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diff --git a/old/1220.txt b/old/1220.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..17e0ecc --- /dev/null +++ b/old/1220.txt @@ -0,0 +1,1095 @@ +The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Atheist's Mass, by Honore de Balzac + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: The Atheist's Mass + +Author: Honore de Balzac + +Translator: Clara Bell + +Release Date: February, 1998 [Etext #1220] +Posting Date: February 21, 2010 + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE ATHEIST'S MASS *** + + + + +Produced by Dagny + + + + + +THE ATHEIST'S MASS + + +By Honore De Balzac + + +Translated by Clara Bell + + + +This is dedicated to Auguste Borget by his friend De Balzac + + + + + +THE ATHEIST'S MASS + + +Bianchon, a physician to whom science owes a fine system of theoretical +physiology, and who, while still young, made himself a celebrity in the +medical school of Paris, that central luminary to which European doctors +do homage, practised surgery for a long time before he took up medicine. +His earliest studies were guided by one of the greatest of French +surgeons, the illustrious Desplein, who flashed across science like a +meteor. By the consensus even of his enemies, he took with him to the +tomb an incommunicable method. Like all men of genius, he had no heirs; +he carried everything in him, and carried it away with him. The glory of +a surgeon is like that of an actor: they live only so long as they are +alive, and their talent leaves no trace when they are gone. Actors +and surgeons, like great singers too, like the executants who by their +performance increase the power of music tenfold, are all the heroes of a +moment. + +Desplein is a case in proof of this resemblance in the destinies of +such transient genius. His name, yesterday so famous, to-day almost +forgotten, will survive in his special department without crossing its +limits. For must there not be some extraordinary circumstances to exalt +the name of a professor from the history of Science to the general +history of the human race? Had Desplein that universal command of +knowledge which makes a man the living word, the great figure of his +age? Desplein had a godlike eye; he saw into the sufferer and his malady +by an intuition, natural or acquired, which enabled him to grasp the +diagnostics peculiar to the individual, to determine the very time, +the hour, the minute when an operation should be performed, making due +allowance for atmospheric conditions and peculiarities of individual +temperament. To proceed thus, hand in hand with nature, had he then +studied the constant assimilation by living beings, of the elements +contained in the atmosphere, or yielded by the earth to man who absorbs +them, deriving from them a particular expression of life? Did he work +it all out by the power of deduction and analogy, to which we owe the +genius of Cuvier? Be this as it may, this man was in all the secrets of +the human frame; he knew it in the past and in the future, emphasizing +the present. + +But did he epitomize all science in his own person as Hippocrates did +and Galen and Aristotle? Did he guide a whole school towards new worlds? +No. Though it is impossible to deny that this persistent observer of +human chemistry possessed that antique science of the Mages, that is +to say, knowledge of the elements in fusion, the causes of life, life +antecedent to life, and what it must be in its incubation or ever it +_is_, it must be confessed that, unfortunately, everything in him was +purely personal. Isolated during his life by his egoism, that egoism is +now suicidal of his glory. On his tomb there is no proclaiming statue +to repeat to posterity the mysteries which genius seeks out at its own +cost. + +But perhaps Desplein's genius was answerable for his beliefs, and for +that reason mortal. To him the terrestrial atmosphere was a generative +envelope; he saw the earth as an egg within its shell; and not being +able to determine whether the egg or the hen first was, he would +not recognize either the cock or the egg. He believed neither in the +antecedent animal nor the surviving spirit of man. Desplein had no +doubts; he was positive. His bold and unqualified atheism was like +that of many scientific men, the best men in the world, but invincible +atheists--atheists such as religious people declare to be impossible. +This opinion could scarcely exist otherwise in a man who was accustomed +from his youth to dissect the creature above all others--before, during, +and after life; to hunt through all his organs without ever finding the +individual soul, which is indispensable to religious theory. When he +detected a cerebral centre, a nervous centre, and a centre for aerating +the blood--the first two so perfectly complementary that in the latter +years of his life he came to a conviction that the sense of hearing is +not absolutely necessary