ico
THE GLORIES OF
LOURDES
CHANOINE ROUSSEII
19
REGIS
WBL, MAJ,
COLLEGE
THE GLORIES OF LOURDES
THE GLORIES OF
LOURDES
By the CHANOINE JUSTIN ROUSSEIL
Formerly Professor of Philosophy ; Curb of Les Saint ts
Hosties J at Pezilla-la-Riviere y Pyrenees-Orientales^
France
Translated from the Second Edition by the
REV. JOSEPH MURPHY, SJ.
RE1OS
OLLLCJ&
R. SP T. WASHBOURNE, LTD,
i, 2 & 4 PATERNOSTER ROW, LONDON
248 BUCHANAN STREET, GLASGOW
74 BRIDGE STREET, MANCHESTER
BENZIGER BROS. : NEW YORK, CINCINNATI, CHICAGO
1909
[All rights reserved]
f; 9.0412
*lthU flbstat.
STANISLAUS ST. JOHN, S.J.
HENRICUS S. BOWDEN,
CENSOR DEPUTATUS.
Imprimatur.
EDM. CANONICUS SURMONT,
VICARIUS GENERALIS.
WESTMONASTF.RII,
Die 13 SeptembriS) 1909.
TO
MY MOTHER,
ABOVE ALL, MY HEAVENLY MOTHER,
TO WHOM I DECLARE THAT I OWE EVERYTHING,
AS i OFFER EVERYTHING;
SECONDLY, MY EARTHLY MOTHER,
WHOM HEAVEN HAS LATELY TAKEN FROM ME,
AND FROM WHOSE DYING LIPS I RECEIVED THE WISH,
DOUBLY SACRED TO ME, OF WRITING A BOOK,
A HUMBLE TOKEN OF OUR GRATITUDE,
IN HONOUR OF THE MADONNA OF THE PYRENEES.
J. R.
THIS important work, blessed by the Pope, praised
by two Cardinals, approved by three Bishops,
honoured by a letter from the Abbe Bertrin and a
preface by Dr. Boissarie, is universally admitted
by the Catholic press in France to be the last
word, whether historical, poetical or mystical, on
the events of the famous Grotto of Massabielle.
LETTER TO THE AUTHOR
FROM MGR. SCHOEPFER, BISHOP
ERRATA
Page 183, footnote, line 5, for 1,500 read 118.
Page 259, line 6, for 1,500 read 115.
The title you have chosen sums up every ming m
a nutshell. " The Glories of Lourdes " how many
promises are contained in these words ! And you
do not disappoint the reader s expectation. The
origin of our shrines, the marvels which accompany
and follow the Apparitions of the Immaculate Virgin,
the prodigies which the piety of the faithful works in
answer to the miracle of Divine power wrought by
the intercession of the Blessed Virgin, the whole
world hastening to the Grotto of Massabielle and
multiplying the manifestations of faith capable of
moving mountains, since they very often touch the
hearts most hardened to supernatural influence
this is what you represent and depict in a series
vii
Uy .
word, whether nis.v^.
the events of the famous Grotto or
LETTER TO THE AUTHOR
FROM MGR. SCHOEPFER, BISHOP
OF TARBES
NOTRE DAME DE LOURDES,
May 4, 1908.
MY DEAR CANON,
Following my beloved and venerable colleague,
the Bishop of Perpignan, I am happy to congratulate
you on the beautiful book which you have devoted
to the glory of Our Madonna.
The title you have chosen sums up everything in
a nutshell. " The Glories of Lourdes " how many
promises are contained in these words ! And you
do not disappoint the reader s expectation. The
origin of our shrines, the marvels which accompany
and follow the Apparitions of the Immaculate Virgin,
the prodigies which the piety of the faithful works in
answer to the miracle of Divine power wrought by
the intercession of the Blessed Virgin, the whole
world hastening to the Grotto of Massabielle and
multiplying the manifestations of faith capable of
moving mountains, since they very often touch the
hearts most hardened to supernatural influence
this is what you represent and depict in a series
vii
viii THE GLORIES OF LOURDES
of pictures animated with colours of life the most
intense, and, I might add, the most glorious.
In justifying the boldness of the title of your work,
you have attained the object which your priestly
zeal had in view that is, to help to spread the
devotion paid to Our Lady of Lourdes. Worthy
compeer of her illustrious historians Estrade,
Lasserre, Boissarie, Bertrin you will have, like
them, the joy of making our Mother in Heaven
more and more known and beloved.
Pray accept, my dear Canon, my congratulations,
and the assurance of my affectionate and devoted
regards.
* F. XAVIER,
Bishop of Tarbes.
CONTENTS
PAGE
LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS
DECLARATION OF THE AUTHOR
PREFACE TO ENGLISH TRANSLATION
YV
PREFACE
LETTER FROM THE CHANOINE BERTRIN
LETTER FROM DR. BOISSARIE
CHAPTER
1. HOLY GROUND
II. THE APPARITIONS
III. BERNADETTE SOUB1ROUS
IV. PROVIDENTIAL OPPORTUNITY II2
V. THE POWERS OF DARKNESS ! 47
VI. THE ENTHUSIASM OF THE WORLD - I?8
VII. THE ABBE PEYRAMALE
VIII. MONSEIGNEUR LAURENCE 221
IX. HENRI LASSRRRE 22 9
X. A GLORIOUS DIPTYCH 2 4^
XL THE LITURGY OF THE APPARITION 265
XII. THE FESTIVITIES OF THE GOLDEN JUBILEE
EPILOGUE: ANALYSIS OF THREE SERMONS
PREACHED BY MGR. IZART, JULY 14-16, IQoS - 3
IX
LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS
PAGE
LOURDES - - - Frontispiece
BATHS OF THE INVALIDS - - 16
THE GROTTO OF LOURDES - 138
PROCESSION OF THE BLESSED SACRAMENT OUTSIDE THE
ROSARY CHAPEL - 199
INTERIOR OF THE BASILICA - 271
CROWNED STATUE OF OUR LADY AND THE OLD
FORTRESS . 299
DECLARATION OF THE AUTHOR
ALTHOUGH (conformably to Article 13 of the Apos
tolic Constitution, Officiorum, and to the recent
prescriptions of the Encyclical, Pascendi dominici
gregis) the text of the present work appears with the
approval of those whom God has appointed to be
judges in this matter, I am, and always will be,
ready to reject everything which may be pointed
out to me by rightful authority as involving an error,
or at variance with the prescriptions of the Church s
authority. Moreover, to conform entirely to the
decrees of Urban VIII. (May 13, 1625, and June 4,
1632), I declare that, if I have sometimes used the
words miracle, supernatural, * revelation, saint,
prophet, * wonder-worker, and any other similar
term, I have nowise intended to claim for the words
so used, in a relative and popular sense, the Catholic
faith due to those truths only which the Church
teaches as revealed, not wishing, on any account, to
confuse facts known by private witnesses with the
wonders which Religion puts before us in the Old
and New Testaments, and never having had the
intention of pronouncing a judgment on these
matters, which belongs only to the Holy Roman
Apostolic See, in perfect communion with which I
wish to live and die.
J. M. ROUSSEIL,
Priest.
xi
PREFACE TO ENGLISH
TRANSLATION
THIS work was first published in France last year,
on the occasion of the Golden Jubilee of the
Apparitions at Lourdes. The author, in his Preface,
gives the reasons which led him to add another
book to the many already written about Lourdes.
However, the fact that the first edition was exhausted
in eight months, and the chorus of praise with which
it was greeted by the Catholic press in France,
seem to contradict the author s modest estimate of
his work, and to show that it has not proved super
fluous. Moreover, it has won the praise of His
Holiness Pius X., of two Cardinals, and of the
Bishops of Perpignan, Tarbes, and Pamiers, The
letters of these Bishops were given in full in the
French edition, but reasons of space have unfortu
nately compelled us to omit two of them, as well as
a long list of French journals and reviews which
gave this work very high praise. The notice from
that important periodical, L Ami du Clerge, omitted
here for the same reasons, described this book as a
brilliant work of science, apologetics, and eloquence
(October 29, 1908).
xii
PREFACE TO ENGLISH TRANSLATION xiii
Moreover, by the advice of authority, it has been
translated into the four principal languages of
Europe, in the hope that, as it had met with so
favourable a reception in France, it might prove
interesting to a wider circle of readers in other
countries, as giving a complete history on broad lines
of the famous Grotto of Lourdes during the last fifty
years. Though there are many books in English
on this subject, yet in the case of a sanctuary still
prolific in wonders, later books have certain natural
advantages over earlier ones ; . . . each year adds
to the number and variety of the marvels effected
there. * Many, therefore, will read this book with
pleasure who have never had the opportunity of
visiting Lourdes themselves, but are interested in
the wonderful manifestations of Our Lady s power
there. Again, there are many Catholics who have
observed with sorrow the relentless persecution
which the Church is now undergoing in France.
They will perhaps learn from these pages that there
is a bright side to the picture, and that, though the
forces of Atheism and Irreligion seem at the present
moment to have overthrown the Catholic religion in
that country, yet there are unseen influences at work
which will eventually counteract and frustrate the
unjust and ruthless policy of the French Govern
ment, and lead to a revival of Catholic faith and
practice in that once Christian nation.
Besides giving an interesting and graphic account
of Lourdes, this book may help to spread devotion
to Our Blessed Lady, especially in our own country,
* The Month, June, 1909.
xiv PREFACE TO ENGLISH TRANSLATION
which was once known as Our Lady s Dowry, and
thus it will happily fulfil the pious wish of the author,
in his Preface to the second edition, that these pale
" Glories " may cause to shine in the mirror of many
minds, and, still better, in the depths of many
hearts, the gentle and victorious image of Our Lady
of Massabielle.
J. MURPHY, SJ.
CLITHEROE,
August 15, 1909.
PREFACE
For fifty years the Immaculate Virgin has reigned at
Lourdes fifty years of graces, wonders, and benefits ; fifty
years of a people s love, of pilgrimages from every quarter of
the world such is the great event, the solemn anniversary of
1908. MGR. SCHOEPFER.
* The world hath age"d fifty years
Since Mary first her child did greet,
And Bernadette, with ravished ears,
First heard those heavenly accents sweet.
L. FEILLET.
LOURDES, since Heaven first visited it, has won a
world-wide and lasting fame. Yet many are not
aware that for the last half-century this Grotto,
which fascinates men despite modern criticism, has
inspired over 200 volumes in prose and verse (not
counting a host of articles in magazines and weekly
and daily papers), partly hostile, but mostly in
defence of it, while many are really interesting either
from an historical or critical or scientific point of
view, apart from the literary merit of many of them.
In truth, hardly any men of culture in the last
half-century can be pointed out who, on so interest
ing a subject, have not taken up their pen to defend
it or (more rarely) to raise objections to it. Those
XV
xvi PREFACE
whom the present generation regards as oracles of
free-thought have not been able to keep out of the
universal current ; thus a Bernheim, a Charcot, a
Luys, or a Berillon, have in turn taken part in the
discussion about Lourdes, and often with a sympathy
bordering almost on veneration, proving thereby that
in the presence of the Mother, as of the Son, no one
can remain indifferent. History will always be proud
to place in its front rank Henry Lasserre, whose book
is the most elaborate memorial yet devoted to the
Virgin of the Pyrenees. How many other writers
of various merit have followed in his steps, to add
their quota in their own way to the story of the most
famous Apparitions of the Christian era !
In the department of criticism there have been a
Boissarie and a Bertrin, pre-eminent among their
fellows, the former a doctor and philosopher, who is,
as all admit, equally learned and conscientious ; while
the latter is an unrivalled advocate by his power of
arguing, and an unequalled statistician in the extent
and accuracy of his survey. The first, who has
already written five works on the Great Cures, has
earned the title of Le Clinicien de Notre Dame; while
the Bishop of Tarbes, a good judge, has said of the
latter that his book was Reason s last word on
the miracles at Massabielle. Having spoken suffi
ciently of him elsewhere, in our Esquisses sur 1 Art
Marial, we will add nothing further, but the reader
will gladly remember that for Lourdes this priest-
doctor remains its greatest advocate.*
* A better and more eloquent advocate than M. Bertrin
could hardly be imagined. Westminster Gazette.
PREFACE xvii
As regards novelists (for this department of litera
ture, not usually associated with piety, must also
pay its tribute), to make up for the scurrility of Zola,
we have had the poetic idyll of a Pouvillon, the vivid
drama of a Huysmans, and the graceful descriptions
of a Boyer d Agen.
As we cannot go over the whole field of books
written on Lourdes, having mentioned the most
important of them, we may add the following as
our predecessors in this realm, whose works have
given us pleasure and profit : Estrade, Souvenirs
d un Temoin ; Dozous, La Grotte ; Vergez,
Rapport Medical d apres la Commission d En-
quete ; Mgr. Laurence, Mandement Doctrinal ;
R. P. Cros, La Grotte Mysterieuse ; les PP.
Missionaires, Annales ; V. Fourcade, L Appari
tion ; Jean Barbet, Le Guide de Lourdes ; Guy
de Pierrefeu, Le Triomphe de Lourdes ; Mgr.
Forcade, Memoires sur Bernadette ; Mgr. Ricard,
La Vraie Bernadette ; Joseph Crestey, Critique
d un Roman ; D. Barbe", Lourdes Hier, Aujourd hui,
et Demain ; Clave", L Immaculee Conception ;
Rascol, Etude Critique ; Archelet, A Lourdes ;
Bretonneau, L Ame de Lourdes.
After such a catalogue of authors and their works
another book might seem superfluous, if we had not
taken up our pen in the service of one whose praises,
according to the Magnificat, can never be too often
proclaimed nunqiiam satis.
Hence this little work is not so much a book as an
ex voto a votive offering of gratitude that cannot pay
its debt. It was not for the sake of writing, but
xviii PREFACE
our heart had to utter a good word (to quote the
Psalmist s vivid phrase) words of grateful love.
Knowing full well our weakness, we had to discharge
our debt, while satisfying our piety, to say what we
thought and felt of the beauty and goodness of this
ideal Queen.
Hence our small reed has become in a wonderful
way the swift pen of the writer in Holy Writ, who
tempered his phrases to the rhythms of his heart
(Ps. xliv.).
Another and simpler reason is to be found in the
present occasion. This year is the Golden Jubilee
of Massabielle. Such coincidences, rare enough in
a man s lifetime, are a sufficient justification, we
think, for the boldness of one who becomes an author
to preserve precious memories from oblivion.
Let him, therefore, who has never felt the poetry
of a Jubilee, and especially of such a Jubilee, be the
first to condemn us. We shall be hardly bestead if,
after choosing a subject and a title so glorious, we
should eventually prove unequal to the weight of so
much glory. Since February n a date we can
never forget, when in the Grotto the idea suggested
itself to us a secret voice has kept ringing in our
ears : Quantum potes, tantum aude.
Hence we thought that, in view of such wonders,
for which the ancients would certainly have chanted
a Carmen Saculare, the least a priest of Mary could
do was, instead of a bulky volume, to relate her
Glories.
May this most indulgent Mother deign to look
at the intention rather than the deed, to smile
PREFACE xix
graciously upon the worker, to bless his readers, and
employ these humble pages, dictated more by the
heart than by the head, for the spread of her sweet
reign, as her Son makes use of the frail elements
held in our hands to accomplish His adorable
Sacrament.
JUSTIN M. ROUSSEIL.
ST. NAZAIRE,
May, 8, 1908.
LETTER FROM THE CHANOINE
BERTRIN
PARIS,
October 30, 1908.
MY DEAR CONFRERE,
I received the Glories of Lourdes, which, in
your letter, you informed me you were sending me.
I began without delay to read the book, and I could
soon see that you touched on a part of the subject
which I had not dealt with myself.
You show, in fact, the part which men have
played in the work of Lourdes, and you do justice to
all those whom God has been pleased to choose as
co-operators in His designs. You judge them with
a sympathetic insight, and award them unstinted
praise.
I myself benefit in several places from your
flattering sympathy, for which I am very grateful
to you.
Pray accept, my dear Canon, my thanks and best
wishes, together with the assurance of the keen
interest which I have felt in perusing your pages.
GEORGES BERTRIN.
LETTER FROM DR. BOISSARIE
LOURDES,
January 10, 1909.
MY DEAR CANON,
You have just written a very personal work.
The history of Lourdes and the story of the Appari
tions derive from your pen quite a novel interest.
My colleagues and myself have perused your
pages, charmed by your style, so full of colour and
poetry.
The different works written of late years about
Lourdes consist for the most part in reproducing
the accounts of Estrade and the records of the
cures published by the Bureau Medical. You
have departed from this plan, not liking to follow the
beaten track. In tracing in your own way the broad
lines of the history of Lourdes, you have succeeded,
moreover, in bringing before our eyes the principal
authors who have left their mark on our annals,
from Lasserre to Huysmans, and even to Professor
Vincent, of Lyons. No writer and no event is for
gotten. You are aware that for twenty years I have
been living in touch with all these men, and in the
midst of all these scenes. So you will allow me to
look back a moment with you on the part which
xxi
xxii LETTER FROM DR. BOISSARIE
they have played, each in his degree, this last half-
century.
Lasserre first filled with his name the history of
the early years. He had a mission from Heaven,
and we can say that he proved himself equal to it.
Towards the end of his career his disputes and con
troversies cast a shadow over his life. But at this
distance of time, in reading you, we forget all this,
and only remember the matchless historian. Every
thing has been said on Zola and his work on
Lourdes without his ignorance and bad faith having
been sufficiently branded. It is now a little over
sixteen years since I welcomed him to my Bureau.
At that time our Society made a great fuss about
this man. They expected to hear from him a
decisive verdict ! To-day the self-imposed task of
this overrated novelist would be no longer possible.
I do not see him pronouncing his verdict in the
midst of six hundred doctors, who took part in our
meetings this Jubilee year.
You told us with good reason that Heaven, to con
sole us for Zola, has deigned to give us Huysmans. I
will not say that you are too lenient towards him, for I
share your leniency. I saw him for two years study
ing our cures with the conscientiousness he brought
to all his works. He loved to breathe this super
natural atmosphere, which wrought upon him so
strongly, and gradually transformed him.
Without doubt, as you justly observe, he could
not change his nature. Always retaining an exag
gerated love of art, he could not tone down the too
glaring colours of his brush.
LETTER FROM DR. BOISSARIE xxiii
But, instead, what descriptions that cling to the
memory of the Grotto, the processions, and the sick
people ! He is our foremost Christian novelist.
Rette, whom you mention, is prepared (they say) to
follow him. They will both penetrate into regions
which are closed to the men of mere science or
mere faith.
You mention also Baraduc, a sincere man, but
the victim of his illusions. He has had the sorrow
to lose his son, while seeking vainly to catch the
emanations of grace on his photographic plates !
Lastly, you recall very appositely the splendid
plebiscite of my colleague at Lyons, Dr. Vincent.
Yes, my dear Canon, he it is who had the honour and
joy of bringing to our hospital three thousand signa
tures of doctors, coming forward thus to reply to the
equivocal attacks of a certain journalist, whose
object was, on the plea of hygiene, to have
Lourdes closed.
It is in truth one of the most beautiful episodes in
the history of the Bureau des Constellations. I thank
you for having referred to it in your book.
I have lingered too long over all these names to
be able to tell you in detail how you interpret
the great facts of Lourdes, and the procession of
persons cured, whom you call the rescued ones
of Our Lady, and all the feasts of the Jubilee, of
which you will continue to give us an account in
succeeding editions.
The Bishop of Perpignan, my compatriot and
dear friend, says very truly that the Catholics on
both sides of the Pyrenees are grateful to you for
LETTER FROM DR. BOISSARIE
the homage which you lay at the feet of the august
Queen of the Grotto. For myself, I will add : All
the lovers of Lourdes can only thank you for this
new jewel which you set in her glorious crown.
They open their ranks to receive you among them
as one of her best historians.
Pray accept, my dear Canon, the expression of
my kindest wishes.
DR. BOISSARIE,
President of the Bureau dcs Constatations.
THE GLORIES OF LOURDES
CHAPTER I
HOLY GROUND
1 The world flocks here, in every clime thou rt known,
In thy pure light the world much brighter grows ;
For Christ hath made this land His Mother s throne
A fount of life to heal all human woes.
IT is universally admitted that as there are holy
seasons in men s calendars, so we find holy places
in their geographical records. This is owing to our
very nature, which, being essentially religious, feels
the need and the duty of consecrating by religious
observance space not less than time, those twin con
ditions of our earthly existence.
Hence we cannot mention a country nor an age
which has not had special festivals as well as hal
lowed places, that, in these topographical or chrono
logical resting-places of our individual and social
life, the creature, forgetting for a brief space the
environment of contingent things, might feel itself
nearer to its Creator.
This is why confining ourselves merely to sacred
2 THE GLORIES OF LOURDES
sites the more civilized the peoples were, even
though pagan, the more they obeyed this great law
of human psychology. The Brahmins and Buddhists
of India pointed out with emotion their sacred
rivers, the Indus or Ganges, along whose banks
the Spirit from above sometimes passed. In
the Greece of the philosophers, poets, and artists,
the temple of Delos, pride of the Cyclades ; that of
Delphi, a marble wonder among the laurels of
Parnassus ; but especially the matchless Parthenon
at Athens, were official sanctuaries, where the god
dwelt. Even Rome, so materialistic, had its Capitol
and immobile saxum, which served as a visible
tripod for the deities of Olympus, while the Gallic
and German Druids sacrificed to the Teutates in the
depths of their silent forests.
In another way, we know, the authentic com
munications of men with God during forty centuries
took place on the glorious mountains of Palestine.
While, in one respect, this chosen country was one
vast Holy Land, since the shadow of Jehovah
wrought there such incessant prodigies, yet there
were favoured spots which His mysterious presence
filled more lovingly ; such were Bethel, Sinai,
Horeb, Carmel, Moriah, and Hermon. How could
Christianity also, when completely developed, be
without its great religious centres Bethlehem, Naza
reth, and Calvary famous above all other holy
places, where the supernatural seems with the good
ness of God our Saviour especially to linger ? The
Church, which is the social organization of the
Christian idea, in its turn did not fail to attach to
HOLY GROUND 3
certain points of its territory, as of its calendar, pious
associations, by which it lived. It had at first its
holy places in the East, then in the West Jeru
salem, Ephesus, and Antioch, soon afterwards Rome
and Provence, the Crypt of Toulouse, and, later, St.
James of Compostella, Mont Martre at Paris, and
the House of Loretto. If I mentioned more names,
this chapter would expand into a volume.
What is most remarkable is that the Most High
in person has always, since the unfolding of Revela
tion, taken the initiative in these kinds of pre
dilections.
Who does not know the refrain of the mystical
chauvinism of the Hebrews ? The Lord loveth the
gates of Sion above all the tabernacles of Jacob. *
In fact, it is on this particular hill of Judaea that He
manifested His glory rather than on any other. Christ
also, when God dwelt amongst mortal men, did not
eschew such preferences. If we consider His friend
ships, Bethany was dear to Him ; when He would
pray, He chose the Garden of Gethsemani ; and
when He would do penance, He retired into the
desert. Since His glorification at His Ascension,
we cannot notice any change in the way of acting of
the Man-God ; and if He wishes anew to manifest
in this world His power, or justice, or love, He
selects a glorious Pathmos, or a blood - stained
Alverne", or a gracious Paray-le-Monial. For we can
be sure that these heavenly preferences are always
in harmony with the places which are so singularly
honoured. If we notice from this point of view the
* Ps. Ixxxvi. 2.
I 2
4 THE GLORIES OF LOURDES
various celebrated places already mentioned, we
shall find that between them and the supernatural
manifestations of which they were the scene there
existed, so to speak, a pre-established harmony.
The positivism of the present day would fain ex
plain this in its off-hand way in suggesting the
influence of the means. * But a Gerbert and a
Lacordaire, in accordance with Christian ideas, have
been more philosophical in discerning in this fact
the workings of a true Predestination. The former
wrote : Providence has prepared great places for
great events ; while the latter said : There are
places blessed as the result of a choice, which is con
cealed in the decrees of Infinite Wisdom.
Both these writers, who were philosophers and
poets, have clearly shown the exquisite sensitiveness
with which the records of Time and Space among
mortals respond in all times and places to the har
monies of the sovereign Musician, whose unerring
bow sways mortal destinies.
Leaving aside mysticism, and still more fatalism,
we believe there is a Divine predetermination of times
and places as well as of men themselves, who move
among their fellows and influence some rather than
others. The word chance, as applied to lifeless
geography or living history, is a word without a
meaning, which unbelievers use to screen their folly,
as well as their bad faith. There is nothing unfore
seen in this well-ordered world. There is no date
without a meaning, no place without some purpose,
just as not a hair falls from our head without the
* L influence des milieux.
HOLY GROUND 5
knowledge of our Heavenly Father. As applied to
individuals or nations, we call it Vocation, but as
applied to the two Categories of Time and Space,
which, as Aristotle says, limit man under one form
of the conditioned, it is Providence. On this ground
Providence rules all things here below. Clearly,
therefore, there are more particularly certain points
of Space and Time which had the honour, from the
beginning, of playing an important role in the
eternal designs of Providence.
Now, such a spot par excellence Lourdes certainly
seems to be in France, the land of heavenly visitations.
Accordingly, Divine power is so visible since the
Mother of God descended here that I venture to say
that, after Jerusalem, city of sacrifice, and Rome,
city of strength, Lourdes, the city of grace, is the
holiest spot on earth. Facts will prove this more
eloquently than entire treatises.
Meanwhile, as a description of the site explains
historical events more clearly, let us study this land
of miracles under the double light of topography and
history.
When, after leaving Tarbes, we pass the lofty table
lands which stretch like the last terraces of Lan-
nemezan, a glorious vista is suddenly unfolded before
our eyes a smiling valley which, in its mystic isola
tion, seems enveloped in a serene atmosphere of
sublime poetry. It is the gracious Lourdes in the
heart of Lavedan.
A wonderful landscape ! Let us take a closer
view of it. That far-off circle of weather-beaten
6 THE GLORIES OF LOURDES
mountains, sharpened like arrow-heads, and lifting
their bare summits above vast plains of snow,
resembles the noble vestibule of some visionary
temple.
They are the towering Pyre"ne"es, reaching in these
magnificent solitudes their highest elevation. Hail
to these giants ! Ardiden, not unlike a pyramid ;
Nouvieille, with its jagged horn ; Vignemale, on its
four peaks upholding the glacier of Montferrat ; and
nearer to us the peak of Jer, the cupola of Be"out,
Espenettes, Espelugues, shutting in the market-
town, like so many sentinels of granite, which, proud
of their crown of hoar-frost and their canopy of blue,
seem to be keeping watch and ward for the passing
of some Faerie Queene. . . .
Nearer, showing their outline against the sky,
admire the beautiful hills of Bigourdain, rounding
off by gentle slopes their harmonious tops. You see
there the last buttresses of the Mountain of fire,
which begins imperceptibly to grow smaller, as
though before some unsuspected grandeur ; while
towards its base, half-way down, begin the forests of
fir-trees, scented with raspberries and whortleberries,
till soon we see the rhododendrons, and all the
vegetation beloved of sheep, scattered over the ever
green grass.
Now at the place where the seven valleys end,
before the lofty heights suddenly opening out, at the
very spot of the romantic gorge, which by various
defiles leads to the famous hot springs, we see,
delightfully situated in a refreshing oasis, at the very
foot of its fortress, which guards it while frowning
HOLY GROUND 7
down upon it, the predestined town of Mary. It
shines like a pearl the pearl of the Pyrenees
among the meadows, green as the water which
bathes them, on the country of Spanish corn, of
white hoods, and of grey bonnets.
All around the landscape becomes more and more
clothed with tufted grasses and flowers that
4 With rich inlay
Broider the ground,
rivalling in colour those of Luz or Argeles, but more
homely, you would say.
To wash its base, the Gave of Pau, the most
famous of the Gaves, with its restless foaming waves,
describes a semicircle to the east, then runs in a
straight line, and dashes wildly along the base of
the neighbouring hill, filling the gloomy precincts of
its caverns with its joyous murmurs. Towards these
flowery banks, where the scent of the apple-trees is
wafted, the peaceful city displays like an amphitheatre
its irregular roofs, somewhat like a figure prostrate in
prayer before the glorious mountains.
Little town of great renown is a proverb often
applied to Bethlehem and Nazareth. It suits
Lourdes equally well, for if in numbers and size it
has always been somewhat obscure, what fame does
not the capital of the obscure Bigorre enjoy by its
associations ! It is not generally known that its
history goes back to very early times, according to
legend.
In the time of Moses there lived a young and
beautiful Princess of Ethiopia, named Tarbis, who,
8 THE GLORIES OF LOURDES
seeing her throne and hand rejected by the Law
giver of the Hebrews, to forget her sorrow as a
Queen and woman, travelled from the shining East
to the frozen banks of the Adour. This country of
tears by degrees so took her fancy that she built a
town there, which she called Tarbes, after her own
name. As for Lapurda, her elder sister, who wished
to follow her in her strange wanderings, she sent
her to build another city at the end of the neighbour
ing hills the ancient Lapurdum, whence is derived
the modern Lourdes.
If this quasi-Biblical tradition does not affect you,
there is another which carries us farther back into
the dim twilight of history. They speak of a
famous town, built long ago in this same glen
among the mountains, coeval with the mysterious
city of Is, every trace of which, even its name, was
swept away by the overflowing of a lake, which
submerged it, leaving behind a story as romantic as
it is terrible. Still, I prefer the story about Tarbes,
in which Holy Scripture modifies mythology and
explains the etymology.
Coming nearer to historical times, we read that
Crassus, Caesar s lieutenant, at the end of a difficult
siege, took by storm this stronghold of Lourdes,
(Castrum Lapurdense), which, even then, possessing
some importance and having withstood more than
one siege, had at length to submit for five centuries
to the Roman dominion, symbolized there on its
guardian cliff by the huge and squarely-built citadel.
After the Romans, the Visigoths will guard the
key of so valuable an outpost to the advantage of
HOLY GROUND 9
the new Faith. In A.D. 406, as history relates,
between Tarbes and Lourdes, but somewhat nearer
Lourdes, the fierce Vandals sustained a crushing
defeat. It only needed a monk and priest, Mesclin,
the saint of Bigorre, to stir up the uncouth inhabi
tants against these hordes of freebooters (as they
would be roused up at the present day if the des
poiling hand of the Government made any attempt
against this shrine).
A little later, when the Arians, vanquished at
Poitiers, tried to rally their disorganized forces in
Occitania, they found themselves obliged, as ancient
records tell us, to come to terms before Lourdes.
Again, the Saracens were driven for ever from
French soil in A.D. 732, being routed in the plain of
Ossun, hard by that fateful town on which already
rested the promises of the future.
The verdict of history assigns to the Moors, and
not to the Goths of Aquitania, the actual building
towering high above the town, about 150 feet
high (besides many other buildings in the Pyrenees),
like a vulture guarding the entrance of the pass.
All, however, agree in saying that the famous Mirat,
one of the most renowned leaders of Islam, took
refuge in this inaccessible stronghold. From this
splendid position the son of the prophet defied the
power of Charlemagne so successfully that to subdue
him the great Emperor with the bushy beard could
not find any other means than converting him.
At least, Lourdes was long called * Mirabel, * beauti
ful to look upon. Moreover, the local records tell
of a siege more renowned than any other, which
io THE GLORIES OF LOURDES
may be identified with the one of which we speak,
and apparently the first escutcheon of the city was
derived from this incident * a golden eagle holding
in its beak a silver trout/ with reference, no doubt, to
the eagle which the astute Mussulman let loose from
his fortress, that, when returning from fishing in the
lake hard by, it might let some of its booty fall
among the besiegers. And this incident gave them
the impression that a fortress which could thus
throw away its provisions could still hold out for a
long time, and made the army of the Christians raise
the siege, at least for a time.
In the thirteenth century, under the historic walls
of Lourdes, we see the last remnants of the Albigen-
sian heresy, already demoralized on the fields of
Muret, overthrown by a handful of the true believers,
A century later we see the men of Lavedan
holding their own against the troops of Charles V.,
commanded by the Duke of Anjou in person, to
defend their autonomy, which was once again in
danger. As regards the history of Lourdes during
the Middle Ages, as the reader can well imagine, it
is centred round its feudal castle, where we must
gather it from the flowers in the crannied wall,
from which the blood of epic contests was so often
shed in the name of a sublime but ferocious chivalry.
Amid all its varied vicissitudes the old castle re
mained ever aloft in its wild solitude, the inviolate
refuge of the faith and traditions of Be arn.
It was Eleonora of Aquitaine who betrayed at
the price of her marriage with a Plantagenet the
fortunes of this citadel, which had been able to
HOLY GROUND n
resist force of arms, but knew no surrender, thus
truly deserving to blazon on its escutcheon this
device : Bigourdain plus feal qu un chien.
After this, how can we describe all its fortunes,
as it passed successively from the Duke of Lancaster
and the Black Prince into the hands of Simon de
Montfort, or a Count of Toulouse, or a Seigneur de
Bigorre ? The sad Treaty of Bretigny handed over
Lourdes and its castle by a written deed to the
English (as far as such acts of injustice can bind).
Later on Bertrand du Guesclin came to show his
patriotism beneath this fort, to restore it to its
traditional masters, but in vain. Only in 1408,
after a tragic siege of two years, our ancestors won
it back finally and for ever (as we trust). When in
the following century the people of Be"arn, following
their rulers, adopted the so-called Reformed Faith,
those of Lavedan had the courage to remain faithful
to the traditions of their forefathers. Here, as else
where, under the plea of a pure Gospel, they engaged
in civil strife. The Protestants soon saw, as was
natural, in the site of Lourdes a prize worth having,
as it would make them masters of the country. But
the commander of the garrison only gave to Villars,
their leader, who, unable to reduce it, tried to come
to terms with the besieged, this answer, not un
worthy of the heroes of old : Go and tell him who
has sent you that I am placed in this post of honour
not to surrender, but to defend it ! It was a
Catholic, and a Frenchman, too, who spoke
thus. . . .
The ruthless Joan of Navarre, misled by Calvin-
12 THE GLORIES OF LOURDES
istic fanaticism, in 1567, set fire to the town of
Lourdes, in the hope of thus destroying the last
refuge of Roman impiety, but to no purpose. The
castle remained unscathed, like the Faith of its
defenders. And when, towards the middle of this
troublous sixteenth century, the surrounding country
fell under the influence of Calvin, this giant of
granite stood firm then, as ever. Henry IV. had to
renounce his Protestantism ere this loyal-hearted
little place would recognize the standard of the
d Albrets, who, tempted by epic memories more,
perhaps, than by the charms of the country, were
not long in fixing their residence there.
Too soon afterwards, having no more liberties to
defend, the stronghold of Lourdes, shorn of its secular
glory, became an ordinary State prison, the Bastile of
the rebellious Seigneurs of Gascony. The revolution
and the forms of government which followed did
not leave it deprived of political masters. To-day,
in spite of the loyal vigilance of local patriotism, the
ancient castle is but a phantom, the empty shadow
of its former glories, rearing still with some pride the
crumbling remains of its medieval walls, no longer as
a rampart against the enemies of home and altar,
but as a landmark for the grotto of -Espelugues,
which in the mysterious designs of Providence was
to be the harbinger of a new world.
We see, then, how brightly for twenty centuries
the star of Lourdes has shone in the firmament of
history. The reader must not deem this meagre
sketch a waste of time. All that belongs to the
soil of France has an interest of its own ; and,
HOLY GROUND 13
moreover, it shows at least that this favoured country
was never like other countries.
I will refrain, even at the sacrifice of some pictur
esque details, from entering on the thorny ground
of popular legend, and describing in turn the bloody
rites which the inexorable religion of the Druids
offered, doubtless for many centuries, on the menhirs
or dolmens of Massabielle, * to the Virgin who was to
bear a child ; and the eerie sabbaths of the fairy
enchantresses, who loved to perform their weird rites
in these horrid glens ; and, in a word, the hordes of
demons, from which the malice of the Evil One
does not seem to have spared such places, taking
early possession of a wilderness which he doubtless
foresaw would one day pass into the hands of his
deadliest foe. . . .
Whatever truth there may be in these stories,
this, at least, is certain : that since the dawn of its
history, every assault and every heresy has spent
itself in vain against Lourdes. Is not this surely a
sign of Predestination ? If the framework explains
the meaning of events, how much they, as they are
unwound from the spindle of Destiny, attest and
foreshadow the designs of Providence, while they pave
the way for them ! But to return to Lourdes.
In this town, whose history is so glorious, where
the supernatural seemed to be in the air, it will be
interesting to visit the place where the heroine
of the nineteenth century, who has done more to
make Lapurdum famous than all its past heroes put
together, fared to her heavenly visions.
I 4 THE GLORIES OF LOURDES
Passing along the Rue des Petit Fosse s, near
the middle of which was her wretched home, and
presently leaving the hamlet behind at the lane
du Baous, Bernadette had to cross the old and
worm-eaten bridge of the Gave. Then she passed
for a moment along the field Laffite, near the
place where the river bends to enclose with the blue
cordon of its waves that vast and gracious domain,
which owes its increased fertility to an ingenious
network of canals. The chief canal was that of
Savy, which worked several mills built in these
places, especially that of the Nicolau family, where
Fran9ois Soubirous sometimes laboured. This
stream flowed nearly parallel to the road of the
wood of Subercarriere, or, rather, the rocky path,
nearly always ascending, and hewn out of the solid
rock. You had to take this path if you wished to
avoid the water, in order to reach, with some diffi
culty, and sometimes slipping on the steep incline,
the excavations there, known by the generic name of
Massabielle.
Here stood an enormous rock, a solid block, rising
to a point in front of you, not far from the Gave.
Here the visitor can enter a natural cavern, about
39 feet wide, and from 26 to 30 feet high. It was
like a natural oratory, the nave of which, all jagged,
was shrouded in dark shadows, while its ample
draperies of stone shut it in all round.
This was the famous cavern which for many
generations was the subject of many awe-inspiring
tales. Few sites seemed to be so fitted for mys
terious rites as this troubled solitude, and few people
HOLY GROUND 15
approached this dreaded place for fear of the Evil
One. Only when surprised by the storm or to
shelter from the sun s heat would the shepherds of
the country, first arming themselves with the sign of
the cross, sometimes pen their flocks here. Yet they
had to bring drinking-water here for their sheep, for
the interior was absolutely dry. No one had ever
seen water there, save rain sometimes trickling
down its walls, and inside the grotto a small pool
of moist mud at the level of the river. Over the vault,
pierced through the solid rock, a sort of window
opened out, which narrowed into a pointed bay,
which admitted the light of day. Below this cleft
the massive rock, somewhat square in shape, was
hung with a severe tapestry of moss, lichen, and
briers, in winter falling in stunted cascades, but
in summer clothed with an abundance of wild
blossoms.
And evermore past its granite base sweeps the
boisterous Gave, noisily wreathing into garlands
its flowers of flashing foam.
So this wonderful cave, like that of Endor or
Cumse, stood in this spot, which at the touch of a
magician s wand was destined to become the shining
Thabor of the Queen of Virgins.
Since the Mother of God has hallowed these
places, what a change has taken place ! Above
all, among the wonders revealed under her influence
we must mention, in the very niche in which Mary
appeared eighteen times, the fountain which gushed
forth at her coming, and which is the jewel of her
grotto, as the grotto is the jewel of Lourdes.
1 6 THE GLORIES OF LOURDES
It is not unlikely that it was already there buried
under the sand without anyone having ever perceived
or suspected it, though many are inclined to think
that it came into existence on February 25, 1858,
after the ninth apparition. The miracle lies in the
wonderful discovery of this spring and in its sudden
and increasing discharge, which amounts to 26,852
gallons in twenty-four hours ; moreover, this spring
never ceases, even when the sultry dog-star parches
the earth, to pour from some mysterious reservoir
a fresh and crystal stream, the overflow from which
fills the * Baths of the Invalids. For there are the
baths of Our Lady, as well as her hospital baths
where their souls must first be sanctified ere their
bodies can be healed, and a hospital where the most
exacting science is represented by the most relentless
of physicians, who spends his time in investigating the
Supernatural, only admitting those cures as miracu
lous which cannot be explained in any other way.
We know that Catholic symbolism would fain see
special relations between this element and the
Madonna at Lourdes. Our liturgists rightly affirm
that there are hardly any holy things which have
not some connection with this precious element.
Thus, the Spirit moved over the waters in the
beginning to render the earth fruitful. The water
of the Deluge came later as a terrible sacrament of
universal renovation. In the Temple ablutions
always preceded the Divine rites. At Siloe every
human infirmity was plunged in the famous Pool with
the five gates, when the angel moved its waters.
On the banks of the Jordan the water of St. John the
HOLY GROUND 17
Baptist endeavoured to impart new life to a de
generate people. Above all, from the wounded
heart of the Man-God the Church came forth in
a symbolical effusion of blood and water, that in our
religion everything may be regenerated by water as
it was redeemed by blood, as is seen in the Holy
Eucharist, where the Precious Blood lies hidden, and
in Baptism, which unceasingly pours over souls its
healing waters.
Thus the fountain is the most amiable and ex
pressive type of grace from above pouring into our
souls, to spring up into everlasting life. Now,
between Our Lady and this element there are
striking analogies, which Grillot de Givry has
published in a suggestive volume. According to
him, Lourdes with its pools is a * sacred town, such
as existed in Palestine and ancient Asia, where
Heaven imparted to the water that sprang up for
this purpose a healing power sufficient for all cures
of soul or body.
I much prefer this ingenious theory, both from a
rational and Christian point of view, to the absurd
theory of Baraduc, which I will speak of in another
place, * who lately explained to us the wonders on
the banks of the Gave by radiographic plates I
The Lady of Light said distinctly to Bernadette,
and through her to all mankind : * Go and drink of
my fountain, and wash there ; moreover, the mere
contact with this liquid, in which (as chemical
analysis has proved) no other healing power is
* In a study on Le Surnaturel a Lourdes, which we hope
soon to be able to publish.
2
1 8 THE GLORIES OF LOURDES
present save that of miracles, gives health to the
body and entirely renews the soul.
Can such virtue surprise us, when we reflect that
this water is not only a gracious boon given by
Heaven to earth, but also the type par excellence of
the Mother of God ? In how many inspired passages
the Holy Ghost calls Mary the Fountain of God /
Besides, what more gracious messenger could be
found for gifts always ready to be showered on us
from the heart and the hands of the Mother of all
mercy ? Hence we can understand the reason why,
wherever she had altars in the countless shrines
which the love of her children has dedicated to her,
* from her feet a fountain of life always began to
flow.
Perhaps the prophet Joel was thinking of the little
rill of Massabielle when he sang ages ago : * From
the house of the Lord shall a fountain come forth,
and shall water the torrent of thorns. * The
reader will make his own application of this text.
Listen to Ezekiel declaring in rapture still more
explicitly : I saw waters coming forth from the
Temple on the right side, and all those to whom
these waters came were saved. t But I think no
one has foreseen more clearly the mystery of
Our Lady s fountain suddenly gushing forth in the
solitude of Beam than Isaias. Let us glance at
the thirty-fifth chapter. After having welcomed
the approach of the Divine influence over the
gladdened wilderness, praised the glory of these
places and the beauty of the worship which would
* Joel iii. 1 8. t Ezek. xlvii.
HOLY GROUND 19
henceforth be given to the Lord, the Prophet
describes to his people the vision of the sick people
of the future, proclaiming to each of the faint
hearted Jews the hope that strengthens a hope
which was fulfilled by after - events, since the
Prophet s scroll records, almost like the register
of a Boissarie, the names of the infirmities healed.
Then shall the eyes of the blind be opened, and
the ears of the deaf be unstopped. Then shall the
lame man leap as a hart, and the tongue of the
dumb shall be free. But whence shall all these
wonders proceed ? From the fountain of the
Almah, whom the Seer even now glorifies. For
waters are broken out in the desert, and streams in
the wilderness ; and that which was dry land shall
become a pool, and the thirsty land springs of
water, ever flowing to refresh the parched wayfarer.
This is no paraphrase, but the Prophet s own words.
In his vision of the future the Seer of Israel goes
on to foretell the holy caravans which will wend to
these holy waters : The path (to the waters)
shall be called a holy way ; the unclean shall not
pass over it such as profane tourists, those hornets
of our pilgrimages. Lourdes, with its mysterious
cavern, its white Lady, its sacred fountain, will be
the only bourne for the pilgrims who hasten thither
on the wings of faith and love. As to fools
worldly people, doubtless, who go on the pretext of
taking the waters they have no business there.
What could they do there ? The power of the Evil
One himself will be harmless at the threshold of
Our Lady s realm. No lion shall be there, nor
22
20 THE GLORIES OF LOURDES
shall any mischievous beast go up by it, nor be
found there.
So, according to the Prophet, this predestined
country is the classic land of the perfect liberty of
the children of God, where no tyranny shall fetter
the aspirations of their religious devotion. And
they shall walk there that shall be delivered. And
at the sight of all the wonders that shall be seen
and wrought there, even great sinners, if they are
sincere, will be converted, remembering the price at
which they are redeemed, both by the blood of a
God and the tears of His Mother. And the re
deemed of the Lord shall return. And because the
true mission of Lourdes, its crowning glory, is the
praise of God, they will be seen on this esplanade,
along which wind so many triumphal processions in
God s honour, coming to the new Sion with songs
upon their lips : * They shall come into Sion with
praise. Hence, as its distinctive feature, joy of
soul and body alike will thrill through the hearts of
the pious pilgrims, which nothing can take away.
And everlasting joy shall be upon their heads.
Lourdes, then, will be for mortals a Paradise Re
gained, from which suffering the effect of sin will
flee away before the gracious smile of Our Lady,
and where, for some days at least, you will no longer
hear, as though you were rapt to the third Heavens,
the sad sighs of this valley of tears : * And sorrow
and mourning shall flee away. For even if they
return with their miseries, the poor invalids will
take back from thence, by the highest miracle of all,
gentle resignation and holy hope.
HOLY GROUND 21
After such a description of the benefits of the
Grotto, penned nearly 3,000 years ago by this
sublime writer (and the lyric beauty of the Prophet s
words must excuse the length of the foregoing
extract), we cannot wonder that the face of the holy
Rock is covered with ex-voto offerings.
Does not the natural instinct of our heart prompt
us to show by external signs our pent-up joy and
gratitude for some remarkable deliverance from evil ?
Thus the patriarchs of old, those patterns of religious
men, taught almost from God s own lips, never
failed to build altars, or at least to erect pillars, in
return for some signal favour of Heaven. They
were the prayers, Holy Writ tells us, * which they
offered to the Most High.
Pagan antiquity also, both among the Greeks and
Romans, was no exception to this law of Nature,
and we see those touching manifestations, the fruits
of their piety, in the pillars of all the temples of
polytheism.
In raising gratitude to the dignity of religion, of
which it constitutes one of the most essential notes,
Christianity was not mistaken in authorizing and
encouraging a similar practice, in order that the
gratitude of the faithful might thus be eternally
blazoned on the walls of her churches.
Hitherto I have endeavoured to delineate the
picturesque side, so to speak, of this famous Grotto
of the Pyrgndes. But how can I express the
hidden virtue which emanates from this hewn-
out rock? Shall I say that through this granite
22 THE GLORIES OF LOURDES
hollow there is something beyond which is seen
and felt ?
Massabielle is truly the gate of Heaven, the
threshold of the Infinite, quite as venerable as the
See of Tarbes, or the Cathedral of Paris, or even the
Pillar of Saragossa. See, then, how, in this tabernacle
of Mary, with mankind earth is forgotten the smiling
Pyre ne es, and the sky ever blue, and the solemn
Gave, and this dreamy landscape so much does
this mysterious hollow of rock attract our eyes as it
wins our hearts. When the white statue is seen
aloft, as though living, in its spotless marble, to smile
upon the crowds, you would fancy that its sightless
eyes gleamed with pleasure upon each pilgrim !
Might it not be the radiance of eternal life which
descended once upon this altar, and which gleamed
still through inert matter ? and in the gloomy depths
of the cave might there not linger some trace of the
ideal woman
Our tainted nature s solitary boast ?
But no ; human poetry has no place here. The
simple and glorious truth is that, since the Immacu
late Queen, who is also all-holy, appeared fifty years
ago in this hollow of blessed rock by this slope,
that dates from the creation of the world, this
ground is holy, hallowing those who tread upon it,
so that there is no place for atheists here.
Zola felt himself one day gasping for breath.
Huysmans says, in one of his happy phrases, that to
venture to remain there without compunction one
would need the spotless soul of a Bernadette, one feels
so unworthy somewhat ashamed even to walk there.
HOLY GROUND 23
Even were it possible not to breathe in the super
natural at Our Lady s feet, a sceptic could not help
feeling it there. Is it not truly a visible miracle of
Heaven, which has made a new creation, as it were,
spring up all around you ? If you visited these
places fifty years ago and revisit them to-day, you
must admit that some quickening influence has
passed over them.
What, then, despite its glorious past, was this
sleepy little town, of 4,000 or 5,000 inhabitants, in
1858, hidden in this far-off boundary of France, so
that many had doubts of its very existence ? It is
true that in the season Lourdes became each year
the halting-place of Europeans going to fashionable
resorts, but as there was nothing to see, people did
not stop there, the coach depositing them at night
fall, only to start again next morning. Even the
undeniable beauty of the country could not detain an
hour longer the modern man of civilization, pant
ing for excitement. But in a few years this
halting-place will become a centre, a focus, an
international rendezvous, whither the infirm people
of the Old and New Worlds will have themselves
carried, forgetting all the attractive watering-places.
And great events will take place there by one of
Time s revenges, known only to Heaven to be
followed by national pilgrimages, which will become
an annual occurrence, a wave of prayer and penance,
to which the festivals of olden times cannot be
compared.
Such will be the change among the visitors.
Notice that of the inhabitants. What has happened
24 THE GLORIES OF LOURDES
to those old and ruinous thatched houses on these
new boulevards where everyone is now walking?
The straggling Scriptural village, so decrepit and
sleepy, has vanished as if by magic, with its thatched
roofs and moss-grown walls ! Garrets, shops, and
plough-lands, all have had to vanish and give way to
an imaginary city, not dreamt of yesterday. Every
thing, down to the headlong and boisterous torrent,
has been compelled to alter its course, and so you
find the eternal mountains have skipped like the
lambs, of which a Prophet speaks, opening at first
their marble sides, whence the materials for a new
world have been quarried ; then being gradually
hewn and fashioned into fine streets and broad
avenues, where Progress pours along with all her
up-to-date magnificence.
Meanwhile, from the station, which witnesses every
year the arrival of nearly a million pilgrims, to the
esplanade a sort of cosmopolitan place which can
hold 100,000 human beings count, if you can, all
the hotels, palaces, and endless rows of wealthy
shops and rich warehouses, wearing everywhere an
unmistakable stamp of religion, side by side with
this display of opulence, which, as nowhere else in
the world, makes you forget Paris, and is a relief
from London.
Such is the wonderful city, springing up suddenly
in our days in these deserted swamps, where lately
the fetid stream of Lapaca and the treacherous
Meriasse rushed together to blend their murmurs
more sonorously with the meeting waters of Azun
and Gazost, and Isabie and Gavarnie.
HOLY GROUND 25
In truth, there are three Lourdes the ancient one,
still loyal (to its credit !) to its traditions not less
than to its white hoods and its bonnets, but narrow
ing more and more on the side of the Fort, the circle
of its original physiognomy ; then the new one, that
vies with the great capitals, though within a narrow
compass ; lastly, the other town, which, as it comes
from God, is neither old nor new, and on which
everything converges.
Withdrawn behind the shelter of its trees, as if
the better to enjoy unutterable ecstasies, encircling
its treasure with a green mantle and invisible
guardians, whose leader is St. Michael, we can say
that it is epitomized in its three temples, which, like
three lilies, have sprung up from the earthy bulb of
the Grotto.
What a wonder of stone is this glorious edifice,
rising in successive tiers one after another, like the
gradual ascents of faith, hope, and charity ! First,
there is the Rosary Chapel, with its Byzantine
narthex, its solitary arch, its spacious dome, and its
campanile admitting the light of day through twenty
shining rose-windows. Then, on the first terraces,
we see the Crypt, entirely scooped out of the rock
a truly Cyclopean work, opening with a single eye,
along a narrow passage, on the splendour of the holy
of holies, where the gleam of lamps round the golden
altar harmonizes with the silence of souls ; venerable
shrine, which corresponds to the very centre of the
holy cavern, and towards which for the last half-
century so many mourners flock silently, but return
full of hope. Lastly, behold the shining Basilica,
26 THE GLORIES OF LOURDES
that glory of Parthenic architecture, lifting up like a
prayer its white elegance as high as genius can carry
it in the pursuit of the ideal a true exaltation of the
Immaculate Virgin, her Magnificat in granite, as
natural, and bold, and lyrical as the enthusiasm
which inspired it ; a matchless poem, the filigree
work of which seems a smile of Heaven as each of its
stones is a loving gift of Earth !
After noticing the exterior, what splendour within !
But what pen could fitly describe this row of
banners scarves of gold, embroidery, and silk and
this gleam of tapers, this profusion of pictures,
this galaxy of statues, and this efflorescence of bas-
reliefs ? What richness everywhere below, in the
middle, and above ! In the circular basement go
round, as an artist as well as a Catholic, the fifteen
mysteries of the Rosary, which are an object-lesson
both in art and theology. Stop, half-way up the
church, before each of these works of sculptor s,
engraver s, and jeweller s art, as wonderful as they
are modestly hidden. But above all, in the lofty
cathedral you will be enraptured, like Bernadette
herself, in presence of this Virgin crowned with
twelve stars in the midst of decorations truly
heavenly. * Signum magnum apparuit in ccclo /
And what worship we see here only to be seen at
St. Peter s, Rome ! Literally, the services at Lourdes
by their beauty and devotion are a foretaste of
Heaven. In proof of this, at the Matins of
February 10, 1908, and at the Pontifical High Mass
next day, you would have fancied yourself in the
midst of the hosannahs of the Heavenly City !
