Charred Wood Part 6

"But why under heaven," he said, "should a foreign diplomat be mixed up in a camp of Slavic laborers?"

"There are strange things in diplomacy," said Father Murray. "And stranger things in Siha.s.set when the town constable has so much interest in your taking of tea at Killimaga. If you had turned around a moment ago, you would have seen our constable's coattails disappearing behind the bushes on our right."

CHAPTER V

WITH EMPTY HANDS

In the long after years Mark Griffin used to wonder at the strange way in which love for Ruth Atheson entered his life. Mark always owned that, somehow, this love seemed sent for his salvation. It filled his life, but only as the air fills a vacuum; so it was, consequently, nothing that prevented other interests from living with it. It aroused him to greater ambition. The long-neglected creative power moved without Mark's knowing why. His pen wrote down his thoughts, and he no longer destroyed what he committed to paper. It now seemed a crime to destroy what had cost him only a pleasure to produce. The world had suddenly become beautiful. No longer did j.a.pan and Siberia call to him. He had no new plans, but he knew that they were forming, slowly, but with finality and authority.

Yet Mark's love was never spoken. It was just understood. Many times he had determined to speak, and just as many times did it seem quite unnecessary. He felt that Ruth understood, for one day, when an avowal trembled on his lips, she had broken it off unspoken by gently calling him "Mark," her face suffused the while with an oddly tender light that was in itself an answer. After that it was always "Ruth" and "Mark."

Father Murray also seemed to understand; with him, too, it was "Ruth"

and "Mark." After one week of that glorious September, Mark was at Killimaga daily; and when October came and had almost pa.s.sed, without a word of affection being spoken between them, Ruth and Mark came to know that some day it would be spoken, quite as naturally as she had uttered his Christian name for the first time. When Mark thought of his love, he thought also of his mother. He seemed to see her smile as if it quite pleased her; and he rejoiced that he could believe she knew, and saw that it was good.

"I love many things in men," said Father Murray one day as he and Mark watched the waves das.h.i.+ng against the bluff. "I love generosity and strength, truthfulness and mercy; but, most of all, I love cleanness.

The world is losing it, and the world will die from the loss. The chief aid to my faith is the clean hearts I see in my poor."

"Uncle Mac again?" ventured Mark.

"Uncle Mac, and Uncles Mac--many of them. They have a heritage of cleanness. It is the best thing they brought to this new world, and _we_ were the losers when they left us."

"_We_? But you are English, are you not?" asked Mark courteously.

"Ah! So you caught me then, did you? Yes, I am English, or rather British. But don't question me about that; I am real Yankee now. Even my tongue has lost its ancestral rights."

Mark was persistent. "Perhaps you, too, have a little of the 'blessed drop' that makes the Uncle Macs what they are? I really think, Father, that you have it."

"Not even a little of the 'blessed drop.' I am really not English, though born in England. Both father and mother were Scotch. So I am kin to the 'blessed drop.'"

"And you drifted here--"

"Not exactly 'drifted,' Mark. I came because I wanted to come. I came for opportunity. I was ambitious, and then there was another reason--but that is at present forbidden ground. Here is your constable friend again."

The constable pa.s.sed with a respectful touch of his helmet. _He_ at least was of the soil. Every line of his face spoke of New England.

"He is a character worth studying," remarked Father Murray. "Have you ever talked with him?"

"No. I have had no chance."

"Then find one, and put him in a book. He was once rich for Siha.s.set.

That was in the lumber days. But he lost his money, and he thinks that the town owes him a living. That is the Methodist minister to whom he is speaking now. He, too, is worth your attention."

"Do you get along well with the Protestant clergy of the town?" asked Mark.

"Splendidly," said Father Murray; "especially with the Universalist.

There is a lot of humor in the Universalist. I suspect the 'blessed drop' in him. One day I happened to call him a Unitarian, and he corrected me. 'But what,' I asked, 'is the difference between the Universalists and the Unitarians?' The little man smiled and said: 'One of my professors put it like this: "The Unitarians believe that G.o.d is too good to d.a.m.n them, and the Universalists believe they are too good to be d.a.m.ned."'"

"Still, it cannot be an easy life," said Mark, "to be one of seven or eight Protestant pastors in such a small town."

"It certainly is hard sledding," replied Father Murray. "But these men take it very philosophically and with a great deal of self-effacement.

The country clergyman has trials that his city brother knows nothing about. He has to figure on the pennies that rarely grow to dollars."

The two friends walked on, Mark's mind reverting to his own lack of faith and contrasting his dubiety with the sincerity of men who firmly believe--foremost among them the man who walked by his side. Ah, if he, too, could only _know_! He broke the silence.

"Father." He spoke hurriedly, as if fearing he might not have courage to continue what he had so boldly begun. "Father, I can't forget your words regarding those who claim to have studied religion and yet who deliberately leave out of the reckoning the greatest part of religion.

I believe I did that very thing. I was once a believer, at least so I thought. I let my belief get away from me; it seemed no longer to merit consideration. I thought I had studied and discarded it; I see now that I simply cast it away. Afterwards, I gave consideration to other religions, but they were cold, lacking in the higher appeal. I turned at last to Theosophy, to Confucianism, but remained always unsatisfied. I never thought to look again into the religion I had inherited."

Father Murray's face was serious. "I am deeply interested," he said, "deeply, although it was only as I thought. But tell me. What led you to do this? There must have been a reason formed in your mind."

"I never thought of a reason at all; I just did it. But now it seems to me that the reason was there, and that it was not a very worthy one.

I think I wanted to get away. My social interest and comfort, my independence, all seemed threatened by my faith. You will acknowledge, Father, that it is an interfering sort of a thing? It hampers one's actions, and it has a bad habit of getting dictatorial. Don't you see what I mean?"

