As I have said, much rumour and discussion followed both Dr Hyde’s letter and Stevenson’s powerful retaliation, and it was not uncommon for Catholic and Protestant divines engaged in arguments on the matter to come even to blows. Now all men admit that Dr Hyde’s letter of denunciation was indirectly one incentive that drew the attention and praise of the world at large to the heroism of the martyr priest, and was responsible for Robert Louis Stevenson’s reply and vindication of him. Personally I do not think Dr Hyde was as deliberately hypocritical as Rumour has painted him. Of course this does not imply that Robert Louis Stevenson’s counter-denunciation of Hyde’s epistle was unjust or too fierce; he wrote as the first champion voice, and wrote from the white-hot intensity of indignation over what he felt was a deadly wrong done to the memory of a great man. This can, too, in the consciousness of man’s fallibility, be applied to motive on the other side, for Dr Hyde, of Honolulu, also wrote to his friend, the Rev. Mr Gage, from a firm belief in his heart that rumour was truth and Father Damien’s memory was not deserving of “extravagant laudation.” Many others of his own denomination had devoted their lives to the lepers, both on the islands and at the lazaretto at Molokai, and so Dr Hyde’s great sin was in believing that which he was told and remembering the self-sacrifice of his own brethren who had also toiled on behalf of the lepers.
The voice of Rumour has many forked tongues of envy and the carelessness of thoughtless scandal. Our religion is founded on the sorrow and disastrous result of its tongue, for did not Christ suffer crucifixion through this weakness in mankind? Through doubt and envy to this day some nations believe one side, and others the other; and are there not millions now who do not believe in that which our religion is founded on? Was Dr Hyde so wicked? I for one do not think so. Do we know what he thought after he had written that mighty atom of a letter? What were his reflections, misgivings and regrets over his first belief and hasty conclusions, and over that celebrated blazing challenge of Stevenson’s to the world, revealing in words of fire the complete vindication of Damien’s life, work and Christ-like heroic virtue? We can imagine what he felt like, for we all make mistakes, but not with such drastic results.
The stern note of intense application to a set purpose reveals in Stevenson’s letter the fact that he felt that Damien needed an immediate champion. Stevenson was at heart a Christian man, in the full, true sense of the word, and I have not the slightest doubt that after his open letter had fulfilled the purpose which he intended it to fulfil, and the first heat of his just indignation had cooled down, he himself would have withdrawn it from publication, if he could have done so, and let the whole matter slumber; for he of all men would not have wished vindictive roots to spread and twine about the hearts of men who thus would strangely nourish the very thoughts that their creed specially preaches against.
Stevenson well knew man’s weakness, and the bigotry of men who differ on religious subjects and are opposed to each other by the difference of creed. Certainly the imputations of undeserved praise which were suddenly hurled at the self-exiled priest’s reputation only served one end: to bring out, if possible in brighter relief, the splendid heroism of Father Damien’s life, both before and after his going back to Molokai. Even had it been bitterly proved that the Flemish missionary was not a spiritual saint, but fallible flesh and blood flowing through earthly channels, which resisted, but did not always overthrow, temptation, still he would stand before us a beautiful man (and he was a man); and to do all that he did, and still have the weaknesses of mankind, makes the martyr stand out greater to our eyes than if he did his wonderful life’s work through some effortless, inborn virtue of heavenly inheritance.
The sad peasant priest of Louvain has been dead these many years; he lived and died without ambition, and only in heaven may know the earthly fame he achieved. Well may we believe how beautifully he would smile, forgive and touch with his lips the brows of his erring detractors, with the same spirit that made him live and die for his fellow-men with the certainty of one final reward—a stricken leper’s grave in far away Kalawao, on Molokai Isle.
Out of grey crags by warder-seas they creep
With wailing voices as the stars steal by;
Dead men—fast rotting on dark shores of sleep,
Their earthly eyes still shape the shadowed sky!
Poor skeletons, they moan, laugh, grin and weep;