The Project Gutenberg EBook of Dawn of All, by Robert Hugh Benson
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Title: Dawn of All
Author: Robert Hugh Benson
Release Date: March 18, 2004 [EBook #11626]
Language: English
Character set encoding: ASCII
*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK DAWN OF ALL ***
Made and Printed in Great Britain at _The Mayflower Press,
Plymouth_. William Brendan & Son, Ltd.
PREFACE
IN a former book, called _Lord of the World_, I attempted to
sketch the kind of developments a hundred years hence which, I
thought, might reasonably be expected if the present lines of
what is called "modern thought" were only prolonged far enough;
and I was informed repeatedly that the effect of the book was
exceedingly depressing and discouraging to optimistic Christians.
In the present book I am attempting--also in parable form--not in
the least to withdraw anything that I said in the former, but to
follow up the other lines instead, and to sketch--again in
parable--the kind of developments, about sixty years hence which,
I think, may reasonably be expected should the opposite process
begin, and ancient thought (which has stood the test of
centuries, and is, in a very remarkable manner, being
"rediscovered" by persons even more modern than modernists) be
prolonged instead. We are told occasionally by moralists that we
live in very critical times, by which they mean that they are not
sure whether their own side will win or not. In that sense no
times can ever be critical to Catholics, since Catholics are
never in any kind of doubt as to whether or no their side will
win. But from another point of view every period is a critical
period, since every period has within itself the conflict of two
irreconcilable forces. It has been for the sake of tracing out
the kind of effects that, it seemed to me, each side would
experience in turn, should the other, at any rate for a while,
become dominant, that I have written these two books.
Finally if I may be allowed, I should wish to draw attention to
my endeavours to treat of the subject of "religious persecution,"
since I strongly believe that in some such theory is to be found
the explanation of such phenomena as those of Mary Tudor's reign
in England, and of the Spanish Inquisition. In practically every
such case, I think, it was the State and not the Church which was
responsible for so unhappy a policy; and that the policy was
directed not against unorthodoxy, as such, but against an
unorthodoxy which, under the circumstances of those days, was
thought to threaten the civil stability of society in general,
and which was punished as amounting to treasonable, rather than
to heretical, opinions.
ROBERT HUGH BENSON.
ROME Lent 1911
THE DAWN OF ALL
PROLOGUE
Gradually memory and consciousness once more reasserted
themselves, and he became aware that he was lying in bed. But
this was a slow process of intense mental effort, and was as
laboriously and logically built up of premises and deductions as
were his theological theses learned twenty years before in his
seminary. There was the sheet below his chin; there was a red
coverlet (seen at first as a blood-coloured landscape of hills
and valleys); there was a ceiling, overhead, at first as remote
as the vault of heaven. Then, little by little, the confused
roaring in his ears sank to a murmur. It had been just now as the
sound of brazen hammers clanging in reverberating caves, the
rolling of wheels, the tramp of countless myriads of men. But it
had become now a soothing murmur, not unlike the coming in of a
tide at the foot of high cliffs--just one gentle continuous note,
overlaid with light, shrill sounds. This too required long
argument and reasoning before any conclusion could be reached;
but it was attained at last, and he became certain that he lay
somewhere within sound of busy streets. Then rashly he leapt to
the belief that he must be in his own lodgings in Bloomsbury; but
another long slow stare upwards showed him that the white ceiling
was too far away.
The effort of thought seemed too much for him; it gave him a
sense of inexplicable discomfort. He determined to think no more,
for fear that the noises should revert again to the crash of
hammers in his hollow head. . . .
He was next conscious of a pressure on his lip, and a kind of
shadow of a taste of something. But it was no more than a shadow:
it was as if he were watching some one else drink and perceiving
some one else to swallow. . . . Then with a rush the ceiling came
back into view: he was aware that he was lying in bed under a red
coverlet; that the room was large and airy about him; and that
two persons, a doctor in white and a nurse, were watching him. He
rested in that knowledge for a long time, watching memory
reassert itself. Detail after detail sprang into view: farther
and farther back into his experience, far down into the childhood
he had forgotten. He remembered now who he was, his story, his
friends, his life up to a certain blank day or set of days,
between him and which there was nothing. Then he saw the faces
again, and it occurred to him, with a flash as of illumination,
to ask. So he began to ask; and he considered carefully each
answer, turning it over and reflecting upon it with what seemed
to him an amazing degree of concentration.
". . . So I am in Westminster Hospital," he considered. "That is
extraordinarily interesting and affecting. I have often seen the
outside of it. It is of discoloured brick. And I have been
here . . . how long? how long, did they say? . . . Oh! that is a
long time. Five days! And what in the world can have happened to
my work? They will be looking out for me in the Museum. How can
Dr. Waterman's history get on without me? I must see about that
at once. He'll understand that it's not my fault. . . .
