Anatole France

“ Failing to realize the necessary relation between individual endeavour and the mechanism of the universe, we fondly imagine that our efforts are directed to our own advantage against the rest of the machine. Work gives us illusory determination, strength and independence, and makes us as gods in our own eyes. We appear to ourselves as so many heroes, genii, demons, demiurges, gods—yes, as God Himself. And, in fact, man has always conceived of God as a worker. Thus it was that the removal restored Madame Bergeret’s natural gaiety and the joyous energy of her physical strength. ”

“ As the twilight fell, they commenced to stroll slowly along the great avenue of the park. Before them the château rose up, in the dapple grey sky, with its heavy façade laden with pediments and crowned with the high-pitched roofs of the Empire period.
“I am convinced,” said M. de Brécé, “as I said before, that the fuss made over this affair is, and can only be, some abominable plot instigated by the enemies of France.”
“And of religion,” gently added Abbé Guitrel. “It is impossible to be a good Frenchman without being a good Christian. ”

“ Gustave Dellion loved an automobile, and not, like Bonmont, with an already satiated love. He gazed at the vehicle which, in spite of the stiffness of modern body-work, looked like a great animal, a conventional, banal, though well-behaved monster, with an apology for a head between the lamps that looked like two huge eyes.
“Not such a bad puff-puff,” whispered young Bonmont to his friend. “Why don’t you buy it?”
“Buy it? Can you do anything you like when you are so unfortunate as to possess a father!” sighed Gustave Dellion. “You don’t know what a nuisance a family is—what a worry.” ”

“ You cannot blame a woman if she has lovers belonging to her own set. But her newest, dearest, her one and only love, Raoul Marcien, had not been one of the Baron’s friends. He did not belong to the world of sale and barter. She had met him in a most select circle of Catholic Royalist society somewhere in the provinces. He was himself as good as a nobleman. This time she had firmly believed she was going to satisfy her desire for love, and delicate, refined intimacy, that at last she had found the chivalrous lover with noble and beautiful feelings of whom she had so long dreamed. ”

“ They do not need many, and a few simple fables suffice to gild millions of lives. In short, truth has no hold on mankind, and it would be a pity if she had, for her ways are contrary to their nature, as well as to their interests.”
“You are like the Greeks, M. Bergeret,” said M. Leterrier. “You indulge in fine sophisms, and your reasonings are tuned to the flute of Pan. And yet, I believe with Renan, I believe with Émile Zola, that truth possesses within herself a penetrating force, unknown alike to error and to falsehood. ”

“ And his gaze spoke of simple, mysterious thoughts, common alike to the thoughtful beasts and simple men of the earth.
Tired, perhaps, with the intellectual effort he had made for the purpose of entering into communication with a human being, he closed his beautiful eyes, and, yawning widely, revealed his pink mouth, his curled-up tongue, and his array of dazzling teeth.
M. Bergeret put his hand into the dog’s mouth, and allowed him to lick it, at which old Angélique gave a smile of relief.
“A more affectionate little creature doesn’t breathe,” she said. ”

“ M. Bergeret put him down on the carpet, and regarded him with interest.
“Isn’t he pretty?” said the servant.
“No, he is not pretty,” replied M. Bergeret. “But he is engaging, and has beautiful eyes. That is what people used to say about me,” added the professor, “when I was three times as old, and not half as intelligent. Since then I have no doubt acquired an outlook upon the universe which he will never attain. But, in comparison with the Absolute, I may say that my knowledge equals his in the smallness of its extent. Like his, it is a geometrical point in the infinite.” ”

“ Madame de Courtrai, who did not care for theories, turned her fierce, masculine old face towards the General:
“Well, General, as, thank God, the Army is respected by every one, as you say it is the only force that keeps us together, why should it not also rule us? Why not send a colonel with his regiment to the Palais Bourbon and the Élysée——?”
She stopped short, as she saw the clouded brow of the General.
The Duke beckoned to M. Lerond.
“You have never seen the library, have you, M. Lerond? I will show it to you. You are fond of old books, and I am sure you will be interested.” ”