HOLY GROUND 27
Lights innumerable, flowers from every clime,
shining tapers, glorious windows, sweet chimes of
bells, wonderful organ music, beautiful singing
nothing was wanting to give you the idea, as hap
pened to one of the most ancient Kings of France,
of being in Paradise ! What is undoubtedly still
more beautiful to the observer than all this liturgical
pomp is the prayer, tempered with sorrow, idealized
by resignation, and borne upwards on the wings of
sweet confidence. This is music sent up to God,
sweeter than that of pealing organs, or of the
heavenly spheres wheeling in faultless harmony in
the starry skies of Lourdes. For all will agree, I
think, that people pray well chiefly in these places*
whether in the heart of the moving crowds, whose
murmur is the praise of God, like that of the waves,
or, better still, perhaps, in the silent hours when,
above the holy deserted Rock, the eagles soar, and
from the dizzy heights of the towers the bells peal
forth their musical chime, Ave Maria.
What virtue at these moments comes forth from
the hollow of the Rock, to supernaturalize man and
transform the multitudes ! How happily in one of
his recent pastorals the Bishop of Perpignan called
this Grotto a second Baptistery of Rheims !
Was I wrong, then, in saying that there are here
below special sites eternally predestined for the
designs of Almighty God ?
Thus Providence stamps on each of the works,
which It makes Its own in a special manner, a
symbolism, which is only the reflex of His infinite
wisdom ; for it is by the avenues of symbolism that
28 THE GLORIES OF LOURDES
rational creatures pass from this world into the
Unseen. Lourdes, however, realizes in a special
way this law of Divine Providence. As it was to
be the scene of the triumphs of the Queen of
Heaven, the Thabor of the Immaculate Conception,
it was necessary that Nature and Art, human history
and Divine grace, should be in harmony by a smile
of peace and beauty, sympathy and love, with this
peerless central figure.
But we must leave this theme, though it be but
half told. Having viewed the place and the sur
roundings, we must now study the wonderful events
which were to happen there.
CHAPTER II
THE APPARITIONS
FIRST APPARITION. It was February n Shrove
Thursday for the world, but the Feast of the
Shepherdess Genevieve for the Diocese of Tarbes
just before the noonday Angelus. Clothed in a
black frock, quite threadbare and patched, with the
white hood on her shoulders, thick fir-wood sabots
on her feet, the little Soubirous whose first name,
Bernadette, was destined ere long to become world-
famous, rivalling even the greatest descended the
steps of the steep town in the piercing cold of a
grey foggy morning, accompanied by her younger
sister and Jeanne Abadie, a neighbour, like herself,
little more than thirteen years of age. They were
going to the banks of the Gave to collect dry brush
wood.
Unconscious of the destiny awaiting her, and
even of her own self, she tripped along in the rustic
charm of her innocence, more pleasing to the soul
than to the eye by that secret radiance of a spotless
nature in which candour was much enhanced by
simplicity. Small for her age, with delicate features
that betokened a rather frail constitution, her com-
29
30 THE GLORIES OF LOURDES
plexion somewhat bronzed by the bracing air of the
country of Bartres, where she had spent part of her
childhood behind the sheep of her foster-father, she
had an appearance quite in keeping with her humble
condition, her kerchief tied in Bigourdain fashion,
hardly showing her fine black hair, yet not com
pletely hiding that beautiful forehead, so bright and
innocent, that seemed the rellex of Heaven. Her
eyebrows arched, her eyes brown, but calm and
bright, her mouth peculiarly adapted to express
kindness or compassion, her features marked by
gentleness, and also a certain intellectual fire, which,
perhaps, in her was only the reflexion of strong
common-sense, she walked along in the charming
innocence of childhood and the shy bashfulness of
her humble condition the daughter of a miller
without corn, who, ignorant of her A, B, C, like
any other shepherd-girl, only seemed fit to carry a
shepherd s crook, or else, perhaps, to turn a spinning-
wheel.
You know what happened the loud hurricane
which overtook her twice on the bank of the canal
of Savy, yet not a leaf stirred among the poplars on
the banks beside her; the dazzling light which
suddenly surrounded her at the same time in front
of the lonely rock of Massabielle ; and, lastly, in
a hollow niche of the Pyrenean granite, the heavenly
vision of a Lady of surpassing beauty such
* Radiant state she spreads
In circle round her shining throne
and breathing an indefinable sweetness from her
whole person; a real Being, at least, and not an
THE APPARITIONS 31
airy phantom, since the child, amazed and enrap
tured, distinctly saw her turn, look, smile, and
sometimes move her lips, as though in mysterious
converse with the Unseen.
Before such a sight what could a native peasant
do save instinctively fall on her knees ?
Meanwhile the Lady (for so the child ever after
wards called her), as she advanced to the edge of
the hollow, seemed to become more beautiful and
gracious. Strange to say, her brightness, like a
golden cloud, though so glorious, did not dazzle or
pain the eyes. Even so softly the day-star, that
harbinger of peace,
* Flames in the forehead of the morning sky.
She seemed to be of middle height, and about
sixteen or seventeen years of age, for a certain
spring-tide grace in her was joined to something
eternal, as though she, the ideal Woman,
So perfect and so peerless, were create
Of every creature s best.
To what type of earth or Heaven could our rough
and all-unable pen compare this Form Divine ?
We cannot describe that which surpasses descrip
tion. Let us at least say, to satisfy our devotion,
while gratifying our curiosity as far as possible, that,
according to Bernadette s account, the oval curve
of the face of the Unknown was in perfect harmony ;
her blue eyes had an irresistible charm ; her lips
breathed gentleness ; her majestic forehead seemed
like the seat of Wisdom or the throne of Virtue.
32 THE GLORIES OF LOURDES
Her robe was white as the driven snow still glittering
on the horizon ; her white veil fell in simple and
chaste folds down to her bare feet, bedecked with two
roses, which were fairer far than those of the wild
rose-tree when they unfold to the warm south winds,
and which had now the honour of serving as footstool
for the Vision. She wore no diadem, necklace, or
jewels of any kind. For a girdle she wore a sky-blue
ribbon tied at her waist. A rosary with milk-white
beads hung down by a shining gold chain from her
albaster fingers, which seemed to be telling the
beads. And with an ineffable kindness the shining
Vision looked at the humble shepherdess, who was
now rapt in an ecstasy of delight. Soon the Lady,
to encourage her, made with a sweet and stately
gesture the sign of the cross, on seeing which the
child wished to imitate her. From this moment she
was able to converse familiarly with the Stranger
without any feeling of nervousness.
Yet what a sight was presented to her enraptured
gaze ! Bernadette, on coming out of this ecstasy
of about fifteen minutes, could truly have said, what
the Apostle wrote of his supernatural revelations,
that eye hath not seen, nor ear heard, nor hath it
entered into the heart of man, to see the like.
Henceforth no external object, however attractive it
might be, could claim a share in her undivided love ;
and whenever any remarkable form of a woman was
pointed out to her as perhaps resembling * the Lady,
she would only make a significant pout of disdain.
Thus, when Fabisch, the famous sculptor of Lyons,
one day unveiled before the untaught peasant of
THE APPARITIONS 33
Lourdes his masterpiece, hoping, after so many
efforts, to have caught the likeness which would best
represent the sublime Original, the child, evidently
disappointed, only made this answer : It is very
beautiful, sir, but it is not her. She had seen face
to face essential beauty at least, as far as mortal
can shine on the forehead of that peerless Being,
whom a certain Father calls the wonderful statue
that came endowed with life from the hands of the
eternal Artist, with a sovereign perfection.
She was in very truth the actual or ideal arche
type of all aesthetic art, who had just appeared to
the child, and psychologists have justly concluded
from the very fact of such a vision, because sur
passing the conception of genius itself, that it was
supernatural. Hallucination since certain sinister
spirits have not shrunk from this stony impeach
ment is limited to reproducing, in fantastic and
usually grotesque combinations, something already
seen, but it never creates anything ; still less could
it conceive what never dawned on a Raphael, or a
da Vinci, or the master of Fiesole himself. To add
another detail, which confirms the authenticity of
this ecstasy. Of all the pictures of Our Lady ever
shown to little Soubirous as possibly resembling her,
none pleased her of those which our classic taste
exalts to the skies (even including the frescoes of
Fra Angelico), except one only, which was a copy of
the famous canvas attributed by tradition to St. Luke,
the inspired painter of the Almah.
We know well that, after this February noon, the
heart of the shepherdess, or, rather, her whole being,
3
34 THE GLORIES OF LOURDES
captivated, remained at this Grotto, which had
become for her the gate of Paradise. The fascina
tion which all pilgrims have since felt for this strange
rock what is it compared to the mysterious mag
netism which will henceforth rivet the poor child to it ?
The presence of the Divine had taken possession of
her for ever. Appetite and sleep were gone. Neither
the fear of her family nor threats of the police will
succeed in keeping her from this mysterious cavern.
What is it in truth to have once seen the super
natural here below, and what will it be like when
the full glory of the Immaculate will begin to shine
on us in Heaven ? Nee oculus vidit. . . . You should
have seen now the motionless and prostrate child,
like the image of the contemplative before this new
Sinai or the second Thabor. As soon as she was
able to return there, an angel s smile upon her lips,
the halo of the blessed around her face, ineffably
transfigured, she looked so beautiful at this moment
that the most sceptical could not fail to recognize
the supernatural, so clearly reflected in her peasant
features. And though the glistering Lady was only
visible to her favoured child, yet, with those clear
rays which she infused on her, all could conjecture
the brightness of Mary, so much did this wonderful
change in her become afterwards the best means of
judging.
SECOND APPARITION. On the i4th (Quinqua-
gesima Sunday), on coming away from High Mass,
an interior voice irresistibly urged the child (like
Joan of Arc long ago) to set off towards Espelugues.
THE APPARITIONS 35
She arrived there a little before one o clock, accom
panied by five or six young companions, who took
the simple precaution beforehand of bringing some
holy water with them, doubtless to drive away evil
spirits, should it be necessary. All this band of.
children had to promise the mother of Soubirous to
be back in time for Vespers.
Having come to the bleak and desolate Rock, all,
copying their model, knelt down and began to say
the Rosary, each by herself; when at the third
decade our favoured child, under sudden influence
of the Divine Form, cried out with an outburst of
joy: There she is! There she is! Then, as if
moved by a strong impulse, the child rises, and
boldly ascends to the crypt all streaming with light ;
and, just as on the previous Thursday, her soul,
body, and all her senses were dissolved into an
ecstasy of sublime joy. A big stone thrown sud
denly from the top of the Grotto by Jeanne Abadie
could not interrupt it.
Such was the visible change that took place in the
person of the shepherd-girl that her friends, who
had never before mentioned it fully, became very
uneasy about her. To make her recover her senses,
and to guard her personally against all possible
harm, they begged Bernadette to sprinkle holy
water on the Vision, according to the manner and
words of country-folk. It was Marie Hillot who
handed her the holy water, and when, rather to
humour her than from fear, the child, hardly turning
from her heavenly trance, timidly threw some drops
of holy water on the Lady, who was decidedly too
32
36 THE GLORIES OF LOURDES
beautiful to be harmful, the latter approved of it,
and smiled even more sweetly, and did not move. It
was a good sign ; soon the ecstasy completely
absorbed her, and in the company of this poor
ignorant girl thus lost in God, each one (even the
miller s son, called in to break the spell) felt that
religious awe so natural to the human heart under
the influence of mystery. . . .
Alas ! an hour later, when she returned to hum
drum, everyday life, what a rude awakening awaited
the little Saint, now like any ordinary person, though
in her heart of hearts she jealously guarded the
blessed Vision. The sudden and brutal entrance
of her mother into Nicolau s mill, where they
managed to carry her, could not efface it. But
Providence, seeing this momentary persecution by
her family, which was only the precursor of one
much more serious, did not fail, according to His
wont, to raise up a support and defence in the shape
of the miller s wife, who cried out to Louise
Casterot, about to raise a stick : Do not strike her,
hapless woman ; your daughter is an angel !
By the evening all the town had learnt about the
strange affair, and the gossips, as usual, discussed it,
some already believing it to be a supernatural
manifestation, whilst the rest the majority were
loath to see anything in it save some morbid dream
of a poor child suffering from hallucination, or else
some profane joke in very bad taste.
THIRD APPARITION. We have now come to the
i8th, the Thursday after Ash Wednesday, eight
THE APPARITIONS 37
days after the first apparition. At daybreak the
child, having heard Mass in the parish church, went
quickly down to the Grotto, escorted this time by
two good Catholic women Madame Millet and
Mademoiselle Peyret. One of them carried in her
hand a candle blessed at Candlemas, the other
concealed under her woollen kerchief a sheet of
paper, pen, and ink ; the former meant to light the
candle before the mysterious Being, and the latter to
give her the means of writing her name, and the
purpose of her troubling visitations.
Impatient of delay, the child quickly outran them,
tripping like a hart, though so demure and always
troubled with asthma, over the somewhat dangerous
slopes of the steep hill, over which a temporary
flooding of the canal of Merlasse obliged them to
pass this day. When these pious women arrived,
she had already been praying for ten minutes, and,
doubtless in reward for so much zeal, the white Lady
did not allow her to wait.
Heralded, as usual, by the shining light, which
quickly filled the sacred cavern, and which only
gradually paled as the Vision vanished, she appeared
with a gracious smile above the kneeling child,
beckoning to her to draw yet nearer, and even
familiarly addressing her by her pet name, a name
which must have greatly pleased the Queen of
Heaven ! At this very moment the two others
entered the Grotto. Naturally, no more than the
casual witnesses of the former scenes did they see
or hear anything of what was happening. As for
Bernadette, she was entirely transfigured, and once
38 THE GLORIES OF LOURDES
more she seemed less a child of men than an angel
of glory. Her companions, moved to tears, bade
her ask the invisible Form if they might remain ; the
reply was that she earnestly wished for people
many people there, including in this loving in
vitation the pilgrims of the future. The worthy
Lourdes women in their turn bent down on the
earth strewn with brushwood, as though on holy
ground, and then lit the blessed candle. It was
evidently the first time since the world began that
religious light had shone in such a solitude. We
know that, like the water which was soon to
murmur there, light is to true believers full of
symbolism, and forms an integral part of their
worship. Nevermore was it to be quenched there.
From its flame so many material, and, better still,
spiritual torches would be kindled, which have for
half a century changed this gloomy cavern into the
brightest of shrines.
Meanwhile the child, encouraged by the increasing
kindness of the Lady, standing up, ventured to
present to her the famous paper, asking her to
write on it her behest. This suggestion made her
smile, but with such kindness that it caused her
no confusion ; then, to show that this naive ex
pedient was not according to her wishes, she vanished
out of sight for a moment, only to show herself again
soon, and at length speak distinctly. How sweet
did the voice of this heavenly turtle-dove beginning
to coo in the hollow of the marble Rock sound in the
ears of the chaste shepherd-girl ! What musical
inflexions it had ! compared with which all harmony,
THE APPARITIONS 39
even that of pure spirits, is only a jarring discord.
Bernadette was particularly touched that so majestic
a Form addressed her in the plural, you, and also
that, to be better understood and make herself more
beloved, she deigned to speak in a patois in the
dialect of Lourdes, even ! she remarked later. We
know the substance of the first discourse heard from
another world. My child, the Vision first asked,
will you do me the favour of coming here for fifteen
days ? What a dignity, but yet what a courtesy,
truly Divine ! It is written that Our Lord always
treats human liberty with reverence. The child
having consented, the unknown Lady in return added
with a motherly smile, full of hope : And I promise
to make you happy, not here below, but in Heaven.
After these words, which were equivalent, as has
often been said, to a decree of canonization before
hand, the enchanting Vision vanished in the fairy
brightness of Massabielle.
As this Thursday was market-day in the little town
of Bigorre, there went abroad, doubtless, a rumour
from Espelugues to Marcadal, which soon spread
through all the countries which the Gaves water
with their blue waves.
FOURTH APPARITION. On the morrow, the igth,
the first day of the mysterious fortnight, Louise
Casterot, whose heart was deeply stirred by all the
strange news which report brought to her cottage,
determined to go herself with her daughter to the
Grotto. At daybreak, therefore, both of them,
accompanied by her Aunt Bernarde, godmother of
40 THE GLORIES OF LOURDES
the child, carefully traversed the Rue des Petits-
Fosse s, well wrapped up in their hoods, for the
north wind was bitterly cold. In a short time quite
a retinue had joined them on the river-banks, the
first-fruits of those crowds of Lourdes * who will
nevermore cease to flock there in ever-increasing
numbers, with the tendencypeculiarto all such gather
ings, some suspecting an artifice of the Evil One in
so sensational an event, others inclined to see in
it only some selfish trickery, or maybe morbid
hallucination, while the majority were beginning to
see in it the finger of God. What happened before
the eyes of the family just now come ? After the
usual rites (bows, prostrations, and prayer), the little
child, as before, was rapt in ecstasy, more sensibly
than on previous occasions. When the overjoyed
housewife saw her Bernadette thus supernaturalized,
and as if carried away by angelic bliss, with those
unearthly smiles that lit up her countenance, usually
so very plain, with transports of unearthly joy,
which made her frail body tremble, she wept, she grew
anxious, and complained that they had changed her
child, whilst around her the stupefied bystanders said
to one another, pointing at the young wonder
worker : How beautiful she is! The transport
lasted nearly half an hour, amid the respectful
silence of the crowd. When Bernadette returned
to herself, calm, but visibly moved, her first greet
ings were for her mother, thus proving that religion,
even when rapt to the heavens, so far from checking
* Les Foules de Lourdes, the well-known book by M.
Huysmans.
THE APPARITIONS 41
the lawful feelings of Nature, only makes them
stronger, while purifying them.
And whilst she came to her side, amid the friendly
cortege, whose astonishment began to show itself by
veneration, the child-seer, becoming the poor, ragged
daughter of a miller, informed them that, pleased
with her punctuality, the beautiful Lady was going
shortly to confide to her important revelations. She
told them also that this morning, when their con
versation was most interesting, a hubbub of uncouth
noises, contrasting hideously with the sweet voice of
the unknown Lady, had sounded quite close to them,
as if coming from underground near the waters
of the canal ; and these voices, wrangling, shouting
together, and disputing, like the discordant cries of
a mob quarrelling, filled the air with barbarous dis
sonance. At one time, even, one of these voices,
harsh and grating, cried out, doubtless to terrify the
timid child: Save yourself! save yourself! But
the glistering Lady had only to raise her head, frown
with displeasure, and with an imperious glance turn
towards the river, and at once this horrible discord,
undoubtedly from hell, ceased as if by magic. Could
the Evil One have foreseen at this hour that this
spot of earth, fraught with destiny, was going to pass
from under his sway, where he had hitherto per
formed his horrid rites ? and was he not then trying
to thwart the designs of Providence, as he will
eventually try in so many ways, either by violence
or craft ? Only what avails the insolence of the bad
angels, joined to their fury, in the presence of her
who, terrible as an army in battle array, has the
42 THE GLORIES OF LOURDES
eternal task of crushing the legions of hell beneath
her victorious feet ?
FIFTH APPARITION. Next day (Saturday), when
the young saint appeared on the scene of these
wonders, again accompanied by her mother, the
approaches to Massabielle were already black with
people, yet this crowd, of which all eyes were turned
towards her, did not seem to embarrass or surprise
her. As though no one was present, Bernadette
went simply and knelt in her usual place a stone
near the centre of the excavation and, taking her
Rosary, began to pray. She said the Hail
Marys as she let drop bead after bead for some
minutes, when, lo ! the punctual Messenger is at
hand. At once the shepherd-girl began to return
her smiles by smiles, and welcome by greetings, not
knowing what to do in order to express better her
reverent and affectionate homage, and she did this
with such grace that her mother, Louisa, more
bewildered than content, said to those within ear
shot : * In truth, I no longer recognize my little child.
In fact, the ecstasy to-day filled her completely.
They came close to her ; they stood up most rever
ently, not uttering a word, and holding their breath,
in order to follow the marvel. Unable to discover
anything, alas ! on the side of the Grotto, lighted up
and tenanted for the child alone, they deemed them
selves happy to be able to see the wonderful reflec
tion on the face of the child that seemed like an
angel s. After this too short scene, hardly lasting
forty minutes, Bernadette declared that her Lady
had -deigned, becoming a teacher of Catechism, to
THE APPARITIONS 43
teach her, word for word, a special prayer for her
own use. How glad should we be to know and
repeat this prayer that came from the heart of the
Mother of God ! O Mary, teach us to pray in like
manner ! . . .
SIXTH APPARITION. From the dawn of this first
Sunday in Lent the number of sightseers who had
come by night to the appointed rendezvous was so
great along the banks of the Gave that at six
o clock the little Soubirous had difficulty in making her
way amid greetings that waxed ever more enthusiastic.
Now, among the spectators, a doctor, notorious for
his scepticism no less than for his skill, had come
here this day. Convinced himself that the child
who claimed to have seen visions was only subject
to some nervous complaint, he resolved to come in
person, in the secret hope of demolishing by a word,
in the name of Science, all this childish display of
pathological mysticism. But at the mere view of
the ecstatic child lost in her wonderful vision, he
soon recognized a case without a parallel, which
doubtless it would not be easy to explain on medical
grounds. So he returned to the Grotto several times
in succession, always more attentive . . . and more
nonplussed. Everyone knows that, as the grace of
God is never wanting to a man of good-will, Doctor
Dozous (for it was he) ended by seeing everything
in its true light. Recognizing, with a fairness and
an independence not often met with, that the facts
at Massabielle were supernatural, he was publicly
converted. He was thus the first man of science
44 THE GLORIES OF LOURDES
won over by Bernadette he would certainly not be
the last. When, then, the doctor had stated that
the child, in the midst of her heavenly ecstasy, did
not lose her self-possession, remaining ever calm
and tranquil, and handing her candle, blown out by
the wind, two or three times to her neighbour to be
relit, her pulse remaining calm the whole time, her
breathing normal, her circulation regular, and showing
no signs of nervous excitement, his conscience forced
him to confess that the finger of God was there.
It is only fair to say that this ^sculapius of
Lourdes was treated by Heaven as a privileged
witness, since at this very date he was enabled to
perceive, besides the almost beatific joy of Berna
dette, her deep sorrow. In truth, the child became
very sad for a moment, and the doctor saw two
large tears roll down her flushed cheeks. Soon
they learnt the meaning of this : the Vision, having
been gracious and winning as ever to her dear con
fidant, suddenly wore a sorrowful and pained look,
when she gazed into the far distance, as though,
beyond the limited horizon of Be"arn, she discerned
sights that saddened her. They were (as she ex
plained at once to the alarmed child) the sins of the
world already far too great which came to dim
accidentally the essential happiness of the Queen of
Heaven, and imprint an unutterable sadness on that
face, the glorious peace of which fills the Seraphim
with joy. The conclusion of this tearful episode
was that it behoved them * to pray much for poor
sinners. Yet we should not have expected to find
there, in her Paradise of the Pyrenees, as on the top
THE APPARITIONS 45
of a new Calvary, the Immaculate Conception liable
to the fear of moral suffering. Those, however, who
are glad to speak of the poetry of this unparalleled
site, the sweetness one feels there, and the spiritual
benefit one derives from it, have not caught the
spirit of Lourdes, for they forget that the Mother of
Sorrows (Mater Dolorosa), present wherever there are
tears to shed, has wept here on their account !
Reparation and Atonement on the banks of the
Gave this is the chief idea (too little dreamt of
hitherto) of our pilgrimages. God grant that the
pious caravans may be more and more filled with
this idea, in proportion as the evils of the present
time wax greater ! Then verily this Thabor, changed
for the nonce into a Golgotha, will become what
Mary desires the mountain of a national Trans
figuration.
But the Divine joy did not long remain absent
from the heart and face of the Lady, who, smiling
graciously and happily as before, disappeared in the
reflexion of her own brightness.
As for Bernadette, the same evening of this
memorable day, when she had witnessed the tears
of the Mother of Christ, a terrible trial was about
to befall her. Hardly had she returned to her
wretched abode before she was led off between two
gendarmes to the police-station, there to hear herself
bitterly reproached, and even threatened, by the
Procureur-Impe"rial, and distinctly forbidden to go
near the too-famous rocks any more. This scene
is wonderfully like that of the Pretorium, at which,
nineteen centuries ago, the holiest of Victims had to
46 THE GLORIES OF LOURDES
appear. The new Caiphas, M. Dutour, employed
his wiliest artifices to no purpose, in the hope of
shaking her firm resolve, alleging by turns that the
public order was imperilled, the majesty of the law
disregarded nay, the sanctity of religion com
promised. Quite as uselessly the police magistrate,
Jacomet, of unhappy memory, added his persuasions,
at first harsh, then mild and insinuating. The
witness of Our Lady found answers to every ques
tion answers as natural as they were to the point-
without being frightened by brutality or won over
by blandishments, or ever losing her self-possession,
despite the deliberate falsification of her previous
replies, and every kind of false testimony.
M. Estrade, a collector of indirect taxes an intel
ligent, thoughtful man, if ever there was one was
present either by chance or by the will of Providence
at her examination. He became so indignant on
account of it that he was inclined to take her
part, rightly deeming that such an attitude on the
part of an ignorant child of thirteen years before
this display of civil authority was decidedly super
natural. The sudden arrival of her father, whom
the timidity natural to poor people urged to add his
involuntary veto to the severity of the law, could
not shake the heart of the shepherdess in her firm
resolve to revisit Massabielle, whither she felt irre
sistibly drawn in spite of herself, as soon as circum
stances would allow her.
How sad must this cold Sunday evening have
been under the roof of the Soubirous , especially to
the heart of the little child ! Foris pugn&, intus
THE APPARITIONS 47
timores. For it is needless to say that mental
anguish was from this time added to external trials.
On the one hand the Apparition invited her, yet
she saw herself restrained from going there by filial
reverence. What was she to do ? Was she going
to the enchanting Vision, so good and sweet, at the
sacrifice of duty duty which was sanctioned by
the solemn authority of the Decalogue ? It was
indeed a cruel dilemma ! . . .
Whilst waiting till it should please the shining
Lady itself to settle this conflict of conscience,
Bernadette, like a good Christian, went early next
day, the 22nd, not to the Grotto, as she had
longed to do hitherto, but to the school.
In the evening, when she had to return to the
Sisters, a strange thing happened. Arriving, with
her little basket on her arm, at the two paths
leading to the hospice, she feels, as it were, an invis
ible but real barrier, which holds her back. Several
time she tries, indeed, to go whither obedience calls
her, but in vain ! Then, thinking she knows, in
her childish conscience, that Heaven is calling her
towards the Gave, she allows herself to go rather
than walks of her own accord there, as though
moved automatically by an irresistible force ; and
though she would have taken a more retired path
way, so as to pass unobserved, she was not long, as
you may imagine, in reaching the rocks. The police
were also soon on her track. Let us give the
gendarme this credit, who was somewhat perplexed :
he had, at least, the good sense not to interrupt
the long prayer of the holy child. But a new trial
48 THE GLORIES OF LOURDES
was in store for her ; this time there was no vision
or transfiguration ! What could such a disappoint
ment mean ? Did Heaven intend, by this sudden
and unexpected refusal, to punish a fault more
physical than moral, or had the Lady of glory
already forgotten her solemn engagements ? Lamma
sabacthani ? Thus, in the depths of a similar cavern,
the Saviour in person had already been abandoned ;
thus, too, on the desolate slopes of Golgotha, the
daughter of Sion had been seen one mournful evening,
abandoned to herself, without anyone offering to com
fort her bitterness, vast and deep as the ocean. But
for us, who, in the light of later events, can grasp the
true significance of it, instead of finding fault, how
can we fail to admire in this the extreme delicacy
of the Blessed Virgin, anxious to respect (by keeping
away, though very reluctantly) paternal authority,
even to the point in which it was in open conflict
with her dearest wishes ?
On the other hand, because it is the rule of Provi
dence to draw good from evil, it came to pass that
the grievous chagrin of the child arose from the
involuntary severity of Francois Soubirous ; and
what might have been the chief obstacle finally
made everything easy for her, the father henceforth
giving leave to his unhappy child to go to Massa-
bielle as often as she liked.
Meanwhile the free-thinkers of the town did not
see it in this light ; and already they were carelessly
scoffing, observing to their friends, with a hearty
laugh, that the Lady was afraid of gendarmes,
adding that because that fox Jacomet had made a
THE APPARITIONS 49
few inquiries into the matter, she had decided to
change her residence. . . .
SEVENTH APPARITION. Unfortunately for carnal
wisdom, its calculations always turn out wrong in
some point. This is proved by the fact that next
day the 23rd the vision occurred as before.
Among the countless spectators whom the dis
appointment of the previous day had not dis
couraged, she had as witness to-day the same
M. Estrade who, as we saw, was so overcome by the
incidents at the police-station, and whom the event
of the day finally made a firm believer. After a
fervent prayer, in which she seemed to beg her
unknown Friend to show herself anew, on a
sudden the humble shepherd-girl makes a start of
admiration, as if a strong light had flashed on her,
and seems born to a new life. Let us watch her
now in her converse with the superior Being; this
half-hour, more like Heaven than earth, how can
human words describe it ? It is better to ask this
Government official himself, who portrayed exactly
on the spot, in immortal traits, the external details
of this ecstasy, how the eyes of the little Saint
were lit up, whilst her lips were wreathed with
angelic smiles, and in her whole figure shone a
beauty undreamt of here below ! . . . You would
then have truly said that this glorious soul, too
straitened in the frail prison of its body, was striving
to shine forth and let its interior gladness be seen.
While these heavenly moments lasted, Bernadette
was no longer herself. She was rather, says the
4
50 THE GLORIES OF LOURDES
first of the historians of Massabielle, * one of those
privileged Beings of supernatural form whom the
Apostle, the seer of great visions, depicts for us in
ecstasy at the foot of God s throne.
At such a sight, a cry of faith rose from all the
bystanders, including the official above mentioned.
For him, as for his boon companion, the doctor, the
hour had come, not to theorize or to scoff, but to
see the truth. First the medical man, then the
Government official what splendid triumphs for a
little shepherd-girl ! In their train, as disciples of
the lowly child, were to come gradually members of
the Academy and politicians, disregarding the plead
ings of ease or of wealth, for, as we see nowadays,
Lourdes has only two enemies. All who are dis
interested and pure (and free, we must add in these
days) find their way to this Rock, like the eagles to
their eyry. Yet the favoured child, though over
wrought with the delirium of this vision, suddenly
became like one who listens to, and then answers,
questions, either smiling or grave, now nodding
approval, and again seeming to ask for explanations.
When the Lady spoke, an intense joy the joy of
Lourdes thrilled through her confidant ; on the
other hand, when she addressed questions or prayers,
her attitude assumed a humility moved even to
tears. At times the conversation ceased ; then the
child-seer returned to her Rosary, but not without
casting a wistful glance at the blessed niche. Then
the mountain-girl offered her homage to her Queen
homage so noble that you could not find the like
in the whole world, says M. Estrade. As to the
THE APPARITIONS 51
sign of the Cross which Bernadette made several
times, the same eye-witness thinks that if this holy
sign is made in Heaven, it would not be made more
religiously.
At length, after nearly an hour s converse with the
Invisible, they saw the child move forward on her
knees to the top of the Grotto, there bow more deeply
than ever, kiss the ground with evident compunction,
and afterwards return in the same way to where she
had knelt. And a parting ray illumined her features,
which, gradually losing the reflections of the other
world, again wore their everyday, though amiable,
expression.
The unknown peasant-girl then mixed with the
crowd, from which she nowise differed in appearance.
Questioned on all sides, she replied that her royal
Visitant had confided to her three secrets regarding
herself alone, the mystery of which, despite many
thoughtless attempts made by inquisitive persons,
lies buried with their possessor in the monastic
vault at Nevers.
All that Bernadette ever revealed about them was,
that the Lady, while confiding them to her, spoke
to her less through her ears than through her heart
mente cordis sui.
EIGHTH APPARITION. On Wednesday, Feb
ruary 24, the child in the morning had to pass through
human barriers, and receive homage she little under
stood, ere she could reach her granite prie-dieu.
Everything, at first, happened as usual that is,
blissfully. But soon over the sweet brightness of
52 THE GLORIES OF LOURDES
ecstasy there rolled, as it were, a cloud of sadness.
Once they saw the child drop her arms, like one
who has just heard some bad news, and tears
coursed down her burning cheeks. She then rose
up, her face full of sorrow, to ascend the slope of
the Grotto, pressing her quivering lips to the earth
each time she knelt. Having reached the wild
rose-tree which hung from above, she made fresh
reverences to the invisible Being, and raised her
head as though to hear her commands, whereupon,
turning to the crowd, deeply touched by her actions,
her unearthly countenance moist with tears, she cried
out thrice, sobbing : Penance! penance! penance!
words of sadness, like the faults which they de
plore, stern as the repentance which they require,
and yet full of light, like the hope in God which
they imply. The conclusion of this touching scene
was the command which the Vision gave to her
confidant to pray for poor sinners. And the
dialogue ended by the revelation of a fourth secret,
which, like the others, we, the uninitiated, shall only
learn in the clear light of eternity.
Having returned to her place, the child-seer found
there her accustomed peace, which the untimely
and burlesque appearance of a sergeant failed to
disturb, though he came, he said, in the name of
the law, to put a stop to all this nonsense. He
only provoked the indignation of the spectators, as
you can well imagine, whose menacing anger soon
put to flight this over-zealous officer.
The reader can easily imagine the effect produced
on all by the touching appeal of the child in ecstasy.
THE APPARITIONS 53
Each on coming away asked himself if such an
indictment on the part of Heaven did not imply the
approach of grave trials, in view of their serious
crimes, unless the Divine justice were appeased by
an adequate satisfaction, clearly hinted at by the
triple cry of the prophetess. ... I venture to add
that in enjoining on us such a severe penance, on
the very eve of national events, the weight of which
was about to aggravate so much, alas ! our national
responsibility, and by a recoil only too well merited,
threaten the integrity of our empire, the Queen of
France, while from the height of her watch-tower
on the Pyrenees she cast a tearful glance during
these tragic hours on her chosen people, disclosed,
then, beyond doubt, the abomination of desolation
in our midst I mean the fatal war of 1870, the
effect of our past sins, but also the cause of our
present misfortunes, and that shameful regime which
disloyalty, in league with the stranger, the enemy,
has set up on our smoking ruins, to be not a
government, but a chastisement ; nay, also the
doubly impious rupture of the Concordat, that
masterpiece of international Freemasonry, which, in
banishing God from His home in our midst, is
preparing the impending obsequies of the fairest of
kingdoms upon earth.
I submit this formidable problem to my contem
poraries, to those who, forgetting the lessons of
Lourdes, and also of la Salette, or of the Gospel,
which is the same thing, seem, in spite of every
warning, to have taken for their motto : Let the
morrow take care of itself.
54 THE GLORIES OF LOURDES
Let those dilettanti of the flowery banks of the
Gave and of sentimental piety understand that, save
by * Penance, penance, penance, there is no salva
tion for nations any more than for individuals.
NINTH APPARITION. --It was on Thursday,
February 25. This morning there was an extra
ordinary crowd of people collecting together in the
vicinity of Massabielle, overflowing on to the island,
covering the crests of the hill, and climbing up the
trees by the bank. After her usual prayers, Ber-
nadette rose by herself as if she were alone in the
heart of this crowd, went to the interior of this
cavern flooded with light, and, moving aside the
tough branches, kissed the rock at the place which
served as a pedestal for the Queen of Angels. Then,
once at her rocky prie-dieu, she beheld for nearly a
quarter of an hour the most blissful of visions.
Suddenly she looked puzzled. Hesitating, she turned
towards the river, took several steps forward as if to go
there, but soon she stopped, looked behind at the sign
made toher, listened attentively, nodded affirmatively,
and again walked, not to the bed of the river, but
towards the left corner of the excavation. There
she was seen to stop, look undecidedly several times
all round her, and once more turn her eyes to the
shining niche, doubtless to ask a question ; then
she promptly bent down in that place, and with
her weak fingers she began to scoop out the soil.
At the end of a few seconds, the little hole she had
just hollowed out was seen to be full of water.
True, it was at first rather muddy, and it was only
THE APPARITIONS 55
after much hesitation that the young child took a
little in her hand, drank it, bathed her face with it,
and finished this curious scene by eating a portion
of the plant, the golden saxifrage,* which grew
beside it.
What was the object of all this ceremonial of a
new kind, so calculated to puzzle the spectators, or
to fill them with doubts regarding the state of mind
of their little compatriot ?
Happily the child was not long in providing the
key to this riddle. We know now that in inviting
her to drink and to wash, not in the Gave, but in
the mysterious basin, which was going to spring up
at the touch of her servant, the Lady, with a mother s
love, intended to open there, by means of a great
miracle, the true fountain of youth, whither men s
bodies would come to be refreshed, purified, and
quickened. What an expressive symbol of that
other salutary pool, which would here entice souls
to be born anew in the mysterious waters of the
Sacrament of Penance ! As to her so strangely
eating of the golden saxifrage, how much it showed
in the mind of the prophetic Woman the need which
sinners, typified by poor little Bernadette, have of
being healed by mortification !
Thus it is that confession and satisfaction, those
two planks of souls spiritually shipwrecked, were
this day signified at Lourdes by the Mother of God
herself through one of those living allegories which
the Hebrew Prophets of yore loved to employ.
* The chrysoplenium ; in French, la dorine.
56 THE GLORIES OF LOURDES
Soon, however (to speak in the manner of Ecclesi-
asticus), the little basin became a great stream, and
the great stream was seen to be a beautiful river, and
this river proved to be like a sea. A proof of this is
the great increase of the water from the Grotto, the
outflow of which is 26,852 gallons in twenty-four
hours ; its virtue never ceases to multiply cures, of
the body, and also of the soul a thousand times
more precious but on condition that we must first,
like the innocent child, * feed on the bitter plant of
repentance and suffering, without which the souls of
sinners cannot recover their health, any more than
without a severe regime the body can regain its
strength. The Virgin of Massabielle this day ex
tolled the virtue of self-denial, which alone has
always produced great Saints and also great
men.
When these evolutions, strange in appearance,
produced a bad impression on a crowd of witnesses,
this only showed that little is needed to make the
prudence of the prudent become sceptical before the
secrets of Heaven. It seems also that, deceived and
discontented, the people departed, as the faint-hearted
followers of the Galilaean Teacher went away long
ago when He told them to eat His flesh and drink
His blood. The carnal man is everywhere the
same. Nevertheless, the pious child continued to
enjoy the Divine Vision, with the eternal smile of
Heaven on her lips, and on her forehead an angelic
gleam, till about eight o clock, when the ineffable
Vision usually ended.
Still the supernatural stream of water continued
THE APPARITIONS 57
to flow silently, ever waxing in volume. Towards
evening of this famous day great was the wonder of
some strayed travellers to see a crystal rill flowing
from the top of the slope, which visibly increased
every minute so as to form in its course a fairly
large stream, as it rushed to meet again the waters
below, singing its melodious refrain.
When the people of Lourdes heard of this they
were astonished and perplexed, knowing very well
that within the memory of man no trace of water
had ever been seen in these places ; and this was
the oft-repeated opinion of visitors, whether pious
Catholics or merely sight-seers. Even the most
sceptical confessed that nothing more was needed
to restore the child s credit in the fickle public
opinion. Moreover, the amazing cures wrought by
means of this wonderful water had the effect of com
pletely vindicating her good faith. Meanwhile no
one could deny that the Lady of the Grotto, more
powerful than Moses striking the Arabian rock with
his rod to draw the Heaven-sent water from it, had
caused pure and refreshing waters to spring from
this Pyrenean granite, or perhaps from the fountains
of the great abyss, as the Psalmist says, which, like
the river in Holy Writ, would rejoice the city of
Mary, strengthening men s faith, soothing their
sorrow, disarming science, banishing all evil, and
drawing down all good. What a beautiful canto of
a Divine epic would the history of such a spring truly
be, if a poet or an angel wished to tell us all its
strange vicissitudes since its mysterious bubbling up
from nothing to the nameless and countless wonders
58 THE GLORIES OF LOURDES
of which it is still among us the efficient and gracious
cause ! *
On the 26th, when the child returned, there were
6,000 persons in front of Espelugues, who had
flocked from all sides for the sole purpose of seeing
her and acclaiming her blessed, which shows that
with the crowd people are just as easily canonized as
condemned. This enthusiasm, quite natural under
the circumstances, concealed, nevertheless, a danger
the danger of popular favour, which, following a
thoughtless act of injustice, might spoil her simplicity
and humility, more important even than the gift of
miracles. But Heaven took pity on our heroine,
and though her prayer this morning was not less fer
vent than before, nothing unusual i.e., supernatural
happened, to the great disappointment of every
one. However, these occasional failures had this
advantage they showed that the apparitions de
pended on other causes than the self-suggestion
of a child of morbid temperament, since it was
precisely when Bernadette, as well as the crowd,
was most anxious for them that they did not take
place.
* The famous water-diviner, Richard de Montlieu, spent eight
days at the Grotto to study the source or origin of this water,
and his conclusion was that this spring already existed, like a
treasure of Nature destined in due season to show forth the
munificence of grace. This does not mean, he adds, that as
this spring was invisible, and even absolutely impossible for a
child to discover, a special and supernatural inspiration was
not needed. There lies the miracle, as we cannot fail to see
it also in its enormous outflow, and still more in the miraculous
effects it has never ceased to produce.
THE APPARITIONS 59
TENTH APPARITION. On Saturday, the 27th, the
child-seer, with the idea of remaining at her favourite
post, came and knelt at the place where, at Our Lady s
bidding, she had scooped out the earth the previous
day and made a muddy pool ooze up. Seeing this
water, clear and abundant, without showing the least
surprise, she makes the sign of the Cross, drinks, and
then bathes her face. That was to be, beyond all
doubt, the rite of all good pilgrims in the future.
Returning to her rock, already she was flooded with
ecstatic bliss, when the well-known voice, suddenly
sorrowful, said to her : Bernadette, kiss the earth
for sinners ! Oh, that solicitude for sinners is
never absent from her thoughts ! You would think
that the more pure and bright and dazzling she
shines at Massabielle, the more she is mercifully
interested in all that is sinful in this world ; and as
though it were not enough to pray for the intention
of poor sinners, she wills that in their favour her
agent should perform a series of penitential acts,
such as applying her chaste lips to the ground
trampled by every wayfarer, a thing naturally
repugnant.
This mortification, added to her humiliation, was
not difficult for the pious shepherdess. But soon,
not content with having done it on her own behalf,
she is seen fearlessly climbing the rose-tree, with
tears in her eyes, as though on a moving pulpit, the
better to invite all the crowd to kiss the ground in
the same way ; and (the strange influence of virtue
in the weakest of beings) at the bidding of this
peasant-girl, acting as the oracle of Heaven, every
60 THE GLORIES OF LOURDES
forehead was bent to the ground, just as in the
autumn fields the proud ears of corn bow before the
caresses of the winds.
This was (for the good of the crowd as well as of
the favoured child) a gradual initiation in the trying
ordeal of the purgative life, until the fullest revela
tion they could desire should be possible. Thus the
spiritual work of Lourdes was harmoniously fulfilled,
and already, by the striking conversions that followed
one after another, and the inexplicable cures that
frequently took place, souls came to be caught on all
sides in the toils of infinite love.
ELEVENTH APPARITION. On the morning of the
28th, the last day of the month, the shining Vision,
after loading her confidant with favours, seemed to
retire. Then, breaking the solemn silence, always
the prelude of something great, she said to the child :
Go and tell the priests that a chapel must be built
here. What an unforeseen task ! Bernadette was
at first puzzled by it. It was no easy task, she
thought, to face this rough man, the Cure" of
Lourdes, who by his crabbed ways had the knack
of making her more frightened than two gendarmes.
But since the Lady had spoken, she could only obey.
The little child, then, after resting a little at her
house, screws up her courage and goes to the
presbytery. With such a personage she could not
feel at her ease. The poor child trembled from head
to foot. At length, when, after some words not very
reassuring, she was asked to explain herself clearly,
she told him at once about the shrine to be built.
THE APPARITIONS 61
Irony was mixed with objections, and even rebukes
came from M. Peyramale slips. It is true the priest
did not long keep up this assumed severity before his
daring sheep, for she gave respectfully, but firmly
and cleverly, a reply to every question, and so
clearly that the man of God was amazed by it. He
wished then to know from the child herself this
strange affair from the very beginning, and whilst
the humble but unfaltering interpreter of Heaven
unfolded with unerring precision her marvellous tale,
he eyed her keenly, almost religiously, without losing
a single word or a single movement of her unusual
physiognomy, reflecting truly that he had before him
* a soul of crystal in which Heaven was mirrored.
Yet the building of the chapel was a great crux to
him. He soon returned to this delicate point, the
gist of the message, and with his sharp manner said
to his visitor : You will tell the Lady that if I am
to listen to her, she must first prove to me who she
is, and what claims she has to such a request.
Clearly wisdom spoke here by the priest s mouth.
In the Church of God, since revelation in the strict
sense is finished, private supernatural revelation
is admitted only when there is no means of acting other
wise. The little messenger had certainly enough
Christian sense to understand it. She politely
bowed and went away, leaving in the soul of the
worthy priest a heavenly odour of sanctity, as it
were, together with much religious uneasiness.
TWELFTH APPARITION. Next day several thou
sands of people were waiting at dawn for the arrival
62 THE GLORIES OF LOURDES
of the child-seer at Massabielle. She came there at
her usual hour, in her modest Sunday attire, having
her aunt Lucile with her, and tripping along like one
who hastens to enjoy a favourite feast. Soon around
her was a sea of human heads, extending along both
banks a moving amphitheatre from which emerged
the figure of the peasant-child, who, amidst an
impressive silence, shed over this multitude the
glorious reflection of the other world, for the Lady
did not keep them long waiting. But this morning
there were only personal communications, that had
no reference to the people. Apparently they were
made for the private direction of Bernadette, whose
education and interior progress was not to be
neglected amidst so many episodes of every kind.
When, at the end of these sacred colloquies, the little
girl wished to approach the foot of the Rock to
perform her final devotions, she could not advance
a step, so dense was the crowd ; and two friendly
soldiers, who had come there from the Fortress, had
to make a way for her. Her duties finished, the
child, who was escorted with an ever-increasing
respect by countless throngs, went straight to the
old church, to hear Sunday Mass there, as if to show
that the sublimest ecstasies cannot dispense even the
Saints from the ordinary duties of the Christian
life.
THIRTEENTH APPARITION. It was now March i.
An incident, apparently trivial, but very instructive
in reality, marked the beginning of the interview.
Ever amiable, Bernadette, to please a neighbour,
THE APPARITIONS 63
had already in her hand a borrowed Rosary in order
to say it in place of her own. The Vision blamed
her for it, asking her only to use her own Rosary,
and thereby suggesting to us the pious respect and
jealous care we should have for the place of every
blessed object, especially of that which, enriched
with the indulgences of the Church, is both the
chief instrument of our spiritual profit and, like a
golden chain, binds us as children in the service of
Mary.
But this unlucky exchange caused among the
bystanders a slight misunderstanding. Those who
were wont to copy, as far as possible, all the actions
of their model began to lay aside their Rosaries,
thinking they were thus joining in some new kind of
prayer. But the child by a sign quickly corrected
this mistake, which, in the words of Scripture,
might have prevented the Divine harmonies which
she was already enjoying. As to the Lady, she
could read the hearts of each too well to be offended
in the least by such a mistake. It was sufficient to
have given a precious lesson thus to her votary, and,
doubtless, through her to everyone.
FOURTEENTH APPARITION. On Tuesday, March 2,
events at first happened as usual prayer, trans
figuration, spiritual joy, which was reflected in the
features of the shepherd-girl. Yet, after her ecstasy,
her aunt Basile was struck by the anxious look of
her niece, and asked her the reason. The reason
she gave was that again, in answer to Monsieur le
Cure!, the Vision had just charged her to give him
64 THE GLORIES OF LOURDES
her embarrassing request about building an oratory !
This now troubled the messenger, and with reason.
In order to give herself more courage, she made her
good relative accompany her to the priest s house.
Her reception was scarcely warmer than before,
especially when the pastor heard that, in addition to
the building required, the visionary Lady wished
them to come there in procession.
Was it not interior worship and social solemnity
that this mysterious Being required ? Now the
Abb6 Peyramale saw that to expect from him such
liturgical exhibitions was simply to be ignorant of
religious affairs ; for it is never a simple priest, but
a Bishop, who must take the first steps in such
matters. He next declared that such-like novelties,
far from favouring Christian sentiment, would only
injure it in the mind of his people, and with his
pitiless and somewhat brusque logic, he concluded
that these wishes or orders could not come from the
true Queen of Heaven. The child s replies could
not set at rest these priestly doubts, so afraid was
the man of God of being deceived ! He shuddered
at the bare thought of some sacrilege and ridiculous
absurdity. What was he to do ? Suddenly a bright
idea (so he thought it, at least) crossed his mind :
Go and tell her who sends you to make the rose
bush at the Grotto blossom at once before the
assembled crowd, and then I will be her humble
servant.
The two poor visitors smiled. Clearly nothing
remained for them but to withdraw. Honest heart of
the priest, who wished in this way to reduce the
THE APPARITIONS 65
Supernatural, so energetic for the last fortnight at
Massabielle, to the level of an ordinary botanical
curiosity ! He did not then see that such a miracle
would only have been puerile, because so short-lived,
and also useless to prove anything to those who are
aware that Nature sometimes causes this premature
growth ; lastly, and principally, because between
the various things of which this Grotto was the
scene, and the fact of a rose-tree putting forth
leaves at the end of winter, there was no sufficient
relation to show the meaning of these events.
By what right could a mortal even a Dean or a
Canon require Providence to work this particular
miracle ? Was it that at Espelugues there were
no miracles in the moral order, that he should
so obstinately persist in requiring one in the
physical order ? As if all these well-known con
versions, and all this wonderful commotion, caused
by prayer not less than by enthusiasm, were not
doubtless something more important than the prema
ture blossoming of a wild rose-tree ! Well, since at
all costs this formidable theologian wanted visible and
tangible facts, what else, pray, were the transfigura
tions of Bernadette, and the insensibility of her
hand held with impunity for a quarter of an hour in
the lambent flame of a taper, and the spring gushing
forth of its own accord, and, above all, the numerous
cases of wonderful cures already obtained by Our
Lady s spring, but facts ? . . .
But M. le Cure", so severe, wanted flowers ! . . .
The day following this fruitless audience, March 3,
was to prove a day of trial for the young Soubirous.
5
66 THE GLORIES OF LOURDES
No visions, no communications ! This bitter dis
appointment, perhaps, in atonement for the extreme
scepticism of the priest, did not bate a jot of the
fervour of this his child. In humility and self-
denial, she might make up for it at least by a fuller
prayer; then, having kissed the ground, as she
was wont, and traced the sign of the cross, she
quietly made her way back to the Rues des Petits-
Fosss.
The crowd, disappointed in their hopes, showed
less resignation. They made out especially that
the period of the apparitions was now over. Not
at all, replied the little Seer, with the sturdy can
dour of her faith, * because one is still wanting.
FIFTEENTH APPARITION. In fact, the morrow,
which was the last of the wonderful fifteen days,
was marked by an extraordinary gathering. From
every quarter, in view of what would certainly prove
extraordinary in this wonderful episode, caravans
flocked there by night, so that the Mayor of
Lourdes thought it prudent to call in troops to
reinforce the local gendarmes.
But the crowds of Lourdes did not need any
persons in uniform. Up to the psychological
moment (7 a.m.) we can say that veritable waves
of humanity poured incessantly into the too narrow
glen where Heaven held commune with this earth.
When Bernadette arrived, there had come to see
her, question her, kiss the hem of her humble robe,
and to raise to her a colossal Hosanna, nearly
30,000 pilgrims a really portentous number, con-
THE APPARITIONS 67
sidering the seventy of the winter, and also that
the railway did not yet traverse the steep Pyre ne es
mountains. Police and soldiers were on duty, but
there was no need of them. From beginning to
end, not a shadow of an accident or incident called
for their services.
But amid the general commotion what were the
Soubirous family doing, whose name flew from
mouth to mouth ? What had become of their
child, the focus of all this religious excitement ?
They were, as usual, silently occupied in their
obscure work, that barely sufficed to earn a piece
of brown bread for the little ones. She, having
finished her morning prayer before her copper
crucifix, that hung above her wretched pallet, feeling
her time draw near, took her Rosary, and calm,
recollected, without noticing the immense crowd,
directed her steps to the Grotto.
As soon as her well-known outline was perceived
on the threshold of her damp home, an electric
thrill seemed to pass through the crowd, as this
password was handed on from group to group :
* The Seer! the Seer! Thence all along this new
Via Sacra gendarmes had to guard the modest
heroine against the outburst of a mystical delirium,
who, after her audience with the Queen of the Earth,
would only have a plate of porridge * for her meal
in her kitchen. Immersed in God and in the Lady of
her dreams, she passed along, her head hidden in
* Literally, boiled maize, a common dish among the French
peasantry.
52
68 THE GLORIES OF LOURDES
her white hood (as Henri Lasserre once told us)
* like simplicity, quite unconscious of itself.
Meanwhile, the familiar scene was soon taking
place as usual : the child crossed herself, kissed
the earth, drank at the spring, ate the herb,
extended her arms in the form of a cross, said
her Rosary. . . . She was beginning the second
decade, when the sudden transfiguration of her
whole being told the crowds closely watching her
that she was rapt in ecstasy. It was during
this delightful transport that a third time she was
bidden to go, as the messenger of Heaven, to ask for
the chapel and procession from the proper authority.