for hearing, nor the sense of sight for +seeing, and that the solar plexus could supply their place without any +possibility of doubt--Desplein, thus finding two souls in man, confirmed +his atheism by this fact, though it is no evidence against God. This man +died, it is said, in final impenitence, as do, unfortunately, many noble +geniuses, whom God may forgive. + +The life of this man, great as he was, was marred by many meannesses, to +use the expression employed by his enemies, who were anxious to +diminish his glory, but which it would be more proper to call apparent +contradictions. Envious people and fools, having no knowledge of the +determinations by which superior spirits are moved, seize at once on +superficial inconsistencies, to formulate an accusation and so to pass +sentence on them. If, subsequently, the proceedings thus attacked are +crowned with success, showing the correlations of the preliminaries and +the results, a few of the vanguard of calumnies always survive. In our +day, for instance, Napoleon was condemned by our contemporaries when he +spread his eagle's wings to alight in England: only 1822 could explain +1804 and the flatboats at Boulogne. + +As, in Desplein, his glory and science were invulnerable, his enemies +attacked his odd moods and his temper, whereas, in fact, he was simply +characterized by what the English call eccentricity. Sometimes very +handsomely dressed, like Crebillon the tragical, he would suddenly +affect extreme indifference as to what he wore; he was sometimes seen +in a carriage, and sometimes on foot. By turns rough and kind, harsh and +covetous on the surface, but capable of offering his whole fortune to +his exiled masters--who did him the honor of accepting it for a few +days--no man ever gave rise to such contradictory judgements. Although +to obtain a black ribbon, which physicians ought not to intrigue for, he +was capable of dropping a prayer-book out of his pocket at Court, in +his heart he mocked at everything; he had a deep contempt for men, +after studying them from above and below, after detecting their genuine +expression when performing the most solemn and the meanest acts of their +lives. + +The qualities of a great man are often federative. If among these +colossal spirits one has more talent than wit, his wit is still superior +to that of a man of whom it is simply stated that "he is witty." Genius +always presupposes moral insight. This insight may be applied to a +special subject; but he who can see a flower must be able to see the +sun. The man who on hearing a diplomate he has saved ask, "How is the +Emperor?" could say, "The courtier is alive; the man will follow!"--that +man is not merely a surgeon or a physician, he is prodigiously witty +also. Hence a patient and diligent student of human nature will +admit Desplein's exorbitant pretensions, and believe--as he himself +believed--that he might have been no less great as a minister than he +was as a surgeon. + +Among the riddles which Desplein's life presents to many of his +contemporaries, we have chosen one of the most interesting, because the +answer is to be found at the end of the narrative, and will avenge him +for some foolish charges. + +Of all the students in Desplein's hospital, Horace Bianchon was one +of those to whom he most warmly attached himself. Before being a house +surgeon at the Hotel-Dieu, Horace Bianchon had been a medical student +lodging in a squalid boarding house in the _Quartier Latin_, known as +the Maison Vauquer. This poor young man had felt there the gnawing +of that burning poverty which is a sort of crucible from which great +talents are to emerge as pure and incorruptible as diamonds, which may +be subjected to any shock without being crushed. In the fierce fire of +their unbridled passions they acquire the most impeccable honesty, and +get into the habit of fighting the battles which await genius with the +constant work by which they coerce their cheated appetites. + +Horace was an upright young fellow, incapable of tergiversation on a +matter of honor, going to the point without waste of words, and as ready +to pledge his cloak for a friend as to give him his time and his night +hours. Horace, in short, was one of those friends who are never anxious +as to what they may get in return for what they give, feeling sure that +they will in their turn get more than they give. Most of his +friends felt for him that deeply-seated respect which is inspired by +unostentatious virtue, and many of them dreaded his censure. But Horace +made no pedantic display of his qualities. He was neither a puritan nor +a preacher; he could swear with a grace as he gave his advice, and +was always ready for a jollification when occasion offered. A jolly +companion, not more prudish than a trooper, as frank and outspoken--not +as a sailor, for nowadays sailors are wily diplomates--but as an honest +man who has nothing in his life to hide, he walked with