“ The miraculous statue was covered by a veil, and stood just over the altar. But above the holy-water stoup, painted in bright colours upon the wall was a full-length figure of Notre-Dame de Lourdes, girdled with blue.
The General looked at her with a set expression derived from fifty years of mechanical respect, and gazed at her blue scarf as though it had been the flag of a friendly nation. He had always been looked upon as something of a mystic, and had considered a belief in the future life to be the very base and foundation-stone of military regulations. ”

“ On the other hand, she pleased M. Bergeret, who was at last enjoying peace in his house and deliverance from all his troubles.
His books, which heretofore had been despised and thrown about, were now displayed upon long shelves in the big sunny room. There he could work in quiet at his Virgilius nauticus, and indulge freely in silent orgies of meditation. Before the window a young plane tree gently waved its pointed leaves, and, farther away, a dark buttress of Saint-Exupère reared its jagged pinnacle, in which grew a cherry tree, doubtless planted there by a bird. ”

“ But we know quite well that, as a matter of fact, the progress of truth is very slight and very slow, and encroaches but little upon falsehood.”
“You are evidently not here referring to scientific truths,” said M. Leterrier. “Their progress is rapid, irresistible, and salutary.”
“It is, unfortunately, beyond all question,” replied M. Bergeret, “that the scientific verities which penetrate the average mind sink as though in a swamp, and drown. They cause no upheaval and are powerless to destroy error and prejudice. ”

“ Think of the beautiful words of Renan; I wish I could remember them exactly: ‘What makes a nation is the memory of the great things its people have done together, and the will they have to accomplish others.’”
“Excellent!” said M. de Terremondre. “But as I have not the will to accomplish great things with the Jews, I remain an Anti-Semite.”
“Are you quite sure that it is possible for your feelings to be wholly anti-Jewish?” asked M. Bergeret. ”

“ At the sound of the bell Riquet leapt down from the couch he was sharing with his master, and, with one eye on the door, set up a terrific barking. When M. Leterrier came into the room, the dog received him with hostile growls; the portly form and full, grave countenance fringed with grey beard, were not familiar to him.
“You too!” murmured the rector gently.
“Please excuse him,” said M. Bergeret. “He is a domesticated animal. When men undertook the training of his forefathers, and, in so doing, formed the characteristics he has inherited, they themselves regarded a stranger as an enemy. ”

“ In a week I shall be fifty-six!”
“And so Madame Péchin really insists on being immortal?” asked M. Bergeret.
“She is convinced that she is immortal,” answered the doctor. “If you told her that she was not, she would take a dislike to you, and disbelieve you all the same.”
“And the idea of having to go on for ever amid the universal passing of things does not astonish her? She does not tire of nourishing such exaggerated hopes? Perhaps she has not given much thought to the nature of man and the conditions of life?” ”

“ M. Guitrel took young Bonmont’s hands in both his.
“Never doubt my affection for you, my son; it is the love of a father for his child; I might even say that it is a maternal love as well, and thus express more fully all that it contains both of strength and tenderness. I have watched you grow up, my dear Ernest, since that day on which you made so excellent a first communion, to this moment, in which you are accomplishing your noble duty as a soldier in our great French Army, which, day by day, I am thankful to say, grows more Christian and more pious. ”

“ From her labours Madame Bergeret derived moral assistance, for it is good for mankind to work. It takes a man’s mind off his own life and turns him away from dreadful self-examination; it keeps him from that which makes solitude unbearable, the contemplation of that other being, his real self. It is the sovereign remedy for moral and æsthetic obsessions. Work is also excellent, in that it panders to our vanity, hides from us our impotence, and flatters us with the hope of something good to come. ”

“ The news came to him one day, after his removal to his new rooms in the Place Saint-Exupère, at the very moment when he least expected it. His joy at the event was greater than his progress in ataraxy should have allowed. Vague and flattering hopes arose within him, and when M. Goubin, who had become his favourite pupil since the betrayal of M. Roux, came that same evening to take him for their usual stroll to the Café de la Comédie, he found him beaming all over with smiles.
The night was bright with stars, and as he went along the uneven pavements, M. Bergeret studied the sky. ”