"What's that? I mustn't trouble myself about that? But--Oh! Dr.
Waterman has been here, has he? That's very kind--very kind and
thoughtful indeed. And I'm to take my time, am I? Very well.
Please thank Dr. Waterman for his kindness and his
thoughtfulness in enquiring. . . . And tell him I'll be with him
again in a day or two at any rate. . . . Oh! tell him that he'll
find the references to the thirteenth-century Popes in the black
notebook--the thick one--on the right of the fire-place. They're
all verified. Thank you, thank you very much. . . . and . . . by
the way . . . just tell him I'm not sure yet about the
Piccolomini matter. . . . What's that? I'm not to trouble
myself? . . . But . . . Oh! very well. Thank you. . . . Thank
you very much."
There followed a long pause. He was thinking still very hard
about the thirteenth-century Popes. It was really very tiresome
that he could not explain to Dr. Waterman himself. He was certain
that some of the pages in the thick black notebook were loose;
and how terrible it would be if the book were taken out
carelessly, and some of the pages fell into the fire. They easily
might! And then there'd be all the work to do again. . . . And
that would mean weeks and weeks. . . .
Then there came a grave, quiet voice of a woman speaking in his
ear; but for a long time he could not understand. He wished it
would let him alone. He wanted to think about the Popes. He tried
nodding and murmuring a general sort of assent, as if he wished
to go to sleep; but it was useless: the voice went on and on. And
then suddenly he understood, and a kind of fury seized him.
How did they know he had once been a priest? Spying and
badgering, as usual! . . . No: he did not want a priest sent for.
He was not a priest any more; not even a Catholic. It was all
lies--lies from the beginning to the end--all that they had
taught him in the seminary. It was all lies! There! Was that
plain enough? . . .
Ah! why would not the voice be quiet? . . . He was in great
danger, was he? He would be unconscious again soon, would he?
Well, he didn't know what they meant by that; but what had it to
do with him? No: he did not want a priest. Was that clear
enough? . . . He was perfectly clear-headed; he knew what he was
saying. . . . Yes; even if he were in great danger . . . even if
he were practically certain to die. (That, by the way, was
impossible; because he had to finish the notes for Dr.
Waterman's new History of the Popes; and it would take months.)
Anyhow, he didn't want a priest. He knew all about that: he had
faced it all, and he wasn't afraid. Science had knocked all that
religious nonsense on the head. There wasn't any religion. All
religions were the same. There wasn't any truth in any of them.
Physical science had settled one half of the matter, and
psychology the other half. It was all accounted for. So he
didn't want a priest anyhow. Damn priests! There! would they let
him alone after that? . . .
And now as to the Piccolomini affair. It was certain that when
Aeneas was first raised to the Sacred College. . . .
Why . . . what was happening to the ceiling? How could he attend
to Aeneas while the ceiling behaved like that? He had no idea
that ceilings in the Westminster Hospital could go up like lifts.
How very ingenious! It must be to give him more air. Certainly he
wanted more air. . . . The walls too. . . . Ought not they also
to revolve? They could change the whole air in the room in a
moment. What an extraordinarily ingenious . . . Ah! and he wanted
it. . . . He wanted more air. . . . Why don't these doctors know
their business better? . . . What was the good of catching hold
of him like that? . . . He wanted air . . . more air . . . He
must get to the window! . . . Air . . . air! . . .
PART I
CHAPTER I
(I)
The first objects of which he became aware were his own hands
clasped on his lap before him, and the cloth cuffs from which
they emerged; and it was these latter that puzzled him. So
engrossed was he that at first he could not pay attention to the
strange sounds in the air about him; for these cuffs, though
black, were marked at their upper edges with a purpled line such
as prelates wear. He mechanically turned the backs of his hands
upwards; but there was no ring on his finger. Then he lifted his
eyes and looked.
He was seated on some kind of raised chair beneath a canopy. A
carpet ran down over a couple of steps beneath his feet, and
beyond stood the backs of a company of ecclesiastics--secular
priests in cotta, cassock, and biretta, with three or four
bare-footed Franciscans and a couple of Benedictines. Ten yards
away there rose a temporary pulpit with a back and a
sounding-board beneath the open sky; and in it was the tall
figure of a young friar, preaching, it seemed, with extraordinary
fervour. Around the pulpit, beyond it, and on all sides to an
immense distance, so far as he could see, stretched the heads of
an incalculable multitude, dead silent, and beyond them again
trees, green against a blue summer sky.