his head erect, +and a mind content. In short, to put the facts into a word, Horace was +the Pylades of more than one Orestes--creditors being regarded as the +nearest modern equivalent to the Furies of the ancients. + +He carried his poverty with the cheerfulness which is perhaps one of +the chief elements of courage, and, like all people who have nothing, +he made very few debts. As sober as a camel and active as a stag, he was +steadfast in his ideas and his conduct. + +The happy phase of Bianchon's life began on the day when the famous +surgeon had proof of the qualities and the defects which, these no less +than those, make Doctor Horace Bianchon doubly dear to his friends. When +a leading clinical practitioner takes a young man to his bosom, that +young man has, as they say, his foot in the stirrup. Desplein did not +fail to take Bianchon as his assistant to wealthy houses, where some +complimentary fee almost always found its way into the student's pocket, +and where the mysteries of Paris life were insensibly revealed to the +young provincial; he kept him at his side when a consultation was to +be held, and gave him occupation; sometimes he would send him to a +watering-place with a rich patient; in fact, he was making a practice +for him. The consequence was that in the course of time the Tyrant of +surgery had a devoted ally. These two men--one at the summit of +honor and of his science, enjoying an immense fortune and an immense +reputation; the other a humble Omega, having neither fortune nor +fame--became intimate friends. + +The great Desplein told his house surgeon everything; the disciple knew +whether such or such a woman had sat on a chair near the master, or on +the famous couch in Desplein's surgery, on which he slept. Bianchon knew +the mysteries of that temperament, a compound of the lion and the bull, +which at last expanded and enlarged beyond measure the great man's +torso, and caused his death by degeneration of the heart. He studied the +eccentricities of that busy life, the schemes of that sordid avarice, +the hopes of the politician who lurked behind the man of science; he was +able to foresee the mortifications that awaited the only sentiment that +lay hid in a heart that was steeled, but not of steel. + +One day Bianchon spoke to Desplein of a poor water-carrier of the +Saint-Jacques district, who had a horrible disease caused by fatigue and +want; this wretched Auvergnat had had nothing but potatoes to eat during +the dreadful winter of 1821. Desplein left all his visits, and at the +risk of killing his horse, he rushed off, followed by Bianchon, to the +poor man's dwelling, and saw, himself, to his being removed to a sick +house, founded by the famous Dubois in the Faubourg Saint-Denis. Then +he went to attend the man, and when he had cured him he gave him +the necessary sum to buy a horse and a water-barrel. This Auvergnat +distinguished himself by an amusing action. One of his friends fell ill, +and he took him at once to Desplein, saying to his benefactor, "I could +not have borne to let him go to any one else!" + +Rough customer as he was, Desplein grasped the water-carrier's hand, and +said, "Bring them all to me." + +He got the native of Cantal into the Hotel-Dieu, where he took the +greatest care of him. Bianchon had already observed in his chief a +predilection for Auvergnats, and especially for water carriers; but as +Desplein took a sort of pride in his cures at the Hotel-Dieu, the pupil +saw nothing very strange in that. + +One day, as he crossed the Place Saint-Sulpice, Bianchon caught sight of +his master going into the church at about nine in the morning. Desplein, +who at that time never went a step without his cab, was on foot, and +slipped in by the door in the Rue du Petit-Lion, as if he were stealing +into some house of ill fame. The house surgeon, naturally possessed +by curiosity, knowing his master's opinions, and being himself a rabid +follower of Cabanis (_Cabaniste en dyable_, with the _y_, which in +Rabelais seems to convey an intensity of devilry)--Bianchon stole into +the church, and was not a little astonished to see the great Desplein, +the atheist, who had no mercy on the angels--who give no work to the +lancet, and cannot suffer from fistula or gastritis--in short, this +audacious scoffer kneeling humbly, and where? In the Lady Chapel, +where he remained through the mass, giving alms for the expenses of the +service, alms for the poor, and looking as serious as though he were +superintending an operation. + +"He has certainly not come here to clear up the question of the Virgin's +delivery," said Bianchon to himself, astonished beyond measure. "If I +had caught him holding one of the ropes of the canopy on Corpus Christi +day, it would be a thing to laugh at; but at this hour, alone, with no +one to see--it is surely a thing to marvel at!" + +Bianchon did not wish to seem as though he were spying the head surgeon +of the