Paul the Minstrel and Other Stories, Arthur Christopher Benson [paper ebook reader TXT] 📗

one, remember this--the flowers were mine, and you did desire them. God sends us gifts sometimes and sometimes not; when He sends them, it is well to take them gratefully, thus--but if He gives them not, and the voice within says, 'Then will I take them,' we must fly from temptation. Do you understand that, little one?" The child stood considering a moment, and then shyly gave the flowers back. "Ay, that is right," said Herbert, "but you may take them now--God gives them to you!" and he stooped and kissed the child on the forehead.

A few days after the old physician came again to see Herbert, evidently troubled. He told Herbert that he had consulted his friend, who could make nothing of the case. "He said--" he added, and then stopped short. "Nay, I will tell you," he went on, "for in such a matter we may not hesitate. He said that it was a delusion of the mind, not of the eye--and that it was more a case for a priest than for a doctor." "He is right," said Herbert. "I had even thought of that--and I will do what I ought to have done before. I will take my story to my lord the Bishop and I will ask his advice; he is my friend, and he has been a true father to my spirit--and he is a good and holy man as well."

So Herbert wrote to the Bishop, and the Bishop appointed a day to see him. The cathedral city was but a few miles from Parbridge, and Herbert went thither by boat because he was not strong enough to walk. The river ran through a flat country, with distant hills on a far horizon; the clear flowing of the water, the cool weedy bowers and gravelled spaces seen beneath, and the green and glistening rushes that stood up so fresh and strong out of the ripple pleased Herbert's tired mind; he tried much to think what he would say to the Bishop; but he could frame no arguments and thought it best to leave it, and to say what God might put in his mouth to say.

He found the Bishop writing in a little panelled room that gave on a garden. He was in his purple cassock; he rose at Herbert's entrance, and greeted him very kindly. The Bishop's face was smooth and fresh-coloured and lit with a pleasant light of benevolence. He was an active man, and loved little businesses, which he did with all his might. He, like all that knew Herbert, loved him and found pleasure in his company. So Herbert took what courage he might--though he saw somewhat that he was both grieved and surprised to see--and told his story, though his heart was heavy, and he thought somehow that the Bishop would not understand him. While he spoke the Bishop's face grew very grave, for he did not love things out of the common; but he asked him questions from time to time--and when Herbert said that the trouble had come upon him after a stroke of the sun, the Bishop's face lightened a little, and he said that the sun at its hottest had great power.

When Herbert had quite finished, the Bishop said courteously that he thought it was a case for a physician, and Herbert said that he had himself thought so, but that the doctors could do nothing, but had sent him back to the priests. Then the Bishop made as though he would speak, and cleared his throat, but spake nothing. At last he said, "Dear son, this is a strange and heavy affliction; but I think it will give way to rest and quiet--and prayer," he added a little shamefacedly. "These bodies of ours are delicate instruments, and if we work them too hard--as methinks you have done--they get overstrained in the place in which we drive them; and just as a scholar who has been disordered dreams of books, and as a doctor thus afflicted would have grievous fancies of diseases, so you, my dear son, who have been a very faithful priest, are thus sadly concerned with the souls of the flock of Christ--and so my advice is that you go and rest; and if you will, I will send you a little priest to help you for awhile--or you may travel abroad for a time, and see fresh things; and, dear son, if there be any narrowness of means, I will myself supply your necessities, and deem the money well lent to the Lord--and so be comforted!"--and he put out his hand to bless him.

Herbert was moved by the Bishop's kindness; but he felt that the Bishop did not see the matter aright, but thought it all a sad delusion; and he made up his mind to speak. So he said, "Dear father and my lord, forgive me if I speak yet further--for I am greatly moved by your kindness, but in this case there is need of great frankness. It is not indeed as your goodness thinks; indeed there is no delusion, but a real and yet grievous power of sight--which I pray God would remove from me--and that as He took the scales off the eyes of the blessed Paul, so I pray that He would put them back on mine. For I see the things I would not, and to me is revealed what ought to be hidden."

