Joris-Karl Huysmans

“ These nuns have ceased to have women's voices; the quality is at once seraphic and manly. In their church you are either thrown back I know not how far into the depth of past ages, or shot forward into time to come, as they sing. They have outpourings of soul and tragical pauses, pathetic murmurs and ecstasies of passion, and sometimes they seem to rush to the assault, and storm certain Psalms at the bayonet's point. And they do assuredly achieve the most vehement leap that can be imagined from this world into the infinite. ”

“ The Abbé Plomb, in a mood for teasing, gave his spectacles a push, settling the arch above his nose, and rubbing his hands, remarked, very seriously,—
"Madame Bavoil, flowers and vegetables are but of trivial importance from the decorative and culinary point of view; the only rule that should guide you in your selection is the symbolical meaning, the virtues and vices ascribed to plants. Now, I am sorry to observe that your favourites are for the most part of evil augury." ”

“ Hildegarde we learn that the plant she calls Fern, or bracken, has magical properties.
"Just as sunshine disperses darkness, says the Abbess of Rupertsberg, the Fern puts nightmares to flight. The devil hates and flees from it, and thunder and hail rarely fall on spots where it takes shelter; also the man who wears it about him escapes witchcraft and spells." ”

“ According to the monk of Clairvaux, it is the false doctrine of the Jews and heretics; and as to the drops of resin, they are Christ's tears, if we may believe Saint Ambrose," replied the Abbé Plomb.
"And even so, our cathedral remains incomplete. We are but feeling our way, without logical sequence. I admit that at the entrance we must plant the purifying hyssop in the place of the holy-water vessel; but with what can we build the walls unless we accept the alternative of a real church having walls but unfinished?" ”

“ For the shape of the monstrance there is the sun-flower."
"Yes," interrupted the Abbé Plomb, wiping his spectacles, "but these are fancies borrowed simply from superficial resemblance; it is modern symbolism, which is really not symbolism at all. And is not this the case to a great extent with the various interpretations that you accept from Sister Emmerich? She died in 1824."
"What does that matter?" said Durtal. "Sister Emmerich was a primitive saint, a seer, whose body indeed lived in our day, but whose soul was far away; she dwelt more in the Middle Ages than in ours. ”

“ Why in these days, when for ten years past the Benedictine Sisters have made a study of Latin, when many of them translate from Hebrew and Greek and are skilled in exegesis, when others draw and paint the pages of missals, reviving the art of the illuminators of the Middle Ages, when others again—as, for instance, Mother Hildegarde—are organists of the highest attainment, you may easily understand that the woman who directs them all, the woman who has created in her Sisterhoods a school of practical mysticism and of religious art, is a very remarkable person ”

“ And to give variety by adding symbols of humility—the knotweed, the violet, and the hyssop—we may form a posy of which the meaning will represent the perfect virtues of Our Mother.
"Now," said he, pointing with his stick to the plan of the nave he had traced, "here is the altar, overgrown with red-leaved vines, purple or pearly grapes, sheaves of golden corn. Ah! but we must have a cross over the altar."
"That will not be difficult," replied the Abbé Gévresin. ”

“ The common white lily which grows in Europe, and which even before the Middle Ages was regarded by the Church as emblematic of virginity, does not seem to have existed in Palestine; and when, in the Song of Songs, the mouth of the Beloved is compared to a lily, it is evidently not in praise of white, but of red lips. The plant spoken of in the Bible as the lily of the valleys, or the lily of the fields, is neither more nor less than the anemone. ”

“ As he was going off, the Abbé Plomb called him back and said, laughing,—
"In your future cathedral you have forgotten to reserve a nook for Saint Columba, if, indeed, we can find some ascetic plant native, or at any rate common, to Ireland, the land where this Father was born."
"The thistle, figurative of mortification and penance and a memento of asceticism, is conspicuous as the badge of Scotland," replied Durtal. "But why Saint Columba?"
"Because of all saints he is the most neglected, the least invoked by those of our contemporaries who ought to be most assiduous ”

“ His housekeeper, quite scared, stood looking at the ground.
"Do not listen to him, Madame Bavoil," cried Durtal. "I have a less medical, and more religious, idea: cultivate a liturgical garden and emblematic vegetables; make a kitchen and flower garden that may set forth the glory of God and carry up our prayers in their language; and, in short, imitate the purpose of the Song of the Three Holy Children in the fiery furnace, when they called on all Nature, from the breath of the storm to the seed buried in the field, to Bless the Lord!"
"Very good!" exclaimed the Abbé Plomb ”

“ Flowers in general are emblematic of what is good. According to Durand of Mende, both flowers and trees represent good works, of which the virtues are the roots; according to Honorius, the hermit, green herbs are for wisdom; those in flower are for progress; those in fruit are the perfect souls; finally, we are told by old treatises on symbolical theology that all plants embody the allegory of the Resurrection, while the idea of eternity attaches more particularly to the vine, the cedar and the palm. ”

“ This scheme of implied meaning, though somewhat strange, in a literal presentment, a scene of actual grinding—the wheat in the grain, in flour, and in the Host—this obvious intention of ignoring the species, the appearances, and substituting the reality which is invisible to sense, must have been adopted by the painter in order to appeal to the masses, to bear witness to the certainty of the Miracle and to make the mystery evident to the people. ”