Hotel-Dieu; he went away. As it happened, Desplein asked him to +dine with him that day, not at his own house, but at a restaurant. At +dessert Bianchon skilfully contrived to talk of the mass, speaking of it +as mummery and a farce. + +"A farce," said Desplein, "which has cost Christendom more blood than +all Napoleon's battles and all Broussais' leeches. The mass is a papal +invention, not older than the sixth century, and based on the _Hoc est +corpus_. What floods of blood were shed to establish the Fete-Dieu, the +Festival of Corpus Christi--the institution by which Rome established +her triumph in the question of the Real Presence, a schism which rent +the Church during three centuries! The wars of the Count of Toulouse +against the Albigenses were the tail end of that dispute. The Vaudois +and the Albigenses refused to recognize this innovation." + +In short, Desplein was delighted to disport himself in his most +atheistical vein; a flow of Voltairean satire, or, to be accurate, a +vile imitation of the _Citateur_. + +"Hallo! where is my worshiper of this morning?" said Bianchon to +himself. + +He said nothing; he began to doubt whether he had really seen his chief +at Saint-Sulpice. Desplein would not have troubled himself to tell +Bianchon a lie, they knew each other too well; they had already +exchanged thoughts on quite equally serious subjects, and discussed +systems de natura rerum, probing or dissecting them with the knife and +scalpel of incredulity. + +Three months went by. Bianchon did not attempt to follow the matter up, +though it remained stamped on his memory. One day that year, one of the +physicians of the Hotel-Dieu took Desplein by the arm, as if to question +him, in Bianchon's presence. + +"What were you doing at Saint-Sulpice, my dear master?" said he. + +"I went to see a priest who has a diseased knee-bone, and to whom the +Duchesse d'Angouleme did me the honor to recommend me," said Desplein. + +The questioner took this defeat for an answer; not so Bianchon. + +"Oh, he goes to see damaged knees in church!--He went to mass," said the +young man to himself. + +Bianchon resolved to watch Desplein. He remembered the day and hour when +he had detected him going into Saint-Sulpice, and resolved to be there +again next year on the same day and at the same hour, to see if he +should find him there again. In that case the periodicity of his +devotion would justify a scientific investigation; for in such a man +there ought to be no direct antagonism of thought and action. + +Next year, on the said day and hour, Bianchon, who had already ceased +to be Desplein's house surgeon, saw the great man's cab standing at +the corner of the Rue de Tournon and the Rue du Petit-Lion, whence his +friend jesuitically crept along by the wall of Saint-Sulpice, and once +more attended mass in front of the Virgin's altar. It was Desplein, +sure enough! The master-surgeon, the atheist at heart, the worshiper +by chance. The mystery was greater than ever; the regularity of the +phenomenon complicated it. When Desplein had left, Bianchon went to +the sacristan, who took charge of the chapel, and asked him whether the +gentleman were a constant worshiper. + +"For twenty years that I have been here," replied the man, "M. Desplein +has come four times a year to attend this mass. He founded it." + +"A mass founded by him!" said Bianchon, as he went away. "This is as +great a mystery as the Immaculate Conception--an article which alone is +enough to make a physician an unbeliever." + +Some time elapsed before Doctor Bianchon, though so much his friend, +found an opportunity of speaking to Desplein of this incident of his +life. Though they met in consultation, or in society, it was difficult +to find an hour of confidential solitude when, sitting with their feet +on the fire-dogs and their head resting on the back of an armchair, two +men tell each other their secrets. At last, seven years later, after +the Revolution of 1830, when the mob invaded the Archbishop's residence, +when Republican agitators spurred them on to destroy the gilt crosses +which flashed like streaks of lightning in the immensity of the ocean +of houses; when Incredulity flaunted itself in the streets, side by +side with Rebellion, Bianchon once more detected Desplein going into +Saint-Sulpice. The doctor followed him, and knelt down by him without +the slightest notice or demonstration of surprise from his friend. They +both attended this mass of his founding. + +"Will you tell me, my dear fellow," said Bianchon, as they left the +church, "the reason for your fit of monkishness? I have caught you three +times going to mass---- You! You must account to me for this mystery, +explain such a flagrant disagreement between your opinions and your +conduct. You do not believe in God, and yet you attend mass? My dear +master, you are bound to give me an answer." + +"I am like a great many devout people, men who on the surface are deeply +religious, but quite as much atheists as you or I can be." + +And he poured out a torrent of epigrams on certain political personages, +of whom the best known gives us, in this century, a new edition of +Moliere's _Tartufe_. + +"All that has nothing to do with my question," retorted Bianchon. "I +want to know the reason for what you have just been doing, and why you +founded this mass." + +"Faith! my dear boy," said Desplein, "I am on the verge of the tomb; I +may safely tell you about the beginning of my life." + +At this moment Bianchon and the great man were in the Rue des +Quatre-Vents, one of the worst streets in Paris. Desplein pointed to +the sixth floor of one of the houses looking like obelisks, of which the +narrow door opens into a passage with a winding staircase at the end, +with windows appropriately termed "borrowed lights"--or, in French, +_jours de souffrance_. It was a greenish structure; the ground floor +occupied by a furniture-dealer, while each floor seemed to shelter a +different and independent form of misery. Throwing up his arm with a +vehement gesture, Desplein exclaimed: + +"I lived up there for two years." + +"I know; Arthez lived there; I went up there almost every day during my +first youth; we used to call it then the pickle-jar of great men! What +then?" + +"The mass I have just attended is connected with some events which took +place at the time when I lived in the garret where you say Arthez lived; +the one with the window where the clothes line is hanging with linen +over a pot of flowers. My early life was so hard, my dear Bianchon, that +I may dispute the palm of Paris suffering with any man living. I have +endured everything: hunger and thirst, want of money, want of clothes, +of shoes, of linen, every cruelty that penury can inflict. I have blown +on my frozen fingers in that _pickle-jar of great men_, which I should +like to see again, now, with you. I worked through a whole winter, +seeing my head steam, and perceiving the atmosphere of my own moisture +as we see that of horses on a frosty day. I do not know where a man +finds the fulcrum that enables him to hold out against such a life. + +"I was alone, with no one to help me, no money to buy books or to pay +the expenses of my medical training; I had not a friend; my irascible, +touchy, restless temper was against me. No one understood that this +irritability was the distress and toil of a man who, at the bottom of +the social scale, is struggling to reach the surface. Still, I had, as +I may say to you, before whom I need wear no draperies, I had that +ground-bed of good feeling and keen sensitiveness which must always be +the birthright of any man who is strong enough to climb to any height +whatever, after having long trampled in the bogs of poverty. I could +obtain nothing from my family, nor from my home, beyond my inadequate +allowance. In short, at that time, I breakfasted off a roll which the +baker in the Rue du Petit-Lion sold me cheap because it was left from +yesterday or the day before, and I crumbled it into milk; thus my +morning meal cost me but two sous. I dined only every other day in a +boarding-house where the meal cost me sixteen sous. You know as well +as I what care I must have taken of my clothes and shoes. I hardly know +whether in later life we feel grief so deep when a colleague plays us +false as we have known, you and I, on detecting the mocking smile of a +gaping seam in a shoe, or hearing the armhole of a coat split, I drank +nothing but water; I regarded a cafe with distant respect. Zoppi's +seemed to me a promised land where none but the Lucullus of the _pays +Latin_ had a right of entry. 'Shall I ever take a cup of coffee there +with milk in it?' said I to myself, 'or play a game of dominoes?' + +"I threw into my work the fury I felt at my misery. I tried to master +positive knowledge so as to acquire the greatest personal value, +and merit the position I should hold as soon as I could escape from +nothingness. I consumed more oil than bread; the light I burned during +these endless nights cost me more than food. It was a long duel, +obstinate, with no sort of consolation. I found no sympathy anywhere. +To have friends, must we not form connections with young men, have a +few sous so as to be able to go tippling with them, and meet them +where students congregate? And I had nothing! And no one in Paris +can understand that nothing means _nothing_. When I even thought of +revealing my beggary, I had that nervous contraction of the throat which +makes a sick man believe that a ball rises up from the oesophagus into +the larynx. + +"In later life I have met people born to wealth who, never having wanted +for anything, had never even heard this problem in the rule of three: +A young man is to crime as a five-franc piece is to X.