Brother Copas Part 34

He fixed the hour--2 p.m. But shortly after mid-day Nurse Turner had taken a cab (ordered by telephone) and was on her way to the railway station with her boxes.

CHAPTER XXI.

RECONCILIATION.

"I am not," said the Bishop, "putting this before you as an argument.

I have lived and mixed with men long enough to know that they are usually persuaded by other things than argument, sometimes by better.

. . . I am merely suggesting a _modus vivendi_--shall we call it a truce of G.o.d?--until we have all done our best against a common peril: for, as your Pet.i.tion proves you to be earnest Churchmen, so I may conclude that to all of us in this room our Cathedral stands for a cherished monument of the Church, however differently we may interpret its history."

He leaned forward in his chair, his gaze travelling from one to another with a winning smile. All the pet.i.tioners were gathered before him in the Master's library. They stood respectfully, each with his hat and staff. At first sight you might have thought he was dismissing them on a pilgrimage.

Master Blanchminster sat on the Bishop's right, with Mr. Colt close behind him; Mr. Simeon at the end of the table, taking down a verbatim report in his best shorthand.

"I tell you frankly," pursued the Bishop, "I come rather to appeal for concord than to discuss principles of observance. If you compel me to p.r.o.nounce on the points raised, I shall take evidence and endeavour to deal justly upon it: but I suggest to you that the happiness of such a Society as this is better furthered by a spirit of sweet reasonableness than by any man's insistence on his just rights."

"_Fiat Caelum ruat just.i.tia_," muttered Brother Copas. "But the man is right nevertheless."

"Principles," said the Bishop, "are hard to discuss, justice often impossible to deal. . . . 'Yes,' you may answer, 'but we are met to do this, or endeavour to do it, and not to indulge in irrelevancy.'

Yet is my plea so irrelevant? . . . You are at loggerheads over certain articles of faith and discipline, when a sound arrests you in the midst of your controversy. You look up and perceive that your Cathedral totters; that it was _her_ voice you heard appealing to you. 'Leave your antagonisms and help one another to sh.o.r.e me up--me the witness of past generations to the Faith. Generations to come will settle some of the questions that vex you; others, maybe, the mere process of time will silently resolve. But Time, which helps them, is fast destroying us. You are not young, and my necessity is urgent. Surely, my children, you will be helping the Faith if you save its ancient walls.' I bethink me," the Bishop went on, "that we may apply to Merchester that fine pa.s.sage of Matthew Arnold's on Oxford and her towers: '_Apparitions of a day, what is our puny warfare against the Philistines compared with the warfare which this queen of romance has been waging against them for centuries, and will wage after we are gone?_'" He paused, and on an afterthought succ.u.mbed to the professional trick of improving the occasion.

"It may even be that the plight of our Cathedral contains a special lesson for us of St. Hospital: '_If a house be divided against itself, that house cannot stand_'"

"Tilly vally!" muttered Brother Copas, and was feeling for his snuff-box, but recollected himself in time.

"You may say that you are old men, poor men; that it is little you could help. Do not be so sure of this. I am informed, for instance, that the proceeds of our forthcoming Pageant are to be devoted to the Restoration Fund, and not (as was originally intended) to missionary purposes."

Here Mr. Simeon, bending over his shorthand notes, blushed to the ears. It was he, good man, who had first thought of this, and suggested it to Mr. Colt; as it was Mr. Colt who had suggested it to the Committee in the presence of reporters, and who, on its acceptance, had received the Committee's thanks.

"I am further told"--here the Bishop glanced around and caught the eye of the Chaplain, who inclined his head respectfully--"that a--er--representation of the Foundation Ceremony of St. Hospital may be included among the--er--"

"Episodes," murmured Mr. Colt, prompting.

"Eh?--yes, precisely--among the Episodes. I feel sure it would make a tableau at once impressive and--er--entertaining--in the best sense of the word. . . . So, you see, there are possibilities; but they presuppose your willingness to sink some differences and join heartily in a common cause. . . . Or again, you may urge that to re-edify our Cathedral is none of your business--as officially indeed it is none of mine, but concerns the Dean and Chapter. I put it to you that it concerns us all." Here the Bishop leaned back in his chair, on the arms of which he rested his elbows; and pressing his finger-tips together, gazed over them at his audience. "That, at any rate, is my plea; and I shall be glad, if you have a spokesman, to hear how the suggestion of a 'truce of G.o.d' presents itself to your minds."

In the pause that followed, Brother Copas felt himself nudged from behind. He cleared his throat and inclined himself with a grave bow.

