"We do not go to Church to see lights and hear music, but to ponder over the sufferings of the Lord."
"Sir," said the artist in a voice trembling with excitement, "I happened to be in Rome last Easter in the Chapel of the Pope, as on the day previous to the death of the Saviour they recalled to our minds, according to our form of worship, the sufferings of the Lord. The choir gave expression to the feeling which fills the soul at the thought of the terrible crime committed by mankind on Christ. That was no singsong, it seemed as if a deep wail passed over the whole earth and heaven on account of the blasphemy and evil of the world, and we wept likewise. And the lights which had been lit had no charm for us. One after another were they extinguished by an invisible hand. The last was borne away behind the altar. The Church was dark and only Michel Angelo's colossal figures of the last judgement loomed forth in the background. But this gradual extinction of the lights affected us more deeply than the best sermon could have done. I trembled, in my excitement I raised my hand to save the last flickering life-flame of the Saviour, and as the last light disappeared, then did we understand what the Scripture saith: 'The light shone in the darkness, but the darkness apprehended it not.' The pure and beautiful life of the Saviour was extinguished before our eyes. Believe me, I felt at that time the sufferings of the Lord more deeply, than if I had been in your Reformed church, and a red-faced man had stood up in the pulpit and had spoken in the coarse voice of a drunkard of a suffering which he comprehended not."
"If the preacher does not believe, the case is bad everywhere."
"If, if," cried Felix passionately, "real belief has ever been rare on earth. And does not even your Church Counsellor Ursinus himself state, that he scarcely knows six Christian clergymen in the Palatinate?"
"What does Ursinus know, who seated behind his study table continually finds objections, and who for years has seen nothing of the world but the road from the Sapientia college to the clerical Library in the tower?"
"Well, what I have seen myself does not convince me that these gentlemen can ever replace Michel Angelo, Raphael and Palestrina."
"In spite of these Masters we are far ahead of you in true culture," said Erast calmly.
"In true culture!" cried Felix angrily. "Look on this building. The culture of your people in these matters was incited by our Masters, then came the great heretic of Wittenberg, the horrible demon sent by the Wicked one to destroy you, and since then what have you done? Catechisms, confessions, pamphlets, books on subjects which none can know, and all your lives passed in wrangling, strife, and discussing unprofitable subjects. Only keep on in this way, and you will never again behold such edifices as that of the departed Otto Heinrich, but only continual bloodshed, hate and never-ending strife."
"Young man," replied Erast, "you have been only a few weeks in Germany, and do you therefore think yourself competent to speak a lasting judgement on our land? Look only at our schools, how the young people grow up Catechism in hand, know the words of Scripture, learn reading, writing, and the ten commandments. Look into the homes of our citizens. If we can once succeed in introducing in every house the Holy Scriptures, the German translation by Martin Luther, so that every man at any hour can take up the word of God, then are your sensuous means not necessary. Perhaps you find this proceeding coarse and plain, but that our people light no candles to the Virgin so that their children may regain their health, but rather seek a physician, that they do not go halves in matters of stealing and robbery with images of the Saints, arises from the fact, that they are edified by the word of God, which tells them what God wills, not by images, lights and music, when every man thinks of the desire of his heart, the one of the good and beautiful, the other of murder and thieving."
The calm man was beginning to work himself into a state of excitement when luckily Lydia came up. She appeared disturbed and her eyes shone feverishly bright. She listened to the conversation in silence, but heard the Artist rather with her eyes than with her ears.