But to-day, as the prudence of the priests must
exceed their devotion (it seems), authority never
stirred, either at Lourdes or at Tarbes, at the risk
of scandalizing the conscience of Catholics, prefer
ring to wait and pray, inquire into the matter, and
thus gain time, which (we may remark in paren
thesis) was truly the best method of acting for the
accomplishment of the Divine wishes ; and from this
point of view the true one the attitude, or, if you
prefer it, the way of acting, of a Laurence and a
Peyramale was remarkably providential. Just as,
according to St. Augustine, the first incredulity of
Thomas has done more for the faith of the world
than the enthusiasm of St. Peter or the poesy of
St. John, so by hesitating so long about the super
natural at Massabielle, these two religious leaders,
whom Heaven had placed there for that very
reason, paved the way undoubtedly for its more
rational triumph. It is true that the civil power
THE APPARITIONS 69
showed much less circumspection speaking of put
ting an end to the imposture or folly, guarding the
Grotto and its approaches manu militari, even
threatening to imprison the Seer. . . . But what
availed all the ukases of the so-called liberal Empire
against the decrees of Heaven ? But to return to
the Vision.
Whilst it continued a little longer than usual, it
was not marked this time by any particular circum
stance. It seemed that in these final days it was
more to strengthen and console, than to instruct her,
that Paradise opened above the head of Bernadette,
in proportion as her inevitable martyrdom drew
near. Meanwhile, the mere sight of her sweet
Queen, even when she remained silent, was enough
to thrill this innocent soul, inspiring her with courage
and a surpassing peace. Providence has always a
foretaste of delights for its chosen workers, especially
when trials are near.
All these cures, which followed rapidly in the foot
steps of Bernadette what a charter they were for
her mission ! Already people were everywhere
talking about the amazing cures of Louis Bourriette,
Justin Bouhohorts, Blaise Maumus,Therese Crozat,
Marie Daube, Bernande Soubies, Jeanne Crassus,
Benoite Cazeaux, Blaisette Soupenne, etc. So
unmistakably, I may say, from the beginning
Divine Power entered on the scene to throw
down the gauntlet to sage Incredulity and inscru
table Policy.
Confronted by this mass of evidence, what did the
swashbucklers of local cynicism do ? In order to
70 THE GLORIES OF LOURDES
discredit the true miracles by ridicule they invented
false ones. Already, ye freethinkers bond-slaves
of Reason this is your work ! Only, as it is
always the fate of iniquity to lie to itself, it so hap
pened that these startling phenomena were witnessed
not merely by a people full of enthusiasm, but by
cold and calculating men of science a Dozous, a
Peyrus, or a Vergez whose relentless official reports,
made on the spot, sounded the death - knell of
materialism at length brought to bay, and who thus
started at this date that Criticism of the Supernatural
which learned and conscientious doctors like Saint-
Maclou and Boissarie have brought to its present
high level under the eyes of a scepticism that is
completely baffled.
Before taking leave of the Lady to visit once more
the Cure" Peyramale, the child who, even in her
ecstasies, never lost the use of her reason, ventured
this morning to ask her name. The moment was
not yet come for this final revelation, and the dis
appearance of the shining Form was her only reply
for the present.
From now till March 25 there were no more
apparitions, but this did not deter Bernadette from
frequently repairing to Massabielle. How often,
when school was over, she would slip away from her
schoolmates, and hasten by stealth to the holy rocks
to say her prayers there ! When there was a holiday
she took the opportunity of spending sweet hours in
the crypt, where her heart was now centred. Already,
by the piety of the people, the interior of the cave
had quite changed its appearance ; a rustic altar
THE APPARITIONS 71
had been reared there, on which stood the statue of
the Blessed Virgin, and all around it were sweet-
smelling flowers and burning tapers, with the almost
uninterrupted strains of fervent prayers or melodious
hymns. With a view to the chapel soon to be built
there, alms poured in from all sides into the hollow,
and no profane hand ever dared to steal the smallest
coin from it ; for everyone, high and low, was fain
to look upon this favoured spot as the vestibule of
Heaven !
SIXTEENTH APPARITION. While these three long
weeks wore slowly away the general opinion was
that the Lady had not uttered her last word ; and
as the eve of the Annunciation drew near everyone
at Lourdes (both the inhabitants and the numerous
visitors whom the desire to witness these wonders
kept there) declared their conviction, due to some
vague presentiment, that on the morrow there would
be a fresh revelation, for it was going to be the great
Feast of Our Lady.
But it was Bernadette herself who in her heart
of hearts most fondly cherished this hope. Soon
she began to hear distinctly the voice from Heaven,
and great must have been her gladness to feel herself
thus summoned again to offer her greetings to the
Queen of Heaven on the blessed day on which the
Archangel had honoured her.
On the evening of the 24th, at the family hearth
she told her delighted parents of her proposed visit.
What an ideal vigil under this roof-tree more
enviable than the palaces of kings, and how different
72 THE GLORIES OF LOURDES
to another not very far away, where she had been
forbidden to go ! The night was passed without
sleep, but not without joy ! How many sighs were
breathed by this seraphic soul, precursors of her
morning greetings as reverent and loving as those
of Gabriel !
The most joyous of solemn feasts was dawning on
the earth, one which would remind everyone of the
heavenly scene at Nazareth. It was also the great
day which the Blessed Virgin had lovingly chosen
in order to give her votary a feast more exquisite
than any other.
This morning, by the banks of the Gave, the air
was clear and bright. On the surrounding moun
tains the last snows were glittering, which the
rising sun was slowly melting with his warm rays,
and on every side, at the approach of spring, the
earth was beginning to grow green. You would
have said that, to herald the coming Easter, Nature
was rising again, and showing forth her hidden
powers, that through
All the rapturous heart of things
she might sing the canticle of Love to the Woman
before whom the pure spirits bow down.
As soon as Bernadette, who seemed to have wings,
began her morning pilgrimage, her reception amid
the universal joy was warmer than ever, and soon,
by the glamour of her presence, Lourdes was hushed
in a sense of mystery.
But this time the beautiful Lady could not wait
for Bernadette s arrival, as though divinely im-
THE APPARITIONS 73
patient to impart her bliss to the child. Great must
have been the surprise and confusion of the latter
when, on crossing the threshold of the Grotto, she
found that the majestic Form was already on her
throne, sweetly smiling and enchanting her. She
seemed to have become whiter and more dazzling
than ever, but, above all, more gracious, doubtless
in memory of all her glories, which were celebrated
on this feast.
Perhaps, too, by this unwonted display of splen
dour she wished to excite the child to ask once
more the burning question, in order at length to
answer it. The first act of the ravished and humble
shepherdess was to beg pardon for her delay. But
the blissful Vision replied that she need not excuse
herself. Then, after having bowed and prostrated
herself, the little Contemplative said the * Hail
Marys on her rude Rosary with a fervour she had
never felt before. Suddenly the thought struck her,
perhaps inspired by Heaven, to ask this charming
and kindly Lady to reveal her name. Twice suc
cessively no answer was given her. The Unknown,
smiling with immortal countenance, * as only
Lourdes and Heaven have seen her smile, kept
unbroken silence, while the features of the peerless
Virgin showed a keener pleasure, and she kept her
hands joined over her heart, as if to contain its
emotion.
When, at length, through this apparent reluctance,
the child s pious wishes grew stronger, and her soul
was better prepared to hear the heavenly news, then
* Sappho, fJ>fiSidffatff Q.6a.va.T<g
74 THE GLORIES OF LOURDES
the third time the glistering Lady, unfolding her
arms, extending her hands towards the child in
ecstasy, raising her eyes and clasping her hands in
front of her breast, uttered these words, through
which all Heaven seemed to thrill :
4 Que" soy rimmacule Councepciou t *
For, as everyone knows, it was in the Bigourdain
patois, or dialect, that the Mother of God deigned
to speak about herself to the ignorant shepherd-girl,
after the example of her Divine Son, Who always,
even when uttering the sublimest truths, spoke in
Aramaean, to put Himself more on a level with the
intelligence of ordinary men.
But what did the form matter, when the message
had at length been delivered, this secret of secrets,
this ineffable Sacrament hardly understood by
Angels in the mystery of eternal predestination,
and which, defined lately for men by the Infallible
Teacher, would henceforth owe its full popularity to
the agency of the feeble daughter of the Soubirous ?
O most fortunate shepherd-girl, who deserved then,
alone of mortals, to learn from Mary s lips the most
touching and luminous formula, perhaps, of all Catholic
dogma, one which, in throwing light on the Past, con
soles the Present and augurs happily for the Future.
At this hour, in the heaven of the Grotto, better
still than in that of Patmos, or even in that of Eden,
the promised Woman, clothed with the sun as with
a garment, having the moon beneath her feet in
token of her dominion, and bearing on her head a
* * I am the Immaculate Conception.
THE APPARITIONS 75
crown of twelve stars, the shining token of her royal
maternity, appeared at length in all the splendour of
her natural, preternatural, and supernatural grace,
such as had been dreamed of by the Cherubim,
yearned for by the patriarchs, foretold by the
prophets, sung by the poets, and welcomed by the
sibyls. Signum magnum apparuit in ccelo !
Just as ages ago the earthly paradise leapt up at
the tragic moment when the first promise of the
redemption resounded amid the judgments of man s
Fall, that Annunciation of better times typified
already in the far-off figure of the true Eve ; just
as on his barren rock in Asia Minor the Seer
of the Apocalypse felt himself filled with ineffable
joy when he saw the Immaculate One, before
whom the dragon fled away much more must our
Pyrenean solitudes have leapt up, as active as the
rams in Scripture,* when, hearing the heavenly
definition, they could re-echo the inimitable sound
of it from peak to peak and from valley to valley.
O beloved native mountains, you are not the highest
nor the most famous in France, but still you are,
methinks, the most hallowed, since eighteen times
in succession the Queen of Time and of Eternity
has trodden you with her virginal feet ; above all,
since you have been found worthy to re-echo, as it
were, the enchanting music which the blessed
enjoy in Heaven, for which mortals yearn in this
valley of tears.
What could be the splendour of the Immaculate
at the solemn hour when she thus shed her rays
* Ps. cxiii.
76 THE GLORIES OF LOURDES
over the Thabor of Bigorre, we cannot conceive,
much less say. The marvellous child did not
believe her eyes ; and when, at the bidding of
superiors, she had ere long to explain herself, the
terms and comparisons and the hyperboles of our
feeble dialects were clearly inadequate to express her
thoughts.
It is because she whose glory she had just greeted,
face to face, this memorable morn is essentially the
summit of all possible perfection after infinite
Perfection.
As to the delightful voice of Our Lady, you may
imagine how it diffused at once waves of light,
peace, and gladness in the child s being. What the
Spouse says of the voice of His beloved in the Divine
Book of the Canticles is nothing compared to the
music of the voice of the Almah. It was truly the
music of the mysterious dove, whose chaste cooings,
better than the strains of Orpheus lute, made the
rocks listen, and melted the soul of Bernadette with
happiness. When anyone, more privileged than
St. Paul, has seen such glory, heard such harmonies,
and tasted joy so keen, what pleasure could he find
in this world so stale and wearisome ? Is it not
best to go and hide the mystery of the Queen * in
the hollow of the rock I mean, in the silence of
the cloister ? Yes ; but meanwhile it remained for
the shepherd-girl to announce abroad what had
been revealed to her. It was no small task for her
to preserve unchanged in her memory the holy and
unfamiliar words of which she was appointed the
messenger. Everyone knows that in order not to
THE APPARITIONS 77
lose a syllable of them she kept repeating them
from the Grotto to the Curb s house, not without
sometimes altering the hidden meaning of them.
The one who was most astonished by her news was
M. le Doyen de Lourdes, who soon understood that
such language was decidedly too much above the
wit of a poor peasant-girl (the most backward of
mountaineers) not to come directly from God, or
from His Mother.
At Massabielle, after this glorious vision, nothing
remained for the young Bernadette, and for the
others, save a lifeless mass of dull granite. I am
wrong ; henceforth this cavern, as solemn as Sinai,
since God s power was authentically shown forth
there, was going to become the great attraction of
the world, drawn thither less by the visible marvels
of every description which daily increase, than by
the powerful charms of the Immaculate Conception.
Meanwhile the crowd, kneeling before the narrow
cleft while these sublime things where taking place,
in a mysterious way were rilled with a special joy.
They had no doubt that close by among this brush
wood she was smiling on them, the sight of whom
is the joy of Angels, and that the Virgin Mother was
speaking, whose voice is the eternal joy of the Thrice
Blessed Trinity. Why must we add that when, on
her way to the priest s house, the child had partly
revealed the secret she met people dull enough to
declare themselves disappointed, this abstract term
conveying no meaning to their sluggish minds ?
The majority, however, trusting the child-Seer,
could recognize the living portrait of the heavenly
78 THE GLORIES OF LOURDES
Madonna, and an emotion overcame all the glad
villagers when they learnt that Mary came on this
earth not only to show herself, but also to declare
her name ; and all wished now to kiss the granite
which had served her as a resting-place or pedestal,
to bind as relics the dry heather which she had used
as a support, without daring to trample too much
on a soil hallowed for evermore, on which the
supernatural seemed everywhere so perceptible.
SEVENTEENTH APPARITION. After this wonderful
interview, it seemed as though all was finished at
Massabielle, but the end was not yet. On April 7,
the Wednesday after Easter, the Mother of God,
doubtless deeming it just to impart to her little
child some Easter joys, drew her to the Grotto.
There, by her sweet presence, Bernadette was the
object of a phenomenon sui generis, gracious and
symbolical, but, above all, full of meaning. As the
child in one hand held her beads, and with the
other a lighted taper resting on the ground, she did
not notice, in the joy of her ecstasy, that the flame,
mounting straight upwards, burnt within an inch
of her skin. The flame was burning her for a full
quarter of an hour, without her noticing it, and,
still more wonderful, her skin did not show the least
sign of burning ! Dr. Dozous, who, by the designs
of Providence, was present at this episode, and held
his watch in his hand the whole time, to see how
long this wonder lasted, could not get over it. As
he said afterwards, the marvel was not that she had
felt no pain (as catalepsy sometimes produces this
THE APPARITIONS 79
effect), but that the tissues remained so long quite
unharmed, since fire naturally destroys every organ
it catches, and would even reduce a corpse to
cinders. This was evidently, by the testimony of
the most sceptical doctors, a true miracle first-class
miracle without reckoning that a little later, to test
it, when the said doctor tried secretly to apply
the flame of the same candle to the hand of the
peasant-girl, now in her normal state, she quickly
cried out, Oh, sir, you are burning me !
EIGHTEENTH APPARITION. It was July 16, Feast
of Our Lady of Mount Carmel, which was to mark
the close of so many wonders.
A month and a half had elapsed since Bernadette
had made her First Communion, with the purity and
love which the Seraphim would have, could they
partake of the mystical banquet. This final vision
seemed to come on this beautiful day as the crown
and seal of the favours vouchsafed to her for half a
year by the Mother of the Emmanuel. This very
morning Bernadette had had the grace of receiving
for the third time Jesus in the Blessed Sacrament.
Of these two delights, to eat the Bread of Angels or
see the Queen of Angels, which would be greater in
the eyes of the favoured child ? Such blessings are
united rather than opposed to one another, just as
we see rainbows mixing together to bathe the sky
with greater splendour. This was the reply of the
peasant-child to a devout questioner : These things
go together. Exact and profound theology ; for
how can we separate the Son from the Mother,
8o THE GLORIES OF LOURDES
the Immaculate One from the Blessed Sacrament ?
Towards the end of this holy day linking together
the Eucharist and Our Lady while the child was
praying in her parish church, a familiar voice
whispered again in her inmost heart. At this very
hour the evening Angelas was ringing from the
romantic belfry. Immediately the young maiden of
Lourdes arose, as long ago the maid of Israel arose
to go to the Hebron, and calling for her more active
aunt, Basile, she soon reached the heavenly trysting-
place. For a long time now nearly three months
and a half everything there had remained in shadow
and silence ! Doubtless on this beautiful night
Heaven would reveal itself in a wondrous fashion.
Unfortunately an Administration, growing ever more
perverse, had increased the obstacles near the Grotto,
as though the Emperor would forbid God to work
miracles there ! But what of that ? Religion is more
ingenious than tyranny. To obey the call of Heaven
without also breaking the laws of man, the child
very simply hastened to kneel on the other side of
the Gave, in front of the blessed rock, and in a short
time there was a circle of devout women round her.
Just as on the happiest days, no sooner had the
angelic child turned her wistful eyes to the well-
known cleft, than her features began to light up, and
she was heard once again to cry out in the transport
of her whole being : * There she is ! There she is !
She is looking at us, she greets us, she smiles on us
above the palisade. It was chiefly to the child that
these ineffable looks, smiles, and greetings were
directed. Had she not well deserved them in
THE APPARITIONS 81
meeting nothing but suffering from those in authority,
especially since March ? What reproaches had they
not heaped upon her in the vain hope of crushing
her rising work ? And how much yet remained for
her to suffer, according to that inexorable law, that
in this world, to win heaven, we must pay the
price ? Soon her mother would die in poverty, and
she would have to say farewell to her dear nuns of
the Hospice where she had lived ; to lose sight of
the hills of Bartres, which had gladdened her child
hood s days ; to leave Lourdes, a true holy land, to
which her soul was henceforth riveted after these
sacred events; to tear herself away from the beloved
Grotto, worth all the world to her ; and to go far,
far away into an unknown country, and be immured
behind the grating of a strange convent, where
suffering both of soul and body awaited her ! Did
not all this merit some special boon from the
merciful Lady ? And then to such an unparalleled
tragedy the ending must be in keeping with its
heavenly character. While the rustic heroine knelt
here this peaceful summer eve, ever fervent and
courageous, amid the flowery meadows watered by
the Gave, the hour seemed supremely happy.
Already below the horizon of red jewel and furnace
flame the sun had gone down in a halo of glory,
and over the solitudes of Massabielle the gather
ing shades of the gloaming threw a mysterious
charm. ... A last look of the Mother on her
child, a last farewell, a last smile, so gentle and
expressive that the child thought she had never
beheld the like. . . .
6
82 THE GLORIES OF LOURDES
It was too soon, alas ! her sad farewell to this
earth, or rather, it was her glad au revoir till the
eternity of Paradise, where the Immaculate Con
ception had solemnly promised one day to make
happy her most pure, humble, and faithful Con
fidant.
CHAPTER III
BERNADETTE SOUBIROUS
AFTER this record of Heaven s visitations, we must
turn to its earthly heroine. Unfortunately we have
no regular biography of Bernadette. Even Henri
Lasserre in his inimitable style wrote rather of Our
Lady. Pouvillon, with his romantic idealism, has
given us less a biographical account than a delightful
romance, full of poetry and tenderness. As for Mgr.
Ricard, who took up his pen to refute the most
hypocritical blasphemies ever written about Lourdes,
he was too much engaged in refuting objections to
write a Life properly so called. I know, however,
a holy and fruitful retreat beyond the mountains, at
the base of which Heaven fashioned Massabielle,
where someone, in spite of the rigours of old age
and exile, is compiling living documents on all the
wonderful career of Bernadette, which promise to be
a revelation to us. Till the hour comes for the
greater glory of the Pyrenean shepherd-girl, or, at
least, till her biographer shall arise amongst us, the
numerous admirers of the amiable child-Seer will
doubtless not be sorry to read here, even from our
humble pen, a meagre sketch as accurate as possible
83 62
84 THE GLORIES OF LOURDES
of her who was to impress her own and future ages
with the lustre of her virtues and her heavenly
mission.
This child of election was born at Lourdes, at the
mill of Boly, near the spot where the river of
Lapaca joins the Gave, on January 7, 1844, her
parents being Fran9ois Soubirous and Louise Caste"-
rot, a young couple, good Catholics, who derived a
comfortable livelihood from their paternal mill^
although the want of thrift and energy in the
husband gave reasons for anxiety about the future.
Baptized, as is the grace of many holy people, the
day after her birth, the child received from her
maternal aunt, Bernarde a pious girl in whose
arms she was held at the baptismal font the names
of the Blessed Virgin herself and of the sweet-
tongued Doctor who has spoken most the praises
of the Mother of Christ here below Marie
Bernard ! Names even more prophetic than
harmonious, which, softened further by one of those
contractions which people adopt in everyday life,
were once again to become immortal. To the eldest
of a household which only inspired sympathy,
neighbours gave a hearty welcome, and there were
rejoicings around this first cradle. Qucz putas puclla
ista erit ? . . .
At the end of six months, on the birth of another
child, they had to entrust Bernadette to Marie
Aravant, a good Catholic of Bartres, a small village
less than two miles away from Lourdes, who, mourn
ing recently for the loss of her own child, was very
glad to nurse the first-born of the Soubirous.
BERNADETTE SOUBIROUS 85
The devoted care of the nurse lasted nearly two
years, after which she had to restore the child to
the care of its relatives. They were not slow to
observe that her sojourn among the mountains had
not exactly strengthened their dear little one.
Rather pale and sickly, she seemed henceforth
troubled with asthma, perhaps congenital, which
was to be the trial of all her existence. The misfor
tune was that too quickly her parents, whose want
of thrift was more and more compromising their
appearance, did not find the means to secure for
her enfeebled health the necessary extra nourish
ment.
It is, then, in the midst of trials that the young
delicate child had to vegetate rather than develope*
for whom Heaven had such great designs in store.
To crown all, in 1855 (when the child, who had
four other brothers and sisters, was entering on her
eleventh year) misfortune already foreseen came
ruthlessly to drive the family from their paternal
mill, and force them to inhabit one of the most
wretched cottages in the quarter of Lapaca. Hence
forth the livelihood of the entire household would
only depend on the spasmodic efforts of the father,
who could no longer grind corn on his own account,
but would hire out his services from day to day with
out being too successful in staving off privations
from their unsettled hearth. So keen would their
poverty become in a short time that they would have
to forsake this humble lodging, and thanks to the
timely assistance of an old uncle, get shelter in a
wretched hovel in the Rue des Petits-Foss6s.
86 THE GLORIES OF LOURDES
I was anxious to visit it the day after the glorious
festival of the Jubilee, entering it as you would enter
a hallowed shrine. But at the sight of this solitary,
gloomy apartment, damp, unhealthy, with crumbling
walls and worn-out flagstones, before these precious
implements of misery, while reverence forced me to
kneel down, I felt a tear of religious pity fall from
my eyes at the thought of the Confidant of Heaven
who had to spend here such years of hardship !
You think how, in the gloom of this unhealthy
abode, almost as bare as that of Bethlehem, the
child saw her chronic ailment gradually growing
worse ; not that the Soubirous, who worshipped her,
did not do their best to pay every attention to her,
buying her, under the pretext of porridge the
ordinary pittance of the poor white bread, wine,
and sugar. Thus they wished her, besides, to be
clothed more warmly than the others, and that she
should wear woollen stockings, preferences as justi
fiable as, alas ! they were incapable of restoring her
lost vigour, and which, moreover, did not fail to
provoke the jealousy, often the blows, even of the
younger children.
For all that, from the following winter the aunt-
godmother was anxious to take home with her her
godchild, for the sole purpose, she explained, of
feeding her up a little.
When seven or eight months of this regime, as
sensible as it was affectionate, seemed to have had
a good result, Bernadette herself asked to return to
the squalid household. From henceforth, also, the
sufferings of the sick child began again with need,
BERNADETTE SOUBIROUS 87
so that to help her not to die of hunger she often
lent her willing services in the house of a neighbour.
Her great compensation, at least (seeing she was
very pious from her infancy), was to be able to
practise every evening under the ruined roof the
virtues of Job in dealing with her unfortunate
parents. Well, what could they have been re
proached with ? Did not Frangois show courage in
working hard at manual labour ? And did Louise
cease, amid such penury, to be the valiant woman
praised by Holy Scripture ? Every night, after the
scantiest of suppers, they said prayers together. It
was the pure and delicate voice of the eldest child,
who recited the time-honoured Bigourdain prayers,
cheering by her touching inflexions the sadness of
this cheerless abode. On Sunday the whole family
went to the church services, and when Palm Sunday
came, father and mother showed their children
beforehand, by their example, the way to the Holy
Table, where the share of the poor is many times
more bountiful than that of the rich.
Yet, about the Feast of St. John in 1857, the nurse
having occasion to look for a young guardian for
her sheep, appealed to the supposed aptitude of the
dear citizen.
So we now see the little child, already in her
thirteenth year, coming back to Dartres, the delight
ful little country of her early childhood, which she
had in truth never lost sight of, and where she was
certainly not forgotten. In the cottage at Lourdes
there were, we can well imagine, many tears shed
on both sides at the moment of parting. But poverty
88 THE GLORIES OF LOURDES
has its own graces to make up for these sacrifices
of feeling, which are required by the poverty of the
homestead. Her new compatriots had soon recog
nized, noticed, and loved the little shepherdess,
whose cheerful modesty and exquisite frankness
seemed at first like the benediction of their solitary
lands. So she never went out leading her sheep
without being greeted on all sides with words of
kindness, to which she replied with that frank
simplicity which added so much to the charms of
her diminutive person. * Truly, the Cure* of the
village said one day to the schoolmaster about her,
if any child brings to mind the two shepherds of
the Apparition of the Alps, it is indeed this shep
herd-girl. Bernadette and Melanie La Salette and
Lourdes what an association already full of pro
phetic truth !
As a matter of fact, Bernadette was not at this
period of her life a precocious child ; she possessed
neither a great intelligence, nor lively imagination,
nor a quick memory. The elements of Catechism,
which her foster-mother tried to teach her every
evening, did not enter her mind easily, and still less
easily remained there. She was always the ordinary
peasant, who in her native country, apart from her
occasional presence at the lessons on Christian
doctrine, had not been able to attract the notice of
the priests, because she remained on her bench in
the last place, and could never give any reply to the
least question.
Such was the obscure being whom Providence
had chosen, and kept in reserve, and prepared in
BERNADETTE SOU BIRO US 89
secret, without any external sign, to accomplish
wonderful things in and through His chosen one.
For if human knowledge glided off the surface of her
soul, we must beware of thinking that the Spirit of
God, that wondrous Master of new natures, did not
develope in her, at an early age, the science of the
Saints, which is derived much less from books than
from prayer, and reveals itself, if not always by
flashes of genius, at least by the spontaneous growth
of all the Christian virtues.
I have mentioned the great word * prayer. But
the poor daughter of the penniless miller did not
occupy the highest pinnacles of prayer. To the
close of her life, at the Convent of Nevers, will she
not declare that she always felt herself unable to
meditate ? Only in her mountaineer s Rosary
(the only book, except the sight of the fields and
the heavens, which she could read) she experi
enced, almost unwittingly, the clearness of faith
together with the fervour of devotion all divinely
adapted to her rank, and age, and forthcoming
mission. So that in every respect it was a happy
and fruitful period, though brief, that Bernadette
spent behind the sheep of her adopted parents, or
more correctly at the school of the invisible Teacher.
Is it not thus that, since Abel and David, the chosen
mortals have been brought up ? Genevieve of
Nanterre and Jeanne of Domremy, who were to save
France the one from a barbarian invasion, the other
from an English conquest were two shepherdesses
before becoming the Angels of their country and the
Saints of our altars. Similarly, under the secret
90 THE GLORIES OF LOURDES
influence of grace, their sister from Be*arn was
trained for her work during her idyllic childhood, in
which (so much the supernatural emanated from her
whole person) the Angels seem to have wafted her
on their wings in heavenly flights.
But it was time that this youthful flower should
at length go to meet the Spouse of virgins, who
rejoices the young and chaste heart by feeding it
with His Flesh and Blood. This was the reason
why the mother, Soubirous, to satisfy her daughter s
desire not less than her own scruples, on learning
that Bartres was left without any priest because the
good Abbe" Ader had entered religion, recalled her
absent child to her home to prepare her for First
Communion.
It was on January 10, 1858, that she returned to
the wretched family roof. Before continuing the
thread of this history, already fragrant in its obscurity
like the lives of the Saints even, let us pause to ask
ourselves what she was like at this solemn hour, for
whom the most remarkable vocation was destined.
Simple, sweet, pure, and good such are the
four characteristic traits which the last survivors of
the rustic hamlet agree in attributing to their young
fellow-citizen of a brief space.
Her physical traits were commonplace, though
amiable. But to make up for this her beautiful
conscience ! Everything in this soul let us repeat
it, the better to hold the key of many things was
whiteness like the lilies in the valleys hard by or the
snows on the heights above. At the age of fourteen
BERNADETTE SOUBIROUS 91
(as the Abbe Pomian, her confessor, tells us), when
she approached her God, she had not lost any of
the charms of baptismal innocence. She felt no
slight confusion, she has told us, on the approach of
the great day, at being able to find only * six venial
sins to be sorry for at her confessor s feet. And
such sins, besides, which in the eyes of many others
would almost pass for virtues !
We see her at the beginning of the severe winter
of 1858, setting off to the task which her strength
allowed her, quite cramped in her poor cloak, with
her heavily pleated dress, and the flat bodice, and
black silk kerchief tied in a point under her chin, so
as to frame her pale face as it were in a lancet-
window. . . . You would call her a young and
delicate novice ! But be careful ! under this very
emaciation what an ardent soul ! Mystery in truth
gleams strongly from those eyes, virgin lakes a
thousand times more clear than those nameless
meres lost on the lofty summits, wherein all the
glories of the Pyrenean sky are silently reflected.
You see how her thin and quivering lips half open
with a quiet smile, which seems truly the untiring
expression of compassionate goodness.
Like her compeer of Lorraine, ignorant of her
A, B, C, Bernadette makes up for it at least as much
as she can on her beloved Rosary, accompanying
her daily toil with numerous and devout Ave Marias.
At the hour of rest you come upon her, between her
crook and distaff, playing like a child with wild
flowers, shining stones, the running water, and
better still with the youngest of her white lambkins,
92 THE GLORIES OF LOURDES
while her rough - haired dog, Montague, from
jealousy, comes to lick her hands. Moreover, the
mere semblance of evil, from what quarter soever,
made her shudder. On the contrary, as soon as
her task allows her some leisure, she instinctively
turns to everything that seems to her small, poor,
pitiful, ignorant, and pure like herself.
Thus this unearthly being unfolded herself now
as she grew to womanhood, who, with a healthy
and vigorous soul lodged in a body of suffering, was
distinctly more pleasing by the simplicity diffused
through her whole person than by superior gifts,
with nothing extraordinary about her the child, if
you will, the least likely for ecstasies and visions, or
again (as we once heard Henri Lasserre say so justly
to the Curd of Lourdes), simplicity utterly uncon
scious of itself.
Such was her state of soul and body when, being
now at home a month with her own family, she set
off to look for dry brushwood in the direction of the
Grotto one cold winter afternoon, shivering at the
breath of the north wind, though heavily clad and
stockinged with warm wool in her mountain sabots,
with the usual hood thrown carelessly over the
kerchief on her head. . . .
I have already related what happened less than
an hour afterwards. . . .
Now that the bucolic poetry of Bartres had come
to an end for ever, it was the epic of Lourdes
which had just unrolled itself before her, as startling
as a flash of lightning, until (to complete the trilogy
of the Bigourdain peasant like that of the Cham-
BERNADETTE SOUBIROUS 93
penoise) there began the drama of Nevers. Yes,
bucolic poetry in all its rustic charm an epic poem
inwrought with radiance from heaven a supreme
drama evolving by the offering of willing sacrifice
on the pyre of a religious holocaust such is the
holy triptych, which will henceforth hold the reader
breathless as long as history will last.
Also, I must add, to imagine that her trials began
only with the cloister is to have a wrong idea of
our heroine. In truth, she who was born in suffer
ing suffered always, but above all from the day when
she beheld herself admitted in the wild Espelugues
to hold converse so directly and personally with the
Divine. Such intimacy, of which a Moses and an
Elias in their time were afraid, is always dearly
bought here on earth ! Bernadette s first struggle,
as we have seen, was against herself, her fears,
hesitations, and doubts; then she had a rude assault
to endure on the part of her own family, who,
dreading the ridicule of the world, but, above all,
the chicanery of the law, tried at first to forbid her
to go to her irresistible rendezvous ; afterwards she
had to struggle against the civil power, whose brutal
and ridiculous pretensions would fain have denied to
God the right of working miracles in His world ;
then it was the turn of science, of a sort of science,
to oppose systematically the experimental certitude
of the shy child by mountains of objections and
treacherous pitfalls ; lastly (why should we not add
it without shame ?), there were priests of the Church,
who by their incomprehensible but necessary hesita
tion caused her much anguish. I nearly forgot
94 THE GLORIES OF LOURDES
Freemasonry, whose dark hand one is almost certain
to trace wherever there is wickedness to be carried
out. Here, shielded by the Prefecture of Tarbes,
and giving the tone to several journals of the capital,
even of the country, it threw aside, under the im
pulse of its father, Satan, its usual mask, applying
the terms lying, hysterical, victim of delusions,
comic actress, laughing-stock of the priests, or of
pride, or of avarice, to the calmest, most candid,
and disinterested maiden in France.
Poor Bernadette ! frail reed shaken by the storm,
without any other support save conscience and the
memory of the smiles of the Madonna 1 What
insults she had to undergo throughout this splendid
six months of apparitions, and even long afterwards!
She was spared nothing that can dishearten an
ignorant, wretched child of the people neither
captious questions, nor violent inquiries, nor subtle
flatteries, nor, lastly, open threats. That pitiable
police magistrate, Jacomet, and that unworthy
Prefect, Massy, especially seemed to vie with each
other in harshness towards this innocent. And
there met together a Sanhedrin of Doctors, in the
pay of the State or of the Lodges (which were already
identical), to declare the ecstatic child insane, and
to demand that she should be confined in a cell,
even when at the most impartial medical examina
tion there appeared no trace of injury to the brain,
or, rather, we should say, when no psycho-physical
temperament was ever found (notwithstanding the
complaint we have mentioned) in more perfect
equilibrium. Thus the learned Faculty diagnozed
BERNADETTE SOUBIROUS 95
at all costs, like Balaam s ass of yore. But what can
all verdicts avail against sectarian prejudice? An
almighty intervention was needed with the imperial
Pilate, who was then occupied in washing his
hands of attempts otherwise sensational, for which
he still remains responsible that of the virtuous
Eugenie, alarmed by the danger of death, sudden
and perplexing, of the young Prince, in order that
the throne should issue a decree not to persecute
the Confidant of the Sovereign of Heaven any
longer.* Religion, in its turn, sufficiently enlightened
by the course of events, abandoned its customary
reserve, or apparent diffidence, which had caused
such scandal ; and, in the person first of the Abbe*
Peyramale, then of Mgr. Laurence, took the part
of the young shepherdess. This pastoral letter of
January 18, 1862, while proclaiming that all these
wonderful phenomena of Massabielle, looked at from
the young child s point of view, could not be explained
except as due to a Divine cause, came opportunely,
after such a storm, like a refreshing godsend ; we might
add that the Chief of the Universal Church himself
was soon anxious to add his supreme sanction to
the too just amende. The reader will probably call
to mind the famous brief of Pius IX., which put
definitely on the work, and then on the person of
Bernadette, the first canonical approval. Two years
later (April 4, 1864) the inauguration of the chapel,
so often asked for by the Lady, and which it cost
* The Emperor, who was staying at Biarritz, ordered the
Prefect Massy to have the palisades removed, and to allow the
people to come to the Grotto.
96 THE GLORIES OF LOURDES
her so much to obtain, took place at the foot of the
cavern. It was observed with great magnificence.
Only by one of those actions of Heaven which, on
behalf of its elect, always mingles thorns with the
flowers, she whom they had seen for six years
together at the labour did not share in the reward,
any more than the Cure" himself, who had become
her right hand. Both of them, evidently marked
out to be in some way victims to the end of this
superhuman affair, instead of being at the Grotto
on this day, the sweetest of their lives, in order to
sing at the head of a rapturous multitude the
Hosanna of victory, were lying on a bed of pain,
the one in his lonely presbytery, the other at the
Hospice of the nuns, whither a return of her malady
had obliged her to take refuge. And all that, says
Scripture, that no flesh should glory in His sight. *
Yet the Christian people, little understanding
these inevitable trials, did not refrain from more
and more honouring the child-Seer. As though a
supernatural virtue emanated from her with magnetic
power, everyone wished to see, hear, and touch her.
Who can tell the number, and so often the quality
of her visitors ? Men like Dupanloup, Donnet,
Landriot, de M6rode, Prince Chigi, Louis Veuillot,
and Admiral de Bruat. They say that the Bishop
of Orleans, ever impetuous, knelt down before the
child to receive a blessing from her, which proceeding
annoyed with good reason the wise parish priest.
What strikes us most is, that in all these tiring
* interviews our Seer remained ever calm, free,
* i Cor. i. 29.
BERNADETTE SOUBIROUS 97
simple, and natural. In spite of her evident lack of
culture and even of intelligence, as soon as she came
to the tale divine, she showed herself wonderfully
ready in discourse, as well as clever, and often even
witty in her answers. Above all, such conviction
escaped from her virgin lips that it became impossible
to listen to her without believing. By turns naive,
spiritual, grave or gay, according to her story, she
won over everyone bishops, priests, monks, journa
lists, professors, doctors, and psychologists ever
remaining the same simple, gentle, and modest
child. So, too, that other French shepherdess of
the fifteenth century had appeared (with whom
Bernadette inevitably suggests comparison), when
the Law, the School, and the Church in turn sat in
judgment before her disconcerting simplicity.
At Lourdes, as at Chinon, all diplomatic arts failed
before such upright candour, and it is not the least
miracle that nothing could ever spoil her neither
sincere praise, nor insidious flattery, nor tempting
offers. To the last this angelic being had the grace
of remaining a child of that class of children, I
mean, to whom the Kingdom of Heaven truly
belongs, and on whose lips God is pleased to put
perfect praise.
But let us continue this spiritual character-sketch.
By the side of such self-denial, what severe and un
relenting detachment !
It happened that a rich Catholic family, attracted
by the heavenly halo which her virtue not less than
her prodigies already formed around her brow, pro
posed from the very first to the pious child to adopt
7
98 THE GLORIES OF LOURDES
her. She shrank with horror from the thought.
Holy Poverty, companion of lowly Simplicity, capti
vated too much her naturally great soul for any
earthly advantage to attract her. That gentleman
also learnt a lesson later on who, even in the parlour
of the convent, dared, in a mystical Quixotic spirit,
to make her the dazzling offer of his hand and
fortune !
It is precisely by this complete denial of self
that in the depth of external tribulations she found
the secret of never losing interior peace ; for it is
only those divested of all things who are masters of
themselves and of the universe.
And yet can we imagine that this loving child, so
devoted to the Madonna, did not feel a particular
grief at seeing the holy Grotto profaned by force for
nearly six months ?
While the child was there, on this spot so full of
sweet memories, where she loved so much to return,
an impious cart (the only one that could be procured
in the whole town) carried off before her eyes,
dimmed with tears, the already numerous ex-votos of
the gratitude of the crowds. Even those numerous
tapers lit one morning in the flame of her ecstasy
had been brutally extinguished one after another ;
and as a crowning act of defiance, they lost no time
in barring all approach to the stream and to the
crypt by means of barricades ; while the Civil Power
was helped from time to time by some pedantic
Doctor, such as Voisin, Diday, and, later, Charcot
and Bernheim, who made out that the undeniable
cures wrought through this fountain were due to its
BERNADETTE SOUBIROUS 99
mineral properties, as though there only had been
hot springs like those of Bareges or Cauterets !
It is true this did not damp the ardour of the
pious caravans. The Vision had asked for people,
crowds of people ; and Bernadette already saw
multitudes flocking there. It was ever thus with
her fluctuations of joy and sorrow, which were
destined to form the chequered tissue of her
life.
Meanwhile, on Corpus Christi, 1858, at length the
long-wished-for day of her First Communion dawned
for the daughter of Soubirous. To teach us what
was this solemn and intimate union of Innocence
with Love would need the lyre of a Eugenie de
Guerin or the brush of the angel of Fiesole. When
this peasant who had been favoured with glimpses
of eternal glory returned from the altar, radiant,
inflamed, and modest, the whole parish understood
truly that God had just given Himself to her as He
does not usually do in this world.
Why was it necessary that she should be awakened
so soon from this ecstasy, which made her most
beautiful days live again, by persecution withheld for
a moment by a sort of truce with the Eucharist ?
At present, unable to blame the miraculous water or
the prophetess who had made it spring up from the
dry sand, they hit upon the expedient, under the
pretext of public interest, of forbidding trespassers
on the land of Massabielle as being town property;
palisades were erected there, gendarmes secretly
posted, numerous summonses and heavy penalties
given, which naturally threw Lourdes and the country
72
ioo THE GLORIES OF LOURDES
into a state of great excitement. What hatred,
then, the Evil One bore to this Grotto, and how he
must have feared it !
So many different trials, added to much fatigue,
told on the health of the child, whom they thought
it prudent to send to Cauterets, not to take the
waters, but for a rest and change of scene. Three
weeks later she returned to the family hearth, not
being able to stay away from the Holy Land.
It was the time when people of quality, both from
France and abroad, bound for all the fashionable
health-resorts, were passing by the country village
that had become so famous.
It was written that this child was to serve as a
witness to the Supernatural before the great
ones of this earth, and by the sport of circum
stances the fame of the city of Mary went on
spreading gradually over the world. At the hospital
of the Sisters, and at the new abode of the Soubirous,
between which Bernadette now divided her time,
the instructions were to give admission to all sight
seers. We must here add that, since the last crisis for
the asthmatic child, the saintly Cure", M. Peyramale,
for fear her health, now so precious, should finally
give way, was careful to remove the poor household,
without any request on their part, from their hovel,
and house them in a dwelling humble enough, but
more healthy, in the Rue du Bourg.
As I had been to the * Dungeon, I wished on Feb
ruary n, by way of completing my pilgrimage, to
visit the last dwelling on earth of the Confidant of
Heaven, whither for nearly eight years the leading
BERNADETTE SOUBIROUS roi
Catholics and also infidels of the nineteenth century
had resorted.
Picture to yourself, reader, at the bottom of a
slight depression in the ground, a plain building
externally unadorned and irregular within, which
belongs to the town, or rather is * a relic of the
town ; no porter stands at the doorway ; the tra
veller may enter, as of yore, into the paternal mill.
Yet what is there to mind ? There is no guide
your piety is lynx-eyed enough to discover many
things not given in Bottin no gratuities : the soul of
the pious child, which seems to haunt these rooms,
would be grieved by it. Here at once you get an
idea of poverty, if not of actual want, in her primi
tive abode. The house consists of two rooms : a
ground-floor a sort of old stable, which still be
trays its original purpose and the upper room, to
which you ascend by a staircase half worm-eaten, a
little shapeless room which had to serve for kitchen
and bedroom, since you see here some rickety
chairs, a table of white deal, that needs propping
up, like that of Philemon and Baucis, two humble
beds, and a bedstead still more humble, guarded by
a circular grating against any acts of pious Vandal
ism. Let us kneel down, for here rested from time
to time the maid of the Pyre ne es, who conversed
with the glorious Queen of the world. More than
once her parents heard her by night conversing
with some invisible Being. Then see those pious
images, those flowers of coloured paper, those faded
ribbons the quaint ornaments and finery of one
who lacked bare subsistence calculated rather to
102 THE GLORIES OF LOURDES
emphasize the surrounding bareness than to screen
it ! But does not the true value of these precious
relics lie in their having existed with, and, as it
were, been associates of the peerless child who saw
them in the same place nay, perhaps hung them
there with whom they lived in that mysterious bond
of union which often subsists between great natures
and the merest trifles ?
But it is time to leave, together with our heroine,
the land of visions, in which she would have hence
forth nothing more to do, since she had finished her
share in the sublime work of which she was only for
a brief space the instrument of Heaven.
Her farewell to the holy Rock was nevertheless
particularly heart-rending, as my friend, the Abbe"
Archelet, has lately told, besides so many others,
in his beautiful book on Lourdes. Was not leaving
this cavern for Bernadette to quit the very threshold
of Paradise ?
Heaven so arranged matters that it was on
July 16, 1866, the day of a blissful anniversary,
that under the immemorial names of Sister Marie-
Bernard, hardly twenty-two years old, she entered
the novitiate at the mother-house of the Sisters of
Charity of Nevers (having been a postulant already
in their house at Lourdes itself).
The Superior-General of this admirable institute,
devoted to the instruction of children and the care
of the sick, was then the Reverend Mother Imbert,
a wise and prudent woman, who was experienced,
it was said, in training souls. The Bishop of the
BERNADETTE SOUBIROUS 103
diocese was Mgr. Forcade, a prelate whose piety
was only equalled by his wisdom two persons
chosen now by Providence to take part in a
history in which everything is really providen
tial. The beginnings were such as they ought
to be with such a chosen soul. Soon the entire
community, piously proud of this flower of the
field, as the Bible says, enjoyed the fragrance of the
sweet odour of her virtues. Not that the eldest of
the Soubirous-Caste rot family was extraordinary in
anything any more than in her native country.
The same simplicity which marked her of yore in
her visions on the banks of the Gave surrounded
her still in the Convent of St. Gildard ; and if any
thing distinguished her from her companions, it
was, besides an unaffected humility, good sense and
unfailing moderation, by which she soon won the
esteem of the nuns, as she had previously attracted
the crowds, and all this unknown to herself! So
when the new spiritual Father of the young nun,
who knew of the harmonious growth of this soul,
learnt that at Paris, in the hospital school, a famous
pathologist had just had enough levity or bad faith
to say that the late Seer of Massabielle had had to
be confined in a mad-house at Nievre, Mgr. Forcade
addressed him this quiet but pithy reply : I can
and must affirm that Bernadette, admitted to the
noviceship of the Dames des Nevers, has always
from the very first day shown no ordinary wisdom,
and a calmness which cannot be equalled. The
evidence given by the doctors of the house was
absolutely the same.
104 THE GLORIES OF LOURDES
Here we have a clear proof of her health of mind
and body ; but regarding her soul how can we depict
it to the thoughtless and profane, when through heroic
concealment it escaped the notice in great measure
of her neighbours in the choir ? Happily, to reveal
the special action of Heaven in this young nun, there
was suffering whose traces are unmistakable in such
cases suffering both of body and mind, compared
with which her previous trials were a mere trifle.
For twelve years in succession this second life was
only a long series of incurable infirmities that baffled
the skill of doctors a sort of dolorous passion, which
in her innocent body and spotless soul * filled up
(to use the strong word of St. Paul) the sufferings,
that wrought redemption, of the Man-God.*
The greatest wonder is that the victim was offered
up at every breath and movement of her body, con
tinually and silently. To see this insignificant Sister
passing along the corridors or garden, or wasting
away on her sick-bed, no one could have doubted
that here was the Apostle of the Immaculate Con
ception, to whom (as to St. John) Heaven had
whispered its secrets.
So in the cloister, as at Espe"lugues, because
she remained the same simple child, God con
tinued to visit His servant ; only, as it became
necessary for the perfection of her peerless virtue,
it was henceforth less by ecstasy which is a grace
freely given for the sake of others than by suffering,
which becomes the most fruitful source of merits
and personal sanctity.
* Col. i. 24.
BERNADETTE SOUBIROUS 105
Her sufferings, in breaking out afresh, would only
have served to bring into stronger relief before the
community the patience ever serene and often
cheerful of the sweet victim, as they had been a
blessing. If at this second Gethsemani, Nature,
taken by surprise in the excess of pain, allowed a
furtive cry of complaint, or, rather, distress to
escape, soon the * Fiat / of sublime resignation
returned with humility and regret in her heart and
on her lips.
We may add that, the lowest of all by her own
choice, she was also kept there, whether sad or
cheerful, as though by the mysterious conspiracy of
all, equals and superiors tacitly agreeing to pay little
respect to her outwardly, while there was not one
who did not worship her in her heart.
For her part, in the divine work in which she had
co-operated, she never breathed a word, unless she
were asked by a Superior. Then you would have
said she spoke as if inspired, so much confidence,
ease, and even dignity, she displayed. So every
time that duty called her to the parlour, where the
most distinguished visitors came, one after another,
to see her and hear her speak but one word, what
a trial it was to her, who loved obscurity and
silence, or the company of her beloved sick ! For the
weakest nun at St. Gildard had been before long
appointed infirmarian, and by common consent she
made an ideal nurse, as if holy obedience, for which
and through which she lived, had given her the
aptitude which till then she had never suspected.
The reason is, because in her eyes to obey, after
106 THE GLORIES OF LOURDES
suffering, was to live. Obscurity had no less attrac
tions for her. She was only happy when she could
pass unobserved. * Now, at least, she said to the
Bishop, I am like anyone else. Not altogether,
unearthly child ! To tell the truth, even from the
natural point of view, if you observed her closely,
she was no ordinary person. Some signs certainly
remained of her surpassing visions.
We will try to sketch the portrait of the little
nun, according to what eyewitnesses have told us.
Her eyes were dark, but clear, and possessing always
an indefinable charm, her face pleasing because so
seraphic, her intelligence sensibly developed, less by
the refinement of the cloister than in the school of
the most clever of teachers. Shall I add (to show
she had not wasted her time with all her ecstasies)
that at times Sister Marie-Bernard, not content
with having succeeded in reading the Little Office,
and writing to her nephews, showed wit, all the
better because it unconsciously showed itself in
smart repartees or pleasant sallies. And that the
triumph of grace might be fully manifest, the shep
herdess of Bartres, the spinner of Lourdes, showed
herself at Nevers very clever with her hands, a
perfect needlewoman, a faultless cook, an unrivalled
nurse, and a good sacristan. So, though she had
said, on entering religion, I will only be useful for
paring carrots, the Holy Ghost was pleased literally
to make her a vessel of election (vas electionis).
As regards the whiteness of her soul, without
which, as a Father of the Church says, no soul can
please the mysterious Lover, she, in truth, eclipsing
BERNADETTE SOUBIROUS 107
that of the snows and lilies amid which her child
hood had unfolded, breathed forth in this hothouse
of religious life all her sweet fragrance, more of
heaven than of earth, like the incense of our altars,
when it mounts upwards in clouds of sweetness to
the throne of the Lamb, who feedeth in the midst
of eternal lilies.
What recollection, whether in her ordinary work
or in racking pain, in this being made for the unseen
world, whose every heart-beat and every breath
seemed a murmur of prayer or a sigh of love !
Then that prayer of the nun, sometimes behind the
holy grille, sometimes alone in her cell. . . .
Long ago the jealous Angels had wondered at
her, raising up her mind and heart far beyond the
boisterous waters of the Gave, beyond the flowery
hills of Espelugues, beyond the picturesque lands
of Bartres, beyond the white gulls floating above
the horizon of the Pyrenees, beyond the sky itself,
so blue, which in the distance seemed to lose itself
in infinite space. . . . But since, in the cells of the
Grotto and the Convent, Bernadette had learnt the
art of arts that of prayer or, rather, since she
received the infused knowledge of prayer the spirit
of prayer who could describe to us the sublimity of
one of her Paters, or the sweetness of each of her
countless Hail Marys ?
And how could her love not bear comparison even
with that of the pure spirits ? Did not this perfect
maiden love with all her heart, in which nothing
human had a share, God, and the Son whom He
has sent into the world, and His ineffable Mother,
io8 THE GLORIES OF LOURDES
who carries Jesus in her arms, and on earth, in
them, by them, and for them, everything worthy of
love, which is not too often found ?
It was in truth the love of the Spouse of the
Canticles, the love naked, poor, barefooted, which
long ago had rilled the soul of her dear patron, the
Abbot of Cluny, and caused the old man of Assisi
to shed burning tears, making the stigmata sweet
and giving a splendour to rags, which otherwise
does not belong to royal purple.
So, to love, pray, obey, suffer, work, and be silent,
and move about like a shadow this was her life in
a nutshell, which was inaugurated by the idyll of
the country, transfigured by the epic on the banks
of the river, and completed by the mystical drama
of the far-off Convent.
Just as in the natural order a flower, a ray of the
sun, or a butterfly s wing, bear witness to creative
power as much as, and more than, a granite boulder,
so natures like that of Soubirous s daughter exemplify
by all their external and interior history the work
ings of Divine Providence in the secrecy of certain
chosen souls. * God, says a famous mystical
writer, sometimes takes a fresh soul whom He wishes
by successive trials to draw slowly to Himself. He sends
it from time to time consolations, but more often He
nourishes it with tears which no one suspects, and makes
it suffer for love. His adorable strictness never relaxes.
The soul would fain have peace He troubles it. And
if He sees it at the last hour faithful and uncomplaining,
He holds out His arms lovingly to it from the threshold
of eternal happiness.
BERNADETTE SOUBIROUS 109
It is thus, in His dealings with men, that the
Most High trains those souls whom He marks out
for great designs by first of all annihilating them !
Now that Bernadette had passed through the ordeal
of the most generous self-denial for thirty-six years,
death, the guerdon of God, could come.
It was on December n, 1878 (during the Octave
of the Immaculate Conception), that Sister Marie-
Bernard had to take to her bed of suffering in the
infirmary, only to leave it for her flight to Heaven.
In the intervals of her malady, which lasted four
long months, they often heard her recalling the
visions of Massabielle, confirming all that she had
ever said about them, and repeating to herself the
promises made to her. She was not spared the
agony of the Garden of Olives. The Evil One,
moreover, kept troubling her. She shuddered at
the thought of death ; above all, she was afraid of
so many graces received. At the anniversary of
each of the apparitions her being seemed to be
revived. Holy Week was strangely sorrowful. From
Tuesday evening after Easter, after the holy Viati
cum, there was peace. Next day the dying child
wished again to receive absolution and gain the
plenary indulgence which Pius IX. had granted to
her at her last hour. Then she was anointed, and
the prayers for the dying said for her. She joined
in them in an attitude of fervour and singular con
fidence. The crucifix was always near her. She
kissed it frequently with the words the only ones
she could utter I love it ! I love it ! Soon she
asked to drink some Lourdes water, which she
no THE GLORIES OF LOURDES
did very religiously, making first the big sign of the
cross, which had formerly so impressed the crowds.
At length she sweetly expired, as she uttered the
last words of her beloved Angelus. Everything
betokened that in her room, at this very moment,
Heaven had again opened for her, and the glory of
the Immaculate Mother began again to shine on
her, nevermore to vanish out of sight ! It was three
o clock in the afternoon, Easter Wednesday, April 16,
1878.
