was the share of those
whom Christ had come to save? Where was Saint Francis's devotion to his
heavenly bride, the Lady Poverty? Though here and there a good parish
priest like Crescenti ministered to the temporal wants of the peasantry,
it was only the free-thinker and the atheist who, at the risk of life
and fortune, laboured for their moral liberation.
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