--These gilded +idiots say to me, 'Why did you get into debt? Why did you involve +yourself in such onerous obligations?' They remind me of the princess +who, on hearing that the people lacked bread, said, 'Why do not they buy +cakes?' I should like to see one of these rich men, who complain that I +charge too much for an operation,--yes, I should like to see him alone +in Paris without a sou, without a friend, without credit, and forced to +work with his five fingers to live at all! What would he do? Where would +he go to satisfy his hunger? + +"Bianchon, if you have sometimes seen me hard and bitter, it was +because I was adding my early sufferings on to the insensibility, the +selfishness of which I have seen thousands of instances in the highest +circles; or, perhaps, I was thinking of the obstacles which hatred, +envy, jealousy, and calumny raised up between me and success. In Paris, +when certain people see you ready to set your foot in the stirrup, some +pull your coat-tails, others loosen the buckle of the strap that you may +fall and crack your skull; one wrenches off your horse's shoes, another +steals your whip, and the least treacherous of them all is the man whom +you see coming to fire his pistol at you point blank. + +"You yourself, my dear boy, are clever enough to make acquaintance +before long with the odious and incessant warfare waged by mediocrity +against the superior man. If you should drop five-and-twenty louis one +day, you will be accused of gambling on the next, and your best friends +will report that you have lost twenty-five thousand. If you have a +headache, you will be considered mad. If you are a little hasty, no one +can live with you. If, to make a stand against this armament of pigmies, +you collect your best powers, your best friends will cry out that you +want to have everything, that you aim at domineering, at tyranny. In +short, your good points will become your faults, your faults will be +vices, and your virtues crime. + +"If you save a man, you will be said to have killed him; if he reappears +on the scene, it will be positive that you have secured the present at +the cost of the future. If he is not dead, he will die. Stumble, and +you fall! Invent anything of any kind and claim your rights, you will be +crotchety, cunning, ill-disposed to rising younger men. + +"So, you see, my dear fellow, if I do not believe in God, I believe +still less in man. But do not you know in me another Desplein, +altogether different from the Desplein whom every one abuses?--However, +we will not stir that mud-heap. + +"Well, I was living in that house, I was working hard to pass my first +examination, and I had no money at all. You know. I had come to one of +those moments of extremity when a man says, 'I will enlist.' I had one +hope. I expected from my home a box full of linen, a present from one +of those old aunts who, knowing nothing of Paris, think of your shirts, +while they imagine that their nephew with thirty francs a month is +eating ortolans. The box arrived while I was at the schools; it had cost +forty francs for carriage. The porter, a German shoemaker living in a +loft, had paid the money and kept the box. I walked up and down the Rue +des Fosses-Saint-Germain-des-Pres and the Rue de l'Ecole de Medecine +without hitting on any scheme which would release my trunk without the +payment of the forty francs, which of course I could pay as soon as I +should have sold the linen. My stupidity proved to me that surgery was +my only vocation. My good fellow, refined souls, whose powers move in a +lofty atmosphere, have none of that spirit of intrigue that is fertile +in resource and device; their good genius is chance; they do not invent, +things come to them. + +"At night I went home, at the very moment when my fellow lodger also +came in--a water-carrier named Bourgeat, a native of Saint-Flour. We +knew each other as two lodgers do who have rooms off the same landing, +and who hear each other sleeping, coughing, dressing, and so at last +become used to one another. My neighbor informed me that the landlord, +to whom I owed three quarters' rent, had turned me out; I must clear +out next morning. He himself was also turned out on account of his +occupation. I spent the most miserable night of my life. Where was I to +get a messenger who could carry my few chattels and my books? How +could I pay him and the porter? Where was I to go? I repeated these +unanswerable questions again and again, in tears, as madmen repeat their +tunes. I fell asleep; poverty has for its friends heavenly slumbers full +of beautiful dreams. + +"Next morning, just as I was swallowing my little bowl of bread soaked +in milk, Bourgeat came in and said to me in his vile Auvergne accent: + +"'_Mouchieur l'Etudiant_, I am a poor man, a foundling from the hospital +at Saint-Flour, without either father or mother, and not rich enough to +marry. You are not fertile in relations either, nor well supplied with +the ready? Listen, I have a hand-cart downstairs which I have hired for +two sous an hour; it will hold all our goods; if you like, we will try +to find lodgings together, since we are both turned out of this. It is +not the earthly paradise, when all is said and done.' + +"'I know that, my good Bourgeat,' said I. 