It was just twenty-one years ago that, on a
similar feast, she held before the Madonna a lighted
candle between her fingers without being burnt
by the flame. Now, too, Death was grazing her
sainted body with his pinion, and did not harm it.
Ubi est, mors, stimulus tuns ? ubi est, mors, victoria
tua? Or, rather, this young temple of God, once
lifeless, appeared to shine more brightly than ever,
as though with a light from beyond the grave
perhaps the same that had shone on the forehead
of the Seer at the Grotto. . . . For three days,
without a shadow of change, the limbs retained their
suppleness ; the bier of the Saint so they began
instinctively to call her became like a triumphal
couch, past which the people of Nevers filed in
order. Everyone, even the least piously inclined,
was anxious to kiss these holy relics. It was in
truth the testimony of the people that she was a
Saint, or, rather, first whispered at Lourdes, it was
only being more openly declared by the people
around her bier, transformed almost into a throne.
The following Saturday the funeral was performed
BERNADETTE SOUBIROUS in
with solemn rites, amid an immense concourse of
people, by Mgr. Lelong himself, who had hastened
for this purpose from the other end of his diocese.
Owing to the exceptional occasion, the Bishop de
livered the funeral oration, or, rather, the panegyric
of the dead child. Then, after the last absolution,
the cortege to the grave, writes an eyewitness,
was more like a procession of the Blessed Sacra
ment.
It is in the little chapel of St. Joseph, in the
middle of the Convent garden, that the child of
miracles was buried. By one of those happy coin
cidences with which the biography I have just
briefly sketched abounds, the liturgy of the Institute
directed that over the humble mound of the glorious
child that sleeps beneath the anthem, Salve
Regina, Mater Misericordite, like the novissima verba
of the ancients, should be sung, which all her life
had been such a joy to her. And when the crowd
dispersed, as though the De Profundis were out of
place at such a burial, they intoned a joyous
Magnificat. . . .
We also, we especially, have good hopes that the
too modest mausoleum of St. Gildard is only for a
time. The fitting place for the body in any case, for
the heart of Bernadette is at Massabielle, or, rather
(I venture to assert it with all the humility of the
humblest son of Holy Church, but at the same time
with all the fervour which such a history has kindled
within me), the place for her (when it shall please
God) is upon our altars !
CHAPTER IV
PROVIDENTIAL OPPORTUNITY
IT will be admitted that no more suitable time
could have been chosen by Heaven for such a person
to serve as the instrument for such miracles.
It was, in fact, the time with us when Science,
breaking away from the bonds of Faith, and quite
smitten with itself, was endeavouring to take the
Creator from His creation, under the sacrilegious
pretext that if we must, at all events, admit God as
* the Category of the Ideal, at least this metaphysical
and unknowable Being has not to intervene in the
determinist evolution of Cosmos, everything happen
ing here below as if there was nothing higher, as if
the supernatural order, superstitiously added by the
old schools to the order of Nature, was only an old-
fashioned legend.
Such was Renanism, a sort of lay State-religion,
reaching its full-blown maturity in the official
academies, to filter down from them, alas ! through
all the avenues of an Atheistic (or Liberal) press to
the lower stratum of the people, who thought they
were thus mounting to the light.
Because there is verily nothing new under the
112
PROVIDENTIAL OPPORTUNITY 113
sun, at the root of this system which now came into
fashion we cannot fail to recognize two of the most
fundamental errors, the children of the pagan Re
naissance and of the philosophy of Rousseau viz.,
the denial of Man s Fall, and consequently of the
Messianic Redemption.
In point of fact these two heresies, which are
really one, while they sap the very foundations of
revealed dogma, contain in themselves, if you notice
carefully, all the poison of the Non-religion, or rather
Impiety, of the day. It is truly an unmitigated,
essential, and complete anti-Christianity, raised to
the dignity of an intellectual doctrine and code of
morals.
A tragic crisis, the most serious that human
thought has ever yet passed through, and one of
which our age is literally dying, which, refusing to
believe any longer in evil, puts its good wherever it
happens to find it ; and which, refusing to admit a
Saviour of the world, can only cause the present
revolt to be followed by an eternal one a gospel of
despair !
Such was the spiritual state of human society in
1858. But (notice how wisely Providence arranges
all things) at this very time the proclamation of the
most salutary of all dogmas suddenly took place,
first at Rome, then at Massabielle the dogma
which, raising the ideal Virgin above all mankind by
her exemption from even original sin, came to sum
up in one peerless being the two essential truths a
catastrophe in the beginning, followed by a deliver
ance when victorious Agnosticism was making
8
114 THE GLORIES OF LOURDES
great inroads with such bitterness. Hence we see
that the dogmatic decree of Pius IX. and the
historic fact of Lourdes were truly providential.
Let no one say that since the voice of Infallibility
had, through the Pope of the Immaculate Con
ception, affirmed this truth by definition, it was
quite unnecessary that the voice of the Church
should be reinforced by so unwonted a manifestation
as that which took place in the valley of Espelugues.
Doubtless, for the faith of Christians, the voice of
Peter was quite sufficient for Rome and the whole
world; but for the love of their Mother, for her
irresistible desire to bring help to the great distress
of her children, should not the blessed revelation be
manifested in bodily form, if I may say so, that it
might become more tangible and so more effectual ?
To explain the matter more clearly, when the
glorious Lady appeared on the happy banks of the
Gave, four years had elapsed since the Holy See had
uttered its dogmatic decree about her. Now (ex
cepting professional theologians), how many at that
time in the world knew the meaning or even the
statement of the new doctrine (I call it new in its
development, in the sense of Vincent of Lerins,
though it is ancient and eternal in itself, quoad se) ?
The proof is that to the mind of Bernadette, though
pious and devoted to Mary, these four words, Que
soy VImmacule Councepciou, on coming to her ears,
remained a complete enigma ; in the same way those
to whom she had soon to repeat them, not without
hesitating and making mistakes also, declared them
selves amazed, almost disappointed, by them. The
PROVIDENTIAL OPPORTUNITY 115
reason is that in all this little city of Lourdes, where
the time-honoured devotion to the Madonna had
always flourished, no one had hitherto ever spoken
or heard such language. There, as in so many
other corners of France, it could only be the parish
priest, to whom an adequate knowledge of theology
made such a phrase familiar; besides, everyone
knew that M. Peyramale, with his large practical
sense, had always carefully avoided such abstract
terms in his Sunday discourses. What he must
have said, what he certainly did say, was : Unlike
all of us, the unhappy heirs of original sin, the
Mother of God alone has come into this world with
out a shadow of sin, man s fatal Fall not having
been able to touch her from the first moment of her
being. To this popular theology to render it
easier to their devotion he merely added the
beautiful expression in vogue since the miraculous
medal was introduced : * O Mary, conceived without
sin, pray for us who have recourse to thee. But,
about the middle of the last century, neither priests
nor people, as a rule, spoke of the Immaculate
Conception. This was an esoteric term, as though
this abstract but fundamental dogma had not had
time, since its promulgation by the Vatican, to pass
from the science of theology into the conscience of
the faithful, from the region of speculation into the
common use of everyday life.
Yet, as we have seen, it became more and more
important, in view of the ever-increasing doctrinal
evil, which had soon become social evil, that the
doctrine should at length be solemnly disclosed, as
82
Ii6 THE GLORIES OF LOURDES
being the specific and most suitable remedy, which,
taking somehow a material shape in a visible drama,
would stem the flood of contrary errors by the two
fold truth which it would bring into clear relief.
How effectively, from the day when she was
personified in the providential dogma, the glorious
Form who appeared in the cleft of the rock as in
a chair of state (a chair certainly not opposed to
the cathedra Petri, but set up there to confirm its
irrevocable definitions) would, in the first place,
emphasize it, then adorn its metaphysical abstruse-
ness with all the charms of a Vision divinely
entrancing !
This is the meaning of Lourdes for society, and
its benefit to mankind ! It has made familiar and
natural to our minds what tongue cannot utter,
almost what the mind cannot conceive, by clothing
it in a tangible form, and, above all, by giving it a
smile, a voice, a gesture, which have profoundly
stirred the mind and heart of the nineteenth century
even more than the favoured corner of Bigorre.
And since this date, one of the greatest in the
annals of mankind, the Immaculate Conception
has become universally, not only a matter of faith,
but also of popular devotion, and you would not
find a child in France as simple as the simple
shepherdess who with equal assurance and fervour
could not spell the heavenly phrase : * Be nie soit la
sainte et immacule e Conception de la glorieuse
Vierge Marie ! *
* * Blessed be the holy and Immaculate Conception of the
glorious Virgin Mary.
PROVIDENTIAL OPPORTUNITY 117
Again, as the rule of prayer always supposes the
rule of faith as the rule of faith is everywhere the
rule of action how can we fail to see beforehand
in the apparently unimportant fact of a mysterious
Woman revealing herself to a peasant-girl a revolu
tion as useful as it is necessary ?
Let us rather examine this question : Since the
events we now speak of, which took place as though
to bring into operation I nearly said, to put to the
test the teaching of the Vicar of Jesus Christ, if
the two principal heads of the infernal Hydra have
not been cut off at a blow (in truth, they will remain
to the end of the world for the trial of the good and
the ruin of the wicked), this, at least, is certain,
that the poison so deadly to men s souls, whether
because infecting their ideas or perverting their
moral standard, has been found to be considerably
limited in its range, and also sensibly abated in its
virulence.
Yes, beyond a shadow of doubt, thanks to Lourdes,
only those die of the bite of the eternal Dragon who
refuse to look at the Almah, their deliverer; as the
Israelites of old, in order to live in the desert, had
to raise their eyes to the prophetic sign.* More
over, can we deny that in our days a true awakening
of religious faith and practice has begun ?
Nowhere is this more clearly shown than on the
banks of the river of Mary, a lasting witness of the
wonderful manifestations caused by the new move
ment in the land of philosophers and politicians.
This affords us grounds for hoping nay, for declaring
* Num. xxi. 8.
n8 THE GLORIES OF LOURDES
with our latest Popes that the future will emerge
gloriously from this Grotto. * Lourdes, Leo XIII.
was fond of repeating, * will save France. As for
Pius X., everyone knows how, in a remarkable Ency
clical the first written by this wonderful Pontiff
after ascending the chair of Peter he declared that
her speedy deliverance must come to us through the
Immaculate Virgin of Massabielle. Whilst waiting
for this blessed day which our present trials make
to appear very far off it would be base ingratitude
not to recognize at this moment the great service
we owe to the ethereal Visitant from the point of
view which we are considering.
What this Queen of Angels really meant in reveal
ing herself in a wild mountain ravine to a shepherdess
of our nation almost in the same way that of yore,
on the mountain of Judaea, God revealed Himself to
a Hebrew shepherd was much less to show her
glory than to bear witness before an apostate
generation, whose entire misfortune arose from no
longer believing the certain real existence of original
sin weighing on all mankind, to the exception of a
single creature who for that had called herself so
happily the Immaculate Conception, and, conse
quently, to recall to those modern men who are
fascinated by the idol of Progress, that deceitful
trifle, in virtue of the holy Redemption, an invisible
world more real and more desirable from which she
descended in a straight line with a whole retinue
of glories and graces, for the sole purpose of teaching
us again the way, and drawing us there by enlighten
ing our minds with the essential truths of which she
PROVIDENTIAL OPPORTUNITY 119
was the official messenger, by warming our hearts
through contact with her winning virtues, by reconcil
ing us with the austerities of the cross of her Son,
which are the necessary prelude to the unfading joys
of our Eternal Home.
It is, then, because Lourdes has had the task of
bringing home to mankind in opposition to the
impious negations which have already done so
much harm to modern society the sublime asser
tions of doctrine and morality, by which alone
salvation can be won, that Lourdes deserves to be
hailed as the presage of better times, in proportion
as men, before such a revelation of Divine power,
imbue their thoughts and lives more deeply with its
reality, instead of scoffing in the spirit of Voltaire,
or blaspheming like Rousseau, or sneering in the
unhappy company of Renan. In this way, the
prophecy of a great servant of Mary, the Blessed
Grignon de Montfort, made over a hundred years
ago viz., that the twentieth century would mark
by a very special devotion to the Mother of Christ
a notable return of society to the kingdom of her
Son seems, after all, not so far from fulfilment.
Now, it is undoubtedly at the Grotto of the Pyre"ne"es
that this happy movement of Christian reaction has
been started. How so ? Since the Lady, most
reverently asked by her confidant to reveal her
name, declares that she is called the Immaculate
Conception, is not that clearly her proper name, her
personal quality, her exclusive and special mark?
The conclusion naturally follows, therefore, that
since she alone has been conceived without sin,
120 THE GLORIES OF LOURDES
all of us, as members of the human race, are
born in sin, and in the vivid words of Bossuet, a
faithful echo of all Scripture and all history, Qui
nous engendre, nous tue. *
Hence the well-known Original Sin is not a fable
or legend, but a heart-piercing reality ; hence it is
only too true that by an incomprehensible but
terrible law of heredity all the children of Adam
are beings fallen, wounded to the quick, incurably
sick, foredoomed to death, forlorn children of wrath,
as in the mournful burden of the Apostle s com
plaint, unless, as mankind hoped for 4,000 years, at
length, some day or other, a Deliverer should arise
to repair the misfortune by sacrificing himself. . . .t
It is a touching fact that the glistering Virgin,
the day she revealed herself to Bernadette, recog
nized at least implicitly that she herself was the first
of mankind to benefit by redeeming grace. Not that
she had ever had need of being rescued from the
Fall (the Precious Blood of the Lamb having been
shed by anticipation for her, to prevent her falling),
but there is no doubt that it is to the sacrifice of
Calvary that she owed from all eternity her preserva
tion, as we in time owe to it our redemption.
Thereby Mary appears gloriously at the head of
the Redeemed, but, as the Bull Ineffabilis says, in
a nobler and more perfect way (nobiliori pcrfectiorique
modo). . . . Yet is it not true that when in the
vision at Massabielle this peerless creature declared
herself to be what she attests, she implicitly
* From our parents we receive life and death. 1
f Cf. Apologia (Newman), ch, v., pp. 241 sqq.
PROVIDENTIAL OPPORTUNITY 121
shows us more clearly than anyone else that
where iniquity hath abounded, grace hath still more
abounded ?
It is thus, we repeat, that our two chief dogmas,
without which there is an end to all reason and
religion, find in Lourdes their crowning triumph.
Hence it appears that as peoples, like individuals,
live by truth more than by science or other secondary
matters, Our Lady, in promulgating a doctrine so
important, saves them much more certainly than
by any other means. For this reason the definition
is the Labarum* of modern times. Having slept
unnoticed through all the earlier centuries, and
only inscribed three or four years previously on
the catalogue of faith, such a declaration from the
very lips of the Queen of Heaven was evidently
reserved for the epoch most liable to the deadly
errors which were to find in it their merited over
throw.
Had the Doctors and Fathers of the Church, from
the earliest centuries, any presentiment of what
would happen one day in this * quiet limit of the
Kingdom of Our Lady, when they were pleased to
call her the great Vanquisher of all the heresies
summed up in these two heresies ? Tit cunctas
hcereses sola interimisti in universe mundo. . . .
How many salutary results, in fact, were to flow
from this privilege of the Immaculate, results all
conspiring to restore truth and virtue in this world !
For observe we cannot, especially at the present
* The Labarum was the standard of Constantine the Great, on
which was depicted the figure of Christ. TRANSLATOR.
122 THE GLORIES OF LOURDES
time, be too well acquainted with such a theology
if it is true that the Divine Virgin, through an
unparalleled grace, was found exempted from the
inherited stain, it is because the human race is
neither pure nor holy in its origin, as Rousseau pre
tended, following the Pelagians, but is born guilty
and prone to evil : to become holy again it needs
a Redeemer.
If the aforesaid exemption of the daughter of
St. Anne was only due to the personal merits of
the perfect Man whose mother she was to be, it
follows that Christ is not a myth, as Strauss asserted,
but an historical Person ; not even a humanitarian
philosopher, as Renan maintained, but God in
person living in our nature.
If it is the sufferings of Jesus which have pur
chased beforehand this singular and supernatural
privilege, it follows that the Man-God has not en
tered this world to fulfil an earthly mission, philan-
thropical or philosophical, as those luminaries of
Rationalism lately affirmed, Jouffroy, Cousin, and
id genus omne, but a part pre-eminently spiritual and
heavenly. . . .
Listen, therefore, O all ye wiseacres of the
present day ! the essential good which Jesus Christ
has brought us is neither science, nor civilization,
nor progress, properly so-called, but faith, grace, and
chanty the life of the soul ; hence the Church,
which carries on His work, must have in view the
eternal salvation of men much more than the gaining
of a purely temporal happiness, which, far from
being the criterion of the true religion, as a narrow
PROVIDENTIAL OPPORTUNITY 123
Positivism would have us believe, becomes too often
an obstacle to its triumph.
From this the duty follows for all who are
baptized instead of giving the rein to their pas
sions, to heal which the blood of the holy Victim
has been shed to fight against them by the practice
of the evangelical virtues, above all by the practice
of penance, which means that all the self-denial and
mortification by which the sufferings of our adorable
Head are filled up in us are not an excess of my
sticism, as the Americanist sect not long ago insinu
ated, but truly genuine and necessary Christianity.
Moreover, since man comes into the world prone
to evil, we must conclude that he is not independent
by nature (although the freethinkers repeat it ad
nauseam), but remains all his life subject to an earlier
and higher Law. Thus the boasted Absolute Auto
nomy of the human being, from which they allowed
themselves to deduce some vague and shadowy
rights of man, to the prejudice of the sole true
rights of God, falls to the ground.
Such are the conclusions, both theoretical and
practical, which flow logically from the fact of
Lourdes. Was I wrong, then, in maintaining that it
was the most merciful lesson of ideas and truths
which the Queen of France could give her people at
the very time when every contradictory negation was
completely sapping her strength ?
So what the definition of her Divine Maternity was,
long ago at Ephesus, may we not think the de
claration of the Immaculate Conception, in a sense,
will prove in our own day, first at Rome by the ap-
124 THE GLORIES OF LOURDES
pointed organ of the Apostolic See, and a little later
at Massabielle, by the extraordinary ministry of the
Mother of the Redeemer herself? To the ^CO-TOKOS of
the fourth century to crown the glorious synthesis of
our faith the beautiful formula has been added
which fifty years ago the shepherdess of the Pyrne es
heard. Nay, more : from this point of view we
cannot doubt that the apparition of March 25,
1858, is more important than anything which hap
pened previously in Christian history even the
famous vision with which St. John was cheered at
Patmos. For this only happened once, and, more
over, it was purely prophetic ; whilst the former,
occurring on eighteen different occasions, implied the
very reality of the peerless Being, who allowed herself
to be seen, and by her sight and still more by her
words overthrew all the prevailing errors. At
that time (we cannot too often repeat it), when
the Rationalistic fever, intensified by paradoxical
idealism, reached its zenith of blasphemy amongst
us, on this spot of earth, by no means the most
central or best known (which proves that God has
no need of our poor resources), the Great Sign
appeared in the heavens of Lourdes. Signum magnum
apparuit in ccelo! And with what state and splendour !
In the Grotto of the Pyrenees, as formerly in the
desert of Asia Minor, this woman who was the
Woman (Mulier) had verily the Sun for a garment.
For one who possesses the honour of being the Im
maculate Conception i.e., who is bathed from her
eternal cradle in the very splendour of all truth what
blending could there be of light and darkness ? Sin,
PROVIDENTIAL OPPORTUNITY 125
as the Gospel says, is night. But the Elect of the
Most High dwelt, from her first creation, in a region of
perfect clearness, where the shadow of a cloud could
not arise. This is why at the tragic hour when the
Prince of heavenly spirits by his pride was hurled
with the crash of a thunderbolt into the abyss of
darkness; at that other hour, not less sad, when
mankind by its weakness was undergoing the lament
able calamity from which we continually suffer, it
was fitting that she, the All Pure, the All Fair, the
Immaculate One, on the shining peaks of her glory,
should remain impervious to every shameful failing,
clothed with the appanages of nature, grace, and glory,
as with a garment of light. Mulier amicta sole. We
may remark aside, does not this garment of light at
once recall the dazzling robe, woven of whiteness,
with which the Madonna of the Apparitions at the
Grotto was apparelled ?
The Prophet of the Apocalypse saw her, moreover,
treading underfoot the moon, a symbol of the
fickleness and inconsistency inborn in every creature
(whether his name be Lucifer or Adam), save only
her whose unshakable foundations were from the
first on the peaks of the holy mountains.* Doubtless,
also, for this reason, in the valley of Beam, on a
beautiful spring morning, the unearthly Virgin stood
upright on her pedestal of granite, to show that her
position above earthly frailties remained, shielded
from the humiliating aberrations of our free-will, firm
and unshaken, like the predestination of God Him
self. Bt luna sub pedibus ejus.
* Ps. Ixxxvi.
126 THE GLORIES OF LOURDES
As to the crown of twelve stars which St. John
and doubtless Bernadette saw shining on the fore
head of Mary, who can fail to see this was the
proper diadem of the Immaculate Conception a
diadem composed of all the gifts, natural, preter
natural and supernatural, which from the first dawn
of her existence created to rule, marked her being,
making her a world apart, a creation a thousand
times more glorious than all those, though so perfect
and so numerous, of the Empyrean ?
We must leave these giddy heights, and humbly
pursue our train of thought the providential oppor
tuneness of Massabielle.
In a word, therefore, should you ask me why Mary
came down from her abode of eternal happiness to
Lourdes a town more obscure than Nazareth, more
poor than Bethlehem I should at once reply, Above
all, to save France thereby; and through France,
modern society, by manifesting here as an antidote
to the two terrible heresies which, theoretically and
practically, are destroying them the two primary
virtues by which, both socially and philosophically,
individuals and nations live.
Shall I also add that it was in truth only to apply
this last remedy to human evil, that had become
painfully acute under the influence of many causes
(especially of the Protestant sociology of Rousseau,
rendered more deadly by the equally Protestant
ideology of Kant, those two Arch-heretics of modern
times), that the gracious Queen of Angels so often laid
aside her regal majesty to satisfy her mother s love ?
In reality, therefore, the apparition of March 25,
PROVIDENTIAL OPPORTUNITY 127
when Our Lady uttered her name, is the climax of
merciful acts which, for nearly six months, the Lady
did not cease to perform on the banks of the Gave ;
the fifteen previous ones being only a preparation
for this, as the two following were intended to confirm
it by the overwhelming proof that she whose lips
uttered such words was not the baseless fabric of a
vision, but the living and abiding personality of the
Mother of the Saviour. It is our duty, then, since
Bernadette has been faithful to the end to her blessed
mission, to derive from it more and more the lessons
for our faith and our daily life, after half a century s
experience, taught us by this event, the most
extraordinary (and the most salutary) in all
history, as Henri Joli lately wrote, since the Incar
nation of the Word, who appeared in a Grotto like
wise two thousand years ago to raise us up, by His
manger and His cross, from our primeval Fall.
This is not, moreover, the sole benefit we owe to
Lourdes. There are others, though this seems to
comprise them all.
Is it not evident, for example, that, from the in
effable dialogue of the Madonna with the shepherd-
girl, the teaching authority of the Head of the Church
receives a timely vindication, since what the Supreme
Shepherd had so gloriously defined on that memor
able date, December 8, 1854, regarding Our Lady s
fundamental privilege, the Blessed Virgin re-words
it in her turn, not less gloriously from the height of
her Pyrenean throne, which resembles, in its surpass
ing majesty, the chair of the Vatican itself? Now,
128 THE GLORIES OF LOURDES
could there be a more absolute confirmation of the
Church s Word on this earth ? Such is clearly the
significance of the events we are considering; they
endorse her infallible teaching in so far as it needs
it not in itself, but as regards us. And how felicit
ously it happened at an hour so threatening for the
whole Church, but especially for the Holy See ! It
was the unhappy moment when the tide was flowing
strongly against Rome. In France especially, con
fronting that sublime Pius IX., who had faith and
love strong enough to rescue the modern world from
shipwreck by lashing it to the bark of Peter, was
there not the Carbonarism of an Emperor, a philo
sophical dreamer, who courted the factions that lived
by spoliation, and again the Gallicanism of a politico-
religious coterie, whose strange policy tended to
limit as much as possible the public and doctrinal
influence of the Pope, as it had tried to minimize the
social rights of Jesus Christ ?
At this critical time, when French soil was still
smouldering with the fires of a social revolution,
when that of Europe was already trembling as
though on the verge of a terrible upheaval, in which
the ruins of the temporal power of the Popes would
be mingled with the tears and blood of the eldest
daughter of the Church, there suddenly appears the
Queen of Heaven, coming on purpose, as we see, to
try and turn aside from her beloved France the
scourges which so many crimes had stored up for
it, but also perhaps chiefly to restore to the
Bishop of Rome, the essential oracle of the Catholic
Faith, his rightful prestige, and so pave the way for
PROVIDENTIAL OPPORTUNITY 129
the declaration of an article of faith which, old as the
Church herself, had slept from the beginning in the
hearts of the faithful, but which would soon have to
be solemnly defined because of our present mis
fortunes. We mean, of course, the infallibility of
God s Vicar on earth, the most important pre
rogative of the Apostolic ministry, especially in
these dreary times, when (in a famous phrase) it is
harder to know one s duty than to do it! But that
which is contained already in the Gospel was attested
at the Grotto of Massabielle, before it was defined by
the Vatican Council ; and probably no one would care
to deny that it was only approved by the Fathers of
1870 because it was first so marvellously brought
before men s minds by the Apparition of 1858.
How well the two things mutually correspond !
Pius IX., of his own accord, and without any conciliar
meeting, fully aware of his high behest, one day
placed on the brow of the Immaculate the fairest of
diadems. In return, and almost without delay, what
does the chivalrous Lady do ? She reveals herself
in the silence of a wilderness, because the beaten
tracks of modern civilization are unworthy to be
trodden by her virginal feet, in order to teach the
world that what the Vicar of her Son has defined
concerning her is the very truth written from all
eternity in the Book of Life above. Thus love for
love, measure for measure ! For the present the
Vatican Council, the most august and numerous
ever assembled,* could wait. The Immaculate
* The Vatican Council was made up of 764 Bishops, repre.
senting over thirty nations. TRANSLATOR.
9
130 THE GLORIES OF LOURDES
Conception having sounded at Lourdes the trumpet-
call of Papal Infallibility, the time was evidently
ripe to utter at length that immortal decision
which was to become, even more than the exalta
tion of the Papacy, the glory of the Church and
the salvation of the future.
A third and no less real benefit of Lourdes is
to have restored miracles in the eyes of the
people. A miracle ! We know only too well
how our modernist age would fain deal with them,
because of its claim to be modern. In vain the
eternal Gospel rises up, ever youthful with Divine
inspiration and human certitude, to record its un
deniable miracles on every page. This history
whilst on its critical side it is no different from other
histories, and, on the whole, offers more motives of
credibility than any profane history has no weight
in the eyes of the modern Intellectualists, as soon
as it treats of the miraculous i.e., the impossible,
or, at least, what cannot be proved.
Well, let that pass. Since in the name of con
temporary philosophy all the past of the Bible, with
its wonders, is ruled out of court, the present rises
with a galaxy of phenomena so remarkable that they
are nowise inferior to the wonderful gifts of which
the primitive Church could boast. It was the fashion
to say often, tauntingly, in certain so-called advanced
circles : We no longer live in the days when the
blind saw, the deaf heard, the dumb spoke, paralytic
folk walked. Divinity in its old age has doubtless
exhausted its first power, or, rather, this sudden
PROVIDENTIAL OPPORTUNITY 131
cessation of miracles coinciding with the upward
rising of the modern spirit is a clear proof that all
these prodigies of a year ago were only a pious
delusion bred of ignorance.
So the critics of yesterday reasoned in their per
nicious little books, as though from the Reformation
down to Ernest Renan or Alfred Loisy no historical
miracles had ever been wrought ! . . .
Even granting that, for one reason or another,
modern times have been less favoured in this
respect than the Middle Ages, when the Supernatural
seemed to flourish under the footsteps of believers,
we have in Lourdes, at any rate for half a century, a
case in point, which affords the most crushing reply
to this reckless assertion, due more to prejudice than
conviction. There in truth, on the banks of the
famous river, amazing events of every kind are be
coming more and more the rule. This time, I suspect,
Neo-Renanism at bay will not go to seek an excuse
for not admitting them in the uncertainty of distance,
which admits of errors. For you see phenomena
taking place before your eyes, numerous and
startling, which cannot be gainsaid. As they take
place in the broad light of day, before countless thou
sands of spectators, everyone can go there to see to
his heart s content, with ample leisure to observe,
investigate, inquire, and even make experiments, and
especially with the full right of contradicting, when
ever his sagacity can detect any trace either of
simple delusion or fraudulent trickery. In fact, let
him count the unceasing caravans of doctors, pro
fessors, reasoners of every degree, who, disdainfully
92
132 THE GLORIES OF LOURDES
passing through the kneeling crowds, have for half a
century been coming to these strange regions to
measure their strength against mystery, only to retire
from so pathetic a duel completely foiled, if not, as
so often happens, confessing the truth.
Thus it is that, by the gentle irony of Fate,
miracles, thanks to Lourdes, banished from History
and Science, force themselves so irresistibly on the
notice of the sceptical twentieth century ! Just as, in
olden times, to prove motion a shrewd philosopher
walked, so in our days, to prove that miracles can and
do occur, the Virgin of Massabielle has begun to
work them miracles such that even a Charcot and
a Bernheim have had to admit them, and even Zola
was forced to exclaim, * These things take away my
breath ! And they have occurred not once or twice,
but almost daily for the last fifty years, often several
times a day, and under conditions of publicity
or scientific scrutiny so rigorous that the most
stubborn of antagonists would never have dared to
require as much. To see this, the reader should
consult the various books of Boissarie, or that of
Bertrin, which is worth a hundred. They say that
the high-priest of learned ungodliness once ex
pressed the rash wish that a miracle might be
worked in the presence of the academic body so as
to win credence ! But observe, M. Renan ! hundreds
and thousands of them will presently be worked
before the most mixed tribunal that can be imagined,
in which philosophers and pastors, doctors and
monks, believers and agnostics, will rub shoulders
together. Is not this jury as good as an academy ?
PROVIDENTIAL OPPORTUNITY 133
But that is not all. When, on the vast Esplanade,
Heaven has wrought before the eyes of representa
tives of the whole world some of its wonders, so
surprising that all are simply astounded by them,
then the medical Bureau is opened it is not a
chapel with closed doors, but an areopagus open to
all-comers. There anyone is admitted, whatever be
his philosophy or creed, who can show that he
possesses some knowledge of the difficult problems,
which are there openly discussed and debated with
a freedom you could seek elsewhere in vain. Pause
a moment to consider this international Sanhedrin
of Science, which has always been anxious to gather
its best interpreters from every school and from every
country. When they have thoroughly examined a
miracle ten miracles in every way and from
every point of view, they are forced to acknowledge
the results so obtained instantaneously, thoroughly,
and definitely, without the help of any healing agent,
surpassing all known laws, as they are a challenge
to all the recognized methods.
I know perfectly well that, rather than make such
an admission, freethinkers (so styled, doubtless,
because they are in bondage to a party) have
thought of every means, however absurd or dishonest,
to explain what is above human intelligence. They
said, * The water of Lourdes has mineral pro
perties ; and Professor Filhol, an unbeliever, came
to discover in the chemical analysis that there were
no more salts in this wonderful water than in that
of the Gave or the Seine. Others sought to ascribe
everything to the healing influence of the crowds,
134 THE GLORIES OF LOURDES
yet we see cures taking place far from all the
assemblies of men e.g., in a solitary church, or in
the privacy of a room in an hotel, or in a train just
starting, or even at the ends of the earth, without
the person cured having ever set foot on this
predestined soil. Later on, it became the fashion to
speak of Suggestive Force/ but the authors of this
theory, that has more sound than sense, uttering
their oracles at Salpetriere, or at the Hospital of
Nancy, had soon to admit that it only holds good in
cases of hysteria, while in general it can never (it is
Bernheim who speaks, and Charcot agrees with him)
reset a dislocated limb, or heal inflammation of
the chest, or arrest the growth of a tumour, or
destroy microbes, or cicatrize the ulcerated coat of
the stomach, all of which cures are wrought at
Lourdes frequently and spontaneously. So, how
ever little honesty and good sense they possess, what
answer in truth can they give, save that the finger
of God is here ?
This is truly the opinion of all these multitudes,
representing every phase of modern thought, who,
returning home, gladly sing a hymn to the miracle
they have seen with their eyes, heard with their ears,
and touched with their hands. This indeed is the
immense service which Lourdes renders to poor
modern society, stifled by the incubus of a senseless
unbelief. Then that unhappily numerous band of
persons who have had the dire misfortune to lose
their faith in the prevailing atmosphere find it
again here, provided they will be honest with them
selves, and those who possess it already draw from
PROVIDENTIAL OPPORTUNITY 135
it a fresh argument (one that has weight) to pre
serve the Faith in their heart, to defend it on every
occasion, to spread it in the face of an unblushing
materialism, which was already flattering itself on
having blotted out the notion of God in this world.
Let us hope that the hour will soon sound for these
self-deluded mortals to be enlightened by the clear
ness of such proofs ; for how can they fail some day
or other to admit the evidential value of miracles ?
Has not Renan himself recognized this, when these
words escaped from him, Show me a miracle, a
true miracle, to which the rules of scientific investi
gation can be applied, and I will believe it ?
Unhappy man ! he need only have gone to Lourdes,
as so many other representatives of science have gone
there, more competent than this fanciful savant, and
who have returned with the Credo on their lips.
Was not that Professor Vergez well qualified to judge
of the superhuman nature of the cures, the great light
of the Medical Faculty at Montpellier, who, when
dying like a Saint, cried aloud : * At Lourdes I have
seen, touched, and heard the Supernatural ? The
pity of it is that a certain number of our freethinkers
(poor thralls of reason !) prefer to scoff at a safe dis
tance rather than come and see for themselves on the
spot. Now, I ask, is such a way of acting scientific ?
It is not even fair or natural. It comes rather from the
Evil One, the father of all deceits and artifices. The
reader may remember the order he tried already in
the beginning to impose on Bernadette. Foreseeing,
as we said, what reverses and losses awaited him in
this fatal Grotto, wishing from the first to counteract
136 THE GLORIES OF LOURDES
the rising work by destroying its first earthly
instrument, did he not make bold at the fifth appari
tion to cry out to the gentle child amidst a hideous
din, Save yourself! save yourself! ?
Such hath been ever since the battle-cry of the
Angel of Darkness in addressing his own. The chief
thing he enjoins on them, when they pass under his
yoke, is not to go to Lourdes this at all costs.
* Save yourself ! save yourself ! And we notice
how men, otherwise intelligent, eager for knowledge,
anxious to inquire, will take care not to go, not even
once, before these rocks, which, magnet-like, draw the
whole world. Charcot was never seen there, who
nevertheless (it is on record) used to send patients
there when he could not cure them. I do not think
Bernheim was anxious to go there. . . . Yet even
from the purely technical point of view it is (as all
masters declare) the most fascinating amphitheatre
which can be imagined ! Yes, but that is the watch
word : Shun Lourdes ! As though unable to kill it
by the radiance of Science, they hoped to hush it up
in the darkness of silence ! The fear, too, haunts
them (we might add) the hideous and diabolical
fear of having to work out their salvation, by faith
and virtue, in going to Lourdes ; and therefore
they save themselves ... by keeping away, far away,
from it. ... This is termed, it seems, independent
philosophy. Let us rather say, it is the blinding of
man s mind, if we do not call it the hardening or
corruption of his heart, and therein, as the Gospel
testifies, lies their crowning misfortune, for it is the
sin that cannot be forgiven.
PROVIDENTIAL OPPORTUNITY 137
In any case, it will not be the foolish or dishonest
prejudice of all our official Homais, which will do
much harm to the religion based to-day, as two
thousand nay, six thousand years ago, on miracles.
Thanks to Lourdes, those become ever more
numerous who, after the example of M. Pasteur, not
only do not start back in terror before the shadowy
outline of the other world, but who also pronounce
without displeasure the word Divine as one of those
indispensable terms to which Science really worthy
of the name ought to give its full rights. Materialism
will scoff and rage in vain. From the banks of the
Gave, wrote Georges Bertrin, a powerful influence
has gone forth which compels the truly serious men
of our time to raise their heads and look at Heaven !
Shall I add that Lourdes has brought back among
our people the practice of the Christian life, so
highly valued by our pious forefathers ? What is the
twofold law of this life ? It is prayer and penance.
Otherwise you cannot live the life of a Catholic.
Now go to Massabielle, and tell me if this valley of
grace is not such just because men pray very much
there and do wonderful penance. To give you
an idea of how they pray at Massabielle, I should
say that it seems like a revival of the earliest ages.
In such a way they would have besought Our Lord
before the images of Mary, during the pagan
persecutions, in the holy catacombs. Oh, that truly
unparalleled sight of those kneeling multitudes, their
arms crossed, their eyes turned to Heaven, their heart
in the heart of their mother ! They are indeed the
138 THE GLORIES OF LOURDES
f crowds of Lourdes, the mystical meaning of which
Huysmans has perhaps imperfectly understood.
Observe them ; under a burning sun, or in storms of
rain, no one there is distracted from his contempla
tion, everyone being spellbound, as it were, by sensible
contact with the mysterious, their souls united in a
sublime, intense, all-absorbing communion, which
expresses itself sometimes by canticles of joy, some
times by ineffable litanies, or else by tears and silence ;
while a hundred yards away the eternal moaning of
the Gave continues, rippling monotonously, like the
echo of the people s prayers. We know, too, that this
prayer, starting with the dawn, hardly ceases till
nightfall, beginning with the first mass at daybreak,
only to end with the innumerable * Hail Marys of
the procession with lights. Meanwhile, how can we
estimate or weigh all the sighs and prayers, public
or private, spoken or whispered, with which the air
of Espelugues is filled ? That doctor of electro
therapeutics who came in jest, no doubt to lecture
us on some fluid discharges or other determined by
the faith of the pilgrims in the sky of the Grotto
was not so far wrong after all ! Yes, indeed, prayer
here has * discharges, which, without breaking any
cloud, because their power is purely spiritual,
penetrate the Heaven of heavens, and while causing
man s great misery to ascend there, often draw down
its great mercy.
As for penance, it is enough to have beheld once
that piteous freight of all human ills brought to
Lourdes from the four quarters of the suffering
PROVIDENTIAL OPPORTUNITY 139
world, like the ransom of our sins, to see that this
land of wondrous changes is also one of sacrifice.
What sights of suffering all round these rocks, and
before the sacred cavern, whence the healing of the
sick seems to flow with the crystal wave, which
gives them such happiness, and by the edge of those
mysterious pools, where every infirmity is laid, as at
Bethsaida, in the hope that God s angel will appear
in the shape either of a noble sick-bearer or a gentle
nurse, to dip them in the healing waters ; and on
this boulevard of the Rosary chapel, where often
there are a thousand sick persons waiting on their
couches for the passing of Christ in the Eucharist,
to remind Him of the ancient days of Palestine, as
they cry out to Him with repeated sobs, * Son of
David, have pity on us !
The merciful Lady once begged very earnestly that
men should there do * penance, penance, penance.
. . . Have the wishes of the Madonna been complied
with, and does it not seem that, of all the praises she
receives in this land of prodigies, those appeal most
to her forgiving heart which come to her sorrowfully
from this place of miracles, obtaining wondrous cures
at the price of such misery ? For we see that, while
the well-known instances of penance recorded in
Holy Writ, or in the bright ages of Christianity, are
here re-enacted, God s anger in Heaven is appeased,
His justice satisfied, His punishments stayed, an
era of grace and forgiveness is begun with marvels
of every kind healing of the body and sanctification
of the soul, individuals are raised up whilst we
await (soon, as we hope) the deliverance of the
140 THE GLORIES OF LOURDES
whole nation. Such does Lourdes seem to be in
fact, regarded under its mystical aspect, which is the
most real of all. Lourdes, the illustrious coadjutor
of Cambrai lately observed, * is the convincing proof
that the gifts of Heaven are given to us without
repentance. Is the outburst of patriotism, pray,
that sends to this centre of French regeneration a
people who are loth to die nothing but mere devotion ?
And has not Heaven shown itself infinitely solicitous
of our needs in opening for us in the land of Bigorre
such a centre of vitality, where the children of the
ancient Franks will find again in tears the eternal
Christ of their history?
It is an inexorable law that joy must come from
the Cross and thrive in misfortune. At Lourdes
the poor eldest daughter of the Church, too
long tried by tyrants both contemptible and hateful,
whom she has allowed for more than a century to
usurp the place of her time-honoured King, Jesus,
will live again like the tree in the Gospel pruned by
the sickle, and we shall see the outburst of a national
spring, such as the former centuries have never
witnessed.
Again, in case that for this renovation, so much
desired and so necessary, the prayers daily rising and
the tears daily shed at Lousdes were not enough,
there would still be charity to complete them, that
unfailing sign of spiritual health. Had I the pen of
the latest apologists of Massabielle, what a chapter
I would have to write on the heroes and heroines
PROVIDENTIAL OPPORTUNITY 141
who there look after the victims of the National
Debt !
Let me say most earnestly that, since from forth
her granite throne the Mother of mercy draws all
suffering to her, she diffuses love in every heart.
Yes, here in truth is the kingdom of universal
fellowship and Christian brotherhood. Here you
find realized more than realized the dream of
Plato ; nay, the fact of the Gospel, cor unum et anima
una, is here repeated in a lasting way. If, after the
sufferings of those who are there racked with pain,
something is still wanting to redeem guilty France, will
it not be the lovingkindness of this army of brothers
and sisters of Sorrow, the chivalry of Our Lady,
who nurse their patients so tenderly ? As to those
who are spoilt by the new civilization, for whom
miracles are a farce, they need only go, if they were
worthy, to see how men suffer on the banks of the
Gave, how they are encouraged to believe in charity,
and then in Our Lady, the Queen of mercy and of
power.
But prayer, which is the avowal of man s misery,
and the appeal of his weakness to God s power ;
penance, which punishes the pride of sin, and pays
the debt of the guilty to infinite Justice ; in fine,
charity wearing itself out amid our earthly egotisms
without ever growing weary, after the pattern of the
adorable Benefactor, who went about among His
exiled brethren doing good what is all this but
religious life in its highest form ? That learned
Benedictine, Thomas Wieckert, was not wrong when
he lately defined Lourdes as a bridge thrown over the
142 THE GLORIES OF LOURDES
chasm between the Natural and the Supernatural.
Moreover, because God is nowhere loved more than
there, both in Himself and in the person of all those
who carry His cross, nowhere else is one better off,
even humanly speaking, than in this oasis of the
Pyrenees. It is * the ideal Fatherland of all, and
those who can spend a few days there find no trouble
in forgetting the land where they can only persecute
and blaspheme, blaspheme and persecute. What
a haven for all the mourners in existence! In
firm in body, or sick in soul, who has not felt a
special benefit there ? Who, in drowning his tears
at the living spring, has not gained peace and
strength there ? When you have been once, you go
there again ; if you are not healed, you go away at
least resigned, hopeful, and better. For everyone,
after the pilgrimage to the Grotto life s pilgrimage
seems less weary. Henceforth they will ascend
better the steeps of earth s Calvary, having learned at
this divine school to suffer in prayer, to pray in
suffering, to bear to the end their burden of sorrow,
whilst forgetting themselves, living for others, seek
ing happiness * not in this world, but in the next, as
the Lady taught her client, whose Christian motto
was always, * To do my duty, and to walk bravely
along my path. This, too, is not the least useful
of all the lessons we can learn at Lourdes.
We must not quit this ideal state of things without
observing that Lourdes has conferred another great
benefit in destroying Human Respect. Here the
reader will notice that I speak chiefly of the men of
PROVIDENTIAL OPPORTUNITY 143
France, those grandsons of the Crusaders, who a
little more than a century ago, fearing the sardonic
laugh of the disciples of Voltaire, would too often
slink away ashamed from before Our Lady s statue.
To-day you see, in this land of miracles, spiritual
more often than physical, these same men, with
a taper in their hand, accompanying without
fear and reproach the Blessed Sacrament in the
winding procession ; going to Confession, in the
crowded churches or in some recess, to the first priest
they meet; going to communion together in the open
air ; saying the Rosary of old women kneeling,
with their arms crossed ; bowing down, kissing the
earth, striking their breast, shedding tears, uttering
cries of joy, or groans of repentance, or Hosannahs
of victory, as the Blessed Sacrament passes by. . . .
What a change has been wrought here ! Who could
have hoped for that fifty years ago, when in good
society, to have a veneer of polished ungodliness
was the mark of good breeding ? From this point
of view, nothing can compare truly with what took
place during our Men s Pilgrimages ! In 1899 they
numbered 60,000, and in 1903 quite a corps d armee
flocked from the -furthest bounds of France, under
the banners of the Faith, to give to their immortal
King, Jesus Christ, the most magnificent ovation
that a Sovereign could wish for. At this very
moment of writing everything indicates that, this
year especially, they will come in still greater
numbers to the banks of the Gave.
Should they not, therefore, while their country is
in mourning, make a national * Act of Reparation
144 THE GLORIES OF LOURDES
here which will hasten the day of their deliverance ?
What a beautiful sight it is truly in these degenerate
days, in which we endure such relentless persecution !
How can we fail to draw consolation and hope from
it ? If only all the good Frenchmen of our nation
would come to Lourdes for this Jubilee, this hope
would truly seem on the eve of fulfilment 1
To whom should the honour of this phenomenon
be ascribed, which perplexes our petty psychologists,
unless to Lourdes ? The mistress of the house, so
clever because so good ( because so motherly,
St. Ambrose would say), began fifty years ago to
attract people by the glamour of her personal charms;
then gradually, mark ! she has directed all to her
Divine Son, for whom, you will notice, she has not
ceased to work in fact since the first apparition. And
thus it is that insensibly this secluded valley has
been transformed into the classic land of Faith, the
dominion of God, where the boldest manifestations
of the piety of our forefathers are the order of the
day ; where to pray and to sing are as natural as to
breathe ; where no one is ashamed to avow himself
a Catholic in faith and practice ; where he who
would not be such would have to hide and flee
away, like the hapless author of Nana, who saved
himself, unhappy man ! at the supreme moment of
grace by declaring he could stay there no longer. . . .
Therefore, is it not true that since the Crusades,
when every baptized person was a soldier of Christ,
nothing like it has been seen on earth ? Morever, it
is in the age of electricity, when an aged Berthelot
PROVIDENTIAL OPPORTUNITY 145
makes chemical compounds, and a young Viviani is
engaged in blotting out one by one the stars of
Heaven, that such sights are witnessed here !
The greatest triumph is that these good pilgrims,
when they return home, become apostles. Just as
formerly they seemed to apologize for their Creed,
and the Decalogue, by keeping it in the background,
now they publicly display it. And it is the work of
the great gatherings at the foot of Massabielle to
sow, when far away, the seeds of the Gospel.
Herein exactly lies the secret of this recent turning
of the soul of France to Heaven, which we mentioned
just now. The clever Lady was well aware what
she wanted when she asked for * a chapel and
processions in the desert. Her maternal heart
was prophetic ! In the light of God it had seen that
from this focus of supernatural life not only would
innumerable graces flow graces given through her
but a whole crowd of apostles would go forth thence,
who would hasten to bring the good news to their
brethren buried in the shadows of death.
It is through winning converts, therefore, that
Lourdes powerfully helps to save our unfortunate
country. So those who obstinately look upon this
Grotto as a luxury of mysticism understand nothing
of the social movement of the hour, so important and
decisive. They overlook the fact that, but for
Lourdes, it would have long since been all over with
Christian France, and even with France as a nation.
But mark ! not only does the Woman who reigns
there hold in check the Beast from hell, always ready
to spring on the eldest daughter of the Church ; but
10
146 THE GLORIES OF LOURDES
the children of Mary also, who come there one after
another without remission (nearly half of our most
Christian nation has come there during fifty years),
carry away, with their baptismal grace renewed, a
sense of their dignity as men and an influence as
Christian apostles that are active and wide enough
to save this people at length from the excesses of
their rulers, who only seem to hold power one after
another in order to ruin more effectually the fairest
kingdom on earth.
Lourdes, the Palladium of France ! Such is the
verdict of contemporary history ; and these matters,
however delicate, should be mentioned in this year
of Jubilee, to pay a national debt of justice to the
Queen in our midst, and in the height of the storm
to fill our sails yet more with the breath of all
patriotic hopes.
Our Lady of Massabielle, who hast already done so
much for thy beloved country, complete thy work by
making each of thy clients an apostle, and our dear
France will become once again what, under thy
auspices, it was for so many centuries the foremost
nation of all the world !
CHAPTER V
THE POWERS OF DARKNESS
THE greater a good work is here on earth, the
more certain it is to meet with opposition or
persecution. Such is, in fact, the authentic seal of
every good work here below. Its condition, since
divided allegiance created two camps in this world,
is ever a warfare. Because thou wast acceptable to
God, said the Angel to Tobias, it was necessary
that temptation should prove thee. * Lourdes,
which for fifty years is the source of health more
than any other place in the world, is no exception
to the law of Providence. On it especially, since it
is the chief headquarters of grace for France, the
storm was doomed to burst.
The reader will remember that this did not fail to
happen at the very beginning, in a most strange
and unpleasant way. The assault having failed
through those threatening voices, the Evil One
did not delay to stir up against the holy Grotto
all the prejudices of the neighbourhood, both of
the spirit, and of the flesh I mean, the market
place. You should have heard in the evening,
* Tobias xii. 13.
M7 102
148 THE GLORIES OF LOURDES
to whet their curiosity, the well-known gossips
of the town discussing, from various motives,
miracles in general, and the visions of Soubirous in
particular. Soon official Science and the Govern
ment took cognizance of it, as we have seen, giving
by turns their explanations or their ukases. Then
there was quite an uproar in this humble Landerneau
of Catholic mysticism.
Then when, on this new ground, success again
failed the presumption of some and the bigotry of
others, they organized against the unlucky Rock the
sage conspiracy of silence. Thenceforward, in the
world of liberal thought, the rule was that not
even the name of Massabielle should be mentioned
by the Intellectualists.
Heaven, however, was not silent here below, never
ceasing to declare itself with an urgency and a
forcibleness that daily increased, and so plainly that
the champions of local liberalism had to reply to
it, relying this time on the precious verdict of
professional men like Diday and Voisin. Medicinal
qualities of the water/ * hallucinations of a child -
this was, however, once again, the only argument
these clever practitioners could bring forward.
Truly impiety is not fertile in expedients. Still,
two men, who represented at this time, not without
distinction, modern medicine in its relations to
psychology, were soon to come to the rescue. They
were the Doctors Charcot and Bernheim. The first
was recognized at Salpetriere as the high-priest of
hypnotism, obtaining in this novel field, by the
ingenuity of his methods, results truly marvellous;
THE POWERS OF DARKNESS 149
the second, less known, perhaps, was no less active
in investigating at the famous school of Nancy the
vexed question of Auto-suggestion. Both these
men, as you might naturally expect, met together at
the outset to define, from the eminence of their
infallible dogmatism, that the strange cures on the
banks of the Gave (if they were really genuine) ought
not to differ specifically from those obtained in their
respective hospitals. And for a long time it will be
the fashion, even among our Deist philosophers (I
dare not reckon certain Catholics among them), to
go on repeating, on the strength of these authorities,
that Lourdes was a Psycho-therapeia, or soul-
healing place, like any other. . . .
Yes, but fortunately Heaven always raises up a
champion against every adversary. Just as Professor
Filhol in the beginning exploded the convenient
theory of mineral salts by his analysis, and
Professor Vergez, in the name of Physiology, de
stroyed the gratuitous and harmful fable based on
nervous affection, so in God s mercy, to reply to
these two oracles of the prevalent materialism,
genuine interpreters of the psycho-therapeutic science
came forward to reply to such lofty assurance.
Thus, among many others, Dr. Julien Besan9on, an
eminent physician of Paris, and director of the
Journal de Medecine Interne, fearlessly threw cold
water on the arrogant enthusiasm of the hypnotic
specialists. When there is question, he wrote,
of nervous affections simply functional, the cure
can depend on Suggestion. But the " suggestive "
methods employed by doctors have never gone so
ISO THE GLORIES OF LOURDES
far as to replace in a few hours the losses of extended
substances, or to cicatrize in a moment old ulcers.
Yet it is certain that such visible changes take place
at Lourdes. This was very apposite, I think, since
thereby the engineer was hoist with his own
petard.
Moreover, the evidence for these supernatural
phenomena became more and more so overwhelming
at Massabielle that our adversaries found themselves
forced to make a qualified admission, not without
trying, by means of crafty evasions, to save their
face as well as they could.
Let us hear the learned Jew Bernheim : Yes, the
facts of Lourdes exist splendid, undeniable. . . .
Our sole task is to strip them of their miraculous
character. That is, indeed, the vital point !
As for Charcot, whose testimonies on this point
are legion, here is still stronger evidence. Asked by
some English people about the usefulness of the
pilgrimage to Espdugues, he did not deny, but he
confessed and declared, the following he, the great
worker of lay miracles, whose surgical hall rose
proudly in front of this obscure Grotto : The pool
certainly cures, the shrine certainly cures, Faith
certainly cures. We know that he finally wrote
a sensational book on this Faith-cure. I do
not forget that by that term now, as ever, the
master only understood the wonderful power of
Suggestion, or Auto-suggestion. . . . Yet the result
was that this prince of medical atheism was soon
compelled to admit no small concession for him
that at Lourdes cures are certified which no science
THE POWERS OF DARKNESS 151
or method could have obtained. Habemus confitentem
reum.
