CHAPTER XV.

The fame of my sanctity had now spread in such a manner abroad, that when I allowed myself to be seen in the streets of Rome, there were passengers who begged me for a moment to speak with them, and then, with the humblest prostration, implored my blessing. No doubt, my severe penitence must excite attention, for I had renewed in their utmost extent all my devotional exercises; but even my strange appearance, my neglect of my dress, &c. might be enough to excite the imagination of the lively Italians, who are ready at all times to fix on any remarkable individual for the hero of a religious legend. Often, when unconscious of all that passed around me, I had thrown myself on the steps of an altar, I was awoke from my inward contemplation by the murmur of prayer, and groans of repentance, from those who had collected around me, as if wishing to implore my saintly intercession with Heaven.

As in the Capuchin Convent, I frequently heard it called out in the streets behind me--"There goes the saint!" and such words never failed to strike like daggers to my heart. I wished, therefore, to leave Rome, and had made my arrangements for this purpose, when, to my utter astonishment, and indeed terror, the Prior of the Convent wherein I lodged, announced to me that the Pope had ordered me to appear before him.

Dark apprehensions arose within me, that perhaps the powers of hell were more than ever on the watch, and laboured by new stratagems to draw me into destruction. Meanwhile, I summoned up all my courage, and at an hour which was duly announced to me, repaired to the Vatican.

I was to have a private audience, and the Pope, who was still a handsome man, and looked as if he had been in the prime of life, received me sitting on a richly ornamented elbow-chair. Two very beautiful boys, in the dress of Sacristans, attended to serve him with iced water; and as the weather was very hot, they were constantly employed in cooling the atmosphere with large fans made of herons' feathers.

I went up to his Holiness with the utmost humility, and paid to him the customary homage of kneeling. He fixed his eyes sharply on me, but instead of the grave severity, which, from a distance, seemed to me before to characterize his features, his looks displayed much good humour, and he welcomed me with a very agreeable smile.

His first inquiries were only common-place questions, as to whence I came, what had brought me to Rome, &c. He then rose from his chair, and assuming a more serious tone, "Brother Medardus," said he, "I have summoned you hither, because I had received extraordinary accounts of your piety. But wherefore do you perform your devotional exercises openly before the people, and in the most public churches? You probably wish to be looked on as a chosen saint, a pre-elect of Heaven, and to be worshipped by the fanatical mob. But inquire into thine own heart, whence this idea first arose, and by what means it has acquired such ascendancy. If your intentions are not pure before the eye of the Almighty, and before me, his appointed Viceroy, then, Brother Medardus, your now flourishing sanctity will soon come to a shameful end."

These last words the Pope uttered in a deep powerful voice, and his eyes gleamed as if in anger. For the first time, since a very long period, I felt myself accused, without being guilty of the faults with which I was charged. On this account I was not only able to retain perfect composure, but even to answer him with some degree of fervour and eloquence.

"Heaven," said I, "has indeed granted to your Holiness to look into my inmost heart, which is loaded and oppressed with a weight of unspeakable crimes, of which my deep consciousness may perhaps prove the sincerity of my repentance. Far from my thoughts is any attempt at hypocrisy. I never had any ambition to influence the minds of the people; on the contrary, the attention which they direct to me is abhorrent to my feelings, and causes to me the utmost pain and regret. In support of what I have now said, will your Holiness grant to a wretched penitent an opportunity of relating the events of his life, that he may prove the sincerity of his contrition, and his utter self-annihilation at the remembrance of the sins which he hath committed?"

On receiving permission, I accordingly went on to narrate, as concisely as I could, the whole circumstances and adventures of my life, only omitting names, which were of no consequence as to the facts that I related against myself. The Pope listened with the greatest attention, appearing always more and more interested. At last, by many extraordinary looks and gestures, he evinced the astonishment that I had excited.