'But I am in a great fix. I +have a trunk downstairs with a hundred francs' worth of linen in it, +out of which I could pay the landlord and all I owe to the porter, and I +have not a hundred sous.' + +"'Pooh! I have a few dibs,' replied Bourgeat joyfully, and he pulled out +a greasy old leather purse. 'Keep your linen.' + +"Bourgeat paid up my arrears and his own, and settled with the porter. +Then he put our furniture and my box of linen in his cart, and pulled +it along the street, stopping in front of every house where there was a +notice board. I went up to see whether the rooms to let would suit us. +At midday we were still wandering about the neighborhood without having +found anything. The price was the great difficulty. Bourgeat proposed +that we should eat at a wine shop, leaving the cart at the door. Towards +evening I discovered, in the Cour de Rohan, Passage du Commerce, at the +very top of a house next the roof, two rooms with a staircase between +them. Each of us was to pay sixty francs a year. So there we were +housed, my humble friend and I. We dined together. Bourgeat, who earned +about fifty sous a day, had saved a hundred crowns or so; he would +soon be able to gratify his ambition by buying a barrel and a horse. +On learning of my situation--for he extracted my secrets with a quiet +craftiness and good nature, of which the remembrance touches my heart +to this day, he gave up for a time the ambition of his whole life; for +twenty-two years he had been carrying water in the street, and he now +devoted his hundred crowns to my future prospects." + +Desplein at these words clutched Bianchon's arm tightly. "He gave me the +money for my examination fees! That man, my friend, understood that I +had a mission, that the needs of my intellect were greater than his. He +looked after me, he called me his boy, he lent me money to buy books, he +would come in softly sometimes to watch me at work, and took a mother's +care in seeing that I had wholesome and abundant food, instead of the +bad and insufficient nourishment I had been condemned to. Bourgeat, a +man of about forty, had a homely, mediaeval type of face, a prominent +forehead, a head that a painter might have chosen as a model for that +of Lycurgus. The poor man's heart was big with affections seeking an +object; he had never been loved but by a poodle that had died some time +since, of which he would talk to me, asking whether I thought the Church +would allow masses to be said for the repose of its soul. His dog, said +he, had been a good Christian, who for twelve years had accompanied him +to church, never barking, listening to the organ without opening his +mouth, and crouching beside him in a way that made it seem as though he +were praying too. + +"This man centered all his affections in me; he looked upon me as +a forlorn and suffering creature, and he became, to me, the most +thoughtful mother, the most considerate benefactor, the ideal of the +virtue which rejoices in its own work. When I met him in the street, he +would throw me a glance of intelligence full of unutterable dignity; he +would affect to walk as though he carried no weight, and seemed happy in +seeing me in good health and well dressed. It was, in fact, the devoted +affection of the lower classes, the love of a girl of the people +transferred to a loftier level. Bourgeat did all my errands, woke me at +night at any fixed hour, trimmed my lamp, cleaned our landing; as good +as a servant as he was as a father, and as clean as an English girl. He +did all the housework. Like Philopoemen, he sawed our wood, and gave to +all he did the grace of simplicity while preserving his dignity, for he +seemed to understand that the end ennobles every act. + +"When I left this good fellow, to be house surgeon at the Hotel-Dieu, I +felt an indescribable, dull pain, knowing that he could no longer live +with me; but he comforted himself with the prospect of saving up money +enough for me to take my degree, and he made me promise to go to see him +whenever I had a day out: Bourgeat was proud of me. He loved me for my +own sake, and for his own. If you look up my thesis, you will see that I +dedicated it to him. + +"During the last year of my residence as house surgeon I earned enough +to repay all I owed to this worthy Auvergnat by buying him a barrel and +a horse. He was furious with rage at learning that I had been depriving +myself of spending my money, and yet he was delighted to see his wishes +fulfilled; he laughed and scolded, he looked at his barrel, at his +horse, and wiped away a tear, as he said, 'It is too bad. What a +splendid barrel! You really ought not. Why, that horse is as strong as +an Auvergnat!' + +"I never saw a more touching scene. Bourgeat insisted on buying