It is a well-known fact that the incomparable
Charcot himself, when he could not manage to cure
his patients, sent them, like a good confrere, to the
Madonna of the Pyrenees. What do all the
M. Homais* of high and low degree say about
that ? The time is past for scoffing at Lourdes and
the cures which a vain people attribute to it, since
the head of contemporary therapeutics has modestly
to recognize its effective power, and look to it as an
aid to his own genius ! Yet what an instance it is
of the irony of Fate ! Moreover, not only are such
people compelled to attribute to the hospital of Our
Lady many wonderful cures, but they must also
allow the fairness of the conditions in which they
always see them performed. * Here, Dr. Berillon,
director of an important psycho-therapeutic review,
said lately in the Bureau des Constatations, the good
faith is above suspicion, the sincerity absolute, and
no stage effects. What further, or what better,
could be desired ?
All this could not prevent Zola, about this time
a man who knew as little of medicine as of philo
sophy, hence the least qualified to intervene in so
delicate a discussion from going there with a
malicious intent against the wonders of the Grotto.
* M. Homais is a character in French fiction, the apothecary
and philosopher of the village, who, having a little acquaintance
with chemistry and medicine, ventures to deny God, miracles,
and everything supernatural. TRANSLATOR.
152 THE GLORIES OF LOURDES
Moreover, by his past career as a third-rate writer
of so-called * experimental Naturalism, he, who
could only blaspheme at every step, was well fitted
to be chosen in his time as the tool of Satan to
fling mud at the Queen of all graces. In fact, how
could such a reprobate have understood the mystery
of heavenly love and superhuman life that breathes
in this unearthly cavern, who, a mere slave to his
instincts, and blind to higher things, had travestied
or outraged everything in this world ? With a soul
essentially base, whose only pleasure was to * prey
on garbage, and under the influence of official per
sonages, from whom he expected recompense, abso
lutely incapable of appreciating the lofty notions,
and still less the lofty sentiments, of duty, virtue
and self-denial, the sad author of the sad Nana
could not fail to be the sworn enemy of Lourdes,
apart from the fact that this disgraceful task assigned
to him by the Lodges was to be richly rewarded, like
all the infamous works which have come from their
hands these thirty years with the seal of State
approval.
To get fuller knowledge (as he claimed or fancied),
we see the leader of the Nature School on the
bank of the famous river of Barn ; he sees every
thing, hears everything, asks all manner of questions,
takes notes, makes inquiries, thoroughly examines
the depositions of people cured. Every door is open
to him; they show him everything wherever he goes;
he is treated like one of the family. He sits in the
areopagus of the leaders of science ; he is present in
the best place at the Holy Offices of the liturgy ; he
THE POWERS OF DARKNESS 153
is seen walking gravely behind the golden monstrance
in the procession of the Blessed Sacrament. Then,
such is the vividness of the impression made on him
in spite of himself that he writes to the Temps: You
see here sick people, who, hitherto unable to move,
suddenly stand up and walk ; and to the Journal de
Paris : What I here witness takes away my breath ! *
Might he have sketched there, so to speak, the
first stage of his conversion ? At all events, good
and noble souls, who were interested in him, could
hope so for a time, especially as the sweet features
of Bernadette wonderfully attracted his romantic
nature. Everything about her filled him with
emotion. He wanted to go and study her, and
breathe her in, he would say, on the spot, wherever
she had dwelt. For that purpose he made a journey
I will almost say a pilgrimage to Bartres, inter
viewing there, as he did in the Rue de Petits-Fosse s,
or the Rue de Bourg, anyone who had known the
child, and could help to depict this incomparable
figure, by which he was evidently fascinated so
much so, it seems, that the new volume at these
charming hours should have for its title the bright
name of the Bigourdain shepherdess ! What a
beautiful idyll it would be from the pen of the author
of Le Reve !
Alas ! these holy places were for only too short a
time for the noisy blusterer on the road to Damascus,
where God s grace had certainly lain in wait for him
on his journey.
Everyone has heard how the fair-haired Monsieur
* Me serre k la gorge.
154 THE GLORIES OF LOURDES
of Paris returned from the classic land of mystery
more unbelieving, or more infidel, than ever. Is it
not written that for certain deceived souls Heaven
finally draws a veil before their eyes ? They have
eyes, says the Prophet, and see not, and ears to
hear, and hear not ; they feel, and do not take hold.
It is to them also that Pascal s terrible * Thought
applies regarding the sufficient amount of light
afforded by Religion to enlighten sincere hearts, but
also of obscurity, which ends by darkening the
others. . . .
There is no doubt now, after half a century of
unassailable proofs, that all mankind would have
long since been on its knees before the sublime
Grotto if only they were willing to be impartial.
Only Christianity would then have no enemies,
its enemies being always recruited wherever passion
stirs up hatred against it, unless it be stupidity,
which gives rise to prejudice.
Whereas, when a man is in good faith, this man,
naturally Christian, seeks the faith of his own
accord, and in our miracles and doctrines finds
higher harmonies, instead of meeting with the pre
tended inconsistencies which Freethinkers or,
rather, Free-livers absurdly complain of.
As for the long-promised History, it was nothing
more, as you could imagine, than an odious and ill-
digested pamphlet of over 500 pages a sacrilegious
caricature of our holy places of France rather than
a conscientious and honest portrayal of them ; the re
volting production of one of those unclean creatures
who dare to trample brutally over the precious
THE POWERS OF DARKNESS 155
pearls of which the Gospel speaks ! Nolite mittere
margaritas ante porcos. Naturally, the aim of the
writer (not critical, but prejudiced) was to inflict a
decisive blow at the apparitions by calling them the
result of hysteria, and at the cures by ascribing
them to some almighty influence or other of the
crowds, which was, in fact, nothing else than
Charcot s theory of * Self-suggestion reduced to a
system and adorned with poetry and beautiful dic
tion, so as to seem brilliant at times.*
With the masses it was, at all events, the most
insidious attempt made by the Evil One for more
than half a century. Such a great name, a writer so
famous, so much art put at the service of so much
bigotry what more was needed to put an end for
ever to the * superstition of Lourdes, that scandalous
anachronism in the heart of all modern Progress ?
So the anti-Romans hoped, who raised a great
storm on the question of Lourdes, as the anti-
militarists had done before in the case of the
* Debacle, and the anti-patriots were to do before
long concerning the author of J accuse. Is it not
in every case the same school of national insanity,
whose god is Dreyfus, and prophet Zola ?
It must be admitted, however, that if the success
ful sale of a book is a criterion of its value, this
work, thanks to unlimited bribery and puffing,
* As an example of Zola s good faith/ Marie Lebranchu
( Grivotte ) was cured at Lourdes in 1892 of pulmonary con
sumption in the third stage, whom the novelist falsely represents
as dying on her return home, and whom he tried afterwards to
bribe (M. Bertrin, p. 347).
156 THE GLORIES OF LOURDES
would seem not to be deficient in merit. But let us
say at the same time that, as regards the effect pro
duced, it was a huge fiasco. Besides, from a literary
point of view, true connoisseurs (more numerous than
you would think), in spite of some remarkable
descriptions, considered this bulky volume loosely
constructed, deficient not merely in scientific accu
racy, but also in good taste, arrangement, and
proportion those qualities so eminently French,
which nothing can atone for in the opinion of
foreigners not even a Machiavellian perfidy nor
Government protection. As for overthrowing the
Bastille of the Church s belief, the new catapult, on
the contrary, only strengthened it by the reaction of
disgust which it provoked. From this time, in truth,
thanks to the most unexpected of advertisements,
the fame of Lourdes has never ceased to grow wher
ever the big bad book has been circulated; and faith
in its miracles has in these days taken still deeper
root in men s minds. Salutem ex inimicis nostris !
It is thus that the Evil One is from time to time
caught in his own snares. The original conspiracy
of silence would have been an advantage to him.
But it pleased God, the better to glorify His chosen
creature, to employ an Emile Zola, just as He made
use, long ago, of the jawbone of an ass. The coarse
ness or wickedness of the instrument matters little
in the clever hands of Providence.
Let us add, for the credit of French literature, and
for the eternal salvation of his soul, this man, if
covetousness and pride had not stifled his good
inspirations at Bartres, could have written splendidly
THE POWERS OF DARKNESS 157
on the wonders of Lourdes. That would have been
far better for him than to be buried in the Pantheon,
which is enough to make the dead there turn in their
graves.
We must thank Heaven for having deigned to
console the lovers of Massabielle for Zola by giving
them a Huysmans ! How, in the course of our
sketches, could we fail to greet with deep gratitude
the figure of this virtuoso of Art, whom sincerity
compelled to write in defence of Lourdes, and who,
before suffering so terribly his work of Christian
mysticism, wished to sum it up in a judicial and
bold way in his Foules de Lourdes ?
For him, too, this remarkable volume was to be
the last ; as if, after having spoken of the Madonna,
either in dithyrambic praise, or in reviling her, the
writer s task was ended ! Thus devotion to Mary is
the crown of all good on this earth, just as hatred of
Our Lady, alas ! is, even in this world, a mark of
eternal reprobation.
Whatever may be said of certain minor details,
which I do not undertake to defend as altogether
appropriate, though they may seem natural enough
to the character of the author, it cannot be denied
that the work in question has proved, in its day,
more useful than a fine or a literary work such as
was then required on the boulevard of Paris, for
which especially an author wrote. It is precisely
because he came from Ld-bas* from such depths,
* The title of one of Huysman s earlier works before his con
version. TRANSLATOR.
158 THE GLORIES OF LOURDES
with so many blemishes still remaining that the
former guest of the suppers of Me"dan could be an
avenger with a double right his talents and his
antecedents the anti-Zola (if you will) of the
beginning of the twentieth century, Positivist,
Realist, Naturalist, as much as you like in external
form, but so full of faith, and zealous and militant at
heart ! For in this ruthless critic of all paltry senti
mentalities and false aesthetics we have a true
mystic who, on the banks of the Gave, thrills like
an ^olian harp, and makes us thrill, to all the
influences of Heaven. I quite admit that, being an
inexperienced neophyte, he has not always caught
the most subtle pulsations of the soul of Lourdes.
Polyeuctes* did not argue as a theologian, and his
terms had not always the orthodox correctness
which an old theologian would have given them, yet
what a champion of the supernatural, and especially
of miracles, is this clever writer! independent even
to fierceness, a reasoner of great subtlety, prosaic even
to the verge of dulness, but all the more convincing,
because everywhere he seems to us converted by the
evidence as much as by grace. So we cannot rise up
from reading these pages (whatever prejudices may
have crept into them) without thinking: * Miracles
truly are not so childish as they are made out, since
an intellect so powerful has ended by finding in them
peace of mind and joy of heart.
Was it, then, a small service to bring an apostate
generation to see that a man can possess a keen
* Polyeuctes, a neophyte, more full of zeal than learning.
Cf. Corneille s drama, Polyeucte. TRANSLATOR.
THE POWERS OF DARKNESS 159
intellect and still believe in miracles ? In this way
I would not hesitate to maintain that Huysmans has
been a sort of instrument chosen by Providence
at the right moment to baffle and confound the
academic or scientific enemies of the mysterious
Grotto. Perhaps it was for this reason that the
gentle Madonna of Bigorre, of whom he wrote such
beautiful and pious thoughts, cured him twice in
succession, first of spiritual darkness, then of physi
cal blindness, that, enlightened by Our Lady, he
might in turn enlighten others. Few people know
of this second benefit, which he has narrated for us
himself. Yet it is indeed worth all those whom his
matchless prose has made known and refuted. At
the hour when his Foules wanted only the final
touches, in this upper room of the Rue de Sevres, a
sudden and cruel ophthalmia made further work
impossible. Stretched on a bed of pain in the
corner of a dim room, where a subdued light was
burning before a medieval image of the Mother of
God, our poor M. J. Kloris was henceforth absolutely
unable to read or write, praying, meditating, suffer
ing, and resigning himself to God s will (not without
smoking many cigarettes), when one evening, at
Easter-time, his sight suddenly returned to him,
strong and perfect. His doctor was astonished at
it. * Wonderful ! wonderful ! were the only words
he could utter. Huysmans felt that it was a signal
favour of Heaven. In thanksgiving, therefore, he
resumed his work, his great work, that for which he
must have been specially set apart nav. miraculously
cured.
160 THE GLORIES OF LOURDES
The appearance of these pages, which the public
had long been anxiously waiting for, was as much
a religious event as a literary feast. Fashionable
society, already permeated with the poison of
Zolaism, regaled itself on this delicious banquet, in
which the flavour of dogma was so pleasantly blended
with an indefinable after-taste of the world, and
everyone read Huysmans to the great advantage of
Our Lady, who by means of her eccentric apostle
multiplied her converts.
The author s design, I repeat, was to deliver the
supernatural from the foolish attacks of a certain
* Science, not so much by arguing with it according
to the spirit of the method now in vogue as by
exposing it I was going to say, by examining it and
dissecting it in the light of common sense, rightly
convinced with Joseph de Maistre that God reveals
Himself more by some of His startling portents than
by all the syllogisms of Aristotle or inductions of
Bacon.
The history of Lourdes, the flocking thither of the
crowds, the liturgy of its shrines, and Christian sym
bolism, are there depicted with the simplicity and
accuracy of a quatrocentist.* You perceive a soul
taken up with the supernatural through the candour
which prayer or worship suggest to him in their
manifold forms. With what a brush, often larger
and more sincere than that of his profane master, he
too can depict the ever-changing kaleidoscope of
vast swarms of humanity ! On Catholic aesthetics,
* Name applied to the Flemish school of painters in the
fourteenth and fifteenth centuries. TRANSLATOR.
THE POWERS OF DARKNESS 161
on symbolism, on healing, what striking facts he
reveals to us ! If Zola was anything but an artist,
you see everywhere here that his disciple was one in
the full sense of the word. But what chiefly makes
him hold his breath are the cures those perplexing
cures of which he had the privilege of being an
eyewitness, and so he is glad to make himself, in his
own way, the painter and historian, the critic and
apostle, to his generation.
After such a work, was not the man of letters
quite right in burning all that remained of his profane
sketches, like these old troubadours of the Middle
Ages, his brethren, who, tired of gaiety and violence,
and moved to repentance, before their death began
(they say) to sing the praises of My Lady, Holy
Mary, and wished to forget everything else here
below ?
Much will have been forgiven this panegyrist of
the eleventh hour, who, though ugliness under all its
earthly forms once enthralled him, veered completely
round to the Heavenly ideal. On this new path, of
which the brilliant stages were called En Route,
La Cath6drale, * L Oblat, Sainte Liwine de
Schiedam, he ended, to our joy and edification, by
finding Jesus at length in the arms of Mary in the
Foules de Lourdes, and on that day there would
have been great joy before the angels of Heaven.
Why, then, should we be shocked more than is
necessary by a certain naturalism in him ? Our
stylist had it in his blood. His education and sur
roundings, and his life of stress and strain, could not
fail to bring it out more clearly. Is it a fault too
ii
162 THE GLORIES OF LOURDES
great for pardon, and must a man write in our days
as in the time of Massillon or Pascal ? It is owing
to a similar cast or tendency of mind (it would be
unjust to forget it) that Huysmans owed his style, so
highly polished, yet careless of conventions, which
suited his temperament, his tastes, and his caprices
as a subtle impressionist, but also (we repeat) to
his special audience, who would not otherwise have
tolerated his pleading on behalf of miracles. So
much the better, then, that this genuine Flemish
author who was in every respect the polar opposite
of the Venetian exaggerator, who neither in mind nor
heart was French has thus brought to our modern
prose and our Christianity the temperament of his
race, whose chief aim was always to paint through
a magnifying-glass, but with infinite care and pitiless
truth. By dint of having been wrought and carved,
the style of the Foules has become the wonderful
metal to which nothing can compare, and which,
while shining on the reader s intelligence, warms his
heart, and forces its way so as to subdue his will.
I know readers who have risen from this book as
believers through the idea I almost said the
feeling of the Divine which they found in it.
Poor des Esseintes ! * Is that not his highest praise ?
He who formerly, alas ! was only bent on depicting
infamous vice was completely changed by a winning
smile of the most pure Virgin, deserving to sing
before his astonished and misguided contemporaries
the endless mercies of the Mother of Christ, the
* Des Esseintes was the pen-name by which Huysmans
often signed his writings. TRANSLATOR.
THE POWERS OF DARKNESS 163
bright haven of all human repentance ! So when he
shows us, in his masterly style, ulcers and cancers
disappearing as if by magic beneath the gracious
hand of the merciful Lady, all this seems to me as
nothing compared with the cure of the spiritual
canker from which he himself had been delivered at
Massabielle. What a great day it was for Lourdes
when this remarkable subject, who was a mixture
of qualities the most opposed senseless depravity
and indomitable striving after virtue, ruthless nega
tion and sublime ecstasies, gross blasphemies, and
fervour worthy of the greatest penitents became thus
the object of the most beautiful of miracles! All lovers
of the sacred Grotto, the workshop of so many secret
conversions, can only doubly rejoice at this signal
favour of the sweet Mother, to sing whose glories it
was fitting that our famous rescued hero should
henceforth dedicate his last writings as the touching
ex-voto of his memorable deliverance. . . .
Shall I add that, thus drawn by Our Lady,
Huysmans was a changed man, from a dilettante
becoming a contemplative, and from an admirer a
believer, as though with the new spirit the specula
tive and practical sense of the beauty of Christianity
had been infused into him ? Who has spoken
better than the author of the Foules of the
grandeur of prayer ; of the secrets of the illumina
tive or unitive way ; of the social meaning of
trials ; lastly, of the second redemption by means of
pain ?
It is certainly no great harm that, preserving
always not for effect, but from conscience his
II 2
1 64 THE GLORIES OF LOURDES
former tone of bold freedom, he does not shrink
from irreverent jesting with regard to venerable
persons or things which, perhaps, rather lend them
selves to it, nor from sharp criticisms of our
miniature ecclesiastical art, or of our rubrics,
sometimes too modernized. That, I repeat, was
the old Adam, which grace does not supplant
when it comes to adapt itself to nature. He, whose
good name I am so pleased to vindicate for the love
of the Almah, sufficiently atoned for these defects of
character by the ridicule and reproaches he poured
on the land of witless incredulity still more, perhaps,
by the suspicion of irony which he gave to more
than one of his new co-religionists whilst waiting
till his last agony should soon end his sufferings.
Whatever the case may be, as regards Lourdes, at
least, Huysmans arose, we might say, like a light, at a
critical timeof its conflict with the powers of darkness,
for, we cannot be tired of repeating, to the prestige of
his great and undeniable talent, this neo-apologist
had to add that of a long personal experience. When
he treats of supernatural mysteries with that convic
tion, and even unction, not unmixed with coarseness,
how can we refuse to believe a witness who comes
from such depths ? In truth, did not the Immaculate
One need this agnostic, this libertine, this myrmidon
of Satan, suddenly transformed into a confessor, and
even a martyr ?
So much the worse for Zola if, having had the
same chance, he preferred, under the incentive of
lust and pride, to turn his back on the advances of
the merciful Virgin, and to remain hopelessly the
THE POWERS OF DARKNESS 165
scavenger who, having left nothing but moral ugliness
in his path, wished, by the height of superhuman
impudence, to sully the most glorious work of God
His Mother! We know the end of this cynical
insulter of the Woman above all women glorified :
by a too evident punishment, one morning he was
found lying dead on the floor, confounded with
unutterable slime ! . . . Thus Nestorius long ago,
the first personal enemy of the Almah, had to be
picked up, suffocated, from the depths of a sewer.
Such endings are quite in keeping with the baseness
of the unfortunate beings who provoked them ;
whereas our writer, having barely finished giving to
religion and literature his harmonious swan-song,
purified by a purgatory of eighteen months, died like
a Saint.
I might also add that before death, while he was
slowly wasting away, he had the ineffable joy of
seeing the soul of his dear friend, the atheist and
anarchist poet, soar upwards in its turn to the light
of faith under Mary s motherly influence. The
sublime ecstasies of a Bernadette had won over a
Dozous ; was it the patient suffering and the beauti
ful book of a Huysmans that reclaimed Adolphe
Rette" ?
After that, is it not true that we could behold
with equanimity a Goliath of the stature of Jean de
Bonnefon arise, a short time ago, to undo completely
the work of such apologists ? Everyone is aware, in
deed, that this writer sprung from the very heart of the
Church which at the outset makes him a traitor and
apostate was anxious to smite with his sledge-
166 THE GLORIES OF LOURDES
hammer the immovable rock of Massabielle, hoping,
doubtless, that after that there would not remain a
stone upon a stone. The poor man ! Would you
believe that, in order to succeed better where a
Diday, a Voisin, a Charcot, a Bernheim, a Zola,
had failed, one after another, Beelzebub, ever spiteful,
put it into his head to pose as a hygienist ? We
see, then, our impresario, in the name of scientific
and democratic Hygiene (the only idol, saving
Progress, of the actual hour), collecting from every
quarter a grotesque and hateful referendum regard
ing the healthiness of our holy places of Bigorre !
In the sudden astonishment caused by this mani
festo, people at first could not help laughing. Next,
the medical body, diagnosing in this a disquieting
wave of hysterical bigotry morbus hystericus
thought it better to answer the ridiculous inquiry
of this unauthorized and incompetent individual.
Dr. Vincent, the eminent head-surgeon of the
Hopital de la Charite at Lyons, having taken the
trouble, or the pleasure, to collect all the votes of his
fellow-doctors, can the reader guess how many votes
in favour of Lourdes he received in less than two
months ? Three thousand ! Nubes testium. . . .
Yes, 3,000 representatives of the science and art
of Hippocrates declared with one accord that
Lourdes is not an unhealthy place ; further, that
Lourdes, by its spiritual influence, and also by its
bodily cures, renders great service to the crowds
of sufferers there; that to wish to close Lourdes,
therefore, on the plea of public health would be an
unpardonable act of folly. Such was the solemn,
THE POWERS OF DARKNESS 167
widespread, and explicit verdict of almost all our
physicians. Among them figure the greatest names
15 members of the Academic de Medecine, 40 pro
fessors of the Faculty, 20 professors of the Ecoles
de Me decine, 130 physicians or surgeons of the
hospital, 60 hospital head - surgeons, 80 former
students of the hospitals of Paris, Lyons, Bordeaux,
Toulouse, Montpellier, etc. In all, 3,000 professional
authorities (the most unimpeachable by reason of
their knowledge, rank, and philosophical or acknow
ledged fairness) gave their votes some asserting it,
others taking it for granted, a few waiving the
question for the free play of the Supernatural on
the banks of the Gave ; whereas (I hasten to point
out the ridiculous contrast), in a spirit of malevo
lence, the journalist of the Matin, in which so many
absurdities abound, succeeded in enlisting altogether
184 partisans, of whom a good number, clearly
ashamed of the mean task in which politics and
party spirit had involved them, contented them
selves with a vague assent without supporting it by
the least scientific motive.
It is true that the proud knight of the trowel,
worthy descendant of Zola, who misrepresented the
dead and buried the living,* could make up for the
rather low figure by alleging on his behalf imaginary
witnesses i.e., the certificate of a Dr. Evrard,
physician at Chateau du Loir, Sarthe, who, on
inquiries being made, was found never to have
existed ! For the modest journalist, who had lately
thundered so virtuously against the knavery of
* See note on p. 155.
168 THE GLORIES OF LOURDES
the Grotto, the episode was not happy. Pshaw !
are not these people the disciples of him who re
marked, with his diabolical cynicism, Lie always ;
something is sure to stick ?
Whether he would or no, our scandalmonger had
perforce to rest content with the votes, more or less
convincing, of his 184 supernumeraries.
This must have seemed to him small, neverthe
less, compared to our bead-roll of true Science, in
which so many and such genuine examples occur
from all the medical authorities, with one accord
replying to this impostor that his list is only an
immense hoax, apart from the fact (I repeat) that
most of these masters profit by such a fortunate
circumstance to proclaim the power of prayer, and
also the reality of the miracles, at Massabielle. The
more timid (or less believing) are at least anxious to
recognize, with a frankness and liberty which honours
them more than Lourdes itself, that there unhoped
for cures are obtained in great numbers by a special
action, of which Science does not know the secret,
nor even a reasonable explanation based on the sole
forces of Nature. (Extract from the beautiful letter,
published in the papers, of Dr. Henri Danchez, Chef
de Clinique, a former student of the hospitals of
Paris.)
Another of the many replies is so touching, and,
moreover, so apposite that I cannot refrain from
quoting it in full. It is that of Dr. Fleury, a phy
sician of Clayes (Eure-et-Loir) :
I know Lourdes, and I declare that Lourdes is,
from the medical point of view, a benefit. In proof
THE POWERS OF DARKNESS 169
of it, I take my own family. One of my sons, then
fourteen years old, seriously ill, was attended by
eleven masters of Science, all professors ; now he was
given up as incurable by all. The case was very
complicated, and, it seems, unknown in the annals of
medicine.
* Well, this child, given up as incurable, was cured
almost instantaneously at Lourdes. This son is to-day
twenty-nine years of age, and he is a credit to the
medical profession (Cf. the very suggestive volume
of Dr. Vincent, of Lyons, Should Lourdes be
Closed? ). But the following is still better: it is
the tablet hung in the principal hall of the Bureau
des Constatations, where so many distinguished
names of the medical Faculty pay a public and
solemn homage to Our Lady of Lourdes in the
following terms :
* (a) The undersigned are of opinion that, what
ever may be a man s party or opinions, he could not
allege or prove a single serious fact which justifies
the closing of this famous Shrine, and which would
entitle the public authorities to forbid invalids to
come here from every quarter of the world. The
sick who go to seek at Lourdes a cure, which we
are powerless to obtain for them, ought to enjoy
their full right, just as those who go freely to water
ing-places, to air- cures, to hot-springs, and fashion
able health-resorts.
(b) The undersigned declare, moreover, that they
fully agree with the authorized declaration of
Dr. Boissarie and of the honourable physicians of
Lourdes, who have followed closely the pilgrim-
i;o THE GLORIES OF LOURDES
ages, and appreciated the facts produced during
them.
(c) To our knowledge, not a single case of con
tagion since 1858 has yet been observed which can
be imputed to the pilgrimages of Lourdes, whether
during the journey, or at the hospital, or in the pools.
Conclusion. The undersigned deem it their duty
to recognize boldly that unexpected cures are wrought
in great numbers at Lourdes by a particular action,
of which Science has not yet been able to discover
the secret, nor even an explanation reasonably based
on the sole forces of Nature. They attest, therefore,
that Lourdes, far from being a public danger, seems
to them a universal benefit. In their opinion it
would be a crime against humanity to close a refuge
where so many sufferings are soothed and so many
wounded souls relieved.
Such is the testimony of hundreds and thousands
of doctors, among whom many, we repeat, are of
great eminence. This is not, then, an apocryphal
document furnished by a renegade after having
been cooked in the Masonic dens; but we can truly
say that we have here, beyond all dispute and
ambiguity, the signature of contemporary Science in
witness of the miracles of Lourdes. This is the
upshot of the intriguing of the aforesaid Monsieur
Bonnefon !
Shameless quill-driver ! who, without any capacity
or business to do so, dared to question this honour
able body of men on a point so highly technical, are
you satisfied now? Since you read formerly the
THE POWERS OF DARKNESS 171
Holy Scriptures before writing to the Matin, allow
me to cull a spiritual bouquet for you in the shape
of a text from the Psalms : Mentita est iniquitas sibi
(Iniquity has once again lied to itself). So, with all
your alarmist outcry on the plea of health, you hoped
to close Lourdes, and it is Lourdes, sorry Paladin of
Acacia,* that has enclosed you in a vicious circle.
Still, you should know you better than anyone else
that such is the fate of everyone who makes an
attack on the Lady of Promises. Now nothing
remains for you, considering the evidence of the
authority, which is borne out by the authority of the
evidence, but to go and tell your employers, the high-
priests of Freemasonry, that if they still mean to
block up the threshold of our glorious cavern they
must use force, since they cannot employ Science ;
only in that case beware of the pitchforks of Beam
and Gascony, or, more correctly, beware of the
uprising of the true France and the execrations of
Christendom ; above all, beware of the curse of all
the sufferers that curse which never bodes anyone
any good! But we need not fear. Before the
heavenly Madonna, who has no other rampart save
her benefits and favours, the naturalist republic will
give way as the Liberal Empire had once to yield.
O Benigna ! Regina ! Maria ! with your
maternal kindness, O Mary, and your royal grace,
O Immaculate, you are truly strong as an army ranged
in battle array, overriding every plot, confounding
every artifice, making sport of every threat, putting
* 7. *., freemason. The acacia flower is the botanical symbol
of masonry. TRANSLATOR.
i?2 THE GLORIES OF LOURDES
your sovereign foot on all the artifices of Hell. All
the same, what honour those pay you, in the Devil s
fashion, who, in trying to overcome you, have recourse
to such base devices !
But let us not sing too soon a paean of victory, for
the powers of darkness have not said their last word ;
now behold, in the person of M. Baraduc, the
Dr. Faust manipulating his plates and his phials
to frustrate the gentle Wonder-worker of the
Pyr6ne"es.
This worthy man, who is not without merit, it
seems, in his own sphere of biometry, has had the
misfortune at length (more from a spirit of system
atizing, I love to think, than from a feeling of enmity)
to claim to reduce the splendid cures of Lourdes to
some purely natural energy. So he turns round, and
with the utmost seriousness, in a confidential
whisper, informs us that he has recorded there the
impress of the healing Force, both biological and
cosmical, on a whole series of sensitive radio-
graphic plates. . . .
After which explanation, forsooth, he examines
the attributes of the supernatural cosmogonical
plan, which produces the phenomena, the sidereal
conditions of the movement of the motive force, as
well as the conditions of receptivity which in the
patients sometimes favour and sometimes prevent a
cure (?).
If the reader finds that all this is not as clear as
crystal, my answer is that it is not altogether my
fault. The pages of which I have here extracted
THE POWERS OF DARKNESS 173
the quintessence would doubtless seem to him still
less clear.
But the worst of it is (and this seems very sur
prising for a doctor of such eminence) that all this
picturesque theory rests, as you have already per
ceived, merely on hypotheses.
What, pray, is this famous healing Force ren
dered sensible to radio-active plates by the polariza
tion of 50,000 prayers which ascend to Heaven,
except the curious coinage of his own capricious
fancy ? Once again, that isn t bad for a positivist !
Beneath all this turgid bombast, which is deemed
scientific, we see here, too, the desire to drag down
the supernatural our Supernatural to the level of
nature, chemical or mechanical, which will thus
eliminate the Divine element in this history.
What can we think of the last wish which the
author utters to instal a laboratory near the Grotto,
which will allow Science to investigate the higher
forces of the cosmos in their relation to our
organism ? But, M. Baraduc, this laboratory exists
under the name of the Bureau des Constatations,
and we are tired of repeating that already, for a
quarter of a century, all the names of any account
in the world of medicine, philosophy, or criticism
have come there to find out that what goes on there
exceeds the laws of Nature, and is quite different to
all the recognized methods. Instead of hypnotizing
yourself on radiographic plates, doctor, on which the
invisible cannot be depicted (what an idea !), go with
an unprejudiced mind and spend a few hours in the
midst of this areopagus of your distinguished con-
174 THE GLORIES OF LOURDES
fibres, in which every shade of opinion, every degree
of learning, is represented ; and if your plates have
not completely crazed you, you will judge with
common-sense, and, besides, you will speak like the
rest of men.
Meanwhile, rest assured that your so-called
psychology of miracle is only the coarse and
comical mechanism of it. Charcot reduced the
superhuman cures to emotions, while yon trace them
back to vibrations. Allow me to say that I like
your theory still less than his. That shrewd
observer, Huysmans, though he knew nothing of
medicine, perceived better than you, doctor, the
peculiar influence which energizes at Lourdes. I
do not mean the influence of the atmosphere, but
that of prayer. Read him without any bias. Yes,
there is truly on the banks of the Gave a perpetual
exchange of disturbances between Heaven and earth.
It is the earnest pleading of human sorrow, which
continually ascends, sometimes solitary and humble,
sometimes public and conspicuous, with irresistible
accents, rising to Heaven, which ends at length by
forcing the hand of the Lawgiver of the universe,
and draws down a miracle. That is, indeed, the
victorious weapon of which the author of Les
Foules, in an admirable page, has seen the poetic
but expressive emblem in the galaxy of tapers, of all
sizes and kinds, which are continually burning before
the Grotto.
In proportion as the sorrow-laden prayers mount
upwards like fire, so pitying mercy descends. This
is verily the magic of Lourdes and its electricity, of
THE POWERS OF DARKNESS 175
a nature wholly spiritual and supernatural. I defy
you to register a trace of it on your docile instru
ments. No one will dispute the fact that they are
sensitive to the impressions of the surrounding mul
titudes ; but as for maintaining that you can with
such apparatus decipher the influence sui generis (an
influence mystical and nowise magnetic), which is
developed there in the midst of universal prayer,
that is, forsooth, a joke quite unworthy of a serious
man like yourself. It is chiefly souls which at
Massabielle are the field of supernatural favours, at
which the world declares itself astonished when
they are manifested, so often and so incomprehen
sibly, by bodily cures. If you wish men to consider
you sane, do not search after the explanation in the
recesses of your dark chamber. Pascal and good
sense would tell you they are things of a higher
order the good sense which does not always
coincide, it seems, with a certain kind of science.
You dream philanthropically of a sanatorium at
Lourdes, with all the latest conveniences of modern
progress, that the healing force may work under
still more favourable conditions. Indeed, with your
carnal wisdom (as St. Paul calls it), you understand
nothing of the things of God. The Spirit breathes
where He wills. It is the ineffable sighs of humble
and contrite prayer which draw Him near. Take
care lest all this foolish paraphernalia of photo
graphic and biometric appliances should only result,
to the grief of those who mourn, in frightening away
for ever the Heavenly Dove, whom so much foolish
arrogance would banish beyond recall.
176 THE GLORIES OF LOURDES
But no, it will not be the superfine or naive
theory of M. Baraduc which will pulverize the rock
of Massabielle !
What is quite clear about this matter far clearer
than this doctor supposes is that Lourdes is a great
crux to a certain type of Science, in love with its own
proud materialism. That unique spectacle of sweet
joy, of peaceful happiness, of sublime hope, of
calm resignation, of consciences healed, of worship
in the open air, of never-ending processions, of
brotherly love, and also (to pass to material objects)
those glorious monuments reared on the soil at the
request of a poor peasant-girl, to hide with the
Queen of Heaven all earth s woes, those countless
throngs coming without remission from every
quarter of the globe, in an unbroken unity of
faith, of hope, and of love, and those immersions in
the icy water from the miraculous spring, and those
startling cures witnessed on the spot by numbers of
doctors of every degree how could this fail
to perplex free -thought now brought to bay?
What can it do ? To speak poetically, does the
swarthy inhabitant of the desert, by his savage
cries, prevent the shining star from sending forth
its light ?
Whether you will or no, whoever has the courage,
or the consistency, or the fairness to repair to
Massabielle, must there have a perception of the
unseen world, just as, by the testimony of Pasteur,
before the notions of Space and Time, every un
biassed mind shrinks back in fear, only to bow down
before the sense of the Infinite. Such is the con-
THE POWERS OF DARKNESS 177
elusion we cannot avoid, unless we take leave of
common sense.
In this way there has been at Lourdes for fifty
years, through God s mercy, a wonderful current of
hidden power, not biometric, or hydrometric, or
fluid, but Divine, which no human analysis that is
merely such will ever be in a position to measure,
no unholy violence will ever succeed in destroying,
and no material improvement will ever intensify.
On the contrary, this current, transmitted straight
from the heights of Heaven, will only continue to
gather strength against all the sacrilegious barriers
which a Jacobin policy, or a science in the pay of
the enemy, will try to erect against it, like our
mountain torrents, which in their own time break
down the dams and sweep them away in their
impetuous swirl. As to the stubbornness of the
freethinkers in their disdain or fury, we must
admit, with Elie Me"ric, that there is truly nothing
on earth more pitiable in presence of so many
sublime marvels than the loud whistle of these
sophists, who, instead of nobly yielding, prefer to
dishonour themselves by the pettiness of their un
reasoning pride.
At all events, in thus breaking away from the
faith by an a priori reasoning that does them no
credit, they do not even remain in harmony with
reason. N^ill^is sapiens nisi credens, Tertullian was
fond of saying : The truly wise man is the believer.
12
CHAPTER VI
THE ENTHUSIASM OF THE WORLD
ALL the hatred of Hell has not been able to harm the
popularity of Massabielle, but, on the contrary, it
has increased it. This statement alone obliges our
enemies themselves to admit that there must be
something supernatural in it. If something extra
ordinary did not take place there, said a freemason
deputy some fifteen years ago to Mgr. Freppel, we
should have long ago demolished your good
Virgin, and no one would speak any longer of
Lourdes.
Now, not only the whole world still speaks of it
after half a century a long period for mortal things
but the magic glamour of this mysterious cave is
more marked, and becomes more widely known
every day.
The reader might prefer figures rather than mere
statements. On February 18, 1858, at the Third
Apparition, the Lady asked for people (du monde).
Next day, at the foot of the Rock, there were fully
100 persons ; the day after at least 500 were seen
there; on the 2ist there were several thousands; on
the last day of the famous Fifteen, March 4, 30,000
178
THE ENTHUSIASM OF THE WORLD 179
human beings stood for hours together in front of this
granite Rock. Everyone knows that now hundreds
and hundreds of thousands of pilgrims hasten every
year to visit the Virgin of the Pyr6ne"es.
It was especially at the beginning of our misfortunes
that the gradual increase took place. It seemed then
that the glorious Grotto was our Cavadonga, to
which our country confided itself by the inspiration
of Heaven. Thus, in 1872, when the Queen of
Nations emerged with difficulty from unprecedented
disasters, there were gathered on one occasion
around the Espelugues as many as 100,000 French
men from France. May I here recall an episode as
vivid as it is sweet ? On May 8 of this memorable
year, on the double feast of our Archangel and our
Deliverer, there arrived at Massabielle the national
Embassy, composed of a great number of represen
tatives of the people. It was impossible to count
the many-coloured banners which came with it from
all the shrines in our country to this mysterious
crypt, at that dark hour when the glorious past, in
order to have more faith in the future, came to greet
a present so rich in promises. Now, among these
humbled banners there were those of Alsace and
Lorraine, covered with crape, whose tragic woe
seemed to cry aloud to Mary, Help us! and to
our country, Remember ! There we had, in truth,
the first of our great public manifestations. The
prophets in politics and philosophy, who had lately
predicted that the pilgrimages had fallen into dis
favour, were amazed by it. The Power, which the
spectre of clericalism already maddened, was alarmed
122
180 THE GLORIES OF LOURDES
by it. But there was no disorder or mishap, not
even a cry beyond the vast murmur of prayer.
Kneeling at the feet of their historical Queen, the
eldest daughter of the Church, bruised and contrite,
had something else to do than to plan seditions.
Had she not to implore her Mother for the moral
and material relief of the holy kingdom ?
I have read that from 1873 to 1903, in thirty
years, 4,371 important pilgrimages brought to the
banks of the Gave 3,817,000 of our nation, without
mentioning so many other pilgrims, either singly or in
anonymous groups. And the living waves from our
midst have not ceased from that time to break at
Lourdes, always more laden with prayers and more
rich in penances. Journals of every shade of
opinion (but in particular the Annals of the work,
the official organ of these sacred places) give, in
their degree, striking proof of it. They show espe
cially that the * National, in discharging every year
there, for over a quarter of a century, its fifty or
sixty thousand pilgrims, is like a crusade of Christian
people to their old fervour, thanks to which (since
love of God and of their country is continually
spreading) half of the country will ere long have
visited the magic realm of the sweet Madonna.
You would say that when this annual caravan
comes, bringing to * the Virgin, who has a child, the
soul of the old Gauls, all that still remains of the
race is stirred with religious emulation, and wishes
to go and swell the happy procession. Not to lose
ourselves in a labyrinth of figures, nor to mention
dates too remote, we may remark that (not counting
THE ENTHUSIASM OF THE WORLD 181
private pilgrims) the year 1906 has witnessed eighty-
five French pilgrimages, with an approximate total of
760,358 persons, to convey whom the companies had
to employ more than 250 special trains. But they
have never counted so many people as in 1907. The
exact census of the tickets collected at Lourdes
Station indicates, we are told, 900,000 travellers.
If we deduct tourists and business people, the
number of pilgrims to Our Lady s shrine amounts
to 850,000 from France, within the space of 365
days, to kiss her maternal sceptre. In 1908 still
more, by reason of the Jubilee celebrations, which
made every day a feast, like a perpetual banquet
juge convivium everyone foresaw that the crowds
would exceed anything hitherto witnessed. Already,
on February n, there were 70,000 of us who came
in a body, despite the severity of the weather and
many other obstacles, to greet the Immaculate Con
ception. We were told on good authority that, in
view of the extraordinary celebrations in August,
twenty-five trains had been already announced, which
would be followed by many others. Then they talked
of a pilgrimage of men, who, still more numerous
than those which have already come here, were to
make their national Easter duties in the middle
of May. This event would not prove unimportant,
and we desired that all our fellow-citizens who love
their country and their Queen should be there. . . .
In any case this, added to the rest, allowed us
already to conjecture for the summer a total of over
a million visitors ! Listen to this catalogue, which
sounds almost Homeric : Trains from Bordeaux,
182 THE GLORIES OF LOURDES
Angers, Luon, Bayonne, Perpignan, Tarbes, Nevers,
Toulouse, Albi, Lyons, Belley, Mende, Bourges,
Paris, Chartres, Amiens, Mans, Rodez, Angouleme,
Arras, Grenoble, Moulins, Langres, Nancy, Verdun,
Evreux, Poitiers, Cambrai, Besan^on, Troyes, Mont-
pellier, Narbonne, Montauban, Brittany, Normandy,
Guyenne, Gascony, Provence, Roussillon, Langue-
doc, etc.
But it is each province, each diocese, each town,
almost each parish, which we should really have to
include in our reckoning. What a spectacle it was
of life and movement which met together in this
sort of geographical parade ! What a panorama
of every local costume, and what a chorus of every
idiom of our native land ! It would need a powerful
painter like Zola, or a refined artist like Huysmans,
to try and describe it. Let the reader try to picture
to himself this unrivalled pageant : see (as far as I
remember from former years) the Breton women
with their wide headdress, like the sails of a ship in
a storm. Further on you see the daughters of
Bigorre, proud of their little silk kerchief wound
round like a bird s nest ; next come the women of
Ossun, decked like sphinxes in their white hoods ;
then behold the women of Catalonia, with their
coloured bonnets set so elegantly on their brow like
a diadem ; then let us welcome the Alsatians, on
whose head there hovers, alas ! the trappings of
woe.*
* This was written in 1908. The statistics of Lourdes 1
Golden Jubilee year are as follows : The pilgrims amounted to
little short of 2,000,000, among whom there were 4 Cardinals?
THE ENTHUSIASM OF THE WORLD 183
Thus the France of yesterday, which remains,
after all, the France of to-day, is represented on
this truly national Esplanade. You would really
believe a bird s-eye view of all our assembled nation
lay before you. From the corner of the venerable
hollow, where I love so much to kneel, breathing the
liturgical fragrance of burning tapers, how often have
I felt the earnest pleading of the French soul, praying
as in their own country, and singing one by one in
twenty different metres the most varied hymns, of
which the common refrain is, * Christ ! Mary ! dear
France !
Let us hear the lyrics of Armorica :
1 Nous venons en chceur du pays d Arvor,
Ou le sol est dur, ou le cceur est fort ;
Fiers de notre foi, notre seul tre sor,
Nous venons du pays d Arvor. . . .
Now listen to these sonorous lines, written in the
very language of the immortal bard of Maillane :
1 Prouvengau tant que saren
Catouli nous monstraren
Sens ren cregne cantaren
Lou front aut, lou cor seren. . . .
But what is that poetry, rising like the sun of the
Pyre ne es, and rivalling in harmony the fountains of
170 Archbishops and Bishops, and innumerable other prelates
from all parts of the world ; 94,500 Masses were celebrated,
1,066,400 communions distributed, 131,261 persons were bathed
in the miraculous fountain, 4,400 offered their services to the
sick (brancardiers), and about 1,500 cures were registered by the
doctors (only a portion of the cures actually obtained at the
Grotto). TRANSLATOR.
184 THE GLORIES OF LOURDES
the glorious Mont Saint - Martin ? Listen; it is
Jacinto Verdaguer, the poet-priest, the Marian
Pindar of Catalonia, who breathes his leit-motif to
the Lady of France :
4 Blanca sou, O Immaculada,
Com la neu del Canig6 !
Desde eixa cora sagrada
Benehiu lo Rosello . . .
Such enthusiasm is not to be wondered at when
we remember that the kingdom of France was
always styled the kingdom of Mary Regmim Gallic?
Regnum Maria just as Britain in the bright ages
claimed for itself the proud title of Our Ladye s
Dowry. This is proved true first from the baptistery
at Rheims, where, blazoned on the shining window,
the Gallo-Frankish Madonna even then smiles so
gloriously on our cradle. Since then the heavenly
Patron has shown herself each time that our forefathers
passed through any serious crisis in their dramatic
history at Paris, when a young girl, consecrated to
Our Lady s service, was miraculously raised up to
withstand Attila ; at Orleans, at the critical moment
when, to drive away the foreigner, the good child of
Lorraine received that invincible sword which came
straight from Our Lady s altar; in many places
when modern heresy, more deadly than all the
invasions of old, tried to poison the minds of the
faithful with the sophisms of Calvin, and freeze their
hearts with the severe doctrines of Port Royal; and
when, against the threat of the one and the danger
of the other, that gentle nun of Paray arose the
child uf Our Lady of the Visitation who, by reveal-
THE ENTHUSIASM OF THE WORLD 185
ing the Sacred Heart, suddenly helped so much to
preserve among our forefathers the integrity of the
faith no less than the just claims of love.
It is not generally known, moreover, that in the
middle of the seventeenth century, to guard religion
from the attacks of a neo-paganism which from
literature was fast spreading into the manners of the
people, the Valley of Laus was honoured with several
apparitions of Our Lady, and the seer was then a
poor Alpine shepherdess, who became later on a nun
(and Venerable) under the name of Sister Benoite.
The epoch of Voltaire does not seem to have known
such privileges, doubtless because at that time
France was less the domain of Mary than a valley
of Hell, desolated by every wicked breath of philo-
sophism till the bloodshed of the Reign of Terror
began. But our assertion is proved more conclusively
than ever in our own century, when twenty-one times
at least the Queen of Heaven revealed herself to her
chosen people. It was at first in 1832 that she came
to bring the miraculous medal as the presage of the
dawn of better times ; then, in 1846, when she
showed herself with tears of reconciliation on the
icy crests of La Salette; then in 1871, when she
showed herself, like a gleam of hope, to the enraptured
gaze of the children of Pontmain. Still, the chief
sign of the predilection of the Mother of Christ for
France is undoubtedly Lourdes Lourdes, where
she revealed herself much more marvellously than
anywhere else to the lowly daughter of Soubirous.
How singularly favoured has our country and, we
must add, our generation been ! Without wishing
i86 THE GLORIES OF LOURDES
to make out our nation better than it is we repeat
the words of Louis Veuillot we Catholics, whom
so many graces of the Blessed Virgin have preserved
from manifold dangers or faults, and who, after
frequent falls, have seen ourselves brought back by
her motherly hand to the path of salvation how
can we help feeling proud ? * Methinks, the same
able writer elsewhere observes, the era which
followed that of the Encyclopaedists could well be
styled, by a wonderful reaction, with us the age of
Mary. From this point of view let us here retrace,
in a few lines that are genuine history, and glorious
beyond compare with the most brilliant exploits, the
destiny of our people.
In the distant ages preceding civilization, to stem
the flood of barbarian invasion, we see the shep
herdess of Nanterre arise the first gift of the
Madonna. Later, when our hereditary foes pushed
their victorious agression so far as to impose an
Anglo-Saxon King on us, the Pucelle arises, heroic
envoy of the Virgin of Bermont and Fierbois, to
drive out the English, and to make the lilies once
more bloom in the garden of Our Blessed Lady.
Later still, when, happily escaping from the rank
corruption of the Reformation, the fortune of this
country, sinking under the too heavy burden of its
triumphs, pride, and prosperity, seemed again com
promised by that fatal error within her, Jansenism,
aggravated by Gallicanism, notice how, in the heart
of a Burgundy cloister, it is once again a child of the
Divine Protectress who is the leader of the most
salutary of Catholic reactions. Lately (to come
THE ENTHUSIASM OF THE WORLD 187
at once to the main point of this digression), when,
faithless even to the secular attentions of their
Mother, the grandsons of the Crusaders had so far
forgotten themselves as to follow the teaching of a
Renan, before the coming of Zola, is it not Berna-
dette, the compeer of St. Genevieve, Blessed Joan of
Arc, and Blessed Margaret Mary, who, drawn like
them from their native obscurity by the hand of a
Queen, becomes, more truly than them, her wonderful
instrument, and thus mystically saves France, then
more than ever on the verge of destruction ? . . .
Should not our national hymn therefore be the
words of the Prophet : Non fecit taliter omni nationi ?
No, Mary has not acted in the same way towards
any other nation, showing herself so often in France
in order to prove that she loves to dwell in our
midst ; treading our earth with delight, as if to
acquire more completely by this preference the
rights she has already acquired by conquest ; gazing
with sympathy on our skies, which seem, as it were,
to remind her of those from whence she comes for
our sake ; hallowing our mountains, which are truly
the chosen pillars of her kingdom of love on this
earth ; blessing our valleys, where she is pleased to
make the rills gush forth and the flowers bloom, as
though in her earthly paradise ; striving from her
lofty altar-throne with her mother s heart to win the
love of her dear France ! And during these rare
visits it is to one of ourselves, a child of our race,
akin to us all by blood, faith, and language, the
daughter of the Bigourdain miller, the shepherd-girl
of the hills of Beam, who is chosen to see the
188 THE GLORIES OF LOURDES
Queen of the universe, to hear her voice, to share in
her secrets, to receive her behests, to offer her
prayers to her, to mingle with this almighty Inter
cessor* her tears for the evil to be washed away, her
prayers for the good to be obtained, her heavenly
smiles, too, as the blessed harbinger of the conver
sions soon to follow ; while on the clear forehead of
the child the inspirations of Heaven shone amid
celestial glory, causing the Lady s white veil to
quiver, and while our Lady, by her emblematic
vesture, displayed the colours of earth ! But the
prodigy of love has not been exhausted by all these
meetings, truly unheard of in the history of mankind.
For fifty years, in the little corner of her ancestral
home, Our Lady, unseen, but ever present, stands
unweariedly in her granite watch-tower, for the sole
purpose of seeing better her dear land of adoption,
of hearing better the cry of great pity, and of coming
to our rescue now, by those cures of every kind,
an earnest of the spiritual renovation which will
restore at length to the hands of the immortal nation
the sword with which of yore they upheld the
honour of God in this world !
Is it not true, then, that when a people believes
this, it ought to be the first, from chivalry (if I may
say so), as well as gratitude, to mount guard at the
foot of the Pyrenean Rock where their Suzerain, out
doing all her former mercies, has lately come to visit
them so repeatedly ? Certainly this pre-eminence
in the service of Mary, in which Heaven desires all
nations to take part, is a very precious favour for us.
* St. Bernard, * Omnipotentia supplex.
THE ENTHUSIASM OF THE WORLD 189
We shall never sufficiently bless God that, by an
evident arrangement of His will, all the other
nations, rivals or jealous of us, are obliged to lay aside
their emnity, and to use our thoroughfares to pay
their homage to her whom all generations must call
Blessed. Clearly, then, thanks to such a design,
this kind of providential association links our country s
name with the memory of the spotless Madonna.
You cannot greet Mary without greeting at the
same time her kingdom, a great orator has declared,
so inseparably are the two things united, which, in
brief, is for us a nobler pre-eminence, not merely a
Platonic satisfaction, and a recovery, in a sense, of
our ancient moral supremacy. How could men fail
to esteem or love a people to whose society Heaven
descends with such gladness, and to whom they
must go to feel the noblest emotions which can be
experienced in this world ? Seen thus at home, men
appreciate better from the four quarters of the earth
what our French nation is, which is ever on such
intimate terms with the Mother of God, and so they
judge what it will become to-morrow, when Lourdes
will have borne its full fruit amongst us. What every
one should, at all events, conclude from this sublime
fact is that, just as Israel possessed the Ark of the
Covenant to be the focus of ancient civilization, so to
France has been given the Grotto of Massabielle to be,
or become once again, the soul of the modern world.
This being said from a sense of duty, the reader
might like to see now, in the footsteps of this France,
that draws peoples after her, the whole world
190 THE GLORIES OF LOURDES
flocking to the EspeUugues. Here again, in order
not to lose ourselves in an endless catalogue of
names, we must confine ourselves to the enumeration
of groups : Pilgrimages from Italy, Germany, Spain,
Belgium, Austria, Switzerland, Portugal, Algeria ;
companies from Strasburg, Palma, Tunis, Namur,
Tournay, Florence, etc. Lourdes can be called a
living Pentecost. It is not uncommon, in other
words, to hear, at this place of the Apparitions, your
neighbours on your right saying the Rosary in
Flemish, whilst those on your left say it in Czech,
Low German, or Gaelic. Lately, when I arrived
at this many-languaged town, I saw the staunch
Catholics of Cologne departing, and those of Buda-
Pesth, so friendly, arriving. They were expecting on
the morrow the pious Catholics from Holland, and
a distinguished company of Greek Catholics. Here
are the English pilgrims ; make way for them ! For
them especially there are no Pyre"ne"es. What
fervour they bring us instead I The highest peer of
their realm, the Duke of Norfolk, loves to pay
frequent visits here, as costly as they are edifying.
This is a fact not generally known, and worth mention
ing : it was last year, I think, that the first official
pilgrimage from Great Britain came here with a
freight of sick people. Shades of Henry VIII. !
Why may we not hope that this * port of the Virgin,
crowned by the Pope, will become before long for
the Anglo-Saxon race the royal road that leads to
Rome ? That could be worth for us in return an
entente cordiale far more solid than any based on
stock-jobbing or political grounds.
