Bernard Capes

“ Bembo stooped, kneeling, and laid one hand softly on his shoulder.
'Poor Cicada,' he said, 'poor Cicada! Alas! I am a child where I had hoped a man, and my head sinks beneath the waters. Tired am I, and fain to go rest my head in a lap that erst invited me. Return thou to thy bottle, as I to my love.'
The Fool, trailing himself up on his knees, caught his hands in a wild, convulsive clutch.
'Fiend or angel!' he cried, 'thou shall not!—The woman!—The skirts of the scarlet woman! Go rest thyself—not there—but in peace. From this moment I abjure it—dost hear, I abjure it? ”

“ What had the fool dared in rejecting her!
To touch the perfumed essence of sin with a rebuke which was like a caress—that, pace his monks, was Bernardo's rendering of the Gospel; and who shall say that, in its girlish tenderness, its earnest emotionalism, it was not the most dangerous method of all? Not every adulterous woman is fit to meet the gentle fate of Christ's. It is not always well to doctor too much kindness with more. Surfeit, surely, is not safely cured, unless by a God, with sugar-plums. ”

“ The wind blew from Florence, and all the peaceful vales, so long trodden into a bloody mire, were awakening to the ecstasy of the Promise. That men interpreted according to their lights—lights burning fast and passionate in most places, but in a few quiet and holy. ”

“ She held her peace during two minutes.
'Who taught you to play it, Saint?'
'It was one of the fathers. What would it profit you to know which?'
'Nothing at all. I trow he was a good master to that and your gospel.'
'My gospel?'
'Ay, of love. He has made you worldly-wise for a saint. Hast ever before been beyond thy walls?'
'Of course.'
'And studied this and that? Experience, methinks is the right nurse for such a creed. What made you accuse me of dishonour?'
'I did not.'
'Nay, is that to be a saint?'
'Whom the shoe fits, let her wear it.'
'Bernardo! ”

“ Where got you the shoe, I say? An eavesdropper is well equipped for a prophet.'
'I am no eavesdropper.'
'Who enlightened you?'
'Your cicisbeo.'
'Under that title?'
'Nay; it is not the devil's policy to call himself devil.'
A shorter pause.
'But you had heard of me?'
'Nothing escapes the Church's hearing. Besides, Messer Lanti's summer lodge is within call, one may say of San Zeno.'
'You are daring. Dost know in what high favour he stands with the Duke?'
'Else how could he have compassed Uriah's dismissal to the wars?'
Silence, and then a sigh. ”