"Your history, Brother Medardus," said he, "is, indeed, the most mysterious that I have ever heard. Do you then believe in the immediate, and _visible_ agency of the devil?" I was about to answer, but he went on. "Do you believe that the wine which you stole from the relic-chamber, and drank, really impelled you to the crimes which you have committed?"

"Like a water distilled from pestilential herbs," said I, "it gave new strength to the seeds of vice and wickedness which lurked within me, till at length they burst from their concealment, and spread into luxuriant and multiplying growth!"

Upon this answer, the Pope seemed to sink into reflection, and said, more as if communing with himself, than addressing me,--

"What if the same rules of nature by which corporeal life is usually governed, applied also to the mind? If every seed or scion must bring forth and perpetuate that which is like to itself? There are whole families of murderers, and of robbers. In such cases this was the hereditary sin, entailed on a race followed by some inexpiable curse!"

"If he who is descended from a sinful ancestor," said I, "must of necessity sin again, it follows from this doctrine, that there is no sin!"

"Nay," said the Pope, "the Almighty created a gigantic power, who can yet tame and control the appetite for crime, which, like a furious wild beast, rages within us. This giant is named Conscience, and from his combat with the beast, arise our independence and volition. In the victory of the giant consists virtue; in the victory of the beast consists sin." The Pope was silent a few moments. He then added in a milder voice, "Do you believe, Brother Medardus, that it is becoming for the Viceroy of Heaven, to reason thus with you on virtue and vice?"

"Your Holiness," said I, "has condescended to allow the humblest of your servants to hear your opinions on this matter; and it well becomes the warrior to speak freely on that combat, whose dangers he has himself encountered, and in which he has long since obtained the palm of victory!"

"You have a favourable opinion of me, Brother," said the Pope; "or do you look upon the Tiara, as the laurel crown, announcing my victory to the world?"

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[_The Editor has here left out two or three pages of this conversation, as it seems irrelevant to the general tenure of the narrative._]

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Hereupon the Pope again rose from his chair. "Thou art an excellent orator, Brother Medardus," said he, "and hast spoken after my own heart--we shall, as I perceive, understand one another better ere long than we now do. Remain at Rome. In a few days you will be promoted to the dignity of Prior of the Capuchin Convent, where a situation is now vacant, and afterwards, perhaps, you will be chosen for my Father Confessor. Go then, behave yourself with more prudence in the churches, and think not of raising yourself to canonization. The calendar is already crowded!--Farewell!"

Our interview ended here, and by these last words of the Pope, I was not a little astonished, as indeed I had been by his whole behaviour throughout, which was completely at variance with the picture which I had previously drawn of him. I had imagined not only that he was a worthily appointed Vicegerent of Heaven on this earth, but that he was gifted with every virtue, and all mental energies. He had, on the contrary, falsely supposed that I was actuated by the base ambition of being looked on as a saint, and now wished to excite in my mind a desire for other temporal distinctions, which was, in truth, not less sinful.

Notwithstanding my perplexity and dissatisfaction, I was led to conform to what the Pope had enjoined, as to the intermission of my penitential exercises; and I wandered for some days idly through the streets of Rome, meditating chiefly on my past life, on the penitence which I had undergone, and the career which was yet before me.

On the last of these idle days, as I passed through the Spanish Square, there was a mob assembled round the stage of a puppet-player. My attention was at once attracted by the croaking voice of Pulcinello, and the laughter of the audience. The first act was ended as I came up--the curtain dropped, and the audience stood in anxious expectation of the second.

The little curtain again drew up. The youthful King David appeared with his sling and his sackful of pebbles. With the most ludicrous gestures, he proved that the monstrous giant should now be slain, and Israel rescued. Then there was heard a fearful hollow roaring and rustling under the stage, whereupon the giant mounted up, with a huge and most absurdly ill-proportioned head. How was I astonished, when, at my first glance of this giant's head, I recognized the features of my old friend Belcampo. Right under his head he had, by means of an ingenious apparatus, contrived to fit on a small body, conformable to those of the other puppets, while his own person was concealed by the stage drapery, which last served, at the same time, for the mantle of the giant. Goliah, with most hideous grimaces of visage and contortions of his dwarfish body, held a proud and threatening discourse, which King David only now and then interrupted by a shrill and contemptuous laughter.

