Part 9

"Ah, that is all the nobles know!" she answered, quietly enough, but with some fire in the old eyes. "They do not realise that we are men, just as they are. God sent us into His world, with just as much, body and soul, as He did them. We have intellects, and hearts, and consciences, just like them. ('Just like'--only fancy!) I trust the good God may not have to teach it them through pain."

"But they ought to be satisfied," said I. "I am perfectly content with my place in the world. Why are they not contented?"

"It is easier to be content with velvet than duffle," said Marguerite more calmly. "It looks better, and feels softer, too. If my Damoiselle were to try the duffle for a day, perhaps she would complain that it felt harsh."

"To me, very likely," said I. "But a villein would not have a fine skin like mine."

"The finest skin does not always cover the finest feelings," said Marguerite in her dry way.

What a very silly idea! Of course those people cannot have such feelings as I have. It would be quite absurd to think so.

I do think, however, that what vexed me most of any thing, was that Amaury--that silly little boy!--should take it into his head to lecture Guy on the way he chose to govern. As if he could know anything about it! Why, he is two whole years younger than Guy. I told him so, feeling really vexed at his impudence; and what should he say but that I was seven years younger than he. I know that, but I am a woman; and women have always more sense than men. At least, I have more sense than Amaury. I should be an idiot if I had not.

I have made a discovery to-day which has astonished me. Lady Judith has a whole Bible, and Psalter too, of her own, not written in Latin, but in her own tongue in which she was born,--that is, Greek. And she says that a great part of the Bible--all the holy Evangels, and the writings of Messeigneurs the holy Apostles--were originally written in Greek. I always thought that holy Scripture had been written in Latin. I asked her if Latin were not the language the holy angels spoke, and our Lord, when He was upon earth. She answered, that she did not think we knew what language the holy angels spoke, and she should doubt if it were any tongue spoken on earth: but that the good God, and Messeigneurs the holy Apostles, she had no doubt at all, spoke Greek. It sounds very strange.

Lady Isabel has had a violent quarrel with her lord, and goes about with set lips and her head erect, as if she were angry with every one.

I almost think Eschine improves upon acquaintance. Not that I find her any cleverer than I expected, but I think she is good-natured, and seems to have no malice in her. If Amaury storms--as he does sometimes--she just lets the whirlwind blow over her, and never gives him a cross word. I could not do that. I suppose that is why I admire it in Eschine.

A young nun came this morning to visit Lady Judith--one of her own Order. I could not quite understand their conversation. Sister Eudoxia--for that is her name--struck me as being the holiest religious person I have ever seen. She spoke so beautifully, I thought, about the perfection one could attain to in this life: how one's whole heart and soul might be so permeated with God, that one might pass through life without committing any deed of sin, or thinking any evil thought. Not, of course, that I could ever attain to such perfection But it sounded very beautiful and holy.

I was quite surprised to see how constrained, and even cool, Lady Judith was. It was only yesterday that she assented warmly to old Marguerite's saying that no one who served God could love any kind of sin. But with Sister Eudoxia--who spoke so much more charmingly on the same subject--she sat almost silent, and when she did speak, it seemed to be rather in dissent than assent. It puzzled me.

When Sister Eudoxia was gone, Lady Sybil said--

"Oh, what happiness, if one could attain to the perfection of living absolutely without sin!"

"We shall," answered Lady Judith. "But it will not be in this world."

"But Sister Eudoxia says it might be."

"Ah, my poor Sister Eudoxia!" said Lady Judith sadly. "She has taken up with a heresy nearly as old as Christianity itself, and worse than than that of Messire Renaud de Montluc, because it has so much more truth in it. Ay, so much mixture of truth, and so much apparent loveliness, that it can be no wonder if it almost deceive the very elect. Beware of being entangled in it, my children."

"Heresy, holy Mother!" cried Lady Sybil, with a shocked look. "I thought I had never heard any one ascribe more of the glory of our salvation to God than she did. For she said that every thing was done for us by the good Lord, and that even our perfection was wrought by Him for us."