“ He hung his views of Naples and Vesuvius, legacies both, on the walls of his study. Now of all the delights permitted to a respectable man, there is perhaps none which procures him such tranquil enjoyment as that of knocking nails into a wall. The keenest pleasure of that experienced voluptuary, Comte de Caylus, was unpacking cases of Etruscan pottery. Thus M. Bergeret proceeded to hang up on his wall an old water-colour representing Vesuvius, adorned with an aigrette of flame and smoke, standing out against the dark blue sky of midnight. ”

“ The man under discussion, Loyer the senator, keeper of the seals and Minister of Public Worship, was an insignificant-looking old bachelor, honest enough outside politics, a bit of a lawyer, and a philosopher, whose hair had turned grey in the enjoyment of clandestine love and tavern nights. As he had not made his entry into society until somewhat late in life, the women he met there were a continual source of wonder to him, as he devoured them with gold-spectacled eyes. ”

“ It was exceedingly necessary that Raoul should pass for an honourable man. In public and in private, ministers maintained that the power and glory of France and the peace of the whole world depended upon this.
His honour was of public utility, and each and all did their best to make it an established fact. The Government worked to this end, as did the lawyers and the newspapers, in fact all good citizens worked joyfully for its establishment. Madame de Bonmont experienced both pleasure and uneasiness at the sudden transformation of her lover into an example and a model for all Frenchmen. ”

“ She opened her heart, however, and in a tearful voice said to the Abbé:
“Don’t you think, M. l’Abbé, that when a man is young and has a fine future before him, he ought not to give way to discouragement and depression? Ought he not, on the contrary, to avoid all sad thoughts?”
“Certainly, Madame la Baronne, certainly,” replied M. l’Abbé Guitrel. “We must never give way to discouragement, or abandon ourselves to grief without cause. A good Christian never encourages gloomy thoughts, Madame la Baronne, that is quite certain.”
“Do you hear, M. Marcien?” asked Madame de Bonmont. ”

“ She painted in glowing colours her life in the little Flemish town where she would live with her mother and her two younger daughters. There she hoped to grow young again, to be brilliant and admired, to have attention offered her, and to find sympathy. Who could say whether, once the decree nisi was granted in her favour, a second and wealthy marriage were not awaiting her in her native town? Was it not quite possible that she might marry a good-tempered, sensible man, a country gentleman, an agriculturist or a Government official, somebody quite different from M. Bergeret? ”

“ As we examine ourselves, let us uncover our true countenance, which is rough and violent like that of our forefathers, and, as we have the advantage over them of a longer tradition, let us at least recognize the sequence and continuity of our ignorance.”
Thus pondered M. Bergeret, as he settled himself in his new abode. He was not sad, neither was he glad, as he reflected that he would always yearn in vain for Madame de Gromance, not realizing the fact that she was only precious to him by virtue of the craving which she inspired. ”

“ He died in possession of all his wealth, leaving behind him a gay young widow, and a boy, who, with his short, squat figure, lowering brows, and already pitiless heart, closely resembled his father. Madame de Bonmont had kept Montil, of which she was very fond.
She led Madame Hortha to the spiral staircase, the interlacing stonework of which repeated interminably in its intertwinings the emblematic peacock of Bernard de Paves tied by the foot to the lute of Nicolette de Vaucelles. Then, picking up her skirts with a sudden, abrupt gesture, not without a charm of its own, she followed her. ”

“ The Catholic town of Tourcoing must shine out on the whole of the Catholic world. Should His Holiness judge me worthy to fill the seat of the blessed St. Loup, I swear in ten years’ time to have won all hearts by the sacred energy of good works; to have stolen back all the souls gone over to the enemy and to re-establish around me the oneness of belief. In the depths of her innermost soul, France is Christian, and only needs energetic leaders. The Church is dying from sheer inanition. ”