The mob were diverted out of all measure, and I myself being wonderfully attracted by this new apparition of Belcampo, allowed myself to be carried away by the impression of the moment, and broke out into the unrestrained and hearty laughter of boyish delight. Alas, how often before was my laughter only the convulsive vibration of that internal torment which preyed upon my heart!

Hereafter, the combat with the giant was preceded by a long disputation, wherein King David demonstrated, with great erudition and eloquence, wherefore he must and would smite his frightful antagonist to death. Belcampo made all the muscles of his countenance writhe and play with the most inconceivable vivacity, indicating extreme rage. His gigantic arms stretched themselves out against the less than little David, who, meanwhile, saved himself by incredible leaps and bendings, vanishing altogether, and then coming into sight again--now here, now there, even from the folds of the giant's own mantle. At last the pebble flew from David's sling against Goliah's head. He fell down lifeless, and the curtain dropped.

I laughed always more and more, excited not merely by the absurdity of Pulcinello, but by my previous recollection of Belcampo's grotesque genius. Probably I laughed too loud, for the people seemed to notice my conduct; and, when I turned round, there was a dignified Abbot standing near me.

"I rejoice, reverend sir," said he, "to find that you have not altogether lost your relish for terrestrial enjoyments. After I had witnessed your most extraordinary penitence and devotion, I believed that it would be wholly impossible for you to be diverted with follies such as these."

While the Abbot spoke thus, it seemed to me as if I ought to feel ashamed of my levity, but involuntarily I answered him in a way of which I directly afterwards repented. "Believe me, Signor _Abbate_," said I, "the man who has once combated, like a stout swimmer, with the stormy waves of this changeful life, never loses altogether the power of lifting up his head bravely from the dark flood!"

The Abbot looked at me with significant glances. "Indeed!" said he, "I know not which to praise most, the poetry or logic of your illustration. I believe that I now understand you completely, and admire you, reverend sir, from the bottom of my heart!"

"I know not, for my part, Signor _Abbate_," replied I, "how a poor penitent monk can have excited your admiration."

"Excellent!" said the Abbot. "You do not, most reverend father, run any risk of forgetting the part you have to play!--You are worthy to be the favourite of the Pope!"

"His Holiness," answered I, "has indeed been pleased to honour me with an audience. I have done homage before him in the dust, as is becoming towards him, whom, on account of his tried virtues, Omnipotence has chosen for his vicegerent on earth."

"Well, then," replied the Abbot, "you, too, are no doubt a well-chosen vassal of the triple-crowned, and will nobly fulfil the duties required of you. But, believe me, the present Pope is a jewel of virtue, compared to Alexander the Sixth, and you may perhaps have erred sadly in your reckoning. Go on with your part, however--What is well begun is half ended!--Farewell, most reverend father!"

With a laugh of unrepressed scorn, the Abbot started away, leaving me confounded and almost petrified at his conduct. When I connected his expressions with my own remarks on the Pope, I became convinced that the latter was by no means that conqueror deservedly crowned "after his combat with the beast," such as I had supposed him to be; and, at the same time, I could no longer entertain any doubt that my penitential exercises must, to the majority of the public, have appeared but as a hypocritical and artificial system, adopted only to force myself into notice. Astonished and bitterly mortified, I returned home to my convent, and going into the church, had recourse to long and zealous prayer.

Then the scales seemed to fall from my hitherto blinded eyes, and I recognized at once the temptation of the powers of darkness, who had of new endeavoured to involve me in their snares. Only rapid and instant flight could save me from destruction. And I determined with the first rays of the next morning to set out on my way.