THE ENTHUSIASM OF THE WORLD 191
And schismatic Russia, Lutheran Scandinavia ;
America, with its modern * trusts ; the ancient East,
with its immemorial traditions of caste; Oceania,
still buried in paganism ; darkest Africa, ever de
graded by its fetishes ; the empires of the Far East,
and the sea-girt isles shining like pearls in the
Indian Ocean from every side mortals hasten to this
Grotto, the precious promise of harvests that are
whitening, under the influence of a charm, which
we can regard as an earnest of untold future
conversions. Ex omni tribu et populo et lingua et
nations.
Since nothing speaks so eloquently as figures, we
will quote some. In the last thirty years there have
been seen on the banks of Our Lady s river 1,200
pilgrimages from abroad, led by 577 Prelates of
various countries and different rites, all glad to join
verily in the most Catholic communion conceivable
with France, for whom (as all allow) Heaven does
what it never did for any other people. It is true
that it can also greet fraternally all mankind at its
international shrine, where there are no strangers,
because all feel like brothers at her feet, who is more
truly a mother, according to St. Ambrose, than any
other mother. Nulla tarn mater.
Notice, also, it is usually persons of high rank in
the Church and society who lead hither the great
bands of pilgrims. Here are some distinguished
names which I have picked at random in late years :
His Eminence Cardinal Katschthaler, Prince-Arch
bishop of Salzburg ; His Excellency Mgr. Tonti,
Apostolic Nuncio at Lisbon ; forty-six Archbishops
192 THE GLORIES OF LOURDES
or Bishops ; M. Lusterziez, member of the German
Reichstag, and sick-bearer; M. Sustersich, member of
the Austrian Reichstadt, and also sick-bearer; Daris
Urzua, Professor of Law in the University of Chili,
etc. Generals, Admirals, Ministers and Ambassadors
move here and there among the pilgrims. You see
here Princes of the blood, Queens as gracious as they
are devout, and no one has yet forgotten how last
year a young royal couple came from over the
Pyre"ne"es to place their love and their throne
under the protection of the universal Madonna.
Moreover, if these endless processions show truly
their eagerness to come here, these facts show the
fervour of their souls. To take only one year as a
sample : in 1907 there were said at the three
churches of Lourdes 45,820 Masses, and 550,145 Com
munions were given. The number of intentions recom
mended was 1,970,683 ; there were 61,559 requests for
thanksgiving. They despatched 98,600 bottles of
miraculous water. The Mistress of the Grotto received
nearly two thousand ex-votes of every shape and value.
Thus, always and everywhere, the figures are huge
and almost fantastic.
On the other hand, the reader must not think that
in the Studio of Our Lady all activity is at a stand
still. What artistic life this last year has witnessed,
when, after the huge outlay of nearly a million
pounds, any further adornment would seem to be
impossible there ! Thus, the central passage of the
Crypt has been adorned with several shining panels.
In the Rosary Chapel the choir has been enriched
with a magnificent episcopal throne of marble,
THE ENTHUSIASM OF THE WORLD 193
bronze, and enamels, and with beautiful stalls of old
oak richly carved. Five chapels have received
marble altar-rails ; one of them, besides, has been
beautified with a splendid mosaic, The Assumption,
given by the Slavs of Bohemia. We must notice
also the cartoons of The Crowning of the Virgin and a
Carrying of the Cross ; lastly, the two bell-turrets, the
stones of which have been quarried from the sides of
Beout, and which spire upwards to guard the
Rosary Chapel, while framing the Basilica. In the
latter, General Vargas, Minister-Plenipotentiary of
Colombia, lately placed, in the name of his people,
a glorious silk flag, of yellow, blue, and red, that it
might be left in the wondrous Shrine as a tribute of
homage from the Republic of Colombia. A republic
happy indeed ! Not all of them are so happily
inspired. . . . Lastly, on the Calvary, which will
soon look like a museum of Our Lord s Passion, four
new stations of great value have been set up, the
last of which is a gift from Catholic Germany.
But I must refrain from giving further statistics of
all kinds. Do we not seem to be dreaming in the
presence of all these splendours, especially of the
wonderful gatherings which are seen there ? Neither
the famous migrations of ancient peoples, shepherds
or warriors, nor the sacred theories of artistic Greece
and philosophical Egypt, nor the campaigns, more
religious than warlike, of the Middle Ages, nor the
imposing expeditions of Islam to its holy Kabaas,
nor the ritual processions of Buddhists and Brahmins
along the banks of their sacred rivers, bear any
resemblance to the extraordinary impulse which thus
13
194 THE GLORIES OF LOURDES
bears mankind along to the land of the Grotto of
Be*arn. It is useless to point to Jerusalem or Rome,
Mecca or Benares. This hollow of our Pyrenees,
more than any other spot on earth, is the meeting-
place of the world, the chief boulevard of history, or,
rather, the capital of Divine favour, towards which,
from pole to pole, all nations now look with reverent,
perhaps wistful, eyes. O Blessed Virgin, you desired
crowds at Lourdes. Behold them ! Are you not
satisfied ? In the odour of your perfumes, and by
the glamour of your charms, behold, the world is
carried away, and the pilgrimage, which at your
behest Bernadette performed eighteen times, has
been repeated by the whole world ; and the pro
cession which you so earnestly desired has not
ceased for a single day during fifty years; and the
chapel which you humbly asked for has perforce
grown into a triple cathedral, to serve as a refuge for
souls from every country. Truly, O Woman, O
Queen, O Mother, from the height of your woodland
citadel you are the great cynosure of our age, as your
theologian and champion, St. Bernard, calls you,
the great affair of all ages. Magnum negotium
sacnlorum.
So it is just to add that there Mary rewards her
children by showing herself solicitous of all needs,
but specially mindful of the manifold ills which seem
the lot of too many in this world. During the twenty-
five years since it started, few, perhaps, are aware
that the National a true work of salvation has
brought to the supernatural rocks 28,680 poor
THE ENTHUSIASM OF THE WORLD 195
sufferers, of whom many have gone back cured, and
all with hope, or, at least, resignation. Every year
there arrives the sacred battalion of a thousand
invalids. In 1883, at the time of the Silver Jubilee,
they reckoned before the Grotto, assembled from
north, south, east and west, for a solemn thanks
giving, 325 persons miraculously cured, each bearing
his badge and his banner. They made a unique
procession, which, by reason of so much gratitude,
was followed by such a host of fresh cures that men
had never witnessed so many at once.
And, for so great a work, what instrument did she
employ ? We know well now a poor, ignorant,
ordinary child. But consider this. Is not the want
of proportion between the means and the end the
characteristic note of Lourdes ? The most sur
prising miracle, in truth, is not the bead-roll of blind
men who see, of deaf who hear, of dumb who talk,
of paralytics who walk, but the simple fact that with
such slight means God or Our Blessed Lady should
have stirred the world so profoundly.
Yes, we cannot insist too much on this point in
the extraordinary confluence of pilgrims which,
through the influence of a humble peasant, is bring
ing the world to the predestined Grotto by some
secret spiritual magnetism, there is a marvel much
more reason-bewildering than all those which these
places have witnessed from the beginning. For it is
contrary to the nature of things (all will grant)
nay, contrary also to all the laws of human
psychology that the mere word of a feeble shepherd-
132
196 THE GLORIES OF LOURDES
girl, fourteen years old, should have the power to
attract the people of to-day, so proud and sceptical,
with that religious enthusiasm which, instead of
abating, has, in spite of every obstacle, only gone
on increasing these last fifty years. We are literally
astounded when we have to confess that the cause of
a movement so far-reaching was so feeble an instru
ment, which effected at once what neither the
ambition of a Napoleon nor the genius of an Archi
medes could ever have dared to attempt. The latter
only dreamed of lifting this physical earth, while the
former confessed, not without a pang of jealous sad
ness, that the soul which carries other souls along
with it in its irresistible flight is mightier than the
conqueror, who only leads armed masses behind his
triumphal car. Let no one here, following a fashion
which with some people gradually becomes a mania,
venture to suggest hallucination. For so insignifi
cant a child, suffering from hallucination, to have
stirred the world so profoundly, it would be neces
sary for our planet to be peopled by madmen.
Would he care to say that ? Every serious and
fair-minded thinker who has studied the strange
moral problem of Lourdes has had to acknowledge
that obsession (i.e., chronic hysteria that resembles
obsession) does not produce such prolonged or wide
spread reverberations. For, notice, this movement
has now gone on for fifty years, and it is still spread
ing. During this long period, not only has the
renown of the Grotto taken deep root in our nation,
but it has crossed all known boundaries, pushing
further, if I may say so, than Alexander s battalions
THE ENTHUSIASM OF THE WORLD 197
or Caesar s legions its conquest of the inhabited
world. Looking back now over the last fifty years,
if you take up a map of civilization, and even of the
regions beyond its pale, you will see (as we have
tried to show briefly) that from north to south, from
east to west, in every land and by the shores of
every sea, there is no Catholic body, however small
or recent, which does not couple with the love of
our Blessed Lord the glorious name of Our Lady of
Lourdes. M. Homais may therefore argue till
doomsday in the midst of his medicines ; the free
thinkers, who succeeded the ministry of the Free
masons, may try in their day to hide with their
triangle the image of the Madonna ; the Pharisees,
who reject all dogma, are at liberty to feel scanda
lized while the trains of numerous pilgrims from all
nations pass over our railways. The fact remains
that such enthusiasm is too much above and beyond
all ordinary laws to allow us to doubt or deny that
the Spirit of God, more than the feeble voice of a
shepherd-girl, is animating them, drawing mankind
to this miraculous cave. Spiritus Dei erat in votis.
And by the irony of Fate it is the modern spirit of
Progress, that exclusive deity, who will bear no
other gods near its throne, which at the bidding of a
power, gentle though mighty, conveys all these
crowds, drawn thither by a seer of visions. It puts
at their disposal its thoroughfares by land and sea,
its carriages and vessels, its speed and conveniences,
as if for the century since it first began to make dis
coveries and to find out still newer inventions it
were only labouring that Bernadette and her mis-
198 THE GLORIES OF LOURDES
tress might be better obeyed. Sic vos, ncn vobis. . . .
This is all, you will admit, very strange, and, in the
position of the freethinkers, we should feel uneasy
about it. True, those people are imperturbable when
they set about devising explanations still more mirac
ulous than the miracles they so obstinately deny.
Lastly (since we must reluctantly leave this sub
ject), what do these multitudes go out to see in the
wilderness of Bigorre ? What is it that has drawn
them from such a distance ? It is certainly not this
sky of Western France, nor the Swiss-like country,
nor the clearness of its atmosphere, nor the fresh
ness of its water, nor the poetry of its mountains,
nor the stillness of its valleys hushed in calm repose ;
nor, again, is it the rather repulsive sight of so many
festering sores, of so many sufferers groaning there, nor
even the sight, however affecting it may be, of so many
cures wrought there. . . . You get used to all that
in time ; besides, such sights may be seen, to some
extent, elsewhere. But what here holds everyone
captive by a spell, which is overpowering, they say,
is Something which you do not see, nor hear, nor
feel, nor hear echoes of, outside this glen, and even
here you must have the faith of the pilgrims their
good faith, at least to perceive it ; in a word, it is
the Divine at Lourdes ! But that, for the man who
comes with an unprejudiced mind, is in the air,
everywhere. From first to last you breathe it in the
three churches, where solemn worship never ceases,
enhanced much more by the supernatural than by
external splendour. You find it at the Poo/s, where
THE ENTHUSIASM OF THE WORLD 199
the holy Rosary of Our Lady makes us forget, in its
musical rhythm, the sufferers racked with pain, and
the river which hardly dares to ripple, ready, like the
Jordan, to hush its murmurs by standing still ; it is
felt most powerfully in the Grotto, amid those
myriads of burning tapers, whose flame is but the
pale emblem of the love of those hearts ; but (we all
know) where its influence is most perceptible, where
its triumph seems most unearthly, is truly on the
evening of the two successive processions the one
of the Blessed Sacrament being the climax of our
pilgrimages, the other, with its moving lights and
melodies blending together, their inimitable poetry.
If you ask me what they go to Lourdes for, this is
what they find: the Supernatural that Supernatural
which causes a strange uneasiness to our generation
in ^spite of itself. A woman in the crowd once said
to me : Here we meet with God in nature. And
if we understand it in a spiritual sense, it is the very
truth. Nowhere else is the Unseen so perceptible as
here. Did not Pius X., who felt regret at not being
able to come here and offer up his prayers, lately
declare that if the Supernatural could be lost in this
world, we should have to find it again here ? O
all ye who assert so positively, with a knowing air,
that Lourdes is a summer resort for the use of
devout people, know that the day when, in the name
of your new-fangled liberty, men can no longer pray,
or weep, or hope, or give thanks in a word, no
longer join their soul in sensible communion with
God under the pitying glance of the Queen of
Heaven on that day the people, disappointed in
200 THE GLORIES OF LOURDES
their sore need, will quickly unlearn the direction of
the country of this Shrine, and the city of marvels
will ere long slumber in its glory, as of yore so many
other famous towns have slept unknown through
their shrines being at length forgotten.
But no (let the mighty ones be quite certain and
the wiseacres never forget), Lourdes must never pass
away (any more than Shakespeare or Racine)
Lourdes will never pass away ! The years may
leave behind a little dust on its churches ; the granite
of the Grotto, too, will show the wear and tear of age,
or of pious lips, perhaps ; the colours of the count
less banners hanging from these solemn vaults may
gradually fade. . . . Lourdes itself will last for ever !
Why ? Chiefly because Our Lady said that she wished
it to be her abode ; because, as long as there will be in
our valley of exile eyes that weep, limbs that suffer,
and souls which hunger and thirst after higher things,
France and the whole world will continue to go
there as to the very centre of their life, their corner
of Heaven, even in this world of sadness. . . .
Inasmuch, then, as this unique Event, which seems
a real challenge to our age of Positivism by over
ruling the contingencies of the world and of history,
continues now for half a century to upset the most
cherished theories of Rationalism or Materialism,
and to baffle the diagnosis and the most vaunted
axioms of Medicine, it will none the less remain the
great historic fact, to which all serious, thinking
minds are directed and all sorrowful hearts especially
yearn. Nothing not even the strength of the
mighty will hush it up. What could you do, puny
THE ENTHUSIASM OF THE WORLD 201
boasters, to tear away the human soul from the
mysterious Crypt the soul which, in this recurring
wave of the miraculous, which meets its eyes or
ears, is so happy to find clear proofs of the Supreme
Being glancing an eye of pity on the sufferings of
poor mortals ?
What an outrage, then, against suffering in all its
forms even more, as three thousand doctors recently
affirmed, than against the religion, art, liberty, and
prosperity of a small country would be the closing
of a place from which so much good has come, and
still more will come in the future ! Can the reader
guess at how many, approximately, the number of
Communions has been reckoned, received in thirty
years (from 1870 to 1900), at the Shrine of the
Immaculate ? Answer, 6,853,180. And how many
Masses said ? Answer, 761,720. This total is abso
lutely colossal, much more by its moral influence
than by its huge figures.
With the twentieth century the figures in this, as
in every other good work, increase year by year,
and this although everything else tends to diminish
them.
What a triumph it is for spirituality I should
rather say, for Christian faith in the presence of
the Unbelief, or, rather, Impiety, of the Government,
which, apparently overlooking this Grotto, boasted
lately of having blotted out all our stars I The pro
testation of Lourdes, crying out through all the voices
of the Christian conscience, * We want God ! is
truly the antagonist to baffle and overthrow the
present evil !
202 THE GLORIES OF LOURDES
Thus Massabielle, in its eternal youth, stands there
to confront their blasphemies, which are more stupid
than wicked, and ere long its influence will have
grown so great that it will overshadow the ruins of
all those artificial temples of free-thought, so re
pugnant to nature that they are already beginning to
crumble away amid the universal awakening.
Moreover, who can say what the world already
owes to this cave, from which, in a constant stream,
flow the light of truth, the fragrance of virtue, and
the exhalations of manifold grace ? We need not
be surprised if the crowds instinctively hastened
there from the very beginning, for the people in
spite of the blighting influences to which they are
exposed retain the sense of truth, of beauty, and of
goodness as the privilege of their baptism.
Again, though Our Lady has clearly a preference
for certain people the most wretched is it not
universally true there is no Christian, or even man
(not even Zola himself, as we have seen), who has
not some time or other derived some secret benefit
from this Grotto ? You could say of it, in due pro
portion, what doctors say of our holy Tabernacles
viz., that no one comes near them with impunity
i.e., succeeds in shielding himself entirely from their
radiance of Life. Nee est qui se abscondat a calore ejus.
All men were included in the merciful design
whereby the Queen of Heaven descended eighteen
times to this spot, hitherto unknown yes, to all, the
lessons and practical examples which she wished to
impart there were addressed by the gentle medium
of a peasant-child. For all, directly or indirectly,
THE ENTHUSIASM OF THE WORLD 203
some special virtue issues from this hollow in the
Rock, which tends to heal their bodies, if not to con
vert or sanctify their souls (an equally precious favour) .
The spiritual misery of our age must have been
great indeed far greater than all those human ills
gathered for fifty years round about the Rock for
the Most High to have thus consented to draw aside
the veil of mystery ; to suspend (dare I say it ?) the
reign of Faith, in order to open so decisively the
flood-gates of the Supernatural, so palpable on these
banks that it takes away the breath of even the
most hardened atheists. . . . Not that the act of
adoration should be wrung from them unwillingly.
Let him only who wills, adore God with his whole
soul, in spirit and in truth. But, at all events, when the
man who is godless on principle returns from Lourdes
his pride is humbled. To make up for this, how
can we enumerate all those who have here regained
their early faith without mentioning many others
who have happily recovered their baptismal inno
cence ? How many consciences have been healed
at Lourdes ! How many lives reformed ! How
many individual or domestic or public virtues date
from that period ! How many crimes, either personal
or against society, have been avoided by it ! I just
now called Massabielle a merey - seat appeasing
Heaven, and warding off punishments from this
earth ; it is also truly a spiritual sanatorium, infinitely
more so than a place of bodily cures. The mere
sight of all the acts of devotion, which are so
frequent there, of all the acts of that Christian
charity which makes the whole world kin, and
204 THE GLORIES OF LOURDES
flourishes as though on its native soil, should make
every sincere philanthropist bless it. And what,
pray, would the world be to-day, crossed by currents
nnumerable of errors, vices, egotism and hatred,
without Lourdes ? What, above all, would our poor
France be like ? If there is still amongst us, despite
much evil, much good ; if the faith among the
better people has not been tarnished by the inanities,
as unscientific as they are anti-religious, in which too
many schools of thought are involved ; if there remain
to-day, amid this weltering chaos of materialism,
souls capable of soaring like the chaste dove of the
Espdlugues on the wings of purity and love ; if for a
good number of French people duty, by God s mercy,
is not regarded as an anachronism, and their country
is something more than an idol, it is to you, O Queen
of the Pyrenees, that my country owes it.
Shall we add that, in safeguarding the present,
Lourdes is forming the future, not merely of France,
but also the future of the world? How? I know
not, not being a sharer in the secrets of the Appari
tion. But this I do know : the Child-seer more than
once gave us to understand as much ; and this belief
is in the air, or, rather, in every heart. Now in such
matters the instinct of men is never far wrong.
Moreover, for some time past (it is a sign of the
times), you will never find in France a Bishop s
Pastoral, or a discourse from a preacher, or a
polemical or apologetic work, that does not point
to the same conclusion. Even the infallible organ
of the Church, in its addresses i.e., encyclicals
is our warrant that Lourdes has not said its last
THE ENTHUSIASM OF THE WORLD 205
word, that it is the task of Lourdes to work out the
salvation of present society. What is equally certain
is that Lourdes, whatever unexpected form its in
fluence may take, will be the Counter-Revolution,
because it is precisely the Revolution, ever living in
its spirit as in its works, which is ruining France,
and, through France, the civilized world. This
tragic duel will be a fight to the death ! The political
journalist, who lately took for the motto of his
Jacobinism, Ceci tuera cela,* is nearer the truth
than he suspects, only ceci will be Lourdes and cela
will be Freemasonry, embittered for over forty years
by its work of destruction under the name of the
Republic. What a moving drama we ourselves are
likely to witness ! For it must needs be that the
great battle, pr&lium magnum, which from the be
ginning the Woman has waged against the Beast,
should be fought out at length, in our days of
pressing need, between the Virgin of Massabielle and
the Serpent, whose hatred, violent and crafty by
turns, seems at present to be perfidiously concentrated
in Modernism, that synthesis of all heresies.
Behold, then, the Leader, whom Providence has
given us to lead all true believers to the storming of
the stronghold of the Evil One ! Is it not he who,
brave as he is pious, will be surnamed by history
the Pope of Our Lady of Lourdes ? What a
blow he has just dealt at the monster of Hell by the
famous Bull, which is known the whole world over
such a blow that the monster will die from it, is
dying nay, is practically dead ! . . . Here is a
* The one will kill the other.
206 THE GLORIES OF LOURDES
point worth noticing! This providential document
bears the date of September 8, Feast of Our Lady,
and the venerable writer, well aware of the task
of deliverer, which he fulfils, strong with the
assistance of her with and for whom he was fighting
so fearlessly, does not fail towards the close, in a
pathetic prayer, to invoke the Immaculate Con
ception.
It is thus that Mary, of whom the liturgical texts
tell us that she is more powerful than an army arrayed
for battle, and that she alone destroys all heresies,
will set her foot at Lourdes once for all on the fore
head of the Evil One, thereby ridding the Church,
France, and the world of the three great scourges to
which our epoch must inevitably succumb : Natural
ism, which is the pride of the flesh ; Rationalism,
which is the impurity of the mind; and Liberalism,
which is the pride of life, both for individuals and for
society at large. Such, in fact, is the triple head of
this Revolution, old as Lucifer, but which in our own
days has sprung up rankly once more because of the
boldness of some, the weakness of others, and the
infidelity of all. Without being a prophet, we can
augur truly by that which happens on the banks of
the Gave above all, by that which shines from the
holy cavern that the hour is not far off when, by
the help of the glistering Lady, our deliverance will
be wrought. All are so thoroughly convinced of it
that the wicked fret in impotent fury, but the good
or those who wish to become good hasten from every
side to Lourdes, as if to the certain focus of national
and universal regeneration. Sienkiewicz, in The
THE ENTHUSIASM OF THE WORLD 207
Deluge, has described the sad plight of Poland
towards the middle of the seventeenth century, when
the Swedes, with the swiftness which distinguished
the armies of Gustave Adolphus, achieved the con
quest of the country. Everywhere treason, dis
couragement, panic, and then defeat, befell them.
Varsovie was captured, Cracow had just surrendered,
their King, John Casimir, was fleeing to Siberia.
Already the remaining fortresses were opening their
gates. One, however, still held out, and around
this noble band other patriotic means of resist
ance were soon organized. Now what was this
forlorn hope of their country in its utmost need ?
It was a shrine, a place of pilgrimage, Czestochowa,
and the leader of this just insurrection was a monk
a monk holding up before their eyes the Madonna
of their ancestors to reanimate their failing courage!
This image of Mary became the symbol of the
awakening of the Polish spirit. All felt sure that
the Blessed Virgin would help them against the
heretical invader, so the nobles took up their swords,
the peasants their sickles, John Casimir returned,
and the Swedes, despite their heroic efforts, saw
themselves driven out of the devoted kingdom.
What an evident allegory lies before us in this page
of history ! Is not our Czestochowa the Grotto of
the Pyrenees, whence salvation will come when
we wish it when we look to Our Lady with faith,
and love, and confidence ? Then also, what a new
Jerusalem will emerge from the heart of this
wilderness, radiant with glory! A people that
possesses Massabielle, said an American doctor
208 THE GLORIES OF LOURDES
lately, on the last evening of a national pilgrimage,
can have great hopes of the future. Wherefore,
O Lady of Lourdes, Health of the sick, come
quickly to our aid from forth your shining empy
rean. Veni adjutrix, pia Virgo, ccelo lapsa sereno.
Israel had its Ark, Athens its Palladium, Rome its
Capitol. We, more privileged than any nation
of ancient or modern times we have your Rock,
whither the world hastens. May the spiritual
transformation of France ere long be wrought from
the hollow of this national Rock, of which that of
Bernadette, under thy heavenly smiles, O Mary, was
only the prophetic symbol !
CHAPTER VII
THE ABBE PEYRAMALE
FOR the whole world to become acquainted with the
marvellous episode of Massabielle, and to draw from
it all the heavenly profit which it affords, there was
needed, we think, a Father, to protect the feeble
child-Seer against herself and others ; a Judge, to
authorize so extraordinary a mission ; and, lastly, an
Historian, to record and spread the unparalleled
story of it.
Heaven eventually provided well for this necessity
when it grouped round Bernadette three men a
priest, a Bishop, and an historian who were never
more to be separated from her. Our sketches of
Lourdes would be very incomplete if we did not here
say a few words about each of these important
personages, since they will doubtless show better
than we have hitherto been able how admirable has
been the working of Providence in the whole course
of this holy affair.
First of all, the Father. Most people are aware
that he was called the ABBE PEYRAMALE. Born
at Momeres, May n, 1811, he received in baptism
209 14
iio THE GLORIES OF LOURDES
the somewhat suggestive names of Marie-Domi
nique. His parents, very virtuous and of the
better class, had nine children, of whom he was the
sixth. The eldest succeeded to his father s pro
perty ; the youngest entered the Civil Service ; the
third became an attache* of the Embassy ; another
was appointed tutor to the King s pages ; another
became a doctor; another, whose profession we have
forgotten (apparently he joined the army), had for
son-in-law the brother of Garcia Moreno, the heroic
and saintly President of the Republic of Ecuador,
who died a martyr of the Sacred Heart by the dagger
of international Freemasonry.
Of a candid mind and thoughtful disposition, the
young Dominique could have risen high in the world.
He preferred to turn to the altar, for the service
of which his soul, naturally pious, felt from his
very cradle a clear call. After pursuing his studies
successively at Saint-Pe" and Tarbes, he went to the
Diocesan Grand Seminaire in October, 1830, without
the feverish unrest of the hour even more anti-
Christian than anti-social being able to cool his
piety. Five years later, the levite, nearly perfect in
everything, was ordained priest, and was sent as
assistant to Vic, and soon afterwards to the epis
copal city. A few years later in 1843, we think
his superiors entrusted to him the parish of
Aubarede, whence he had to return to the capital of
the department, to fill the post of civil and military
almoner. Lastly, from this obscure post of zeal,
where he was worshipped by the sick, he came six
years later to the parish of Lourdes, where such an
eventful work was in store for him.
THE ABBE PEYRAMALE 211
They say that on his first coming to the little
capital of Bigorre he won the esteem of all, as
everywhere else, and soon their sympathy. The new
doyen was clearly meant to be a ruler of men, and
especially a director of souls. Of herculean stature,
naturally majestic, with a touch of austerity about
him which at first sight might seem harsh, but was
tempered by a genuine fund of good-nature, a quick
mind, an eagle eye, a sonorous voice, a prodigious
memory, unfailing good sense, the adviser of the
great, and the idol of the poor such were the moral
and physical traits of this by no means ordinary
pastor whom Providence had chosen for its designs
there. As a priest, not many could be mentioned
who were more learned or more orthodox in every
respect, or who possessed such solid piety under a
calm exterior. The interesting spot of earth allotted
to him by obedience soon absorbed all his priestly
energies, placed from the first at the service of a
zeal which knew no bounds save those of an ever-
watchful prudence. So this parish, which had ever
borne the reputation of piety, might soon be taken
as a model. The practice of religion flourished there,
the people were virtuous, blasphemy hardly sad
dened its peaceful activity, and, except for a small
band of " intellectualists," whom the civilization of
neighbouring towns had perverted, we might say that
this chosen people gave promise of becoming a living
copy of their pastor. His church very bare, his
poor often very poor, and his favourite books the
standard authors these three words sum up the
priestly activity of M. Peyramale. In his church he
142
212 THE GLORIES OF LOURDES
preached the Word of God zealously, sometimes
sternly, but always with great prudence.
To his flock he seemed the pattern of the kindness
and charity of his Divine Master. Among his books
he increased his store of learning, while continually
perfecting in this way his splendid ecclesiastical
spirit. It is to this familiarity, even more than to
empty knowledge, that he owed that spirit of modera
tion in everything which was not incompatible with
original thought, or lofty sentiments, or subtlety,
and even wit, in preaching.
In a word, when the great events happened after
ten years of this work, the instrument (subordinate,
but still necessary) was ready : his constitution of
" oak smoothed by the axe," as M. Bertrin says,
inured him for stubborn conflicts ; his native good
ness made him ever mindful of weakness oppressed,
and by his ripe judgment, rare training, and habit of
prayer, he seemed able to undertake the most deli
cate causes. So the miraculous might now take
place. Providence had stationed someone there
who would never lose his self-possession. And this
was of the utmost importance, first, in order not to
compromise religion, which some are always apt to
ridicule, especially in times of difficulty, by blaming
the actions of its ministers ; secondly, on behalf of the
little child, who throughout her coming exaltation,
combined with a living martyrdom, would have no
other support save the man of God. If, then, at the
opening of this heavenly drama, the Abbe Peyra-
male showed himself cold, reserved, almost dis
couraging, it was a way of acting which quite suited
THE ABB PEYRAMALE 213
the occasion, and was evidently inspired by Heaven.
Had he manifested too soon the least sympathy
with the child, the freethinkers of the village,
whose jealous, prying eyes ever followed him about,
would have certainly suspected some dark schemes
afoot between the sacristy and the poor household
of the Soubirous for the furtherance of superstition.
But by this way of acting the good pastor tested his
sheep, and by this wise method of fatherly restraint
kept her calm and tranquil amid her sublime
ecstasies. Lastly, a priest less calm and shrewd
and patient might have spoilt everything by his very
anxiety to acknowledge the miracle or canonize the
chosen child. He, on the contrary, began by look
ing askance at these strange novelties, never setting
foot in the Grotto, forbidding his three curates to
show themselves there, not giving it any official
sanction, receiving rather courteously the extra
ordinary messenger, which did not prevent him
meanwhile from listening, noting, studying, and
praying, thus leaving to the Supernatural (if it really
was that at Massabielle) the duty of declaring itself
and of developing by its own power. . . .
On the other hand, we must in fairness say, as
soon as Heaven had shown its credentials by
miracles, and the diocesan authority had thereupon
intervened, the worthy priest could abandon his
original tactics. In proportion as he had seemed
indifferent and even distrustful, so henceforth, with
his wonted courage, he will take the part of the
child, which was now to declare himself for God in
person. This is why, on learning that the police,
214 THE GLORIES OF LOURDES
ever godless and spiteful, were thinking of arrestinghis
spiritual child, her ghostly Father was changed into
the rude mountaineer. Drawing himself up to his
full height before the Procureur-Imperial, he said to
him in tones by no means courteous : Make
inquiries as much as you like, but the man that
touches a hair of her head will have to reckon with
me. Thus he entered on the scene to challenge
official bigotry, whom Zola had to call * a great,
sincere man of upright mind and undaunted heart.
The Cure" of Lourdes was fully and clearly revealed
in this reply to the minions of authority, strong as a
lion, gentle and compassionate as a mother.
The reader can imagine that the legal and civil
authorities took him at his word, at least for the
present.
By this firmness, prompted by courtesy as much
as by faith, Bernadette had just escaped the asylum,
to which the odious Massy had dared to sentence
her (on the plea of dangerous hallucination), en
couraged by his assistant, Rouland, who in due
course ended by being so severely rebuked himself.
When, a little later, the persecution broke out
afresh, she entered too evidently into the designs of
Providence for her representative to be able to over
look her. But all through, from beginning to end,
you could see beside the inspired shepherdess her
energetic and kind protector. Was not that his chief
mission ?
Whilst watching over the worker, the envoy of
Heaven must not lose sight of the work, for it was
to him, as the head of religion in the parish, that
THE ABBE PEYRAMALE 215
Our Lady had wished her request to be made
known. Therefore it remained for the Abbe Peyra-
male, now that he was doubly assured that the
message came from Heaven, to devote his generous
soul to its execution. Everyone knows that no one
showed himself more determined than he did to give
full satisfaction to the Queen of Heaven. His motto
from the first was, Do everything great. As archi
tect, he engaged the most eminent man he knew
in the district. Spare no expense, he said to
M. Durant, * and be our Michael Angelo. They
say that he happened to tear in pieces and throw
into the Gave a first design that did not fall in with
his ideas. I want, he cried out, * a marble temple
which shall cover the whole plateau of the rocks.
But the money ? they objected to him. The
Blessed Virgin will take care of that. You would
have truly thought that the conception of his task
had inspired his prosaic nature with poetry.
He mounted upon the scaffolding, overlooking
everything and directing everything, like the soul
which animates the frame. I have heard it said that
more than once he worked as a labourer. He it was
who planned the splendid gardens adjoining the
Grotto, planted the trees, sowed the lawns, and,
after having opened the crypt and crowned the
Basilica with its airy spire, built also the house for
priests and the chalet for Bishops. For himself
what did he take ? Nothing. I am wrong. In his
supernatural enthusiasm he began to dream, in the
depths of his old ruinous chapel, of a parish church
worthy of its fellow-churches at Massabielle. It
216 THE GLORIES OF LOURDES
seems that this was to prove his misfortune or his
fault. Meanwhile the undaunted builder rejoiced
with the joy of the saint more than of the artist at
these twin churches, the children of his faith. The
first, corresponding to the centre of the cavern, well
represented the chapel asked for by the Appari
tion. This marble oratory, so impressive in its
mystery, became thus, as it were, the centre of the
work of Lourdes, all the rest being only in due pro
portion its gradual and harmonious development.
It was there that he felt the deep pulsations of the
heart of Massabielle ; there the influence of the
white Madonna rained down most visibly. We
know, as a matter of fact, that in this original
Holy of holies the most beautiful miracles from the
beginning were wrought e.g., that of the Abbe* de
Bussy, the blind priest, recorded by Lasserre. It is
also well known that it is especially in this silent
catacomb, honeycombed on every side with confes
sionals, that those strange stirrings of conscience
take place which Huysmans has related perhaps a
little too picturesquely.
M. Peyramale from the first loved this spot above
all others. He found, too, and with good reason,
that nowhere else in the world would the intimate
(and piteous) prayer of the heart of her children
reveal itself better to the heart of the Mother, who
descended eighteen times on this famous Rock.
Alas, that his lawful satisfaction could not be com
plete 1 The day (I well remember it) when the
dedication of the new church was solemnly performed,
the pastor, whose career henceforth was to be over-
THE ABB& PEYRAMALE 217
shadowed by the cross, like that of his client also,
was lying on a bed of suffering, while Bernadette
also, disappointed in the natural consolation of
sharing in the reward, who had borne so much of the
labour, was passing through a crisis of her asthma in
a poor room of the infirmary.
Such is the lot of those who co-operate with God
in His holiest designs ! As their true value, since
Calvary, is only in tears and blood, it is necessary
that the blood and tears should be inexorably shed.
Such was truly the lot of Dominique Peyramale, as
of Bernadette Soubirous. Both of them, mystically
united for the divinest of apostolic works, had to be,
in the first place, martyrs. The affairs of Heaven
are carried out in no other way ; we promote truth
by a self-sacrifice.
It does not enter, fortunately, into the scope of
this modest work, which is more a defence of Lourdes
than a history, to relate one by one the troubles we
should prefer to bury for ever in oblivion. I do not
maintain that this dauntless worker of Our Lady was
perfect in every respect. The best here on earth
have their faults. Perhaps the subject of this
chapter was not sufficiently free from what I venture
to call his holy megalomania, though the purity of
his intentions justified it so much beforehand ;
perhaps with his unyielding character he did not
always use sufficiently the oil of evangelical unction
to lessen the inevitable friction of certain wheels ;
perhaps, also, with his inflexible and iron will, his
strong determination in good did not allow him the
means of guarding himself as much as we should
218 THE GLORIES OF LOURDES
have wished against unhappy misunderstandings.
These are human matters, essentially delicate, and
belong much more to God s judgment than to a poor
passing critic. It remains none the less true that,
when the indefatigable priest began, in spite of
much opposition, to provide for his people a church
more befitting its new importance, everyone agreed
with him. All felt that a costly monument, reared
thus in the very heart of the city of Mary, would be
the happy sequel of the holy places of Massabielle,
and that the annual pilgrimages of the nations would
naturally end there. Those who had the right to
think otherwise did not conceal their just dis
quietude, and even (it seems) their resistance, in view
of the excessively large proportions the new building
soon assumed. The servant of God went further.
As he had stretched out his hand for the Grotto, he
became a mendicant for his parish. Offerings once
more poured in, numerous, rich, some even princely;
and the walls rose and the vault was finished, and
already the overjoyed Onias, on whose shoulders the
mantle of Monsignore had just fallen unknown to
himself, almost against his will, took a pleasure in
showing to delighted visitors the forthcoming decora
tions, when, on a sudden, by one of those unforeseen
reverses which Providence mysteriously decrees,
everything was changed. Rome was silent ; the
Bishop (a Jourdan had lately succeeded a Langdnieux)
became stern ; the Fathers of Garaison, who had
taken the Cure s place in the management of the
temporal and spiritual interests of the work, showed
themselves, from wisdom, and not through jealousy
THE ABB& PEYRAMALE 219
(as some foolish or unjust writers have ventured to
make out), colder than ever; his near or distant
friends discouraged him, excepting two or three, who
remained loyal to him to the end ; and, all help fail
ing him, his splendid scheme, the harmonious sequel
of the glories of the Grotto, had to be stopped.
Another blow Lamma sabacthani / . . . The agony
felt by Bernadette so many times before human
tribunals, and even at the sacred Rock, it was now
the turn of Peyramale to endure in his lonely house,
or on his bed of suffering. To fail in his heavenly
mission through the ill-will of certain people (so he
thought, at least), and after having stirred the world,
to end in failure was anything further needed to
break down so much physical energy joined to so
much moral courage ? To the Cure" of Lourdes,
overcome by Fate, but venerated by the whole world,
there was nothing else in store except to die far from
this dear Grotto, where they would never again
behold him during the great festivals ; farther still,
alas ! from his beloved parish church, which was
vanishing for him now in a dismal nightmare.
What was there for him to do here below, when his
child and companion, the Seer, severed too from all
earthly satisfactions, had been torn from the land of
ecstasies to go and bury herself in the silence of a
cloister s pale ; when his destiny likewise his only
true destiny seemed quite fulfilled, since now at
length the heavenly Lady saw the crowds daily
flocking there, processions winding along, prayer
waxing more fervent, her service increasing, and by
miracles raining down from her maternal hands,
220 THE GLORIES OF LOURDES
Lourdes was by this time the great Fact of the day,
or, to speak more correctly, of history ? As soon as
an instrument is of no more use to God, God breaks
it if it has proved untrustworthy, but takes it to
Himself if it has proved obedient to the end. It was
certainly the case with this much-enduringpriest. The
Blessed Virgin, for whose glory he had always striven
so supernaturally, and who, besides, had intimated to
him that he would only have to suffer on earth,
granted him the precious boon, better than all our
fleeting triumphs, of calling him to the foot of her
throne, more glorious even than that of Espelugues,
on September 8, 1877, the happy feast of her Nativity,
unsullied as her Conception.
It is now thirty-two years that the immortal Cure"
of the Apparitions has slept his last earthly sleep
in the crypt alas ! not of Massabielle, but of his
church which hastened his end, and which Pro
vidence, out of respect for his memory, willed to be
completed despite all obstacles. They say that at
the marble sepulchre where his remains repose,
awaiting the glorious Resurrection, admiring and
grateful souls still come at times to pray. . . .
CHAPTER VIII
MONSEIGNEUR LAURENCE
NEXT comes the Judge. With BERTRAND SEVERE
LAURENCE, born at Oroix, September 7, 1790, of poor
but Christian yeomen, the designs of Heaven will
only be, if possible, shown still more clearly. For
asmuch as the priest, who was to be the father,
had received every necessary qualification for this
pathetic duty, so much nay, more did he who, as
Bishop, had the task of placing the seal of authentic
certainty on the Divine affair seem accordingly
marked out in the highest degree for so important
a work. Although the gifts of mind and heart had
been generously bestowed on the young villager, the
poverty of his family seemed at first to condemn
him hopelessly to the obscurity of the country, when
a good country doctor, M. Jacques Dusserm, whose
practice was in this neighbourhood, won by the
bright countenance of the boy, whose wisdom and
intelligence everyone boasted of, proposed to take
him with him, and have him educated. Of course,
the family accepted with eagerness and gratitude,
though not without feeling deeply the pain of
parting.
221
222 THE GLORIES OF LOURDES
We see, then, by the visible action of Providence,
our little peasant taken from his beloved native toil
to come to Juncalas, the town close to Lourdes, to
grind at the thorny elements of French at the house
of the doctor, who hoped to make him a second
edition of himself. Meanwhile, in order to be of
some little use to his host, Laurence had between
the lessons to shave the customers of the place, as
was then the custom with our rural surgeons, born
barbers, like the famous one of Seville, which was
doubtless signified by the vague and honourable
title of chirurgien, with which they were usually
dignified.
Now how can we not admire the mysterious
chain of events ? the Cure" of the modest commune
had no difficulty in discerning better than his
parishioner, the disciple of ^Esculapius, that the
newcomer was not exactly born to trim beards,
unless it were those, at a later date, of the Prefect
of Tarbes and the Minister at Paris. * Mon ami,
the Abbe* Cazenavette said to him one day, as he
emerged quite rejuvenated from his deft hands,
4 would you like to become a priest ? This straight
forward question did not embarrass the prentice-
student perhaps he had already felt within him
self a responsive call and with equal readiness and
joy he replied : I would ask for nothing better,
Monsieur le Recteur. No sooner said than done.
That very evening the happy peasant lad came to
the presbytery, and under the guidance of the
devoted priest he set foot, not without emotion,
into the tangled thickets of the Latin grammar. Up
MONSEIGNEUR LAURENCE 223
to the age of twenty (he was then fully fifteen) the
toil was unremitting. His chance professor laboured
as hard as the pupil to keep up with a progress
which vanquished every obstacle, and at the end of
a lustrum (to use a classical word) this obscurantist
had made of the little barber s boy a solid and even
brilliant scholar. All hail to these admirable little
country priests, modest in their tastes and position,
whose zeal, unable to find any other outlet, contrives
to perpetuate itself by raising up in the cairn of a
fruitful solitude some unsuspected vocation, which
will one day, perhaps, become the glory of the Church !
Thus Elias, carried up to Heaven, was proud to
leave his mantle (and his spirit) to Eliseus.
When, then, he had to leave the poor Bigourdain
presbytery to go to the seminary at Aire, and follow
the course of logic and theology, the separation for
both seemed a great wrench. Those years of intel
lectual companionship, equally useful to the master
and disciple, had passed by so pleasantly. The
human reward for M. Cazenavette was before long
to learn that by his real knowledge, his great facility
in picking up learning, and, above all, his remark
able judgment, combined with sterling piety, the
tiller of Oroix, the barber of Juncalas, the Latin
pupil of the humble village Cure, was at the top of
his class. He continued the same all through his
studies. The proof of this is that, on the very day
of his ordination the Abbe" Laurence was made
Superior of the new ecclesiastic establishment of
St. Pe, of which he may be regarded as the founder,
inasmuch as he devoted to it all the natural and
224 THE GLORIES OF LOURDES
supernatural resources of his vigorous youth. These
important duties lasted for eight years. Numerous
were the boys of the Pyre ne es, whose souls he culti
vated with a view to the priesthood, charmed by the
glamour both of his talents and his virtues. Too
soon for his liking, towards the beginning of 1830,
his superiors, who were well aware of the value of
such a subject, entrusted to him the beautiful parish
of ... Lourdes. He was only destined merely to
pass through it, this brief contact being already
sufficient to forge between his heart and that of the
fateful parish links which the future would only rivet
more firmly. We see him, then, hardly forty years
old, Vicar-General in the diocese of Tarbes, which
he will never more leave. As might be supposed,
this new office, the second in the diocese, would
soon bring into prominence, besides so many other
priestly qualities, the administrative powers of the
young auxiliary of Mgr. Double.
A mind more than ordinarily gifted, upright and
practical sense such appeared at first more than
ever the chosen priest, before whom even Zola bent
in reverence, styling him the man of calm, cold
intellect and sound culture. Real goodness verging
even on compassion came to tone down in him the
stiffness of manner which was probably due less
to his character than to that regard both for doc
trine and discipline of which M. Laurence seemed
always the living exponent.
With regard to those who, as apparently happens
everywhere, thought they had reason to complain of
his severity (he was not christened Svre without
MONSEIGNEUR LAURENCE 225
reason), they had to admit that no one had better
notions in every case of distributive justice, just as
no one knew better how to stand aloof from unhappy
disputes and discord. As he was thoroughly an
enemy to the illusions of imagination, as well as to
the weaknesses of feeling or outbursts of enthusiasm,
people could be sure of receiving truth and justice
from this superior the very reverse/ they said,
of an enthusiast.
So when the old Bishop of the See of Tarbes died,
the voice of the people, an echo of Heaven s designs,
proclaimed the name of its chief priest, whom a fairly
long management of affairs had finally qualified for
the leadership of the Church of which he was the
son and glory. A few years had elapsed of this rule,
both useful and beloved, when the events happened
which we have related in a previous chapter. The
first move of the Bishop, agreeing in this as in every
thing else with the Cure of Lourdes (those two souls,
so thoroughly ecclesiastical, seemed like one), was to
act very cautiously. Perhaps the so-called visions
at Espelugues were only the dream of a poor nervous
child, or else the device of a little blackmailer to
swindle people, or even the entrance on the scene of
a suspicious occultism ? All these points needed
examination, which the Prelate did not fail at the
outset to ask himself with his calm mind, being
otherwise too prudent a theologian not to know that,
regarding the supernatural properly so-called, before
the Church could lawfully allow it, it must furnish
its own complete proof, according to the advice of
one Apostle to the chiefs of the Church not to
15
326 THE GLORIES OF LOURDES
believe every spirit, and of another, warning them
to prove them. *
So the Bishop, acting in concert with his doyen,
began by acting with extreme slowness, reserve, and
even hostility, in presence of the wonders of Massa-
bielle, at the risk (as we have seen) of shocking, and
even scandalizing, men s minds. But let us repeat
and the future, besides, would prove it it was exactly
this attitude that was all-important at the beginning,
Providence only having raised up someone to tem
porize like this, that he might be, in the eyes of all,
the impartial judge. Is it not from so much wisdom
that, after four long years of waiting, prayer, and
study, the solemn act owed its importance, by
which the Ordinary concluded at length that the
facts at Lourdes were superhuman ? Imagine as
Cure" instead of Peyramale the pattern of good
sense an enthusiast, and as Bishop instead of a
Laurence the soul of prudence a poet ; why,
the work of Massabielle, however heavenly, would
have perished prematurely. But God was watching
from eternity over this Grotto, which He wished to
make the cradle of social renovation, and just as He
had arranged the sites for the merciful drama of the
future, so He took care to train the characters for it.
Moreover, as soon as it became quite clear (in
consequence of a host of cures, which the Commission
of Inquiry proved to be absolutely certain) that the
ringer of God was there, then this conscience of a
true Bishop hesitated no longer, and soon there
appeared that admirable Pastoral of January 18, 1862,
which, deciding a question, both doctrinal and his-
* i John iv. i.
MONSEIGNEUR LAURENCE 227
torical, of such importance, declared at length that
the Apparitions at Lourdes were supernatural, and
that the cures also, of which this Grotto had con
tinually been the favoured theatre, were miraculous.
After such a verdict a monument of reason no
less than of faith, more valuable than the splendid
churches, which could never have risen on the soil
without it it remained in the name of piety and
logic to carry out the desire of the noble Lady. The
Bishop was equal to the task. Hardly was winter
over when the works were begun under his active
patronage. The money, as we said, flowed in from
all sides, so thoroughly did the world understand, as
soon as the head of the Church had spoken by a
Brief which proclaimed the * striking evidence of
the supernatural, that this work was from God. So,
after a short time, Religion could take official pos
session of these holy places. Henceforth, in pro
portion as basilicas are reared there, there will be
unparalleled rejoicings, in which the liturgy will be
anxious to mingle its splendour with that of art, to
pay greater honour to the Heavenly Queen. It is
thus (to proceed with our story) that, in the con
secration of the upper temple, thirty-five Bishops or
Archbishops took part, among whom there was a
Cardinal, Mgr. Guibert, and the Papal Nuncio,
Mgr. Meglia. Never since our old Bishops inaugu
rated in the Middle Ages their Gothic cathedrals
had France seen such solemnities at a dedication.
They counted no less than 3,000 priests and 100,000
of the faithful. The great preacher of that day,
Mgr. Mermillod, gave the sermon before this
152
228 THE GLORIES OF LOURDES
assembly, the vastest and most distinguished that
could be imagined : In die ilia erit canticum. Next
day our immortal Pius, of Poitiers, made himself
heard (and applauded) at the crowning of the
statue of the Blessed Virgin. Thus were begun the
feasts of Lourdes those feasts of which we can say
that by the beauty of the surroundings, the richness
of the decorations, the grandeur of the ceremonies,
and the concourse of people, they are unparalleled
in the whole world.
As to Mgr. Laurence because it was written that
none of the original workers of Massabielle would
have a complete triumph here on earth the reader
can surmise that he did not taste the joy of such
happy days. When he had done his life-work i.e.,
approved of Lourdes, and started the great move
ment which was never to stop Pius IX., whose great
soul was henceforth turned towards this Grotto,
called him to his presence to learn from such a
witness the wonders of the Pyrenees.
The first Bishop of Our Lady of Lourdes had been
two months in the eternal city, when death surprised
him on January 30, 1870, at the age of eighty years ;
or, rather, so prudent a saint did not allow himself
to be surprised, ready as he had been for a long
while to see in Heaven this glorious Madonna, of
whom he had had the honour of being the guardian
and advocate on earth. In her maternal kindness
Mary wished, at least, that her Bishop, full of merits
even more than of years, should journey to his true
native country from Rome itself, in the shadow of
the throne of him whom history has already surnamed
the Pope of the Immaculate Conception.
CHAPTER IX
HENRI LASSERRE
LASTLY, the Historian. In an age when, even in
religious matters, the Press forms public opinion
even more than the voice of the priests of the
Church, a master in the art of writing was needed
who, by the lustre of his talents, would make known
and bring into vogue from pole to pole the heavenly
story of Massabielle. The reader will presently judge
whether, in this matter also, Heaven knew how to
choose the right person.
Born at Carlux, near Perigueux, on February 25,
1828, of a noble and very religious family of partly
foreign extraction, HENRI PAUL JOSEPH LASSERRE
DE MONZIE was baptized the same day in the rnodest
church of the village where his parents were then
living for a time, until next year they should take
up their residence in the Chateau des Bretoux, in
the commune of Coux, on the poetical banks of the
River Dordogne. It was there that the elect of the
Most High spent his childhood, gay and light-hearted,
but pure, and much more fascinated by the charm of
the fields than by that of books. At the age of
eleven, being already proficient in grammar and
229
230 THE GLORIES OF LOURDES
Christian knowledge, he was sent to a boarding-
school at Sarlat, then to the College of Cahors,
where, despite the difference of religion, he formed
a friendship with the young Protestant, Charles de
Freycinet, which was destined to become historical.
At length he went to finish his brilliant studies at the
Lyce"e de Perigueux, during which the racy prose-
writer and (it seems) clever mathematician showed
himself more than once a charming poet.
Towards his seventeenth spring, having gained the
distinction of Bachelier-h-Arts, doubt (that terrible evil
of Jouffroy and so many other young philosophers of
the period) came to assail him. He seems to have
suffered for some time from it, although his ardent
and loving nature was formed for the higher joys of
faith. But this is what heightened so much his keen
sorrow, this chosen soul having to pass through the
furnace of a humiliating scepticism before bathing one
day in the certainty of supernatural faith. Three
books gradually restored to him moral peace as well
as intellectual light, though not as yet the fullness of
the Christian life viz., the "Essai sur 1 Indifference,
by Lamennais ; the " Etudes Philosophiques," by
Auguste Nicolas; and especially the "Imitation of
Christ," that Divine refuge of all consciences in
affliction.
Soon, what speculative thought had not been able
to merit, almsgiving an alms wellnigh heroic given
by the young man to an old Polish wanderer on his
estate won for him : so true is it that man flies to
God better on the wings of generosity and love than
on those of learning and controversy. From that
HENRI LASSERRE 231
time forth this soul, as if a single act had formed a
habit in it, remained always keen and energetic in
doing good. To give charity, to perform kind
actions this was his craving and his chief delight.
The day following this beautiful day, which marked,
so to speak, his conversion once for all, the young
Lasserre left for Saint Acheul, where, at the good
school of the Jesuit Fathers, he laid the foundations,
firm and unshakable, of that religious spirit, so
enlightened and so devout, which was to make him
not only one of the greatest Christians of the
nineteenth century, but also the panegyrist of the
Mother of God.
Meanwhile, in his twentieth year, we see him
entering the capital to follow the course of the School
of Law. As quick as he was hard-working, he was
successful in all his examinations. In turn Licentiate
and Doctor, at the age of twenty-five he was called
to the Bar at Paris. Hardly had he begun practising
there when the Revolution of February broke out.
On the stormy night which witnessed the fall of an
unpopular Royalty and the proclamation of a fancy
Republic, the little advocate, more from provincial
curiosity than from political zeal, found himself at the
Town Hall, where he had the doubtful honour (as he
felt it himself) of sitting at the table of the members
of the Provisional Government, and of drinking out
of Lamartine s own glass.
Still, in these difficult times, despite a merely
passing acquaintance, he no more thought of con
cealing his political views than his religious beliefs.
This parading of his Christian and Legitimist aims,
232 THE GLORIES OF LOURDES
which was to make its mark and also his popularity,
he calmly kept up in the midst of the people of
Basoche all through the feverish excitement of the easy
life to which his fine, inbred sense of humour, not less
than his buoyant good-nature, disposed him too much.