He looked on all this, but it meant nothing to him. It fitted on
nowhere with his experience; he knew neither where he was, nor at
what he was assisting, nor who these people were, nor who the
friar was, nor who he was himself. He simply looked at his
surroundings, then back at his hands and down his figure.
He gained no knowledge there, for he was dressed as he had never
been dressed before. His caped cassock was black, with purple
buttons and a purple cincture. He noticed that his shoes shone
with gold buckles; he glanced at his breast, but no cross hung
there. He took off his biretta, nervously, lest some one should
notice, and perceived that it was black with a purple tassel. He
was dressed then, it seemed, in the costume of a Domestic
Prelate. He put on his biretta again.
Then he closed his eyes and tried to think; but he could remember
nothing. There was, it seemed, no continuity anywhere. But it
suddenly struck him that if he knew that he was a Domestic
Prelate, and if he could recognize a Franciscan, he must have
seen those phenomena before. Where? When?
Little pictures began to form before him as a result of his
intense mental effort, but they were far away and minute, like
figures seen through the wrong end of a telescope; and they
afforded no explanation. But, as he bent his whole mind upon it,
he remembered that he had been a priest--he had distinct memories
of saying mass. But he could not remember where or when; he could
not even remember his own name.
This last horror struck him alert again. _He did not know who he
was_. He opened his eyes widely, terrified, and caught the eye of
an old priest in cotta and cassock who was looking back at him
over his shoulder. Something in the frightened face must have
disturbed the old man, for he detached himself from the group and
came up the two steps to his side.
"What is it, Monsignor?" he whispered.
"I am ill . . . I am ill . . . father," he stammered.
The priest looked at him doubtfully for an instant.
"Can you . . . can you hold out for a little? The sermon
must be nearly---"
Then the other recovered. He understood that at whatever cost he
must not attract attention. He nodded sharply.
"Yes, I can hold out, father; if he isn't too long. But you must
take me home afterwards."
The priest still looked at him doubtfully.
"Go back to your place, father. I'm all right. Don't attract
attention. Only come to me afterwards."
The priest went back, but he still glanced at him once or twice.
Then the man who did not know himself set his teeth and resolved
to remember. The thing was too absurd. He said to himself he
would begin by identifying where he was. If he knew so much as to
his own position and the dresses of those priests, his memory
could not be wholly gone.
In front of him and to the right there were trees, beyond the
heads of the crowd. There was something vaguely familiar to him
about the arrangement of these, but not enough to tell him
anything. He craned forward and stared as far to the right as he
could. There were more trees. Then to the left; and here, for the
first time, he caught sight of buildings. But these seemed very
odd buildings--neither houses nor arches--but something between
the two. They were of the nature of an elaborate gateway.
And then in a flash he recognized where he was. He was sitting,
under this canopy, just to the right as one enters through Hyde
Park Corner; these trees were the trees of the Park; that open
space in front was the beginning of Rotten Row; and Something
Lane--Park Lane--(that was it!)--was behind him.
Impressions and questions crowded upon him quickly now--yet in
none of them was there a hint as to how he got here, nor who he
was, nor what in the world was going on. This friar! What was he
doing, preaching in Hyde Park? It was ridiculous--ridiculous and
very dangerous. It would cause trouble. . . .
He leaned forward to listen, as the friar with a wide gesture
swept his hand round the horizon. "Brethren," he cried, "Look
round you! Fifty years ago this was a Protestant country, and the
Church of God a sect among the sects. And to-day--to-day God is
vindicated and the truth is known. Fifty years ago we were but a
handful among the thousands that knew not God, and to-day we rule
the world. 'Son of man, can these dry bones live?' So cried the
voice of God to the prophet. And behold! they stood up upon their
feet, an exceeding great army. If then He has done such things
for us, what shall He not do for those for whom I speak? Yet He
works through man. 'How shall they hear without a preacher?' Do
you see to it then that there are not wanting labourers in that
vineyard of which you have heard. Already the grapes hang ready
to pluck, and it is but we that are wanting. . . . Send forth
then labourers into My vineyard, cries the Lord of all."
The words were ill-chosen and commonplace enough, and uttered in
an accent indefinably strange to the bewildered listener, but the
force of the man was tremendous, as he sent out his personality
over the enormous crowd, on that high vibrant voice that
controlled, it seemed, even those on the outskirts far up the
roads on either side. Then with a swift sign of the cross,
answered generally by those about the pulpit, he ended his sermon
and disappeared down the steps, and a great murmur of talk began.
But what in the world was it all about, wondered the man under
the canopy. What was this vineyard? and why did he appeal to
English people in such words as these? Every one knew that the
Catholic Church was but a handful still in this country.
Certainly, progress had been made, but. . . .
He broke off his meditations as he saw the group of
ecclesiastics coming towards him, and noticed that on all sides
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