"I do," said the priest; and paused as if to gauge the sincerity of his companion. "In fact, I went through a similar experience."

"Then you can tell me what you think of my position."

"I have already told you," said the priest earnestly. "You are the one to do the thinking now. All I can do is to point out the road by which you may best retrace your way. You have told me just what I expected to hear; I admire your honesty in telling it--not to me, but to yourself. Don't you see that your reason for deserting your Faith was but a reason for greater loyalty? The oldest idea of religion in the world, after that of the existence and providence of G.o.d, is the idea of sacrifice. Even pagans never lost that idea. Nothing in this world is worth having but must be paid for. Its cost is summed up in sacrifice. Now, religion demands the same. If it calls for right living, it calls for the sacrifice that right living demands. An athlete gets his muscle and strength, not by coddling his body, but by restraining its pa.s.sions and curbing its indolence, by working its softness into force and power. A river is bound between banks, and only thus bound is it anything but a menace. If a church claims to have the Truth, she forfeits her first claim to a hearing if she asks for no sacrifice. That your Church asked many sacrifices was no cause for your throwing her over, but a sign that she claimed the just right to put religion in positive form, and to give precepts of sacrifice, without the giving of which she would have no right to exist at all.

Am I clear?"

"You are clear, Father, and I know you are right. I have never been able to leave my own Faith entirely out of the reckoning. I am not trying to excuse myself. I could not ignore it, for it intruded itself and forced attention. In fact, it has been forcing itself upon me most uncomfortably, especially of late years."

"Again," said Father Murray, "a reason why you should have attended to it. If there is a divine revelation confided to the care of a church, that revelation is for the sake of men and not for the sake of the church. A church has no right to existence for its own sake. He was a wise Pope who called himself 'Servant of the Servants of G.o.d.' The position of your Church--for I must look upon you as a Catholic--is, that a divine revelation has been made. If it has been made it must be conserved. Reason tells us that something then must have been established to conserve it. That _something_ will last as long as the revelation needs conserving, which is to the end of the world. Now, only the Catholic Church claims that she has the care of that revelation--that she is the conserving force; which means that she is--as I have told you before--a 'City set upon a Mountain.' She can't help making herself seen. She _must_ intrude on your thoughts. She _must_ speak consistently through your life. She can permit no one to ignore her. She _won't_ let anyone ignore her. Kick her out one door, and she will come in another. She is in your art, your music, your literature, your laws, your customs, your very vices as well as your virtues--as she was destined to be. It is her destiny--her manifest destiny--and she can't change it if she would."

Mark drew in a deep breath that sounded like a sigh. "I suppose, Father," he said, "I could argue with you and dispute with you; under other circ.u.mstances perhaps I should. I hate to think that I may have to give up my liberty; yet I am not going to argue, and I am not going to dispute. I wanted information, and I got it. The questions I asked were only for the purpose of drawing you out. But here is another: Why should any inst.i.tution come between a man and his G.o.d? Is that necessary?"

The priest's eyes held a far-away look. It was some little while before he spoke, and then very slowly, as if carefully weighing his words.

"There is nothing," said the priest, "between the trees and the flowers and their G.o.d--but they are only trees and flowers; they live, but they neither think nor feel. There is nothing between the lower animals and their G.o.d; but, though they live and feel, they have none of the higher power of thought. If G.o.d had wanted man thus, why should he have given him something more than the lower animals? Man cannot live and feel only and still be a man. He must feed not only his body but his heart and soul and intellect. The men who have nothing between themselves and their G.o.d are mostly confined in lunatic asylums. The gift of intelligence demands action by the intellect; and there must be a foundation upon which to base action. When the foundation is in place, there never can be any limit to the desire for building upon it. Now, G.o.d willed all that. He created the condition and is, therefore, obliged to satisfy the desires of that condition. Some day He must satisfy the desires to the full; but now He is obliged only to keep them fed, or to give them the means to keep fed. Of course, He could do that by a direct revelation to each individual; but that He has not done so is proved by the fact that, while there can be but one Truth, yet each individual who 'goes it alone' has a different conception of it. The idea of private religious inspiration has produced public religious anarchy. Now, G.o.d could not will religious anarchy--He loves truth too much. So reason tells us that He _must_ have done the thing that His very nature would force Him to do. He _must_ have confided His revelation to His Church in order to preserve it, to teach it, to keep it for men. That is not putting any man or inst.i.tution between Himself and His creatures. Would you call the hand which drags you over a danger an interference with your liberty? Liberty, my dear Mark, is not the right to be blind, but the privilege of seeing. The light that shows things to your eyes is not an interference between those things and your eyes. The road you take to your destination is not an obstacle to your reaching it."

The priest was silent for a moment, but Mark knew that he had not quite finished.

"The rich young man of the Scriptures went to Christ and asked what he should do to be saved. He got his answer. Was Christ in his way? Was the answer a restraint upon his liberty?"

"No," answered Mark, breaking in, "it was not a restraint upon his liberty. But you say that Christ is G.o.d, so the young man had nothing between himself and his G.o.d."

"Oh, yes, he had," said the priest. "He had the command or counsel that Christ gave him. It was against the command or counsel that he rebelled. Now have not I, and you, and all the world, the same right to get an answer as that young man had? Since we are all equal in the sight of G.o.d, and since Christ came for all men, have we not the right to an answer now as clear as His was then?"

"It seems logical," admitted Mark.

"Then," said Father Murray, "the unerring Voice must still be here.

Where is it?"

"Yes," retorted Mark, "that is my cry. Where is it? I think it's the cry of many other men. What is the answer?"

"It is the thing that you threw over--or believed you had thrown over--and that you can't get away from thinking about. It waits to answer you."

A silence settled between the two men. It lasted for over a minute.