Then the Bishop looked a little angered by Herbert's insistence, and said, "Dear son, if this were a gift of God to you, it would be more than He gave even to the blessed Apostles, for we read of no such gift being given to man. Some He made apostles, and some evangelists, but we hear not that He made any to see the very secrets of the soul--such sight is given to God alone--and indeed, dear son, for I will use the same frankness as yourself, it seems to me but a chastening from God. He delivers even those He loves (like the blessed Paul himself, and Austin, and others whom I need not name) to Satan to be buffeted; and though I have myself no fault to find with your ministration, it is plain to me that God is not satisfied, and by His chastening would lead you higher yet."

"But come, for I will ask you a question. This light that you speak of, that plays about the heads (is it so?) of other men, is it always there? Has it, to ask an instance, appeared to you with me? I charge you to speak to me with entire freedom in this matter." So Herbert raised his eyes, and looked the Bishop in the face, and said very gravely, "Yes, dear father, it doth appear."

Then the Bishop's face changed a little, and Herbert saw that he was moved; then the Bishop said with a kind of smile, as though he forced himself, "And what is it like?" And Herbert said, looking shamefacedly upon the ground, "Must I answer the question truly?" And the Bishop said, "Yes, upon your vows." Then Herbert said, "Dear father, it is strangely dark and angry." Then the Bishop, knitting his brows, said, "Does it seem so? And how is this a true light? My son, I speak to you plainly; I am a sinner indeed--we are all such--but my whole life is spent in labour for God's Church, and I can truly say that from hour to hour I think not of carnal things, but all my desire is to feed and keep the flock. How dost thou interpret that?" And Herbert, very low, said, "My lord, must I speak?" And the Bishop said, "Yes, upon your vows." Then Herbert said very slowly and sadly, "My lord, I know indeed that your heart is with the work of the Lord, and that you labour abundantly. But can it be--I speak as a faithful son, and sore unwilling--that you have your pleasure in this work, and think of yourself as a profitable servant?"

Then the Bishop looked very blackly upon him and said, "You take too much upon yourself, my son. This is indeed the messenger of Satan that hath you in his grip; but I will pray for you if the Lord will heal you--it may be that there is some dark sin upon your mind; and if so pluck it out of the heart. But we will talk no more; I will only tell you to rest and pray, and think not of these lights and flashes, which are never told of in Holy Church, except in the case of those who are held of evil." And he rose and made a gesture that Herbert should go; so Herbert kissed the Bishop's hand and went very sadly out, for it seemed as though his burden was too great for him to bear.

There followed very sad and weary days when Herbert hardly knew how he could bear the sorrow that pressed upon him. But he preached diligently, and went in and out among his people. And in that time he helped many sad souls and set struggling feet upon the right road, though he knew it not and even cared not.

One day he was walking in the street, and came past a little mean house that lay on the outskirts of the town. There was a small and pitiful garden, sadly disordered, that lay in front of the house. Here there dwelt a wretched man named John, who had done an evil deed in his youth. He had robbed his mother, it was said, a poor and crippled woman, of her little savings; she had struggled hard for her all, but he had beaten her off, and done her violence, and she, between grief and disease, had died. In her last hour she had told the tale; her son had been driven from his employment, and the hearts of all had turned against him. He had left the place, but a few years after he had returned, a man old before his time, with a sore disease upon him, in which all readily saw the wise judgment of God.

He had settled in the little house which had been his mother's before him, and had stood vacant. But none would admit him to their houses or give him work. Occasionally, when labour was short, he had a task given him; but he was slow and feeble, and those that worked with him mocked and derided him. He bore all mockeries patiently and silently, with a kind of hunted look; but none pitied him, and the very children of the street would point at him, call him murderer, and throw stones at him. He would seek at times to do a kindness to the poor and sorrowful by stealth, but his help was often refused even with anger.

Herbert had seen a little sight a few days before that stuck in his mind. He had been passing along the road that led into the country, and had seen some way ahead of him a little child, a girl, with a heavy burden. She had put it down by the wood to rest, when John came suddenly upon her from a lane, where he had been wandering, as his manner was. The girl had seemed frightened, but Herbert, making haste to join them--for he too had a great suspicion of the man--saw him speak gently to her and lift up her burden, and walk on with her. Herbert followed afar off, but gained on the pair, and as he came up heard him speaking to her, and as Herbert thought, telling her a simple story about the birds and flowers. The child was listening half timidly, when from a gate beside the road, which