for +me the case of instruments mounted in silver which you have seen in my +room, and which is to me the most precious thing there. Though enchanted +with my first success, never did the least sign, the least word, escape +him which might imply, 'This man owes all to me!' And yet, but for him, +I should have died of want; he had eaten bread rubbed with garlic that I +might have coffee to enable me to sit up at night. + +"He fell ill. As you may suppose, I passed my nights by his bedside, +and the first time I pulled him through; but two years after he had a +relapse; in spite of the utmost care, in spite of the greatest exertions +of science, he succumbed. No king was ever nursed as he was. Yes, +Bianchon, to snatch that man from death I tried unheard-of things. I +wanted him to live long enough to show him his work accomplished, to +realize all his hopes, to give expression to the only need for gratitude +that ever filled my heart, to quench a fire that burns in me to this +day. + +"Bourgeat, my second father, died in my arms," Desplein went on, after +a pause, visibly moved. "He left me everything he possessed by a will +he had had made by a public scrivener, dating from the year when we had +gone to live in the Cour de Rohan. + +"This man's faith was perfect; he loved the Holy Virgin as he might have +loved his wife. He was an ardent Catholic, but never said a word to me +about my want of religion. When he was dying he entreated me to spare +no expense that he might have every possible benefit of clergy. I had +a mass said for him every day. Often, in the night, he would tell me of +his fears as to his future fate; he feared his life had not been saintly +enough. Poor man! he was at work from morning till night. For whom, +then, is Paradise--if there be a Paradise? He received the last +sacrament like the saint that he was, and his death was worthy of his +life. + +"I alone followed him to the grave. When I had laid my only benefactor +to rest, I looked about to see how I could pay my debt to him; I found +he had neither family nor friends, neither wife nor child. But he +believed. He had a religious conviction; had I any right to dispute it? +He had spoken to me timidly of masses said for the repose of the dead; +he would not impress it on me as a duty, thinking that it would be a +form of repayment for his services. As soon as I had money enough I paid +to Saint-Sulpice the requisite sum for four masses every year. As the +only thing I can do for Bourgeat is thus to satisfy his pious wishes, on +the days when that mass is said, at the beginning of each season of the +year, I go for his sake and say the required prayers; and I say with +the good faith of a sceptic--'Great God, if there is a sphere which Thou +hast appointed after death for those who have been perfect, remember +good Bourgeat; and if he should have anything to suffer, let me suffer +it for him, that he may enter all the sooner into what is called +Paradise.' + +"That, my dear fellow, is as much as a man who holds my opinions can +allow himself. But God must be a good fellow; He cannot owe me any +grudge. I swear to you, I would give my whole fortune if faith such as +Bourgeat's could enter my brain." + + + +Bianchon, who was with Desplein all through his last illness, dares +not affirm to this day that the great surgeon died an atheist. Will not +those who believe like to fancy that the humble Auvergnat came to open +the gate of Heaven to his friend, as he did that of the earthly temple +on whose pediment we read the words--"A grateful country to its great +men." + + +PARIS, January 1836. + + + + +ADDENDUM + +The following personages appear in other stories of the Human Comedy. + + Bianchon, Horace + Father Goriot + Cesar Birotteau + The Commission in Lunacy + Lost Illusions + A Distinguished Provincial at Paris + A Bachelor's Establishment + The Secrets of a Princess + The Government Clerks + Pierrette + A Study of Woman + Scenes from a Courtesan's Life + Honorine + The Seamy Side of History + The Magic Skin + A Second Home + A Prince of Bohemia + Letters of Two Brides + The Muse of the Department + The Imaginary Mistress + The Middle Classes + Cousin Betty + The Country Parson + In addition, M. Bianchon narrated the following: + Another Study of Woman + La Grande Breteche + + Desplein + Cousin Pons + Lost Illusions + The Thirteen + The Government Clerks + Pierrette + A Bachelor's Establishment + The Seamy Side of History + Modeste Mignon + Scenes from a Courtesan's Life + Honorine + + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of The Atheist's Mass, by Honore de Balzac + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE ATHEIST'S MASS *** + +***** This file should be named 1220.txt or 1220.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + http://www.gutenberg.org/1/2/2/1220/ + +Produced by Dagny + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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