"And not by Him in us," said Lady Judith. "The very point of the heresy, my child. Eudoxia sees no distinction between the righteousness done for us, which is our ground of justification before God, and the holiness wrought in us, which is our conformity to His image. The first was finished on the rood, eleven centuries ago: the second goes on in the heart of every child of God, here and now. She is one of those who, without intending it, or even knowing that they do it, do yet sadly fail to realise the work of the Holy Ghost.

"But how much she spoke of the blessed Spirit!" objected Lady Sybil.

"My daughter," said Lady Judith, with a smile, "hast thou not yet found out the difference between names and things? There are many men who worship God most devoutly, but it is a God they have made to themselves. Every man on earth is ready to love and serve God with his whole heart,--if he may set up God after his own pattern. And what that really means is, a God as like as possible to himself: who will look with perfect complacency on the darling sins which he cherishes, and may then be allowed to condemn with the utmost sternness all evil passions to which he is not addicted."

"That sounds _very_ shocking, holy Mother!" said Lady Sybil.

"We are all liable to the temptation," replied Lady Judith, "and are apt to slide into it ere we know it."

We all wrought for a little time in silence, when Lady Sybil said, "What do you call that heresy, holy Mother, into which you say that Sister Eudoxia has fallen?"

"If thou wilt look into the vision of the Apostle, blessed John, called the Apocalypse," answered Lady Judith, "thou wilt see what Christ our Lord calls it. 'This thou hast, that thou rejectest the teaching of the Nicolaitanes, which I hate."'

"But I thought," said Lady Sybil, looking rather surprised, "that those Nicolaitanes, who were heretics in the early Church, held some very horrible doctrines, and led extremely wicked lives? The holy Patriarch was speaking of them, not long ago."

"Ah, my child," said Lady Judith, "men do not leap, but grow, into great wickedness. Dost thou not see how the doctrine works? First, it is possible to live and do no sin. Secondly, _I_ can live and do no sin. Thirdly, I do live and not sin. Lastly, when this point is reached,--Whatever my spiritual instinct does not condemn--I being thus perfect--cannot be sin. Therefore, I may do what I please. If I lie, murder, steal--which would be dreadful sins in another--they are no sins in me, because of my perfection. And is this following Christ?"

"Assuredly not! But does Sister Eudoxia really imagine that?"

"Oh no!" responded Lady Judith. "She has not reached that point. Comparatively few get so far on the road as that. But that is whither the road is leading them."

"Then what is the root of the heresy?"

"That which I believe lies at the root of every heresy--rejecting God's Word, that we may keep our own traditions. The stem may perhaps consist of two things; the want of sufficient lowliness, and the want of a right knowledge of sin. It is not enough realised that a man's conscience, like all else in him, has been injured by the fall, but conscience is looked on as a heavenly judge, still in its original purity. This, as thou mayest guess, leads to depreciation of the Word of God, and exaltation of the conscience over the Word. And also, it is not properly seen that while a man lives, the flesh shall live with him, and the flesh and the renewed spirit must be in perpetual warfare to the end."

"But we know----" said Lady Sybil,--and there she paused.

"'We know'!" repeated Lady Judith, with a smile. "Ah, my child, we think we know a great deal. And we are like children playing on the seashore, who fancy that they know all that is in the sea, because they have scooped up a little sea-water in their hands. There are heights and depths in God's Word and in God's purposes, which you and I have never reached yet,--which perhaps we shall never reach. 'For as the heaven is high above the earth, so are His ways higher than our ways, and His thoughts than our thoughts.'"

I was curious to know what Marguerite would say: she always agrees so strangely with Lady Judith, even when they have not talked the matter over at all. So I said, when I went up to change my dress--

"Margot, dost thou commit sin?"

"My Damoiselle thinks me so perfect, then?" said she, with a rather comical look.

I could not help laughing.

"Well, not quite, when thou opposest my will," said I; "but dost thou know, there are some people who say that they live without sin."

"That may be, when to contradict the holy Evangels is a mark of perfection," said Marguerite drily.

"Well, what hast thou heard about that in thy listening, Margot?" said I, laughing.

