J.-K. Huysmans

“ Then, too, Durtal was attracted to the Church by its intimate and ecstatic art, the splendour of its legends, and the radiant naïveté of the histories of its saints.
He did not believe, and yet he admitted the supernatural. Right here on earth how could any of us deny that we are hemmed in by mystery, in our homes, in the street,—everywhere when we came to think of it? It was really the part of shallowness to ignore those extrahuman relations and account for the unforeseen by attributing to fate the more than inexplicable. Did not a chance encounter often decide the entire life of a man? ”

“ Now the rich have their names and titles inscribed on the bells which they give to the churches, but they have so many qualities and titles that there is no room for a motto. Truly, humility is a forgotten virtue in our day."
"If that were the only forgotten virtue!" sighed Durtal.
"Ah!" replied Carhaix, not to be turned from his favourite subject, "and if this were the only abuse! But bells now rust from inactivity. The metal is no longer hammer-hardened and is not vibrant. Formerly these magnificent auxiliaries of the ritual sang without cease. ”

“ Carhaix rejoined, "why society—if it is as you have described it—should fall to pieces. I, too, think it is putrefied, its bones ulcerated, its flesh dropping off. It can neither be poulticed nor cured, it must be interred and a new one born. And who but God can accomplish such a miracle?"
"If we admit," said Des Hermies, "that the infamousness of the times is transitory, it is self-evident that only the intervention of a God can wash it away; for neither socialism nor any other chimera of the ignorant and hate-filled workers will modify human nature and reform the peoples. ”

“ Guardian of strident Neuroses, Leaden Tower of Hysteria, bloody Vase of Rape!
"Master, thy faithful servants, on their knees, implore thee and supplicate thee to satisfy them when they wish the torture of all those who love them and aid them; they supplicate thee to assure them the joy of delectable misdeeds unknown to justice, spells whose unknown origin baffles the reason of man; they ask, finally, glory, riches, power, of thee, King of the Disinherited, Son who art to overthrow the inexorable Father!" ”

“ Durtal went on, after a silence, "it is perhaps best that the case should be as it is. The rare artists who remain have no business to be thinking about the public. The artist lives and works far from the drawing-room, far from the clamour of the little fellows who fix up the custom-made literature. The only legitimate source of vexation to an author is to see his work, when printed, exposed to the contaminating curiosity of the crowd."
"That is," said Des Hermies, "a veritable prostitution. To advertise a thing for sale is to accept the degrading familiarities of the first comer." ”

“ Finally, the peasant learns to look with horror upon an old woman, Perrine Martin, who wanders around, clad in grey, her face covered—as is that of Gilles de Sillé—with a black stamin. She accosts children, and her speech is so seductive, her face, when she raises her veil, so benign, that all follow her to the edge of a wood, where men carry them off, gagged, in sacks. ”

“ In one visible phase a society woman, prudent and reserved, in another concealed phase a wild romantic, mad with passion, hysterical of body, nymphomaniac of soul. It hardly seemed probable.
"No," he said, "I am on the wrong track. It's merely by chance that Mme. Chantelouve spoke of my books to Des Hermies, and I mustn't jump to the conclusion that she is smitten with me and that she has been writing me these hot letters. It isn't she, but who on earth is it?" ”

“ Everywhere on lurid coloured paper in box car letters were the names of Boulanger and Jacques.
"Thank God, this will be over tomorrow."
"There is one resource left," said Des Hermies. "To escape the horrors of present day life never raise your eyes. Look down at the sidewalk always, preserving the attitude of timid modesty. When you look only at the pavement you see the reflections of the sky signs in all sorts of fantastic shapes; alchemic symbols, talismanic characters, bizarre pantacles with suns, hammers, and anchors, and you can imagine yourself right in the midst of the Middle Ages." ”

“ Gévingey went on, "the day when the grand sciences of the Middle Ages fell foul of the systematic and hostile indifference of an impious people was the death-day of the soul in France. All we can do now is fold our arms and listen to the wild vagaries of society, which by turns shrieks with farcical joy and bitter grief."
"We must not despair. A better time is coming," said Mme. Carhaix in a conciliating tone, and before she retired she shook hands with all her guests. ”

“ And as Durtal looked at him inquiringly, he continued, "You see I am well acquainted with Lyons. People's brains there are as foggy as the streets when the morning mists roll up from the Rhone. That city looks magnificent to travellers who like the long avenues, wide boulevards, green grass, and penitentiary architecture of modern cities. But Lyons is also the refuge of mysticism, the haven of preternatural ideas and doubtful creeds. That's where Vintras died, the one in whom, it seems, the soul of the prophet Elijah was incarnate. ”

“ I have seen a new Hyacinthe, talking like a silly little milliner in heat. All the nastinesses of women unite in her to exasperate me."
After a thoughtful silence he concluded, "I must be young indeed to have lost my head the way I did."
As if echoing his thought, Mme. Chantelouve, coming out through the portière, laughed nervously and said, "A woman of my age doing a mad thing like that!" She looked at him, and though he forced a smile she understood.
"You will sleep tonight," she said, sadly, alluding to Durtal's former complaints of sleeplessness on her account. ”

“ Surely nobody is cutting children's throats as in the days of Bluebeard and of abbé Guibourg."
"You mean that nobody is brought to justice for doing it. They don't assassinate now, but they kill designated victims by methods unknown to official science—ah, if the confessionals could speak!" cried the bell-ringer.
"But tell me, what class of people are these modern covenanters with the Devil?"
"Prelates, abbesses, mission superiors, confessors of communities; and in Rome, the centre of present-day magic, they're the very highest dignitaries," answered Des Hermies. ”

“ He finally flung himself on a couch and, enervated to the point of crying, he went through the back-breaking motions mechanically, like a dredge.
Never had he so execrated the flesh, never had he felt such repugnance and lassitude, as when he issued from that room. He strolled haphazard down the rue Soufflot, and the image of the unknown obsessed him, more irritating, more tenacious.
"I begin to understand the superstition of the succubus. I must try some bromo-exorcism. Tonight I will swallow a gram of bromide of potassium. That will make my senses be good." ”

“ He who had renounced all carnal relations years ago, who, when the barns of his senses were opened, contented himself with driving the disgusting herd of sin to the commercial shambles to be summarily knocked in the head by the butcher girls of love, he, he! was getting himself to believe—in the teeth of all experience, in the teeth of good judgment—that with a woman as passionate as this one seemed to be, he would experience superhuman sensations and novel abandon. ”

“ In an unsparing humility, doubtless, He had willed to suffer the Passion with all the suffering permitted to the human senses, and, obeying an incomprehensible ordination, He, in the time of the scourging and of the blows and of the insults spat in His face, had put off divinity, nor had He resumed it when, after these preliminary mockeries, He entered upon the unspeakable torment of the unceasing agony. Thus, dying like a thief, like a dog, basely, vilely, physically, He had sunk himself to the deepest depth of fallen humanity and had not spared Himself the last ignominy of putrefaction. ”