His comrades hardly called him anything else but
Henri the Catholic, which, he quickly retorted, obliged
him still more to uphold steadfastly the standard of
all holy causes. It was his charity which, in the full
life of the world, always safeguarded his faith the
same charity which had restored it to him under his
father s roof in a sorrowful hour. For the barrister
of Paris, like the student of Dordogne, remained
unalterably the man of good works. He who, during
his vacation in the country, had one day, it is said,
thanks to the muscles of his strong arm, saved the
life of an unfortunate miller on whom the enraged
peasants were about to wreak their vengeance for
his professional thefts, gave himself up in the big
city to the constant exercise of the corporal and
spiritual works of mercy, visiting, after the manner
of Ozanam, the sick who wept under their roof of
misery, assisting them even with his purse, inspiring
in them something of his faith, honouring them with
a sort of supernatural devotion, prompted by pity
and reverence e.g., the sick old woman of the Quartier
Latin, the widow Vassal, whom he helped like a son
to suffer, and even to cure her to cure her marvel
lously . . . since it was just at the end of a novena,
made by the brilliant thinker and the poor widow
together in honour of St. Genevieve, that her
health was perfectly restored. Thus the man whom
HENRI LASSERRE 233
Providence marked out as the authentic chronicler
of so many miracles met with the miraculous at the
outset of his thrilling career.
All this did not, however, prevent Henri Lasserre
from possessing the most enviable circle of friends
in the world. Being on intimate terms with the
young Count L<once Dubos de Pesquidoux, he
shared with him an apartment in the Rue de Seine,
which for seven years was frequented by the elite of
Parisian young men, such as a Henri d Ideville, an
Armand Ravelet, a Leon Gautier. There also
came men already famous, or soon to win fame,
as Louis Veuillot, Laurantie, Theophile Sylvestre,
Raymond Brucker, Poujoulat, Eugene Loudun,
Adolphe Thiers, Henri de Riancey, Barbey
d Aurevilly, Arthur de Boissieu, Edouard Drumont,
and the faithful Charles de Freycinet.
But, as the author of France Juive tells us, the
most attractive of this illustrious areopagus was the
master of the house our hero. And yet this
splendid mixture of keen intellectualism and elegant
worldliness did not exempt him from the inexorable
ennui of which Bossuet speaks. Rich, educated,
talented, blessed by the unfortunate, praised by the
happy, seeing a splendid future opening out before
him, the son of the manorial lords of Bretoux had
still, at the age of twenty-eight, to find his true
vocation! More than once the vision of the
priesthood, or even of the cloister, seemed to attract
him. To examine his dispositions, he made retreat
after retreat in all the well-known monasteries.
His accidental meeting with Dom GueVanger was
234 THE GLORIES OF LOURDES
specially fruitful to him. If it did not win him a
religious vocation, at least he owed to it that
wonderful impress of practical and militant faith
which made him henceforth the knight-errant of
justice comes justiticz the device blazoned on the
prophetic scutcheon of his ancestors.
Lasserre found himself at this very hour, without
in the least suspecting it, at the turning-point of his
career, at that solemn moment when, having con
sistently done good by his words, his fortune and
his example, it remained for him to bring to it the
assistance of his pen.
This was in truth what Heaven was waiting for,
all the rest having only been the gradual prepara
tion for this his highest task.
Curiously enough, the first literary attempt of this
mystic was political. His pamphlet, Le Coup
d Etat, appeared in 1851, at the height of the
democratic anarchy, as the complete programme of
social conservation. They say that the Prince-
President, touched by the support given him by this
Royalist, offered him the post of Maitre de Rcqueles in
the Council of State. The Bourbonism of the author
forbade him to accept it, but he contented himself
with laying before Louis Napoleon a plan for
planting fruit - trees along all the highways of
France, thereby showing that true philanthropy
for believers lies not in words, but in deeds.
Shortly afterwards appeared his second work,
* The Spirit and the Flesh, the vigorous onslaught
of a Christian moralist on the unbridled licentious
ness of the period, still further aggravated by the
HENRI LASSERRE 235
odious and grotesque Saint-Simonian theories of
a Pere Enfantin.* Next year the Serpents was
the hiss of disapproval of good sense and religion
against the tortuous policy of a revolutionary and
atheistical party. Then in 1861 came * The Gospel
of Renan, an incisive and spiritual reply to the
infamous Life of Jesus. We notice more and
more the fervent apostle and the keen con
troversialist, as we must also admire the accom
plished writer.
Meanwhile Lasserre (to gain adherents rather
than to earn his livelihood) contributed articles to
various orthodox journals the Pays, Monde, Reveil t
Ami de la Religion, Revue du Monde Catholique. At
the famous Congress of Mechlin he made a great
impression when, with great courage and enthusiasm,
he advocated (what was, alas ! already a moot point)
the union of the Catholic press on the exclusive
ground of principles.
In the interval he had the good fortune to stay for
over six months in Rome as secretary to Prince
Constantin Czartoryski, to plead the cause of our
Polish brethren, daily more and more oppressed by
the Muscovite tyranny, at the feet of Pius IX., a
mission which resulted, on his return to France, in
the well-known pamphlet, Poland and Catholicity.
But hardly had this generous pamphlet seen the
light, when a sudden ophthalmia came mysteriously
* Saint Simon was a philosophical dreamer, who held strange
theories on philanthropy and Socialism. The Pere Enfantin
was another fanatic (neither a priest nor a religious), who tried
to carry out the former s theories by founding a communism
partly mystical and partly revolutionary. TRANSLATOR.
236 THE GLORIES OF LOURDES
to deprive the courageous writer of the use of his
eyes. The doctors, far from lessening the evil, only
made it worse, as if to prove that the trial came less
from man than from God. Not being able to read
or write, the unfortunate publicist communicated to
his friend Freycinet his great sorrow. You know
the rest how the Huguenot advised the Catholic,
since the doctors could do nothing, to appeal to
Heaven by means of the Madonna of Lourdes, the
wonders of whom were beginning to be talked of
even on the boulevards of Paris ; and how the
Catholic at first replied coldly to the advances of the
Huguenot, fearing nothing so much, as he confessed
afterwards, as a miracle, which would oblige him to
break certain bonds, from which hitherto he had
been loth to tear himself away. . . . Nevertheless,
under pressure of the evil, and at the entreaties of
his friend, Henri soon gave way. In order that
everything might seem marvellous in this marvellous
affair, it happened that it was Charles himself who
wrote to the Cure" of Lourdes for a flask of the holy
water. As soon as the precious liquid arrived
(October 10, 1862), the first need of the poor blind
man for so he was nearly was, by an impulse of
grace, which so many good works had assuredly
earned for him at this fateful hour, to fall on his
knees and address to the Mother of all mercy a
prayer full of humility, but also inspired by con
fidence. Rising up again, he takes, not without
trembling, the precious flask, pours a little of this
healing water in a cup, and rubs his eyes with the
corner of a moistened towel. ... To his surprise,
HENRI LASSERRE 237
as soon as the sacred water touched the injured
organ, his sight was restored to him, as good, keen,
and strong as ever ! The cure, clearly super
natural, was accomplished in a few seconds like a
flash of lightning, to use the words of the healed
man. It is impossible to describe his shock, or,
rather, his consternation. He literally could not
believe his eyes, the more clearly he felt his vision had
been restored to him. To make more certain of the
fact, he runs to his library, takes a profane book,
throws it down at once, as too unworthy of such an
attempt, chooses a pious one (the notice on the
facts of the Grotto, which was enclosed in the
packet), and begins to read with his naked eye
104 pages on end without difficulty or fatigue,
without even feeling the need of stopping once,
though it could not have been very bright in Paris
at the window of a room towards half-past five in
the evening in mid-October.
The reader may judge if the happy recipient of
such a favour, as complete as it was freely bestowed ,
was not stirred to the depths of his being. I have
read that the Protestant himself was not converted
in the course of a Retreat which he made at
Solesmes under the influence of this miracle; yet
that he would certainly have been converted but
for that fatal siren which men call politics, or,
rather, if you will, ambition. This, however,
remains the secret of Him who fathoms the reins
and the hearts. In any case, it cannot be with
impunity that any man whatsoever even if he
aspired to guide the car of State finds himself
238 THE GLORIES OF LOURDES
personally concerned in such interpositions of
Divine power. There is grave reason to fear that if
it is not for the spiritual welfare of the privileged
witness, it only turns out for his eternal ruin.
Lasserre understood immediately that the saying
noblesse oblige is still more true of miracles.
Gratitude lending him wings, he sped to the banks
of the Gave to offer his prayers of thanksgiving at
the feet of the maternal Madonna, who had just
granted him such a signal favour. When the Abb6
Peyramale heard the story from the lips of the man
miraculously healed, he cried out prophetically,
Behold the historian of Our Lady of Lourdes !
while shedding tears of joy like the aged Simeon.
In fact, this day, we may say, marked the be
ginning at Massabielle of the sublime mission of this
client of Mary his one true and undoubted mission
of relating for his generation, as for all genera
tions, the miracles of the Queen of the Pyr6ne"es.
Were not all his gifts for this sole purpose ? We
see, first, our hero in long prayer before the glorious
Grotto ; the next, frequently conversing with the
child-Seer. Was not he, too, henceforth a seer, who
probed this soul of light to its inmost depths ? He
conferred, also, many times with the parish priest,
interviewed all those who from far or near had taken
part in the episodes of Massabielle, visited the places
that had anything to do with the visions or the
cures, took notes, made inquiries, asked for authentic
records, armed himself with all sorts of living
documents. On his journey to Tarbes the Bishop
wished to put at his disposal the various Proceed-
HENRI LASSERRE 239
ings of the Commission, together with the numerous
reports of the doctors and the voluminous corres
pondence relating to the supernatural at Lourdes.
All was then ready for the composition of an immortal
work, which would become, by a stroke of genius, a
chef-d ceuvre of the first rank. And yet, doubtless
that nothing should be done too hastily i.e., that
human errors might not appear in this record of
Divine mercy five years passed by without any work
appearing. M. Peyramale, with his zeal now at
fever-height, was disheartened by it, rightly thinking
that it was an injustice not to record once for all the
history of it a history so important and delicate
whilst nearly all the eye-witnesses were still living.
At length (since the Mysterious had to take part
from beginning to end in the affair), on the eve of
August 15, 1867, the Blessed Virgin had to force the
hand (so to speak) of her somewhat tardy chronicler.
The circumstances under which it happened fully
deserve to be told once more in these pages : that
evening, the Vigil of the greatest of Our Lady s
feasts, Henri Lasserre went to confession not to his
ordinary confessor, Abb6 Ferrand de Missol, who
was away, but to an unknown priest, who was hear
ing confessions in a little chapel of the Rue Duguay-
Trouin and accused himself (it seems), amongst
other things, of ingratitude to Our Lady in putting
off continually the writing of a book in her honour,
despite the promise he had made after an extra
ordinary grace. Very well, replied the confessor,
for your penance begin the work this very day.
And as the penitent still tried to put it off a little
240 THE GLORIES OF LOURDES
longer, probably because of the timidity natural to
the holiest persons regarding the unfolding of God s
works, Not to-morrow, insisted the confessor with
the voice of a prophet, but this evening. I order
you ! He who spoke so sternly and peremptorily
was no other than Theodore Ratisbonne, the cele
brated Jew converted at Rome by the miraculous
medal ! And the result was that from this memor
able vigil of Our Lady in August the writer of the
Immaculate Conception set to work. . . .
The first steps, uncongenial enough for such a
master of style, consisted in selecting and arranging
the various parts. Perceiving ere long that there
were gaps in the outline of facts, the author, who
was now urged on by conscience and love, began to
travel to various places, where the missing references
might be gathered. This indispensable work a true
critical cross-examination being added with scrupulous
care to so many other preliminary investigations-
furnished the most satisfactory and reliable results ;
and when the examining magistrate had finished his
task, it was the turn of the advocate, or, rather, the
historian.
A year later the remarkable masterpiece focussed
on itself universal attention. Its popularity at once
surpassed all previous expectations. Translated into
seventy-eight languages or dialects, this volume, the
greatest literary success of modern times, has already
run through more than two hundred editions in less
than forty years! It can be said that the whole
world wished to read these matchless pages in
English, German, Flemish, Czech, Breton, Spanish,
HENRI LASSERRE 241
Dalmatian, Dutch, Hungarian, Slovenian, Arabic,
modern Greek, Italian, Maltese, Roumanian, Polish,
Portuguese, Chinese, Japanese, Bengalese, Kamaran,
and Tamoul. . . . The good Lady had visibly
blessed the work of her chosen author. This is
what the Head of the Church himself was pleased
to declare in a Brief full of high praise, addressed to
his famous and beloved son on September 4, 1869.
The highest praise of this providential work is
that it marked the beginning of the universal
enthusiasm of which we have endeavoured to give
some account in a previous chapter. Lasserre has
spoken, said Ernest Hello ; the pilgrimages are
the answer. Published at Lourdes, the book drew
everyone to Lourdes, and thus became as useful to
the designs of Providence as, after Bernadette s
visions, the labours of a Peyramale or the judgment
of a Laurence. This is why, from all the organs of
religious thought, from the Pope downward, con
gratulations poured in upon Lasserre, who had
* decidedly entered into the glory of his sublime
heroine, the Virgin of Massabielle, as the Rev.
Pere Sempe wrote to him, voicing the opinion of all
the Bishops, priests, and people. Even members of
the Academy, literary men, and journalists were
anxious to add their note of enthusiasm to this
chorus of praise. The reason was because a picture
so heavenly was designed in so artistic a framework!
Never has writing, they said, * succeeded more
completely in fascinating the mind while stirring
the heart. The absorbing tale of apparitions and
cures ; the dramatic picture of conflicts stirred up in
16
242 THE GLORIES OF LOURDES
turn by Unbelief and political hatred, and bringing
out into strong relief the doctrinal meaning of facts ;
and, lastly, the graphic description of the final
triumph of the supernatural all is found in this
matchless work with an ever-increasing interest and
(we must add) with a conscientiousness that leaves
no room for error or doubt. Such excessive critical
severity has led Lon Gautier, a true connoisseur, to
remark that such a work is the authentic record
(proces-verbal) of miracle. Considered from the
point of view of its moral influence, notice how the
same critic appreciated this work from the beginning :
It is a manly and strong work. It will assuredly
make men ! In any case, it has already made many
believers, which is without doubt better still. But
let us hear Hello once more : This book has been
everywhere ; it has conquered time and space ; the
movement has carried it in a tremendous whirlwind,
then it has ended by drawing men into this move
ment, making them submit wherever it passed.
We know that this masterpiece was not his only
one. In 1879 appeared * Bernadette, a touching
and edifying biography of the Ecstatic Child, who
had just died like a sweet saint in the obscurity of
the cloister of Nevers. What other pen save that
which had described so well the peerless Lady
could reveal to us the supernatural beauties lodged
in the soul of S. Marie Bernard ? Four years later
we have the Miraculous Episodes of Lourdes, a
sort of natural continuation of the great history.
The first volume, some thinker or other has said,
was bound to produce the second, not only in the
HENRI LASSERRE 243
order of ideas, but also in that of facts. We might
call this work a true mosaic of little dramas in a
hundred different acts. What a variety of characters
move across the stage ! What richness of scenes, and
what a splendid style ! But, above all, what a refuta
tion of the prevailing materialism by this triumph
of the supernatural, as undeniable as over
whelming !
Such is the Lourdes trilogy of Henri Lasserre.
I am mistaken ; there are two others Month of
Mary of Our Lady of Lourdes, and a Life of the
Abbe" Peyramale.
But, speaking generally, the first two works, which
even then were not to everyone s liking (Mgr.
Perraud forbade them in his diocese), seem little
more than the resume of the preceding writings,
with a character of vivid piety and of a mystical
unction better adapted to their special purpose. As
to the biographical study which the author gave in
1897, twenty years after the death of his admirable
friend, it is only fair to say that even there we find
many valuable details regarding the origin of the
famous Shrine, the growth of the pilgrimages, and
a host of men and things relating to this sacred
Grotto.
But what constitutes the chief charm of these
pages, written from his heart, is the life of the hero,
as I have tried to sketch it before. Then, once more,
though always with a new felicity of painting, comes
the tale of the marvellous facts, in which the Cure
of Lourdes played so important a part, as well as
the account of how the work was carried out his
1 62
244 THE GLORIES OF LOURDES
own special work ! Through all these episodes,
which are nearer Heaven than earth, the great soul
of the priest of God looms out, now agitated by
doubt, now restrained by prudence, now led by faith,
and again upheld and consoled by prayer. What a
majesty surrounds this champion of Our Lady when,
convinced at length that his little parishioner speaks
to him in her name, he takes the poor child under
his protection, already harassed by persecution !
His struggle against all the forces of man constitute
a true play within a play, with that stern epilogue
especially I mean the last trials of the good Cure",
victim, like Bernadette, of the glory of Our Lady of
Lourdes : happy victims, whose crown in return
would have to be beautiful beyond compare !
All this, the reader may imagine, written in charm
ing prose, is read and devoured like a romance.
What a pity why should we mention it ? that the
personal note creeping too much especially into
this last work, the champion of the supernatural
descends to mere self-defence and to vulgar recrimi
nation of others ! Not wishing once again to re
open old wounds, or to enter into the intricacies of
a dispute which is not yet settled, and perhaps never
will be, suffice it to say that Lasserre was at times,
as someone said, * headstrong in good. For this
reason, if he had disappointments like his venerable
friend, perhaps he was also misrepresented.
But this Christian loved Our Lady of Lourdes so
much, and served her so well, that we may well
pardon him an alloy, which in his case, doubtless,
was only an intemperate form of zeal. The writer
HENRI LASSERRE 245
of these pages will never forget the supernatural
accent with which the historian of Massabielle (for
thus he will be known to posterity) honoured him
by speaking to him, shortly before his death, almost
at the feet of the Madonna and this Grotto, where
all his life and heart were.
We are aware that the last days of Our Lady s
scribe were, according to the mysterious law of
Providence, darkened by other trials than those he
endured on the banks of the Gave. The unhappy
translation of the Holy Gospels, by drawing on
him the censures of the Index, finally broke down
the remaining strength of his embittered soul. To
him likewise was offered the crown of thorns after
the crown of glory. It was a happy token for the
next world, whither he went at the age of seventy-
two, full of virtues and merits, like the just men of
the Bible, laid low by death, but even in the tomb
destined for a holy immortality !
CHAPTER X
A GLORIOUS DIPTYCH
AFTER the famous dead, it would be unjust to forget
those servants of God still living who by their
various services merit the gratitude of all lovers of
Massabielle.
Now, of many names, two by common consent
stand out pre-eminent that of the Organizer and
that of the Physician. We purpose, then, in a brief
sketch, with the reserve which their modesty
demands of us, to present to the reader this fresh
group, which, in its turn, has no less claim on our
attention and gratitude.
We shall first speak of the Bishop of Lourdes,
as Mgr. Schocpfer loves to sign himself. When I
call him the Organizer of the work of Esp&ugues,
I do not mean to say that there was no organization
before his time ; that would be absolutely unfair. I
only mean that, the latest of the Bishops of Our
Lady, he has been able, owing to the labours and
experience of his predecessors, to carry almost to
ideal perfection the spiritual and temporal adminis
tration of this glorious Shrine. Everyone is aware,
in fact, that the present Guardian of the Grotto, the
246
A GLORIOUS DIPTYCH 247
sixth link in the golden chain which binds the
Bigourdain See to the Madonna, when taking
possession eight years ago of the See of Tarbes,
found bequeathed to him very precious examples
regarding the interests he had to watch over.
On the palace to-day, alas ! does not the venerable
and saintly figure of Mgr. Laurence look down,
who will ever live in history as the Bishop of the
Apparitions ? Mgr. Pichenot, on whom his mantle
of virtue even more than of authority fell, passed like
a transient gleam, giving barely a hint of what, like
a true shepherd, he would have done for the glory of
Mary.
Then came Mgr. Langenieux, whose memory is
enshrined in contemporary annals with the halo of
an apostle even more than of a Bishop. Coming to
the banks of the Gave when the external work was
hardly beginning, he was, we may say, under God,
its good genius. With his mind so keen, his heart
so generous, with all the means besides, which his
savoir faire, joined to his influence, commanded, he
did much for the establishment and adornment of so
beloved a pilgrimage. Even when the Basilica of
Rheims had called him away from the Crypt of
miracles, the Archbishop of Rheims, the Cardinal
of working men, the Legate of Leo XIII., never lost
sight of Lourdes, continuing to direct everything
from afar, and was glad to throw his red mantle,
type of his love for Mary, over this Grotto, on which
his first labours as Bishop had been spent. Might
it be to show more clearly that the things of God
have no need of man s help, that to such a Prelate
248 THE GLORIES OF LOURDES
Providence gave as successor Mgr. Jourdan, the
infirm and eccentric old man, whose mission re
garding Massabielle (if mission it might be called)
seemed to be, while suffering, to make others suffer ?
We have already sketched the trials of a Peyramale
sufficiently ; we have seen clearly enough how
largely they entered into the designs of Providence
to allow ourselves to complain against him who was
perhaps the cause of them. God, who, as St. Augus
tine says, uses the bad to purify the good, often uses
the good also to test those better than themselves.
Again, Mgr. Billieres, however deficient in poetical
sensibility, had certainly too much faith and
patriotism (he was a native of this land) to take
no notice of the treasure which Heaven deigned to
entrust to his care. Very good to the needs of his
priests, he showed himself most devoted to his
Grotto, despite the menace of a civil power which
did not spare him difficulties.
Such was for about forty years the list of Bishops at
Massabielle. Let us now turn to the present Bishop.
Alsatian by birth, Vicar (after his native province
was severed from France) of that church of Notre
Dame des Victoires, which in Heaven s designs was
a preparation for Lourdes, everything fitted before
hand the newly elect for his special calling to be the
servant of the Immaculate Conception, both the
religious training of his family circle, and the
ecclesiastical novitiate in the most Marian of Paris
parishes, and, lastly, a fairly long administration of
an important church in the capital. Thus it is, we
may repeat, that God usually deigns to choose His
A GLORIOUS DIPTYCH 249
instruments, disposing not only in their heart, but
throughout their career, those mysterious ascents
by steps * which ravished the spirit of the royal
Psalmist. So, when coming to the Pyrenean See,
Mgr. Francis Xavier Schoepfer, doubtless to prove
more clearly that he would be, above all, a client of
Our Lady, if he chose the cross as his symbol the
wooden cross of his heroic patron saint was
anxious to choose a device which contains in a
nutshell the whole of Christianity : Per Mariam ad
Jesum. But, moreover, what is perfectly summed up
in these four words is his beneficent rule, of which
the vigour, tempered with unction, has already
carried out so many plans, used the services of so
many people, and won the heart of so many
pilgrims, with the sole aim of drawing all to the
Son by means of the Mother: Ad Filium per
Matrem. From the very day of his consecration (to
use a happy phrase employed on that occasion) did
not the Lady of Massabielle vouchsafe to her chosen
son, as the most expressive presage of all, from the
crannies of the Rock and the flowering walls of the
Grotto, the most sweet and prophetic smile of her
maternal lips ?
Men were soon able to judge if the new agent of
the wonder-working Queen of Heaven had at heart
the interests of his Suzerain. Hardly had he come
to the land of Mary, henceforth his own land, than
he addressed a circular letter to his colleagues
throughout the world to invite them to an extra
ordinary festival which would take place at Esp-
* Psalm Ixxxiii.
250 THE GLORIES OF LOURDES
lugues at the same time as the ceremonies of the
secular jubilee, coinciding with the profane re
joicings of an Exposition Universelle. Thus he
had the honour and happiness, if not of inaugurating,
certainly of celebrating, with greater pomp than ever
the universal solemnities which are the monopoly of
Lourdes only, and to which the venerable heads of
all the churches have since been periodically invited,
bringing with them their flocks. With what refined
courtesy the Bishop of Our Lady always welcomes
his venerable brethren of two worlds ! What is not
less noticeable is the anxiety of the pious Prelate for
all the chief duties of Massabielle. Nothing is done,
however unimportant, without the master and father
going there, with his soul clearly full of religious
fervour, with his smile so gracious and indulgent.
Has he not for some time now, like the Madonna,
taken up his residence there, in order to be in the
very centre of the prayer of Lourdes, as well as of
its material interests ?
It is well known to all, I think, that at the holy
Rock three duties from the beginning have specially
claimed the sympathy of Mgr. Schoepfer that of
hospitality, that of the hospital, and, lastly, that of
the men s pilgrimages. The first has been brought
under his influence to the highest perfection, it
seems, that Christian charity can reach ; the second
has been able to realize under his sway what I will
call with eminent professional men the ne plus ultra
of scientific investigation applied to the verification
of Divine phenomena ; as to the third, in which the
Prelate sees, not without reason, the triumph of
A GLORIOUS DIPTYCH 251
Lourdes, everyone knows the splendid results which
on this score he has already obtained by the truly
colossal gatherings of our French fellow-citizens at
the feet of the white Madonna. Adding a noble
example to his wise precepts, how often can the
good pastor be seen going from one hospital to
another, carrying his blessing and comfort to this
host of suffering clients of Mary, who are his children
for the nonce ! It is not unusual for him to come to
the Bureau des Constatations and sit beside M. Bois-
sarie, for whom he professes so openly a friendship
based on esteem and gratitude, and take part in the
study of cases with a knowledge and aptitude truly
wonderful. As regards the pilgrimages for men only
assembled on the banks of the famous river, we know
the marvellous results obtained of late years. The
years 1899 an d 1903 brought 60,000 good Catholics
to the wonderful review at Massabielle. This year,
likewise, this energetic Bishop expects to see
100,000 Frenchmen coming in May to renew before
their Queen the solemn promises of their baptism.
What a reward must not such spectacles be to him
already for so many labours !
With a view to the convenience of the pious
visitors, Mgr. Schoepfer lately had the new hostelry
built, of vast proportions and comfortably fitted up,
in order to give them a warmer welcome. But the
shrines of Our Lady especially are the continual
object of his religious care. It is generally known,
I think, over the whole world, that at his accession
the new Bishop conceived the idea of extending
Massabielle as far as the Vatican, by constructing in
252 THE GLORIES OF LOURDES
the gardens of His Holiness a replica of the Grotto
of Bigorre. To-day the facsimile, it seems, is so
perfect that the Vicar of Jesus Christ, coining every
day to make his orisons in this corner of Heaven,
can fancy himself by a sweet illusion in the most
wonderful spot in France. How happy, then, must
such nearness seem to the pious soul of Pius X. !
Lourdes and Rome, the city of the spotless Virgin
and that of the infallible Pontiff are they not the
two great devotions of the present day, which
Heaven itself has united by links, doctrinal and his
toric, rich in the most glorious hopes ?
Yet (we must add) the spiritual beauty of the
temples of Mary are much more important to their
distinguished Guardian than their material splendour.
Thus, from the outset he gave himself no rest till he
could obtain the solemn consecration of the Rosary
Chapel. It was performed by a Legate of the Sove
reign Pontiff, and Leo XIII. wished to make known
to the whole world these memorable feasts in a
special Encyclical, Parta humano generi. At the
close of these solemnities the same Pope, in an
autograph letter, praised the wisdom and prudence
admirably united to zeal and piety of the Bishop of
Our Lady of Lourdes. It was shortly after this that
his special devotion moved Mgr. Schoepfer to com
pose with his hand or, rather, with his whole heart
that touching prayer to the Madonna which
Pius X. s predecessor approved and enriched with
indulgences, and which the holy Pope now reigning
loves to say devoutly every day at the feet of the
Grotto.
A GLORIOUS DIPTYCH 253
As though the valley of Espelugues did not afford
sufficient scope for his zeal, how often have men seen
Mgr. Schoepfer, undaunted by every obstacle, go
to the limits of his diocese to promote devotion to
the gracious Queen of the Pyrenees ! Thus, he
lately ascended the mountain of Troumouse to bless
a colossal statue of the Immaculate Virgin, standing
on a pedestal 6,560 feet high !
So it is not wonderful that during the early
months of his reign he received from the Secretary
of State an official note saying that the new Pope,
the inheritor of the special good-will of Leo XIII.,
was pleased already to praise his thoughtful zeal,"
and his unremitting care to glorify the Blessed
Mother of God in a shrine which is the centre of
her power and mercy.
When the times began to look threatening, what
efforts did the Bishop of Tarbes not make to shield
his beloved work as far as possible from men s hatred
and the law s intolerance ? Letters, applications,
journeys nothing was neglected by him for this
purpose. If he could not succeed in keeping for the
work of the Grotto those admirable Fathers of
Garaison whom Heaven chose almost from the
beginning by means of Mgr. Laurence, at least he
had the very great joy, at the dark hour, alas ! when
so many weaker institutions began to give way, and
so many glorious temples were closed, of preserving
these holy places for the glory of Mary and the piety
of the world, which made Paul de Cassagnac him
self say : * Yes, it is this Bishop that has saved
Lourdes.
254 THE GLORIES OF LOURDES
The reader may imagine that Mgr. Schoepfer has
left no stone unturned on the occasion of the
Jubilee, 1908. How many of the glories and benefits
of this year of Jubilee do they not owe to him ?
If the head of the Church has gone so far as to
astonish Heaven by the profusion of his supernatural
indulgences, the Bishop of Tarbes has contributed
no little to this. Read the fascinating pamphlet
which, in the form of a pastoral, he took care to
publish on the eve of the Golden Jubilee as the
incentive, no less than the memorial, of the unrivalled
fetes of 1908, and you must admit that this Prelate,
writing, preaching, travelling, ever active, is indeed,
on the banks of the Gave, the spirit which animates
Massabielle mens agitat molem.
Such appears, to every unprejudiced eye, the worker
of the Immaculate Conception. When, then, he
modestly styles himself the Guardian of Our Lady,
is not this term too feeble to convey the idea of so
much energy ? We should rather call him the
Organizer an organizer who, seconded by the valu
able assistance of the chaplains, has already very nearly
(I love to repeat it) brought the complex working of
this shrine to the highest degree of perfection.
With his majesty marked by sweetness, with his
persuasive speech, in which we know not which to
admire most, its faultless style, its elegant simplicity,
its priestly unction, or its Apostolic doctrine, with
his noble heart, so devoted to all that concerns the
interests of Our Lady, he well deserved to figure in
bas-relief opposite the memorable Pope of the Rosary,
on the peristyle of the basilica there this pious
[A GLORIOUS DIPTYCH 255
and undaunted Bishop, whom his contemporaries
already call Vembelliseur de Notre Dame !
After the religious man comes the man of science,
the inquisitor of the supernatural in the footsteps of
its apostle.
Who has not been at least once inside this little
building a kind of austere and impressive cenacle,
where doctors from every realm, geographical or
philosophical, meet together from May till October
to discuss in modern fashion the works of God ?
Over this learned body Dr. Boissarie has now
presided for sixteen years. Take a good look at this
^Esculapius, long, dry, unbending, with impassive
features, abrupt gestures, full voice, and say if he does
not seem to have been placed there to throw cold water
on miracles, so much does he give you the idea from
the first of being cold as analysis, inflexible as
geometry, a sort of living syllogism ! . . . Formerly
a house-surgeon of the hospitals at Paris, he had
already, by his well-earned reputation as a clever
doctor, won an enviable position, when the wonders
of Lourdes attracted his robust reason, and led him
to change his career in life. We first meet with
him as an assistant to Dr. Saint-Maclou that
Benedictine in a frock-coat boldly installed in the
neighbourhood of the famous Grotto in order to
examine better its mystery.
After the death of his master, he has presided with
an ability and a conscientiousness which all must
acknowledge over this congress of doctors, whose
fame is known all over the world. He has already seen
256 THE GLORIES OF LOURDES
there in succession 2,500 doctors, among whom are
reckoned members of the Academy of Medicine,
professors of the Faculty, professors of medical
schools, hospital surgeons or doctors, and house-
surgeons, etc.
Among the most regular, and not the least eminent,
of his confreres we are glad to mention Drs. Cox, Dure",
and Desplat. Far from slackening with time, the eager
ness of this illustrious assembly does nothing, like
the fervour of the crowds, but continually increase,
the more the wonders declare themselves. For some
time past the average number of the disciples of Hip
pocrates every year is, at the lowest estimate, 250.
Shall I add, then, that the most exacting of all
these inquisitors is their president so much so
that more than once his colleagues have had to
remonstrate with him, e.g., when not having been able
to obtain what he always needs, * overwhelming
proof (le luxe de la preuve), he rejects without
pity the most convincing arguments, and refuses to
enter into the official registers cases otherwise re
markable which the voice of the people, and even
the verdict of many professional men, had already
declared superhuman.
In this long space of time, what phenomena has
our doctor not seen, heard, experimented with,
which baffle in turn all the schools ? Time after
time you should hear his verdict, earmarked with
consummate wisdom, but also with a disheartening
reserve, and you will have to admit that such an
examining magistrate (for M. Boissarie is pre
eminently such) cannot deceive himself any more
A GLORIOUS DIPTYCH 257
than he would wish on any account to beguile us.
I shall never forget the disappointment of certain
persons miraculously cured before the cold, un
compromising manner of this ruthless man, who,
after examining his patients or, rather, the Blessed
Virgin s from every point of view, passed them on
to his assistants with the utmost indifference, called
them back, putting aside pitilessly, almost inhumanly,
the cases in which there was a shadow of doubt,
demanding of others, before definitely keeping them,
whether they had been certified and described be
forehand by some doctor who has signed the proces-
verbal of their case so much so that more than
one person cured, to my knowledge, prefers to keep
the secret to himself rather than undergo such a merci
less ordeal. We expected to find here a devout man on
the look-out for supernatural evidences, and, instead,
we meet with a matter-of-fact practitioner, who does
not profess to be anything else, and remains so to
the end. Who has not heard him putting questions
and raising objections ? We are tempted to ask
if he is not trying to forearm himself, by the aid
of Science, against Divine power the more clearly
Divine power asserts itself. I have already men
tioned his favourite axiom, * Not to admit the inter
vention of Heaven, save when there is no means of
doing otherwise. Ever the last person to yield,
has he not boasted in one case of having waited
fourteen years before deciding in favour of the
miraculous character of a certain cure ?* * Here is
* Strictly speaking, the Bureau Mddicalsi Lourdes, upholding
the rights of Faith as scrupulously as those of Science, never
17
258 THE GLORIES OF LOURDES
one man, at any rate, who will never become a
fanatic, was the remark of a Parisian journalist
one day in my hearing. If any title would suit him,
it would be, I think, the Iconoclast of pious illusions,
for (as all feel who see him at work) an organic
or constitutional cure nervous cures he simply
despises must be doubly and trebly certain, evident,
undeniable, before he will consent at length to
declare it superior to the laws and rules of medical
science. Nay, more, even when its supernatural char
acter forces itself upon you, the prudent physician
still postpones the final decision, until the lapse of
a long experience has tested it, being fond of
repeating with a famous Cardinal, Le temps et moi. *
So the famous challenge delivered formerly to free
thinkers by M. Artus regarding Lasserre s book a
reward of 10,000 francs for the man who should
prove the inaccuracy of a single statement of the
immortal historian might be repeated to-day regard
ing the official results of the hospital of a Boissarie.
The fact still quite recent of the pretended blind
man of Marseilles, Auguste Philippi, does not tend
to lessen the value of his judgments, if we recall
with what distrust at first, then with what caution,
he took up this case, refusing definitely to declare
it authentic till further inquiry. Meanwhile all
could see the zeal and unselfishness with which he
uses the word miracle. Leaving this task to religion only, it
confines itself to declaring that such a cure, either by its nature
or by its manner, cannot be accounted for by purely natural
causes.
* Time and myself will decide.
A GLORIOUS DIPTYCH 259
anxiously undertook to find out the real facts of the
case, which ended in the discovery of an ignominious
fraud, which his unerring medical sense, ever at the
service of this great, good man, had divined and
frustrated.
Although, on an average, 1,500 cures are entered
annually in the Register of the Bureau, the President
never ceases to declare that it is not so much the
quantity as the quality that matters. In fact, a
single miracle, duly verified and maturely proved,
ought to be enough to make the most exacting
Rationalist submit and confess the truth. Zola fully
admitted this. Who would, then, venture nowadays
to maintain that such a Court of Inquiry is wanting
at Lourdes ? Doctors innumerable, and for the most
part eminent, but with the most widely divergent
views on medical matters, come there like inexorable
judges rather than partial advocates, in presence of
a host of cures, each more difficult to explain than
the last, and after a searching, exact, and profound
study on the spot often prolonged even after their
return home all these masters are at length forced
to conclude, on their honour as professional men,
and sometimes in spite of their most cherished con
victions, that here they meet with facts unheard of
extraordinary, and surpassing all known forces and
methods. It is clear that in these tragic hours (for
they are truly such), the Christian, which lies hid
under the medical man, shines forth in M. Boissarie.
Having taken every precaution against false explana
tions, how happy he is so believing at heart and so
fervent in practice when the evidence, stronger
172
260 THE GLORIES OF LOURDES
than all their theories, bows down the souls of these
proud medicos round his austere person, who came
at first in the secret hope of finding God at fault !
And if, as not seldom happens, some touching con
version follows from these dramatic scenes, his joy
then becomes almost the happiness of an apostle.
In 1905, for example, that doctor of Chartres who
came armed with all kinds of precautions and safe
guards, but after carefully noting, examining, and
hearing everything,ideclared he had found the faith !
The same evening he made a public speech to the
doctors and brancardiers of Massabielle on the un
deniable reality of the miracles he had felt with his
own hands, confessing, in tones of touching humility,
his former scepticism, and proclaiming his recovered
faith with a conviction that had all the greater
weight with his audience. I was present, and saw
the tremendous effect it produced.
Thus, thanks in great measure to M. Boissarie and
his methods, miracles are being more and more
ackowledged in the world of medicine the hardest
world to convince taking their right place there,
and there, by God s grace, multiplying their con
quests.
Still, you must admit a creation of this kind was
not started without some courage. What confidence
a man must have in himself and in Heaven thus to
entrust miracles, by a sort of Inquisition open to all
comers, to the mercy of an ever-changing and mixed
assembly, and how on every side marvellous facts
are brought to light ! Here it is a consumptive
cured during the Procession ; there a victim of
A GLORIOUS DIPTYCH 261
cancer, who has left his sickness in the Pools ; farther
on, a case of Pott s disease * suddenly cured during
Mass, etc. So, in view of such results, absolutely
abnormal and certified by Science, even Dr. Berillon,
the renowned director of a Revue d Hypnotisme> has
made no secret latterly that we are at Lourdes in
presence of an * astonishing power. Is this of the
same order as our own or not ? This is what the
learned doctor as yet cannot, or at least dare not,
decide. At all events, let us hear how he concludes
this avowal : If this power is of the same order, we
must confess that it seems superior to our own.
In common fairness, from which even doctors are
not excused, they will all come gradually with the
help of God s grace, and despite their hopeless
formulas to acknowledge that the finger of God is
here. M. Boissarie will be able on that day to burn
a candle in thanksgiving to the good Mother who,
through him, as through Bernadette formerly, will
have won over the medical body by the hook of
prodigies that bespeak her mercy even more than her
power !
Meanwhile, is it not already wonderful, in an age
of positivism and criticism run wild, that no serious
man has any longer the power or the boldness to
scoff at Lourdes, even to question the splendid cures
which take place there ? Those who may still
doubt have only to visit the spot, returning home, as
so many notorious unbelievers have done before
them, confessing with their lips and with tears in
their eyes. Moreover, does not everything take
* Decay of the spinal column.
262 THE GLORIES OF LOURDES
place in the open air, in the noonday glare of
publicity that is, in the presence of from 30,000 to
60,000 witnesses of every condition ; above all, before
the eyes of this unimpeachable jury of learned men,
that was lately so loudly called for by the champions
of irreligion, and which a Boissarie, strong in the
Faith no less than in Science, and armed with the
approval of Holy Church, was not afraid to assemble
on the very scene of so many marvels, in order to
submit miracles to the test of reason ?
By this, as Mgr. Pie says, the argument on which
Christianity is wont to base its oracles, the argument
that God proves His word by miracles, is henceforth
found among us not accidentally or in isolated cases,
but in a chronic, or (more accurately) a permanent,
form. Bernheim says the same thing in slightly
different words. The facts of Lourdes, he says,
belong to Science, for all the observations are there
made with such sincerity, and investigated by men
as capable as they are honourable. To have won
such an avowal from the king of hypnotism, a Jew,
the Autopsy of the Supernatural must have indeed
been merciless at Massabielle !
As though so many works and merits were not
enough, everyone knows that Boissarie spends his
spare time in writing. But it is always with the
same critical seventy that the pen of the writer
replaces the scalpel of the surgeon. The former
reveals and publishes what the latter has already
examined and diagnosed.
Such is the latest work, which appeared not quite
A GLORIOUS DIPTYCH 263
a year ago (in succession to four or five others), on
the very eve of the Jubilee, besides the scientific
preface to the Noces d Or. There, as you can
imagine, we find gathered together the most im
portant and undisputable facts which have been
observed quite lately in this Bureau Medical, the
living school of Catholicism, taught by Reason alone.
It is, indeed, chiefly from a scientific and critical
standpoint that this volume is addressed to us. I
would call it a proof of the Supernatural by human
reason. From end to end, the Supernatural is irre
sistibly borne in upon you in all the cases which
the author relates and dissects with his professional
severity. Does not such a work, therefore, in
directly at least, constitute a crushing reply to the
perfidious Immanence of the present day, which
would fain reduce our most undisputed miracles
to so many pious legends, or, at all events, con
tingencies incapable of proof, or, lastly, phenomena
hitherto unexplained, but which will eventually be
explained, from which, therefore, no conclusion
can be legitimately drawn? When we happen to come
across cures that are literally astounding e.g., those
of a Peter de Rudder, a George Gargam, a Madame
Rouchel, and the Parisian singer I will ask in all
sincerity, what object can all the sciolism of the
present day, multiplied into a hundred protean forms
(Suggestion, Immanence, Higher Criticism, etc.),
have in coming here ? On rising up from these
pages if our Intellectualist has not taken leave of
fairness and common-sense what else can he do
except give up arguing, and adore ?
264 THE GLORIES OF LOURDES
This is how, as we said, so much good is done by
this beautiful work, so striking in substance, often so
impressive in style, but written always with a clear
ness and simplicity which are the secret only of the
greatest masters. Hitherto to mention Boissarie
was to quote the highest medical authority on the
things of Lourdes ; in the future, the doctor who
spends his life in minutely examining miracles will
appear, besides, in the eyes of those whose views
are not formed beforehand, as the matchless critic of
a medical school that has no rival !
CHAPTER XI
THE LITURGY OF THE APPARITION
OF all the testimonies which for fifty years have
thrown light on Lourdes, the best undoubtedly are
those numerous ones coming from the Holy See;
and foremost among these no one would hesitate to
place the Office, in which the wonderful things of
Massabielle are found approved, not to say
canonized, by the highest authority in the world.
We have thought the reader might like to rest
awhile, at the close of this account of Lourdes, in a
sort of mystic oasis, while we unfold before his eyes
the beauties of the liturgy of Lourdes.
First Vespers. How beautiful are the five
opening anthems engrafted on the psalms of Our
Lady like so many petals fallen from Heaven !
From the first, with the radiance of uncreated light
in which the Immaculate Conception was bathed,
exhales the fragrance of spotless innocence. The
next sketches more in detail the Woman clothed
with the sun as with a garment, having the moon
beneath her feet, and on her head a crown of stars.
So before such a vision the antiphonary, borrowing
265
266 THE GLORIES OF LOURDES
from the Hebrew poets their richest imagery, says
of this peerless Lady that she is the glory of
Jerusalem, the joy of Israel, and the honour of all
her people. Then come a series of loving invoca
tions, recalling the greeting of the Archangel and
the inspiration even of the Heavenly Magnificat.
The last refrain declares that her praises will never
cease on earth, whom the Lord hath so highly
exalted. After which we hear the Little Chapter,
drawn from Canticles of Solomon, an enchanting
nuptial song, which seems the quintessence of all
the perfumes, the sweetness of all the melodies, the
brightness of all the colours of the Bible. Arise,
my love, sings the invisible Spouse, my beautiful
one, and come : my dove in the clefts of the rock,
in the hollow places of the wall, show me thy face,
let thy voice sound in my ears. *
At such words what else can the servants of Mary
do except fall on their knees and salute with a
respect full of tenderness their Queen, whom by
turns they call Star of the Sea , and Gate of
Heaven, Virgin undefiled and the sublime
Mother of God ? Ave Maris Stella. When this
glorious symphony comes to an end, an angel, an
echo from the Heavenly country, utters this
piercing cry, which will remain like the motto for
the day : O most sacred of all beings, deign to
allow me to unite my praise with that of mortals,
to which the human choir replies by begging from
the Immaculate Mother strength against the enemy,
which the Fall of Man renders so necessary, alas !
* Cant. i. u, 13, 14.
THE LITURGY OF THE APPARITION 267
here below. And after a majestic prelude, wherein
the Almighty enters once more on the scene, to
declare that the heroine of the feast is His well-
beloved, His peerless one, the perfect one, such as
from the beginning He conceived in His plan of
creation, hear this song of all her mystic triumphs
borrowed from the Madonna herself, in order to
magnify better her glory that unrivalled glory of
which for twenty centuries she was the first to be
conscious, while she protests her virginal humility.
Vespers end here with a devout prayer, in which the
motives of the dogma are felicitously mingled with
motives of love to dispose the Eternal better in
men s favour by reminding Him of all that He has
done for the benefit of the Woman foretold long ago.
Matins. Amid the frozen shadows of this wintry
night do you hear, like the blast of a Seraph s
trumpet, the words of the Invitatorium, apparently
so simple, but in reality so pregnant with meaning ?
The hymn which follows is a harmonious series of
variations, in which the Church is pleased to
celebrate the condition of the All-pure, bidding her
to regard the sad plight of the sons of Adam, and
more especially, it seems, the heritage of shame
bequeathed to her hapless sisters, the daughters of
Eve, through that accursed dragon, whose venom
infects through them all the race. . . . Now the
joyful anthems of the first nocturn, like pearls from
the Gospel, will be recited in a melodious bead-roll.
It is at first the greeting of Heaven s messenger to
the daughter of Israel that we are reminded of;
268 THE GLORIES OF LOURDES
next we assist at the impressive scene of the Visita
tion, when her holy cousin in prophecy blesses her
whom all generations call Blessed. The third in
vocation, the praise of Heaven and earth combined,
recalls to Mary that by her primeval privilege she
has entered into a friendship with God, such that no
evil can touch her, and she has since become the
radiant centre of all good. What do you think of
this little versicle and its short response, inserted
here, just as at the end of the other nocturns, in the
body of the text, like two jets of light and flame,
the better to warm the heart by enlightening still
more the mind ? It is the same with the longer
passages, which form an epilogue to each of the
three Lessons ; there, somehow, the spirit of the
Scripture just read is pithily summed up. As for
the first three Lessons, they are taken from the
Book of Proverbs, so prophetic of Our Lady. It is
Wisdom personified, in so far as it has been able to
reveal itself in this world in a created form, whom
we hear already revealing to men (long before the
future secrets destined for Bernadette) who she is,
what she is called, what she possesses, and lastly,
what part she plays in the eternal mystery of Predes
tination.
With the second antiphons the prophecy becomes
more clear in proportion as the designs of God
are unfolded. We hear, first, from the humble
Virgin s own lips this triumphant assertion, which
we noticed in the office of the Vigil, and the refrain
of which will often charm the liturgy of the present
day : He that is mighty hath done great things to
THE LITURGY OF THE APPARITION 269
me ; then the ardent reply of mankind : Yea, truly,
the Most High hath sanctified the woman, who was
to be His tabernacle; and because God reigns in
the midst of her she will never be disturbed.
Lastly, a voice particularly pleasing (none other
than that of the Angel Gabriel) tells us the great
secret, which explains such a preference the bound
less love wherewith the Creator from all eternity
surrounded His elect. Again we come to the
* Lessons/ this time historical, as the former ones
were prophetic ; they bring us to the very threshold
of the wonders of Lourdes, in medias res. Every
thing is here faithfully related the Apparitions,
and the various circumstances under which they
happened eighteen times, and the salutary con
sequences to the world which have accrued from
them. How solemn are the opening words, Anno
quarto a dogmatica definitions . . . like the majestic
prologue which the Roman martyrology uses on
Christmas Eve to denote the chronology of the
Heavenly plan ! * What news is sweeter than that ?
we exclaim with St. Bernard, welcoming the yearly
repetition of the glad tidings. * O words, though
short, yet so joyful, since they tell us of the approach
of God s mercy ! What sweetness do they not contain ?
The charm of such words urges us to seek develop
ments to this language, and here words fail us.
So spake in the twelfth century the honey-tongued
doctor in his poetical mysticism ; thus, on hearing
from the inspired lips of the Church the preface to
the story of Massabielle, every Christian soul can
and should break forth into transports of joy. Truly
270 THE GLORIES OF LOURDES
a wonderful event ! You should read the account
in this inimitable language of the Church s prayer,
in which we know not which to admire more, the
simplicity which charms us, or the sublimity which
carries us away. And as the liturgical periods
proceed, does not each one feel himself fascinated
by the interest of a story that has no parallel, and
moved to tears by the merciful intervention of Divine
power in the most touching and winning way
possible viz., of a Woman, a Queen, a Mother,
whose beauty at the sight of our miseries is dimmed
with tears ? And these visits of the Immaculate
Queen coinciding exactly with the time when her
blessed dogma was proclaimed, what glorious vistas
do they not open out to our pious meditations ?
How this bleak wilderness, in which the Queen
of angels comes to smile on a poor child, becomes
apparelled with celestial light in the sacred ac
count, which puts it at once on a level with the
most sacred shrines in the world ! How every little
detail is filled in ! We see again the bright counte
nance of the Lady, the splendid robe which
adorns her, and the mantle which envelopes her
royally ; the blue sash which girdles her with such
grace, the golden roses blooming like heavenly
carbuncles on her bare feet; the white Rosary,
which she piously grasps, in her hand, and the big
sign of the cross with which she signs herself. Then,
again the strangely altered figure of the child-Seer
her humble white hood, which, as she hastens to the
sublime vision, protects her against the biting north
wind ; her appearance in her ecstasy, the mere sight
INTKRIOR OF THE HASILICA.
\Tofacep. 271
THE LITURGY OF THE APPARITION 271
of which wrought conversions ; the holy water, which
in her childish timidity she was for sprinkling on the
Apparition ; the invitation which in reply the Un
known gave her to return for fifteen days to the
Grotto ; the penances she gives her, the promises she
makes her, the gifts she bestows on her, the message
she entrusts to her ; and, lastly, the seal she puts on
all these wonders by deigning to disclose her name.
We have the beauty of churches, springing up as
though by the hand of a magician, which are being
continually adorned before our eyes with untold
treasures ; then the procession of all mankind, which
we see winding without a break towards the Rock ;
there Bishops and priests walk in due precedence,
whilst from his infallible See the Pontiff of Rome
blesses the movement, encourages it with all kinds
of spiritual favours, and in this sacred cavern
welcomes with unfeigned joy the salvation of the
future.
Such are the three wonderful Lessons of the
second nocturn, presenting a graphic and compre
hensive picture of the whole sublime drama of
Espelugues, and all in beautiful Latin, in which
classical elegance continually vies with mystical
unction. May I add that to us, Frenchmen, it has
this special beauty, that Lourdes, the Gave, Massa-
bielle, Bernadette, in our own tongue, find a place a
place of honour like shining gems, in the beautiful
language of the Church a thing unheard of in the
Church s annals ! If the world lasts, they shall be
names as musical to the ear, as stirring to the heart,
272 THE GLORIES OF LOURDES
of every pious Catholic as any that are enshrined
in the immortal book of the Church s Liturgy.
The responsories, which conclude each of these
Lessons, serve each in its turn to bring out into
stronger relief the facts of the history, like the
antistrophes of ancient Greek tragedy, in which the
Chorus never failed to * point the moral of the pre
ceding narrative. Just as in their winged brevity
they gare dark hints in the first nocturn, so they
seem to become still clearer in the second. Notice,
it is God Himself who speaks to the beloved of His
heart in the dithyrambic tone, as if so much beauty,
grace, and glory wellnigh astonished Him : * Who
is this that cometh up like the rising dawn ? She
is as shining as the sun, beautiful as the moon. *
And, proud of His conquest, by which at length
He achieves his full triumph as Creator, Redeemer,
and Sanctifier, let us hear Him, in words much
better than our weak paraphrases, cry out once
more in rapture : She is indeed my dove, my perfect
one, my Immaculate one ! Immaculata mea.
In the next responsory it will be a Prophet, the
most famous of all in Israel, who will open his
mouth clearly to foretell at this early date that hill of
France on which * the Virgin will appear, to which
henceforth all peoples will flock with this hymn on
their lips : * Come, let us ascend together to the
mountain of God, which is Mary. At the end of
this nocturn, so poetical in many respects, we hear
the Seer herself thank the Lord in the name of all
her exiled brethren for the blessings He has lavished
* Cant. vi. 9.
THE LITURGY OF THE APPARITION 273
on His mother ; after which, as a token of her high
sovereignty, she shows us the crown of precious
stones which, like the twelve stars of the Apocalypse,
sparkle on the forehead of the Almah.
In the third nocturn, also, each antiphon will be
a colloquy, in which Creator and creatures will
speak to Mary. Thou art truly happy, the earth
sings to her, because the hand of the Most High
has strengthened thee. Fear not, says Jehovah
to her ; in lavishing such gifts on thee, I was not
doing a work that was to pass away, but thy unique
privilege was fraught with eternal consequences.
Yes, it is true, angels and men cry out together,
that in raising thee to such glory the Almighty has
brought to confusion His enemies, which are ours.