"My lord," he said, "my fellow-pet.i.tioners here have asked me to speak first to any points that may be raised. I have stipulated, however, that they hold themselves free to disavow me here in your lords.h.i.+p's presence, if on any point I misrepresent them."

The Bishop nodded encouragingly.

"Well then, my lord, it is peculiarly hard to speak for them when at the outset of the inquiry you meet us with a wholly unexpected appeal . . . an appeal (shall I say?) to sentiment rather than to strict reason."

"I admit that."

"As I admit the appeal to be a strong one. . . . But before I try to answer it, may I deal with a sentence or two which (pardon me) seemed less relevant than the rest? . . . _If a house be divided against itself, that house cannot stand_. True enough, my lord: but neither can it aspire."

The Bishop lifted his eyebrows. But before he could interpose a word Brother Copas had mounted a hobby and was riding it, whip and spur.

"My lord, when a h.e.l.lene built a temple he took two pillars, set them upright in the ground, and laid a third block of stone a-top of them.

He might repeat this operation a few times or a many, according to the size at which he wished to build. He might carve his pillars, and flourish them off with acanthus capitals, and run friezes along his architraves: but always in these three stones, the two uprights and the beam, the trick of it resided. And his building lasted.

The pillars stood firm in solid ground, into which the weight of the cross-beam pressed them yet more firmly. The whole structure was there to endure, if not for ever, at least until some a.s.s of a fellow came along and kicked it down to spite an old religion, because he had found a new one. . . . But this Gothic--this Cathedral, for example, which it seems we must help to preserve--is fas.h.i.+oned only to kick itself down."

"It aspires."

"Precisely, my lord; that is the mischief. When the Greek temple was content to repose upon natural law--when the Greek builder said, 'I will build for my G.o.ds greatly yet lowlily, measuring my effort to those powers of man which at their fullest I know to be moderate, making my work harmonious with what little it is permitted to me to know'--in jumps the rash Christian, saying with the men of Babel, _Go to, let us build us a city and a tower whose top may reach unto heaven_; or, in other words, 'Let us soar above the law of earth and take the Kingdom of Heaven by storm.' . . . With what result?"

"'Sed quid Typhoeus et validus Mimas Contra sonantem Palladis aegida . . . ?'"

"The Gothic builders, like the t.i.tans, might strain to pile Pelion on Olympus. _Vis consili expers_, my lord. From the moment they take down their scaffolding--nay, while it is yet standing--the dissolution begins. All their complicated structure of weights, counterweights, thrusts, balances, has started an internecine conflict, stone warring against stone, the whole disintegrating--"

"Excuse me, Brother--"

"Copas, my lord."

"Excuse me, Brother Copas," said the Bishop with a smile, "if I do not quite see to what practical conclusion we are tending."

"There is a moral ahead, my lord. . . . Thanks to Mr. Colt's zeal, we have all begun to aspire along our different lines, with the result that St. Hospital has become a house divided against itself. Now, if I may say it modestly, _I_ think your lords.h.i.+p's suggestion an excellent one. We are old poor men--what business have we, any longer, with aspiration? It is time for us to cease from pus.h.i.+ng and thrusting at each other's souls; time for us to imitate the Greek beam, and practise lying flat. . . . I vote for the truce, my lord; and when the time comes, shall vote for extending it."

"You have so odd a way of putting it, Brother--er--Copas," his lords.h.i.+p mildly expostulated, "that I hardly recognise as mine the suggestion you are good enough to commend."

Brother Copas's eye twinkled.

"Ah, my lord! It has been the misfortune of my life to follow Socrates humbly as a midwife of men's ideas, and be accused of handing them back as changelings."

"You consent to the truce, at any rate?"

"No, no!" muttered old Warboise.

Copas turned a deaf ear.

"I vote for the truce," he said firmly, "provided the one condition be understood. It is the _status quo ante_ so far as concerns us Protestants, and covers the whole field. For example, at the Sacrament we receive the elements in the form which life-long use has consecrated for us, allowing the wafer to be given to those Brethren who prefer it. Will the Master consent to this?"

Master Blanchminster was about to answer, but first (it was somewhat pitiful to see) turned to Mr. Colt. Mr. Colt bent his head in a.s.sent.

"That is granted," said the Master.

"Nor would we deny the use of Confession to those who find solace in it--"

"Yes, we would," growled Brother Warboise.

"--Provided always," pursued Copas, "that its use be not thrust upon us, nor our avoidance of it injuriously reckoned against us."

"I think," said the Master, "Brother Copas knows that on this point he may count upon an honourable understanding."

"I do, Master. . . . Then there is this new business of compulsory vespers at six o'clock. We wish that compulsion removed."