"The first thing I heard perplexed me," said she. "It was of Monseigneur Saint John, who said that he that is born of God doth not commit sin: and it troubled me sorely for a time, since I knew I did sin, and feared lest I was therefore not born of God. But one day, Father Eudes read again, from the very same writing, that 'If any man sin, we have an Advocate with the Father,' and likewise that if we say we have no sin, we are liars. So then I thought, Well! how is this? Monseigneur the holy Apostle would not contradict himself. But still I could not see how to reconcile them, though I thought and thought, till my brain felt nearly cracked. And all at once, Father Eudes read--thanks be to the good God!--something from Monseigneur Saint Paul, which put it all right."

"What was that?"

"Ah! I could not get it by heart. It was too difficult, and very long. But it was something like this: that in a Christian man there are two hearts, of which the one, which is from God, does not sin at all; and the other, which is the evil heart born in us, is always committing sin."

"But, Margot, which of thy two hearts is thyself?"

"Ha! I cannot answer such questions. The good God will know."

"But art thou sure those are not wicked people?"

"Certainly, no. Monseigneur Saint Paul said 'I' and 'me' all through."

"Oh, but, Margot!--he could not have meant himself."

"If he had not meant what he said, I should think he would have mentioned it," said Marguerite in her dry, quaint style.

"Well, a holy Apostle is different, of course," said I. "But it looks very odd to me, that anybody living now should fancy he never does wrong."

"Ah, the poor soul!" said Marguerite. "The good God knows better, if he do not."

*CHAPTER VIII.*

_*AS GOOD AS MOST PEOPLE*_*.*

The best way to see Divine light is to put out your own candle.

This morning the Lady Princess of Antioch visited the Lady Queen, and remained for the day, taking her departure only just before the gates were closed, for she preferred to camp out at night. She is quite young, and is a niece of the Lady Queen. After she was gone, we were talking about her in the bower, and from her we came to speak of the late Princess, her lord's mother.

"Pray do not talk of her!" said Lady Isabel. "She made herself a bye-word by her shameless behaviour."

"Only thoughtless," remonstrated Lady Sybil gently. "I never thought she deserved what was said of her."

"Oh no!--you never think anybody does," sneered her sister. "I could not have associated with such a woman. She must have known what was said of her. I wonder that she was brazen enough to show herself in public at all."

"But think, Isabel! I do not believe she did know. You know she was not at all clever."

"She was half-witted, or not much better," was the answer. "Oh yes, I know that. But she must have known."

"I do not think she did!" said Lady Sybil earnestly.

"Then she ought to have known!" sharply replied Lady Isabel. "I wonder they did not shut her up. She was a pest to society."

"O Isabel!" deprecated her sister. "She was very good-natured."

"Sybil, I never saw any one like you! You would have found a good word for Judas Iscariot."

"Hardly," said Lady Sybil, just as gently as before. "But perhaps I might have helped finding evil ones."

"There are pearl-gatherers and dirt-gatherers," quietly remarked Lady Judith, who had hitherto listened in silence. "The latter have by far the larger cargo, but the handful of the former outweighs it in value."

"What do you mean, holy Mother?" inquired Lady Isabel, turning quickly to her--rather too sharply, I thought, to be altogether respectful.

"Only 'let her that thinketh she standeth, take heed lest she fall,'" said Lady Judith, with a quiet smile.

"I?" said Lady Isabel, with a world of meaning in her tone.

"My child," was the reply, "they that undertake to censure the cleanness of their neighbours' robes, should be very careful to avoid any spot on the purity of their own. Dost thou not remember our Lord's saying about the mote and the beam?"

"Well," said Lady Isabel, bringing her scissors together with a good deal of snap, "I think that those who associate with such people as the Princess Constantia bring a reflection on their own characters. Snow and soot do not go well together."

"The soot defiles the snow," responded Lady Judith. "But it does not affect the sunbeam."

"I do not understand you," said Lady Isabel bluntly.

"Those who confide in their own strength and goodness, Isabel, are like the snow,--very fair, until sullied; but liable to be sullied by the least speck. But those who take hold of God's strength, which is Christ our Lord, are the sunbeam, a heavenly emanation which cannot be sullied. Art thou the snow, or the sunbeam, my child?"