Then the melodious canticle is sung, telling us
that on this peerless creature the graces and the
blessings of the Most High have been showered
abundantly. Again, we come to the Lessons the
happiest commentary on the Gospel of Our Lady,
since it is taken from St. Bernard. The first act of
the holy doctor is to utter a cry of joy, inviting all
mankind to rejoice with him, even the ancient head
of mankind and his unwary consort ; for if both slew
all their posterity at the fatal hour of their birth in
misfortune, we see one of their daughters arise who
will repair the original fall by showing herself not
merely sinless, but also full of grace to free others
from sin. So that the word of malice which the
first man spoke regarding the first woman, The
woman whom you gave me as helpmate gave me
the fruit of death, will henceforth bear the most
18
274 THE GLORIES OF LOURDES
beautiful of applied senses, and each of us, when we
look towards the Immaculate, will be able to sing this
hymn of grateful joy : Behold the true mother of
the living, who, in giving us the blessed fruit of her
womb, has given life to the world ! On this theme
of man s fall the last of the fathers is pleased to
trace an eloquent and ingenious parallel between the
two Eves of Holy Scripture. Thus he greets in a
series of eloquent antitheses the prudence which
atones for * folly, humility for pride, and instead
of the fatal apple which an unhappy spouse offers
to her credulous husband, he boasts of the bread of
Bethlehem, which the Virgin Mother will one day
bring to hapless mortals. Then he cries out in a
transport of religious fervour : * O woman, admirable
and worthy of all honour ! But the interpreter of
love does not fail to discern, throughout this passage,
the fulfilment of the ancient prophecies viz., the
overthrow of the infernal beast by the Virgin
promised from Eden, thus showing how Mary really
overcame the Evil One by crushing already at this
distant hour his power of pride, of avarice, and of
pleasure.
She is truly, amid all the frailties of her sex, the
valiant woman described by Solomon, who triumphs
over Satan, as he triumphed of yore over the weak
woman the first Eve ! After such words, what
else can follow but the joyful strains of the Te Deum,
borne upwards on the sonorous breath of the pealing
organ, and rolling along the arched roof in tumultuous
waves of enchanting sound, to thank Heaven for
having bestowed so precious a gift on the children
of earth ? . . . .
THE LITURGY OF THE APPARITION 275
Lauds. This hour will not detain us long (though
it is also very beautiful), since we have already ex
plained the antiphons and little chapter in * First
Vespers. We may notice, however, that the hymn,
Aurora cceli prczvia, over and above the stamp of
beautiful Latin, has the true lilt of lyrical sentiment.
The sublime heroine is regarded under the most
expressive aspects : she is the radiant dawn that
heralds the bright day ; the sacred Ark, by the mere
contact with which the billows of universal woe are
calmed; the dew of springtide on the bosom of
sorrowful Nature, parched by blighting storms ; the
eternal champion whose victorious heel proudly
crushes the eternal enemy, but also the sweet and
merciful mother, ever mindful of the prayers and
tears of her children.
As the loving conclusion, we hear again that sigh
so often breathed from the heart of suppliant mortals,
Diffusa est gratia a kind of ritournelle, or echo, full of
music and sweetness ; a relief after sublime ecstasies
and deep contemplation. With the Benedictus, that
Magnificat of the dawn, there resounds once more
the paean of the spiritual victory, and again the
Mother of Jesus is likened to the broadening day,
the harbinger of our redemption, from whose bosom
the Sun of eternal justice will one day shine forth to
dispel our darkness.
Little Hours. Prime differs but little (in the Little
Chapter at the end, which occurs again in None)
from the same hour in the Little Office of the Blessed
Virgin Mary, At Tierce the Canticle of Canticles
18 2
276 THE GLORIES OF LOURDES
pays its melodious tribute to the stainless Virgin. In
a sort of animated dialogue, the Church borrows the
lyrical words of Ecclesiastes, Who is she that
cometh up from the desert (the desert of life, laid
waste by sin and overshadowed by evil) overflowing
with delights ? She that leaneth on her beloved.
The daughters of Sion have seen her and declared
her blessed/ At midday, when the Marial Office has
reached the Hour of Sext, we hear the Madonna speak
to us as she spoke about the same hour fifty years
ago to the little Soubirous : In me are all riches
and glory, the most valuable treasures, and, above
all, original justice : they are my gifts, better than
gold and precious stones, which the vanity of earth
so eagerly desires.
Then, as if not to discourage us by so much super
natural splendour, the sweet Madonna adds : I am
the Mother of fair love, and of fear, and of know
ledge, and of holy hope ; I alone can give them to
you, my children. In me is all grace of the way and
of the truth ; in me is all hope of life and of virtue.
These teachings are truly too sweet and too profitable
for our filial piety not to be repeated once more in
None. In the convincing tone of the Jewish prophet,
she repeats to us that, in her, Christians will find
the secret of virtue, and hence eternal salvation,
which, being the end of our existence, comes from
God, but ought to reach us through Mary. So, at the
hour when day begins to turn towards its setting, hear
with what piteous earnestness this Mother cries
aloud : Come over to me, all ye that desire me, and
be filled with my fruits; through me your destiny
THE LITURGY OF THE APPARITION 277
will be perfectly accomplished. Lastly, the voice of
Our Lady, becoming as thrilling as when it enraptured
Bernadette, tells us that to find her is to find life,
and that only those become her chosen ones who
love her by seeking her, and seek her by loving
her. Qui me invenerit, inveniet vitam, et hauriet salutem
a Domino.
Second Vespers. With somewhat less solemnity,
doubtless, than on the vigil, they reflect the same
character of devotion almost in the same inspired
words. Laying aside this evening the ordinary
metre, Our Lady s minstrel employs the rhythm of
Sappho, doubtless in order to relate better, on the
wings of the graceful stanza, ere this charming
liturgy ends, the two cardinal facts about the
Immaculate Conception : first, the proclamation of
the Dogma in 1854, and the outburst of rejoicings
which it caused everywhere ; next, the Apparition
of the Woman with glory crowned to the unknown
shepherd-girl, whom the mere sight of so much
splendour filled with an ecstasy almost like that of
the Blessed. Here the liturgical bard, rivalling in
poetic fire the Kings of Latin poetry, sings of the
happy Grotto, which beheld the countenance of the
Queen of Angels a thousand times more beautiful
than that of the goddesses of ancient mythology ;
the holy Rock, too, which served as footstool to
the Queen of Heaven, and from which the waves of
immortal life have since issued :
O specusfelix, decorate divae
Matris aspectu ! Veneranda Rupes
Unde vitales scatuere pleno
Gurgite lymphae /
278 THE GLORIES OF LOURDES
Then he hails the bands of pious pilgrims, hasten
ing from every quarter of the earth to pray to the
Lady of Lourdes, who smiles graciously on all, and
reserves for each a special favour. The ode ends
with a fervent prayer, in which the bard of Massa-
bielle begs the Mother of Grace to dry every tear by
healing every ill, and granting every boon here
below, till we win those of our eternal country.
This day of Paradise ends with a rapturous and
clear-toned Magnificat.
Lastly, as the dominant idea of the matchless
liturgy, we hear those glorious words, which we take
away with us as the mystical flower of the happy
Esplugues : Hodie gloriosa cccli regina in terris
apparuit, hodie. . . .
THE MASS. From the first words of the Introit,
taken from the Apocalypse, we see with the eyes of
the Seer of Patmos the mysterious Queen, who on
her watch-tower eighteen centuries later was to look
down on the Seer of the Pyre"ne"es a true living city
of the Most High, which is for the child a Jerusalem
more refulgent than that of old, descending straight
from Heaven on the bosom of clouds, as the glister
ing messenger of God, and decked with richest
nuptial gems, like the ideal Spouse described in
Holy Writ ; a vision splendid, to which the
Psalmist, the inspired ancestor of the stainless
Virgin, makes a triumphal echo in his joyous
Eructavit ! Then comes the prayer already read
at each of the Little Hours, in which the priest,
clearly alluding to the astonishing cures of Lourdes,
THE LITURGY OF THE APPARITION 279
begs Almighty God to grant to all the faithful health
both of soul and body. But let us next turn to the
divine Epistle of St. John, historian, doctor, and poet
of the Immaculate. It is the splendid account, written
nearly two thousand years ago, of what happened at
Massabielle the sky, which is suddenly opened;
that surpassing brightness, with which the Grotto is
flooded; the muttering of the storm, which the
shepherdess hears rumbling amid the universal still
ness ; the quivering of the trees, trembling as if at the
approach of some royal personage from Beyond
every little detail is rilled in of the supernatural
signs that preluded the most supernatural of
dramas. Then see drawing nigh the living Ark of
both Testaments. Its great sign (signum magnum),
that which all tradition since Adam has recognized,
is a woman the Woman par excellence, clothed with
light, having creation for her footstool, and bearing
on her head the diadem of a softly gleaming
sovereignty.
They heard, then, in Heaven and they notice it
again in the temple as it were, the sound of a loud
voice, crying : It is to - day, the eventful day of
February n, that an exceeding great mercy has
been wrought for earth.
Notice how the Gradual, to translate better the
spirit of the people s jubilation, is by turns poetical
and mystical ; forgetting, in fact, that the gloomy
winter still spreads over nature its white mantle of
death, it declares and sings that around the white
Lady Spring awakens again with the spontaneous un
folding of the flowers, which keep her feast, with the
280 THE GLORIES OF LOURDES
premature budding of the vines, which waft theii
perfumes towards her, with the soft cooings of the
turtle-dove, overjoyed to welcome the Queen of
creation. And from the empyrean the thrice-blessed
Trinity welcomes the coming of Its Ambassadress,
giving her once more endearing and sublime terms,
inviting her at length to stay her dove s flight from
God in the cleft of the granite cliff of Bigorre, in
the depths of the niche purposely designed for her
from the beginning of the world. Replying in her turn
to the music of Heaven and the harmonies of earth,
hearken to the young Seer, kneeling on the earth,
cry lovingly to Mary in the ritual language : Dear
Lady, show me thy face, and let me hear thy voice ;
for thy words are sweet above everything, and thy
countenance, on which the angels gaze, is the
reflection of eternal glory. Alleluia ! Alleluia ! . . .
At the Gospel we assist at the holiest and most
fundamental act of history, Divine or human that
which has lasted through twenty centuries of Chris
tianity, and which especially is the key of Lourdes
I mean, the Annunciation of the Archangel to
the child of Juda. Thus the glorious Being, who
this winter afternoon sets her flower-decked feet on
the wild rose-tree, is the Vision to which all the past
ages turned their eyes, until the brightest of pure
spirits came in the name of the Heavenly court to
greet her on bended knee.
And what a greeting, so full of the Immaculate
Conception, he gives her ! A ve, gratia plena ! 1 1
bow down before thy surpassing greatness, O
Mary, who art the pride of creation, the masterpiece
THE LITURGY OF THE APPARITION 281
of grace, the pinnacle of glory. The Lord is with
thee as He never was with any of the Seraphim.
His Essence bathes thee with all possible holiness,
until soon He may take of thy very substance to
realize His Being of Man-God. O " Woman, above
all women glorified," who in Heaven or earth can
compare with thee ? Surpassing Eden in delight,
and Paradise in light, thou art ineffably above thy
fellow mortals in beauty and goodness. This is why
all generations will call thee Blessed ; or, rather,
thou art the living benediction, since from thee will
Jesus come, who is the Blessed of God and of men.
Thus (metaphorically, at least) the text represents
on this great feast the ethereal visitant speaking or
singing in the holy house of Nazareth. So, fifty
years ago, spake Bernadette, while she recited her
Rosary with angelic fervour, so that it is literally
true to say that, as at the moment of the Incarna
tion, it was during the virginal music of the Hail
Mary that the peerless Mother of Christ revealed
herself to the simple shepherd-girl in all her gifts of
nature and of grace. Do not wonder, then, if, for
this reason, these cries and sighs, this outpouring of
homage and love continues to the middle of the
offertory, like the special refrain of the feast, Ave
Maria !
At the Secret, in which the priest commemo
rates in the silence of the Divine Action the chief
intention of this day, he evokes the glories and
merits of the stainless Madonna, and by her all-
powerful intercession he takes care to pray for the
welfare of our souls and bodies. What time or
282 THE GLORIES OF LOURDES
place could be more favourable to hymn her praises,
or to ask her help ? Yet, at the solemn moment
when the priest receives the Bread of Heaven, listen
to those strains which rise from the hearts of the
people ; quickly they go, like the overflow of all
deep feelings, but blent sufficiently with joyful
gratitude to ascend straight to Heaven : * Lord,
Thou hast really visited the earth in the person of
Thy august Mother, and by this visit Thou hast
vouchsafed to pour Thy bliss in all hearts, just as to
enrich us the more it seems Thou wouldst fain
impoverish Thyself. And what will be the final
fruit of the sacrifice ? My God, the priest joyfully
exclaims, grant that, in return for so many favours
received in this holy place, the hand of Thy glorious
Mother may raise us all to Heaven, the sole Thabor,
which passeth not away, and where we yearn to go
and contemplate in Thy glory the glories of her
Immaculate Conception.
Thus ends one of the most remarkable offices in
the golden cycle of the Liturgy.
CHAPTER XII
THE FESTIVITIES OF THE GOLDEN JUBILEE
THEY lasted three days (from February g to n, 1908),
and by the testimony of all they were, from beginning
to end, truly worthy of the immortal anniversary which
they commemorated. Whether regarded from a
religious, philosophical, and even social, point of
view, we may question whether there have been
many functions of equal importance. As to Lourdes,
where magnificent displays are everyday occurrences,
it is certain that by the quality even more than
the number of the pilgrims, the grandeur of the
ceremonies, and, above all, by a supernatural
enthusiasm running electrically through the crowds
it had never before witnessed such a sight. To
this city of Mary, transformed into a vision of
peace, those words might perhaps be applied during
this Triduum which David addressed long ago to
Jerusalem : Joy is the portion of all those that
dwell within thy walls (Sicut Icetantium omnium
habitatio est in te.)
Shall I add that, as was most fitting, the first
element of success, always so uncertain on such
occasions, was the sun ? From the morning of the
283
284 THE GLORIES OF LOURDES
gth, as though to welcome the crowds which were
pouring in from all parts, and in which the pilgrims
from abroad mingled picturesquely with our own
countrymen, it rose gloriously, making the last snows
on the crests of the neighbouring mountains glitter
with heavenly alchemy. Light and whiteness is
not that the symbol of Our Lady of the Pyrenees ?
Already, at the invitation of the distinguished
Guardian of these places, several princes of the
Churches had arrived.
Mgr. d Angers was the chosen orator of the Golden
Jubilee. No one will be surprised to hear that, by
the beauty of his words and the suitableness of his
doctrine, he showed himself during these three days
the eloquent orator that he is esteemed to be.
Lourdes and France Lourdes and the Church
Lourdes and the Pope this was the sublime
teaching that we were privileged to hear. Such
pages hardly admit of analysis. It is infinitely better
to read them and to enjoy them in their entirety. I
may at least mention, as serving as peroration for the
Sunday evening s discourse, the commentary on the
Magnificat, in which the soul of this unhappy country
seemed to pass, clinging to the Madonna because it
is loth to die.
Mgr. Schoepfer drew the practical conclusion by
conducting Bishops, priests, and faithful before the
holy Rock, there to implore with one voice (how
fervently you may imagine !) the Queen of our nation.
Gradually the evening drew on, clear and mild, like
the extension of a day in spring, so as to allow round
about the festive basilicas those unrivalled visions of
THE FESTIVITIES OF THE GOLDEN JUBILEE 285
beauty in which, along the lofty terraces that seem
like the corridors of Heaven, the glory of sound vies
so wonderfully with the splendour of light.
Next day because a pious and salutary thought
wished that the Feast of the living should include
also the dead in a refreshing dew the sky, sharer
of our griefs as well as of our joys, was at first
overcast. But what came to shine with a clear
brightness, both of theology and pathos, was the
sermon of the Bishop of the Diocese during the
touching Requiem celebrated for the departed
workers of the shrine of Lourdes. This theme of
supernatural remembrance enabled the venerable
orator to call to mind some famous figures : first,
two great Popes, among the most signal benefactors
of the Grotto ; then an ideal Cure", who might be
termed the good genius of its epic beginnings;
then a matchless historian ; but, above all, that
humble child of the Soubirous, whose angelic name
the good Bishop could not pronounce without tears
of emotion.
But the * event of the second day if I may use
such a modern phrase was to be the Legate s
arrival. As soon as the figure of the Cardinal was
seen, genial and smiling in majesty, there was an
outburst of cheering. In the person of this old man,
clothed in red, at whose knees even the Bishops
knelt down, all welcomed the Pope. For Pius X.
was truly at Lourdes in the person of his represen
tative, and justly, therefore, the eminent head of the
city, M. Justin Lacaze, addressing the distinguished
286 THE GLORIES OF LOURDES
visitor in the name of all the City Council grouped
round him, declared that he, as the foremost of his
fellow-citizens, was saluting the Vicar of Christ.
From the station to the steps of the Esplanade,
amid the arches of triumph and display of endless
banners, the ovation appeared in truth too hearty
for Cardinal Lecot, who would have wished to remain
in the background, the shadow of Peter, not to
take his large share of it. Never did delegate of the
Holy See meet with greater personal success, because
he combined so much greatness with so much
goodness. * Vive le Legat ! was the cry all that
day, and all felt, moreover, that an enthusiasm so
natural did no wrong to his august Master, in whose
name the Bishop of Bordeaux came amongst us,
or to the glorious Queen, at whose feet he was
hastening to pay his official homage.
Now, since the head and heart of the Church were
at Lourdes, the Golden Jubilee was fully inaugurated.
This is what all the bells of the holy city, that rocked
and swung madly, never ceased to proclaim with
their melodious chimes ; this is what the Bishop of
the place, in his own style, so pleasing to the ear,
declared when welcoming such a guest. The ardent
profession of faith, or, more exactly, of loyalty to
Rome, that came from the heart of Mgr. Schoepfer,
was much appreciated when, looking back over the
past fifty years, he affirmed that in this realm of
Mary the pearl of Catholicity nothing had been
done, was done, or would ever be done, unless with,
by, and for, the Pope. At the mystical feast of
Massabielle, as at the more material one of Cana,
THE FESTIVITIES OF THE GOLDEN JUBILEE 287
does not the gentle Virgin bid us only to think,
love, and desire what the Bishop of Rome thinks,
loves, and desires, who perpetuates the person of
Christ in history ? Then came the sermon at the first
Vespers of the Feast itself. On the eve, to emphasize
the note of national thanksgiving, Mgr. Rumeau had
taken this text, so often heard among the rocks of
Espelugues : * O Immaculate, you have been pleased
to visit our earth, and you have exceeded all your
former mercies in order to enrich us still more.
This evening the theme, more sacred, if I may say
so, was inspired by the triumphal antiphon, which
the prelude of the Magnificat will soon proclaim :
To-day the glorious Queen of Heaven has appeared
in this spot ; to-day she has come to bring to her
people words of salvation and an earnest of peace.
What a beautiful text to make known all that for
fifty years religion owes to the merciful Lady ! As
before, this superb flight of oratory ended, at the
close of an hour, in a veritable canticle of super
natural hope.
But now, as in the bright ages of Christianity,
in the calm of a night, thickly strewn with lights,
the solemn office of Matins is about to begin.
Already the immense circle of the Rosary Chapel is
filling with worshippers eager to follow this holy
action, to feel its devotion, to drink in its harmonies.
In every respect I will say it was truly heavenly.
Mgr. de Pamiers officiated, assisted by the Arch-
priest of Elne and the Chanoine Rousseil. In the
choir, streaming with light, were several Bishops in
their stalls round the pontifical throne, who were
288 THE GLORIES OF LOURDES
again surrounded by a host of priests and levites,
whose deep voices blended sweetly with the melodious
voices of the two choirs. Oh, those psalms chanted
so musically to the purest Gregorian modes ! Oh,
those versicles rippling forth at intervals like pearly
cascades ! Oh, those lessons interpreted with so much
unction and fidelity ! Oh, those responsories, which
revealed by turns the grace of the idyll, the majesty
of the drama, and the power of epic song ! I have al
ready tried to describe somehow the intellectual beauty
of all this liturgy ; but what can I say of its musical
sestheticism ? We must admit that, to thoroughly
enjoy both, the enraptured hearers should have
been able to add to the delight of those * inimitable
sounds the understanding of the words. What a pity
it is, in truth, that our modern laymen can no longer
read, especially on such occasions, the sublime book
of the Church s Prayer ! The prayer which this
night was chanted by so many priestly choristers,
and breathed such a poetry of places and things, while
nocturn by nocturn, as though from act to act, the
sacred function was gradually evolving amid exquisite
episodes, touched every heart. Again, what a silence
of minds and hearts, while the holy canticles were
sung * with wanton heed and giddy cunning, amid a
variety of rites and ceremonies, for which that fault
less rubrician, Chanoine Pettier, gave the signal so
graciously ! For my part, never have I seen or heard
Matins sung so perfectly. From beginning to end
you remained, eyes, ears, mind, and heart, dissolved
in an ecstasy of delight. Above me, a venerable
chorister, who wears a mitre, could not restrain the.
THE FESTIVITIES OF THE GOLDEN JUBILEE 289
expressions of his artistic devotion. If they sing office
in Heaven (and the Apocalypse tells us they do), it
must be like this ! When, after two hours and a
half of this delicious psalmody, an ocean of celestial
light and sound, the Te Dcum was joyously intoned
by countless voices, far from feeling the least fatigue,
everyone Prelates, clerics, and people would have
gladly begun again. I thought myself (may Our
Lady, the object of so much homage, pardon me
this distraction !) I thought of the monk in the
legend, who, letting himself be carried away in an
ecstasy, could not understand, on coming to himself,
why everything about him had changed its appear
ance, unaware of the fact that his ecstasy had lasted
a century !* So the heavens had opened above us,
and from the height of her liturgical glory the Im
maculate Conception was perceptibly smiling on us,
and we had not noticed the flight of the hours.
Yet the third day (February u) was to be more
wonderful still, on which at length dawned the
auspicious anniversary. From an early hour, under
an Eastern sky, there brooded a halcyon calm. And
the crowds grew unceasingly, and the temples were
fast filling with countless worshippers, and the con
fessionals were besieged, and on every side, with a
truly royal profusion, the Bread of Angels was being
distributed ; and at all the countless altars the priests
waited their turn to say Mass, and at the Grotto, the
chief place of the celebrations of this the crowning
day, the Masses of Bishops went on unceasingly.
* Cf. Longfellow s * Golden Legend, ii.
19
290 THE GLORIES OF LOURDES
Yet the bells of the Basilica, which had never pealed
with so much vigour, began to ring out to the echoing
Pyre"ne"es their solemn chimes. On the stroke of ten a
gorgeous procession of Bishops came forth, followed
by their retinue. Let us welcome, as he passes in his
festive landau, the Cardinal Legate, clothed in purple
and ermine. Behind him walk fourteen Prelates,
wearing their mitres and carrying their crosiers ;
among them this time we notice the Metropolitan
of Auch and the Archbishop of Toulouse. When
such a cortege could at length enter the temple,
already overflowing, we might well ask if the
spectacle of the old Cathedral of Rheims, which
extorted from Clovis the admiration recorded in
history, was more beautiful. In default of the
reality, let the reader picture to himself a triple
crown of flowers and of electric lights stretching
round the vast dome to form in the glorious
sanctuary the most dazzling of ciboriums, beneath
which the marbles, gold, and enamels of the high
altar form for Our Lady a pedestal of surpassing
richness. How beautiful, too, the square of azure
tapestry, brocaded with white plush and embroidered
with gold, with which clever hands have covered the
chairs on which our Fathers in the faith will sit !
It is Mgr. Germain who begins the Mass,
surrounded by all the pomp of ritual, with a host
of ministers eagerly following the movements of the
Prelate, whose devout mien enhances his dignity.
To-day, especially, what a feast is in store not
merely for the eye, but also for the ear ! A divine
music is soon heard from the choir-lofts, as though
THE FESTIVITIES OF THE GOLDEN JUBILEE 291
from Heaven, sung by three hundred choristers of
Lourdes, who, with finished art, performed the Jubilee
Mass, a real masterpiece in its classical and religious
inspiration by the Abbe Darras, the well-known
choirmaster of the Grotto. I can only briefly
mention the Kyrie, so overpowering in its entreaty,
and the Gloria, in Allegro brio time, that so weirdly
appeals to the hearer. As to the famous Credo of
Dumont, when its Catholic dogmas were one by one
proclaimed by the innumerable voices of men, it
produced a really wonderful effect.
Yet, strange to say (and this is its highest praise),
all this storm of harmony did not in the least dis
tract your attention from the sacred mysteries that
were being enacted in the sanctuary. While the
praise of the Sanctus, so rich in mystical devotion,
or the pleading of the Agnus Dei, so full of sweet
confidence, rose to Heaven, the hearer might have
fancied himself rapt to the very midst of the choirs
of the heavenly Jerusalem !
When, with the final ceremonies, the last lights
were extinguished, it was a happy idea to visit the
miraculous Rock. Cardinal, Archbishops, Bishops,
canons, priests, clerics the entire ecclesiastical
hierarchy advanced in procession, not without some
difficulty, through the serried ranks of the enthusi
astic crowd to Massabielle, to complete the Liturgy
there by saluting the Madonna at the very moment
when, on a similar day fifty years ago, she had
hallowed these places and made them immortal.
What a triumph of the idea or the love in the
very fact of this huge multitude gathered at the
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292 THE GLORIES OF LOURDES
mouth of a bleak cave, from which all felt the influence
of the Divine ! It was the duty of the Guardian of
this realm once again to speak at this solemn
moment. Mgr. Schoepfer seemed literally inspired
as soon as he opened his mouth to call up the
unfading episode. With that apostolic fire, always
tempered by an elegant refinement of style, the
zealous Prelate did not fail to draw the practical
conclusions from the most salutary of events. The
best conclusion (he said), since the salvation of
France is at Lourdes, is to love this shrine of our
national life, as the Hebrews loved the Temple of
Sion and the Ark of the Covenant, declaring that
what has already been done here on the part of the
Mother of God towards men, and also on the part of
men towards the Mother of God, is a presage of the
mercy she will yet show them and the favours they
will yet obtain. But where the orator joined to the
eloquence of his thoughts the eloquence of acts was
when he showed to the crowd, moved even to tears,
the Rosary of Bernadette that Rosary which there
the Queen of Heaven had eighteen times seen and
touched and blessed !
May the author add that, in an audience which
the Bishop of Tarbes granted him on the morrow,
he had the unspeakable joy of touching and kissing
between the Bishop s hands this priceless Rosary,
although so rude and simple, like the soul of her
who so often recited it ? After the sermon came
prayers, for it was the very moment when, fifty
years ago, the Apparition took place.
Then, while the noonday Angelus chimed from all
THE FESTIVITIES OF THE GOLDEN JUBILEE 293
the belfries of this Dowry of Mary, 40,000 Chris
tians or perhaps more saluted thrice, in union
with the Angel, the Full of Grace not without
looking furtively to see whether in the hollow of
the granite she might not appear again ! And
because the intervention of the Pope could not be
wanting at so dramatic a moment, to add his
blessing to those of the Madonna, the envoy of Pius
X., standing upright above the sea of bowed heads,
granted the great pardon of Rome that is to say,
the Plenary Indulgence of the Jubilee of Mary.
Thus ended a morning absolutely unparalleled.
Who would have thought, fifty years ago, when the
delicate child of the Soubirous had her vision here,
that half a century later there would be found in the
same place a large gathering of princes of the Church,
two thousand priests, and innumerable spectators,
to commemorate with so much pomp and joy the
most popular of jubilees ? Is it possible that, for so
long a period, crowds so varied, and hastening from
the four quarters of France and the world, would
come to an almost unknown wilderness and grow
enthusiastic before a vain shadow if the power of
God did not draw them there ?
The evening was not less impressive. At three
o clock began the procession of the Bishops,
descending the terraces of the Residence to repair to
the Rosary Chapel through a formidable mass of
humanity, who greeted them with Vivats / as respect
ful as they were hearty. All felt that in the persons
of these holy Bishops the Church of France passed
by despoiled, persecuted, but full of merits and still
294 THE GLORIES OF LOURDES
invincible. Under what roof can they receive so
many living waves, which, like those of a rising flood,
seemed to wax continually greater? Already the
Second Vespers of the Apparition are about to begin.
Fully three-quarters of the pilgrims must hear them
outside on that esplanade, converted for the nonce
into one of the open-air temples dreamed of by
the poet long ago ; this will be indeed a sacrifice, for,
both from the beauty of the Liturgy and the perfec
tion of the music, everything foretells that the new
office will be sung to perfection. On his throne sits
Cardinal Lecot, surrounded by his court, having in
front of him a noble circle of Bishops and priests, all
the priesthood in its different degrees and many-
coloured insignia. When the cantor began to sing
the passage which treats of * the splendours of the
Saints in Heaven (in splendoribus sanctorum), a friend
of mine remarked that the City of Heaven ought to
have descended at that moment to earth (vidi
Jerusalem novam descendentem de carlo). Soon it was
the turn for the sermon, which always comes first in
the ceremonies of our greater feasts. Poor orator!
how will he, from the height of the low marble pulpit,
be heard by all those souls straining to catch his
words ? On the other hand, is it possible to leave
without the supersubstantial bread the crowds
outside, who are surging up to the church walls in
their religious impatience ? Well, let the tents of
Sion be enlarged ; or, rather, since the people cannot
come to the priests, let the priests go to the people,
and thus, under the Heaven s majestic dome (at
Lourdes every boldness, as every liberty, is excused),
THE FESTIVITIES OF THE GOLDEN JUBILEE 295
one man will feed with the bread of the Gospel
sixty thousand men ! Had the old masters of the
Areopagus or the Forum ever such an audience ?
But this was the triumph as it seemed destined to
be the danger of the Bishop of Angers, to be able
for nearly an hour to hold everyone, body and soul,
under the spell of his discourse. If many, unhappily,
could not hear him (though the voice of Mgr. Rumeau
is powerful), all clearly felt that words befitting the
occasion fell from the worthy Bishop s lips. As the
crown of the trilogy we have mentioned, the subject
of the evening was Lourdes and the Vatican, or
the two loftiest mountains of God.
Could there be a more fitting and logical choice at
the close of this memorable feast ? Having spoken
of the sweet Apparition in relation to France, then to
the Church, it remained now to sing a hymn of doctrine
and eloquence to the undying concordat, which, from
the dawn of the Gospel, has linked together the Pope
and Our Lady. There were, as you may imagine,
thoughts and sentiments most admirable, while,
touching lightly on the harmonies of dogma and
the varied course of history, the learned preacher
pursued his ingenious parallel. The interest was
very great when this parallel was at length applied
in detail to Pius X., so devoted to Our Lady and
Lourdes. In proportion as his services already
numerous and remarkable in favour of Massabielle
were recounted, it seemed that so many new
jewels were being set in the diadem of the Immacu
late Queen. No one will be astonished that the end
of an address so instructive and earnest was, by a
296 THE GLORIES OF LOURDES
liberty always allowed in such cases, greeted with
universal applause.
At length, as the conclusion of these holy rejoic
ings, there was to be fairy nocturn a hundred times
more beautiful than that which ancient Ephesus
decreed on a famous occasion to the Mother of God.
Here again picture to yourself, reader, an entire
people, both strangers and Frenchmen, rising once
more by some supernatural impulse at nightfall, as
if they had not done enough while daylight lasted,
to translate better into a language of fire their filial
enthusiasm. In a short time, wherever you turned
your eyes to the top of the peak of Jer, or to the
neighbouring slopes, or to the monasteries strewn
like a mystic garland around the Grotto there was
only one line of joyful fires. In the town, especially,
you could not have found a fa?ade or a window
(belonging to free citizens) which was not lit up.
Public buildings and private houses, luxurious hotels
or humble dwellings, great warehouses and modest
shop-windows, all were bathed in light ; at every
point Chinese lanterns, lamps, and lights, the
splendours of earth, rivalling in brilliance under the
beautiful sky of Be"arn the myriad stars which were
already beginning, in the infinite stillness of this
dreamy night, to strew the sky with gold. And the
electrical surprises quickly followed one another.
Here it was the scene of February n, 1858, uprising
suddenly amid starry lights ; there Bernadette, the
immortal child, was depicted, amid a sheaf of flames ;
elsewhere the holy figures of the Bishop and the
Cure* of the Grotto passed like radiant orbs. But how
THE FESTIVITIES OF THE GOLDEN JUBILEE 297
can I describe, or even enumerate, all the Bengal
fires, all those coloured fairy-lights going off one after
another at different points of the flaming horizon ?
At least, I must mention the beautiful Virgin out
lined in fire, whom you saw for an instant brush the
summits of the Calvary with her white robe and
blue sash amid a spray of fiery roses.
You would truly have called it a ghostly Venice
that had emerged from the side of the flaming moun
tains to float in light, and I am not sure if, espying this
spectacle from the height of their lofty observatory,
the jealous angels did not find that this strange
corner of our planet was almost as bright as in
Heaven !
At least, a party journal had to admit next day
that * such a sight was unparalleled in the world ;
and, what is infinitely better, this was the testimony
of Prelates, who, walking at this hour through the
illuminated city of Our Lady, did not cease to
declare they had never seen anything like it.
There was nothing, not even the old feudal
castle, which was not anxious to outline its rugged
profile in the general illumination. That fiery banner
which from its solitary height it held in its giant arms,
tired by the centuries, added very happily the note
of patriotism to the religious symphony. And the
sparkling purple whereof it wove itself a garment of
joy, as if some wizard of the Middle Ages had come
and thrown over its decrepit shoulders the Cardinal s
robe what a vision it was of its great past of
chivalry and Christianity roused up to an un
paralleled apotheosis in honour of her who, in spite
298 THE GLORIES OF LOURDES
of all, remains always the Queen of the fairest
of kingdoms on earth !
Could the three Palaces of Mary have remained
in darkness when all things were thus illuminated
in her honour ? I must say at once that my falter
ing pen could not attempt any sketch of the won
derful procession that the approaches of the Espe-
lugues then witnessed. Sixty thousand human
beings are there in the immense square, each with a
torch in his hand. At a given signal this formidable
mass which is not a mere mob, but a singing and
walking church begins moving with dignity and
regularity and orderly tranquillity, which, even amid
inevitable cross-currents, we know how to preserve ;
and soon, from the walks of the Grotto to the terraces
of the Basilica, and from thence to the lawns of the
high plateau, there are, under the sky, darkened by the
brightness of earth, in every direction, in countless
rhythms, a thousand ten thousand luminous circuits
like the measured heaving and swell of an ocean
of flame without ever a cry of discord or a false
movement marring the ideal music, Ave, Ave, Ave,
Maria. . . . They talk of miracles ; here is one not
easy to match !
But suddenly you see all the temples lit up at once.
An invisible Genius, the docile servant of the Immacu
late Conception, has just passed unawares, and with
his electric wand has set the triple church aglow
with light. So at this hour the lofty temples, rising
tier upon tier in the splendour of their architectural
beauty, of which not a line is lost, no tracery nor
ornament escapes your notice, seem like an un-
THE FESTIVITIES OF THE GOLDEN JUBILEE 299
earthly enchanted palace a wonderful spectacle,
worthy of the poetic imagination of Alighieri him
self, the superhuman splendour of which lifts you to
Heaven.
When, amid the universal illuminations, at length
the hymns, the lights, and the rejoicings gradually
died away, it wanted but an hour to midnight, as
though the swift-footed day were all too short, and
had to encroach on the kingdom of night in order to
record for all time THE GOLDEN JUBILEE OF
MASSABIELLE.
Meanwhile, a few paces away, the eternal Gave
kept murmuring its musical refrain amid a silence
full of mystery, and there in front, on the rocky hill
which serves as a beacon to the mountain of wonders,
the feudal castle showed dimly its rugged profile, the
lasting witness of an age that has vanished before
these * glories of the present, which give promise of
a brighter future in the powerful gesture of a Queen
and the merciful smile of a Mother !
EPILOGUE
THE LAST TRIDUUM
(July 14-16)
THE reader might naturally expect here that, as I
have endeavoured to describe the earlier solemnities
of the Jubilee, I should also give some account of
those which, five months later, commemorated so
gloriously the close of the Apparitions. Although I
should have been glad to describe once more the
splendours of the memorable ftes of July, 1908, yet
because, in their main outlines, these celebrations,
despite the grandeur and enthusiasm which will
doubtless never be surpassed, would entail much
useless repetition, I thought it better, instead of a
fresh description, to give a useful and interesting
account of the splendid sermons preached at the last
Triduum of the Jubilee.
ANALYSIS OF THE SERMON-TRILOGY OF
MGR. IZART.
FIRST DISCOURSE, JULY 14, 1908 : OUR LADY OF LOURDES
A MORAL FORCE AS THE MOTHER OF FAIR LOVE.
Ego mater pulchrae dilectionis. ECCLUS. xxiv. 24.
Exordium. The preacher begins by showing us
the wonderful way in which the ecstasies of Berna-
300
EPILOGUE 301
dette have been followed by the feasts of Massabielle
and the pilgrimages of the world. Then, at the
opening of this Triduum of July, how could he fail
to call up the memories of Mount Carmel by draw
ing a parallel between the mountain of Scripture and
the hill of the Pyr6ne"es ? In both we have a cloud
of light and healing waters. . . .
So the subject naturally divides itself into three
heads viz., the triple benefit which the Immaculate
Conception came to give to Lourdes in order to
save us more thoroughly, by revealing herself there
as a Moral, Doctrinal, and Social Force.
Above all, observes the Bishop of Pamiers (and
this will be the subject of his first discourse), as was
fitting, it is in her capacity as Mother of Love of
fair love that Mary was pleased to descend in our
midst to instruct her children by the prestige of her
personal virtues.
Now, these virtues may be reduced to two,
humility and purity, since all Christian perfection
in truth is summed up in these two.
I
First, Humility. The preacher says at the outset,
with the masters of the spiritual life, that humility is
Christianity in act, as paganism was pride. Above
all, since God emptied Himself to raise man up, it
is impossible for man to become God-like without in
turn annihilating himself. To share in the Divine
nature, we must first divest ourselves of human
nature ; and just as the motto of the ancient city,
302 THE GLORIES OF LOURDES
as St. Augustine tells us, was * the worship of self,
even to the contempt of God, so that of the new
city ought to be the worship of God, even to the
contempt of oneself.
Severe but fundamental theology, from which the
preacher proceeds to draw admirable conclusions.
As a confirmation from actual experience, we should
hear him laying stress on the place and the person
purposely chosen at Massabielle by the merciful
Lady as two striking types of humility.
The place ! What place more obscure than this
mountain hamlet, without any attraction or renown ?
Such was Bethlehem of old, which served as the
scene for the birth of the Messias.
The person ! Who was more insignificant than
the Bigourdain shepherdess, ignorant and wretched ?
Such were the shepherds and fishermen called long
ago by Christ to be His Apostles. It is thus that in
every case, to accomplish His designs, God needs
nothing. A proof of this is the Creation ; a better
proof, if possible, is the Incarnation. Was it not
specially by her humility that the daughter of St.
Joachim pleased the Most High ? Thus, before the
Espe"lugues a double humility will become necessary
for the heavenly manifestation. Lourdes and Berna-
dette, two true nothings which are unknown !
How the poor manger of Judaea and the lowly
Virgin of Sion have had the power of attracting
Heaven and drawing down to earth the Queen of
Angels ! In their turn, let the humble city of Beam
and the humble child of the Soubirous sing the
Magnificat with joyous gratitude, for in glorifying
EPILOGUE 303
lowliness so much, Our Lord wished to give the
world important and necessary lessons. . . .
We need not remark that in this passage, partly
doctrinal and partly historical, we meet with many
reflections remarkable for their beauty and depth,
with superb passages, and an eloquence of style
always on a level with the great subject.
Meanwhile the Bishop, doubtless to bring home to
us still more the importance of holy humility, mother
of all moral greatness, and the first condition of
Divine works, returns once more to that initial drama
of the Annunciation which was truly the starting-
point of evangelical holiness : on the one hand the
Heavenly Spirit kneeling before a young Jewess, and
religiously holding before her astonished gaze un
paralleled vistas ; on the other this same timid being
protesting, at the moment when such a wonderful
destiny is unfolded to her, that she is, and wishes to
be, only the handmaid of God. Oh, the beautiful
revenge of Nazareth over Eden ! There a woman,
by her pride, had lost everything; here another
woman, the true Eve, humbles herself s<o as to
restore all things.
By a higher congruity, it behoved Mary from
this day especially to humble herself precisely be
cause of her surpassing dignity. For is it not
the law in every building, spiritual or material,
that the higher the roof is, the deeper should be
the foundations ? But what an ideal temple was
the Immaculate Virgin, saluted by Archangels,
longed for by the Patriarchs, sung by Prophets,
and from the dawn of eternity admitted into full
304 THE GLORIES OF LOURDES
relationship with the adorable Trinity ! . . . There
fore, since the topmost peaks thus reach the Heaven
of heavens, should not the base be buried in depths
unfathomable ? Yes, in the designs of infinite
Wisdom, a humility without limits was needed in
order to uphold (without being overwhelmed by
it) a glory so unparalleled that of her Divine
Maternity. This is precisely the reason why God
evidently takes so much care, in proportion as His
elect is magnified, to lower her still more. We have
the Grotto of Bethlehem, with all its bareness, the
workshop of Nazareth, with all its silent hours, her
public life, with all its sacrifices. For the Mother of
such a Son the glories of Thabor and the delights
of the Last Supper were denied.
We do not see her at the Paschal Alleluia, or the
meetings of the Apostles. Was she even on the
Mount of Olives at the solemn moment of His last
farewell to earth ? The sacred text says nothing
about it, as it is strangely silent on all that can
redound to the joy or the honour of her maternal
heart. Whereas, whenever there is a humiliation to be
borne, or a martyrdom to be endured, we can be sure
that the Blessed Virgin is there, even until Calvary.
* Oh, the Orator cries out, like Bossuet, the Eternal
knows full well how to dig deep the foundations
of His wondrous Temple ! Without doubt, as
St. Paul tells us, it is most true to say that no one
in Heaven or on earth could have ascended higher
than this peerless Woman, but only on condition
that we add, no one, even among sinners, has had
to descend so low. Hence we need not be surprised
EPILOGUE 305
that the day she deigned to come to us as an envoy
of salvation, so marvellous a Creature, remembering
God s mysterious ways, has made use of nothing
a twofold nothing. Then, in a magnificent outburst
of eloquence, he continued : Royal towns, royal
fortunes, Kings of intellect, you were not worthy
to be of the household of the Virgin of Nazareth j
Ye solitary mountains, desolate rocks, unknown
village, the true counterpart of ancient Bethlehem,
you will be companions of the Queen of Humility.
And you, ignorance and poverty of a shepherdess
you alone will enter into this new Grotto, which for us
will become the vestibule of Heaven ! Behold in
what manner at Lourdes the gentle Madonna teaches
the first of all moral lessons, and thereby shows her
self the Mother of fair love.
II
Next, Purity. But to humility the Christian who
wishes to reach his true end, the vision and enjoy
ment of God, must join holy purity. But with the
object of bringing this second lesson home to us,
what does the Apparition do on the banks of the
Gave ? As It has already employed two nothings,
It asks likewise for two innocent creatures, the
innocence of the framework, and the innocence of
the instrument.
From its very position, is not Lourdes in truth
the freshness of nature ? Is not the daughter of
Franois Soubirous, in a mystical sense, the bright
ness of grace ? Oh, the divinely * pre-established
20
306 THE GLORIES OF LOURDES
harmony between the sacred mystery ready to rise
up on the one hand, and the charming country on
the other, in which it will be unfolded no less than
the spotless child, who will be the chosen confidant.
But how Bernadette especially seems marked out
for the sublime part which awaits her ! For this
humility of the shepherd-girl connotes an angelic
purity, such as the Queen of Angels requires when
she would fain hold converse with mortals. Here
the Prelate speaks of the profound definition which
the white Lady gave of herself in the Grotto.
Having the right to claim so many glorious titles,
she only puts forward one that of her Immaculate
Conception. Why? Because, to enable us to under
stand better her entire teaching, Mary had need
precisely of this title, though new, bold, and almost
startling, which would not only attest her great
ness, but also declare the full measure of her sanctity.
In fact, does not this unheard-of expression, while
showing us the essential mark of the Virgin par ex
cellence her absolute spotlessness tell us a thousand
times better than any words what the children of a
Mother so bright should be ? For we should never
forget : together with humility, the essence of the
celestial Madonna is purity, which goes so far as to
personify itself in a sort of living abstraction, which
is called the Immaculate Conception.
Notice, also, for what reason Mary seems to us
so great at this Grotto. The height of greatness, in
fact, is to begin by self-effacement, and to come to
be like God, who is the pure Act, and that through
purity growing ever brighter. Quis ascendet in montern
EPILOGUE 307
Domini ? . . . Innocens manibus et mundo corde. The
Bishop reminded us that, even in Heaven, on the
wings of His seraphim the Eternal one day found
stains. In this world of sorrow, even in the best
consciences, how many imperfections ! Had there
been only original sin, yet because of it the Saint of
saints could not have fully contemplated Himself
through our shadows.
This cannot be doubted, but behold a soul apart
which, escaping the law of universal decay, and
clothed with grace as with a royal garment, deserves
to attract the eyes of God, and delight them in
expressibly more than all angelic and human
creatures !
In this created mirror of uncreated splendour God
will at length contemplate His own beauty in so far
as it can be realized outside Himself. Do you not
see now why, of all her gifts, this one, her robe
of innocence, is the dearest to the heart of Mary,
and that, when she wishes to teach us what,
after her example, we should strive to become,
she finds but one expression to convey her mean
ing : I am the Immaculate Conception. By
these words, in fact, which preach to us a truth so
solemn, the Virgin of Massabielle has never ceased
to cry out for half a century : Before you, my child
ren, I forget the numerous titles which form my
glory in Heaven even that of my glorious Maternity
because, in truth, all those taken together only
touch me accidentally and externally. But to have
been conceived without the shadow of a stain, this
privilege, while it remains my chief and personal
20 2
3 o8 THE GLORIES OF LOURDES
happiness, is so far your pattern and the means of
your salvation that at the moment when I descend
to you I cannot find anything more eloquent or
profitable to reveal to you. Look well, then, on
this pattern of all purity and humility, which has
mercifully appeared to you among these Pyrenean
mountains, and copy it ! ... Such is the twofold moral
teaching which Our Lady of Lourdes has given to
the modern world from this hallowed granite Rock
as from a new pulpit. While, unhappily, too many
make pride and pleasure the chief aims of their life,
the Queen of Heaven came expressly to us at the
time when we sorely needed this lesson, to tell us
that the whole aim of a Christian in this world
consists in remaining, like her, humble in mind, to
draw down God s grace, and pure of heart, in order
at length to see God. There, in truth, is the highest
nobility, the sole aristocracy of the true soldiers of
Our Lady, who, under the banner of humility and
purity, are marching securely towards Heaven. . . .
SECOND DISCOURSE, JULY 15, 1908 : OUR LADY OF LOURDES
A DOCTRINAL FORCE AS THE MOTHER OF FAITH.
Ego Mater Agnitionis. ECCLUS. xxiv. 24.
The hidden God, the unknown God such
were the two great religious miseries, recorded in
turn by Isaias and St. Paul, as inherent in the ancient
civilizations, including even Judaism. Before Christ,
in fact, no people, in spite of all the voices of Nature,
of conscience, and of the Bible, knew of the Creator,
EPILOGUE 309
or, at least, knew of Him remotely, only catching stray
glimpses of Him, as Jehovah said to Moses : Thou
canst not directly look on My face.
But, wonderful to relate, behold how, at the
beginning of the Gospel, a cry goes forth from
the heart of humanity : Vidimus ! We have seen
the Invisible close at hand, face to face, heart to
heart, as He is, even interiorly, full of grace and
truth.
Now, by whose means was this change, the most
far-reaching in history, brought about ? By means
of a woman the Woman, the second Eve in whose
heart the Eternal was pleased to lodge His Word,
in order that henceforth, far better than prophets
and philosophers or naturalists, she might remain
the authentic revealer of Him, and that, as Mother
of Jesus, Mary should become at the same time
Mother of Faith, by containing it as a Book, and
manifesting it as a Monstrance.
Such was the exordium solemn, imposing, and
full of promise. Then follows a graceful compliment
to Cardinal Andrieu, who presides at the Triduum
as Papal Nuncio, and a respectful homage to the
Bishop of Lourdes, whose enlightened and burning
zeal has only made one mistake during the entire
Jubilee that of choosing the humblest of Bishops
to preach on the most glorious of Virgins.
I
Mary, the Book of Jesus. The learned Prelate begins
by laying down the axiom that in Heaven or on earth
no creature could have fully expressed the Creator,
3io THE GLORIES OF LOURDES
His eternal Word alone is His perfect and substantial
image, His thought both adequate and sharing
His whole Word, for this Logos is God, even as the
God who begets Him. But where can we apprehend
this only-begotten Son of the Most High on earth ?
If the commonest human idea escapes us, unless it
is embodied in a sensible form, who will embody or
incarnate for us incomprehensible Wisdom ? His
Mother. Thanks to her, this ineffable Theophania,
that perplexed all the preceding generations, could
at length, in the fullness of time, be effectively
realized, and the first chosen ones of Christianity,
whether shepherds or Magi, invited to go and
behold the Ancient of the days in the arms of a
young woman, have had the right to cry out in
triumph, Let us hasten to Bethlehem, there to
behold with our eyes of flesh God Incarnate.
In their footsteps the preacher desires us to
approach Mary, who, since that time, is the Book
par excellence of men, a matchless volume a thousand
times better able to initiate us in the dogmas of
Revelation than all the Old Testament, since it is
the Godhead Himself who will henceforth be reflected
in the Son of the Virgin, with His various attributes.
First, with His power. Will He not be seen using
His sovereign power over the angry waves, over
incurable maladies, and inexorable death, with
imperious gestures, which the astonished elements
will have to obey ?
Next, with His justice. The Bishop hails it elo
quently in the body of the newly-born Child, but
much more in the bleeding limbs of the Crucified,
EPILOGUE 311
who writhes on the Cross of Calvary, the innocent
Victim of our misdeeds, a prey to unspeakable
justice.
Lastly, with His bounty. Behold, he cries out in a
lyrical transport how sweetly it flows forth from the
lips of the Saviour in generous forgiveness, in gentle,
comforting words, in large-hearted pity ! Never
resting from all eternity, do we not see Him hasten
after the lost sheep, showing pity to all things that
suffer, weeping over all things that are lost ? and, by
an unheard-of excess of love, having died for each
of us, He contrives still to live on, in order to
renew and perpetuate His sacrifice on the mystic
table of our altars.
Well, without Mary, should we have should we
even know all this about the God thrice holy and
by nature incommunicable? Take away this Woman,
providential teacher of the world redeemed, and no
one would know to-day, any more than in past ages,
what is the august Trinity, nor even if it exists; still
less the mighty and merciful act by which the
Infinite was one day hypostatically united to the
finite; nor the touching substitution whereby the
Innocent One willed to pay for the guilty; nor, above
all, this Love of loves, with the idea of better winning
our hearts, clothing Himself with the weakness of a
child, the tears of a martyr, and the heroism of a
friend who becomes the Food, still more than the
Ransom, of our souls. . . . How eloquent is this
Book! sings this Bishop, O volume truly unparal
leled ! Now for twenty centuries humanity reads
God therein fluently, in the eternal brightness of the
312 THE GLORIES OF LOURDES
Christ, which His Mother has shed over the world.
The preacher shows us, next, genius and sanctity
hastening eagerly through the ages to gain light at
this centre of light ; and if to-morrow (an impossible
hypothesis), at the hearth of the Church, the Virgin
Star were extinguished, we should see mankind
blindly falling back into aboriginal Chaos. In fact,
from the very cradle of the new religion, such was
the doctrinal influence of Mary that history shows
us the sacred writers themselves on their knees as
before a second source of heavenly inspiration.
Will they not gather from her lips the most gracious
memories of the Divine Idyll, as well as the most
heart-rending details of the final drama; but espe
cially what may be called the Spirit of the new times,
the fullness of which she received for each of her
disciples in the Pentecostal chamber ?
Book of God, His Greatness finds that the Virgin
is something more, and greater still His Monstrance,
a living and shining Monstrance. We know well
that the desire of every mother on this earth is to
let her child be seen and esteemed. Do her
arms not carry it and lift it ? Do her hands ever
forget carefully to draw aside the veils which hide it,
in order that he may be seen, of whom she loves to
say with holy pride, * This is my son ?
Much more is this the case with this Virgin
Mother, more truly a mother than any other, Our
Blessed Lady. In a magnificent address, the orator
likened Her to a throne of glory, richer than gold,
purer than diamond, more precious than shining
silks, destined by Heaven to show to mortals the
EPILOGUE 313
wisdom of God mad^ man. Now, there were three
special occasions on which this merciful revelation
had to be made in the cave of Bethlehem, at the
marriage-feast of Cana, and beneath the Cross on
Calvary. This thought he beautifully developes,
and as ever, explains with the most lucid theology.
The first part ended with a splendid survey of
the whole Gospel, of which the interpreter from
beginning to end seems to us to be the Mother
of Jesus.
II
At Massabielle, however, this showing forth by
Mary had to be enacted once again, at the end of
the ages, when ignorance or contempt of the Son of
the Almah would oblige this ideal Evangelist to
resume her role of Mother of Faith.
To prove this assertion, which is the keynote of
his discourse, the Bishop reminded us that on earth
it was ever from the beginning the fortune of truth to
be the mark of every kind of contradiction, the out
come of pride, falsehood, and vice. So the pos
thumous history (if we may so call it) of the Blessed
Virgin will be, like her life on earth, a long and epic
contest through the ages against the repeated attacks
of the infernal Serpent, which will earn for her the
glorious title of * Vanquisher of all Heresies.
But the Bishop, always logical, even in his
sublimest flights of eloquence, hastens to add : We
all know that, especially in our own day, Rationalism,
with an unheard-of boldness, has raised the standard
of the most determined revolt in the name of
3M THE GLORIES OF LOURDES
Science. So we see the terrible assault delivered
now