“ Saint Melito defines it as the Incarnation and the Scriptures; Raban Maur as the Preacher, the hypocrite, and the Gentiles; Saint Eucher as the sinner; the Anonymous monk of Clairvaux as Christ; and others which I have forgotten."
"These are many meanings for a single plant," observed Durtal. "But now if we want to specialize some chapels as dedicated to saints, nothing can be easier; at any rate, for such as have lent their names to plants. ”

“ Since, according to the Rationale of Durand of Mende, the sacristy is the very bosom of the Virgin, we will represent it by virginal plants such as the anemone, and trees such as the cedar, which Saint Ildefonso compares to Our Mother. And now, if we are to furnish the instruments of worship, we shall find in the ritual of the liturgy and in the very form of certain plants almost precise guidance. Thus, flax, of which the cornice and altar napery is to be woven, is indispensable ”

“ Can we, to begin with, compose a dictionary of plants representing the capital sins and their antithetical virtues, sketch a basis of operations, and pick out by certain rules the materials at the command of the mystic gardener? ”

“ Wherever you go, the voice of a nun preserves, merely by reason of her sex, a sort of emotion, a tendency to the cooing tone, and, it must be owned, a certain satisfaction in hearing herself when she knows that others can hear her; so that the Gregorian chant is never perfectly executed by nuns. ”

“ This plant is 'warm,' and imbibes its qualities from the light. Hence it can drive away melancholy, which, says St. Hildegarde, spoils men's good manners, making them utter speech contrary to God, on hearing which words the spirits of the air gather about him who has spoken them, and finally drive him mad.
"I may also tell you of the mandragora, a plant 'warm and watery,' that may symbolize the human being it resembles; and it is more susceptible than all other plants to the suggestion of the devil ”

“ Another interpretation to the credit of the palm!"
"But after all, you are absurd, our friend!" cried Madame Bavoil. "All this will not hold together. Your plants are the growth of different climates, and in any case they could not all be in bloom at the same time; consequently, by the time you have planted this, that will be dead. You can never grow them side by side."
"That is symbolical of many unfinished cathedrals, where the building is carried across from century to century," said Durtal, snapping his stick. ”

“ We have only to look at the transparent pictures let into the walls of our new churches to appreciate the incurable idiocy of painters who insist on treating window panes from cartoons, as they do subject pictures—and such subjects! ”

“ So plant whole fields of garlic, Madame Bavoil."
"The Father does not like it!"
"And then," the Abbé Plomb added, very seriously, "you must fill your mind from the books of Albertus Magnus, the Master of Saint Thomas Aquinas, who in the treatises ascribed to him on the Virtues of Herbs, the Wonders of the World, and the Secrets of Women, puts forth certain ideas, which, as I may hope, will not have been written in vain.
"He tells us that the plantain-root is a cure for headache and for ulcers; that mistletoe grown on an oak opens all locks ”

“ In point of fact, their particular function is not at all to bury themselves under the accumulated dust of ages, nor even to accept in substitution the sins and woes of others as the Orders of pure mortification do—the Carmelites and the Poor Clares. ”

“ The vine, of which the Lord said 'Ego vitis sum,' is also the emblem of communion and the image of the eighth beatitude; corn, which, as the Sacramental element, was the object of peculiar care and respect in the Middle Ages. ”

“ Theodoret for sin; Saint Jerome ascribes it to the devil; and Saint Bernard takes it as symbolizing humility. Again, in the 'Theologia Symbolica' of Maximilian Sandaeus, this shrub is made to signify the worldly prelacy, while the olive, vine, and fig, with which the author contrasts it, are the contemplative Orders. In this, no doubt, we may see an allusion to the thorns which Bishops were not always unready to thrust on the long-suffering Heads of monasteries.
"You have forgotten, too, in the blazonry of your chapel, the reed which formed the sceptre of mockery forced into the Son's hands. ”

“ I may add that the volume was printed privately by the Abbess herself, helped by some of the nuns, in a little hand-press belonging to the convent, and has never been in circulation. It is, in fact, an epitome of doctrine, the essential extract of her teaching, and was more especially intended for those of her daughters who are unable to have the benefit of her instruction and lectures, because they live away from Solesmes, in other convents that she has founded. ”

“ Thyme, on the contrary, according to Macer Floridus, cures snake-bites, fennel is a stimulant wholesome for women, and garlic taken fasting is a preservative against the ills we may contract from drinking strange waters, or changing from place to place. ”

“ At Saint Etienne, Caen, the monks washed their face and hands, and kneeling before the altar of Saint Benedict, said Lauds, the seven penitential Psalms, and the Litanies of the Saints. Then a lay brother presented the mould in which the wafers were to be baked, two at a time ”

“ For instance, the Valerian, known as Herb Saint George, the white flower with a hollow stem, which grows in moist, places, and its popular name is quite intelligible since it was used in treating nervous diseases, for which the saint's intercession was invoked. ”

“ Seven times a day the Benedictines do the homage required of the Elders in Heaven, as described by Saint John in the Apocalypse, and represented by sculptors as playing on instruments here at Chartres. ”

“ Still, I would not have you believe that the whole mission of the Benedictine Order consists in overhauling ancient manuscripts and reproducing ancient Antiphonals and curious chronicles. The Brother who has a talent for any art devotes himself to it, no doubt, if the Superior permits ”