"Oh dear! I cannot deal with tropes and figures, in that style," answered she, rising. "And my work is finished; I am going now."

I fancied she did not look very sorry for it.

Great events are happening. The Lord King, finding his malady grows rather worse than better, has resolved to abdicate, in favour of his nephew, Lady Sybil's baby son. So to-morrow Beaudouin V. is to be proclaimed throughout the Holy City, and on the Day of Saint Edmund the King,[#] he will be crowned in the Church of the Holy Sepulchre. They say the Lord King was a very wise man before he became a mesel; and he will still give counsel when needed, the young King being but three years old.

[#] Nov. 20.

I do not quite see what difference the abdication will make. Guy must still remain Regent for several years, and the only change is that he will govern for his step-son instead of his brother-in-law. And I feel a little jealous that Lady Sybil should be passed by. She, not her son, is the next heir of the crown. Why must she be the subject of her own child, who ought to be hers? I really feel vexed about it; and so does Guy, I am sure, though he says nothing--at least to me. As to Lady Sybil herself, she is so meek and gentle, that if a beggar in the street were put over her head, I believe she would kneel to do her homage without a cloud on her sweet face.

However, I felt at liberty to say what I thought to Amaury, though I seldom do it without being annoyed by his answer. And certainly I was now.

"She! She's a woman," said Messire Amaury. "What does a woman know about governing?"

"What does a baby know?" said I.

"Oh, but he will be a man some day," answered Amaury.

"But Guy will govern in either case," I replied, trying not to be angry with him.

He is so silly, and he thinks himself so supremely wise! I do believe, the more foolish people are, the wiser they think themselves.

"Ha!" said he. "Saving your presence, Damoiselle Elaine, I am not so sure that Guy knows much about it."

"Amaury, thou art an idiot!" cried I, quite unable to bear any longer.

"I believe thou hast told me that before," he returned with provoking coolness.

I dashed away, for I knew I might as well talk to Damoiselle Melisende's pet weasel.

I do not like the Count of Tripoli. The more I see of him, the less I like him. And I do not like his fawning professions of friendship for Guy. Guy does not see through it a bit. I believe he only means to use Guy as a ladder by which to climb himself, and as soon as he is at the top, he will kick the ladder down behind him.

Did I not say that Amaury was an idiot? And is it not true? Here is our sister Eschine the mother of a pretty little baby, and instead of being thankful that Eschine and the infant are doing well, there goes Amaury growling and grumbling about the house because his child is a girl. Nay, he does more, for he snarls at Eschine, as if it were her fault, poor thing!

"She knows I wanted a boy!" he said this morning.

Men are such selfish simpletons!

To see how coolly Eschine takes it is the strangest thing of all.

"I was afraid he would be disappointed," she said calmly. "You see, men don't think much of girls."

"Men are all donkeys," said I, "and Amaury deserves to be king of the donkeys."

Eschine seemed to think that very funny.

"Come, Elaine, I cannot let thee say that of my lord, and sit silent. And I think Messire Homfroy de Tours quite as well qualified for the position."

"Ah," said I, "but Lady Isabel keeps her curb much tighter than thou. I really feel almost sorry for him sometimes, when she treats him like a baby before all the world."

"She may do that once too often," said Eschine.

Amaury means to call the baby Heloise--for a reason which would never have occurred to any one but himself--because we have not had that name in the family before. And Eschine smilingly accepts it, as I believe she would Nebuchadnezzar if he ordered her.

To-day the little King was crowned in the Church of the Holy Sepulchre, at noon; and in the evening the Damoiselle Heloise de Lusignan was baptized into the Fold of Christ. The King was very good: I think he inherits much of his mother's sweet disposition. I cannot say as much for my small niece, for she cried with all her heart when the holy Patriarch took her in his arms; and he said it showed that Satan must have taken strong possession of her, and was very hard to dislodge. But no sooner had the holy cross been signed on her, and the holy Patriarch gave her back into the arms of her nurse, than, by the power of our Lord, she was quite another creature, and did not utter a single cry. So wonderful and effectual a thing is the grace of holy baptism!

"Much effect it took on thee, then," growled Amaury, to whom I said this; "for thou didst wait until the water touched thy face, and then didst set up such screams as never were heard from mortal babe before."

"What dost thou know about it?" said I.

"Ha! Don't I?" answered he provokingly.

I have been amused to hear the different ideas of various people, when they first see the baby. The Lady Queen stroked its little face, and said pitifully--"Ah, poor little child, thou art come into a disagreeable world!" Lady Judith took it in her arms, and after rocking it a little, she said--"What possibilities lie hidden here!" Lady Sybil said--"Little darling! what a treasure thou art!" Lady Isabel's comment (for which I shall never forgive her) was--"What an ugly little spectacle! Are young babies no prettier?" Damoiselle Melisende danced it up and down, and sang it a lively nursery song. Guy (like a man) said, with an amused look, "Well! that is a funny little article. Heloise?--that means 'hidden wisdom,' does it not? Very much hidden just now, I should think." Amaury (that stupid piece of goods!)--"Wretched little creature! Do keep it from crying!" And lastly, old Marguerite came to see her nursling's nursling's nursling. I wondered what she would say. She took it in her arms, and looked at it for some time without speaking. And then she said softly--

"Little child! He that was once a little Child, bless thee! And may He give thee what He sees best. That will most likely be something different from what we see."

"O Marguerite!" said I. "That may be an early death."

"That would be the best of all, my Damoiselle.[#] Ah! the eyes of a noble maiden of seventeen years see not so far as the eyes of a villein woman of seventy. There are good things in this world--I do not deny it. But the best thing is surely to be safe above this world,--safe with the good Lord."

[#] It would have been well for Heloise, who bears a spotted reputation in history.

"I do not want to lose my baby, Margot," said Eschine, with a rather sad smile.

"Ah no, Dame, _you_ do not," replied Marguerite, answering the smile with a brighter one. "But if the good Lord should call her, it is best to let her rise and go to Him."

Again we hear something more of those strange rumours, as though the people were not content under Guy's government. But what does it signify? They are only villeins. Yet villeins can insult nobles, no doubt. Sister Eudoxia (who was here again yesterday) says they actually talk of a petition to the King, to entreat him to displace Guy, and set some one else in his stead. The thought of their presuming to have an idea on the question! As if _they_ could understand anything about government! Discontented under Guy! my Guy! They are nothing better than rebels. They ought to be put down, and kept down.

The Lady Queen has received a letter from her kindred at Byzantium, from which she hears that the young Byzantine Caesar, who is but a child, has been wedded to a daughter of the Lord King of France. Dame Agnes is her name, and she is but eight years old.

I wonder if it is very, very wicked to hate people? Old Marguerite will have it that it is just as bad as murder, and that the holy Evangel says so. I am sure she must have listened wrong. For I do hate Count Raymond of Tripoli. And I can't help it. I must and will hate him. He has won Guy's ear completely, and Guy sees through his eyes. I cannot bear him, the fawning, handsome scoundrel--I am sure he is one! They say, too, that he is not over good to his wife, for I am sorry to say he has a wife; I pity her, poor creature!

Lady Judith asked me, when I repeated this, who "they" were.

"I do not know, holy Mother," said I; "every body, I suppose."

"I would not put too much faith in 'them,' Helena," she said. "'They' often say a great deal that is not true."

"But one must attend to it, holy Mother!" I answered.

"Why?" replied she.

"Oh, because it would never do!"

"What would never do?"

"To despise the opinion of society."

"Why?" she gently persisted.

Really, I found it rather difficult to say why.

"Methinks, Helena, I have seen thee despise the opinion of society, when it contradicted thy will. Is it not more reasonable to despise it, when it contradicts God's will?"

"Holy Mother, I pray you, tell me--is that the world?" said I. "Because my nurse, old Marguerite, says, that Monseigneur Saint John bade us beware of the world, and the flesh, as well as the Devil: and I am not quite sure what it means, except that the world is other people, and the flesh is me. But how can I be inimical to my own salvation?"