Bruno’s answer was not addressed to Margaret.
“Lord, care about it for her! Breathe upon this dead, that she may live! Save her in spite of herself!”
There was a slight pause, and then Bruno quietly gave the absolution, and the confession was over.
The next Sunday, there was the unwonted occurrence of a sermon after vespers. Sermons were not fashionable at that time. When preached at all, they were usually extremely dry scholastic disquisitions. Father Warner had given two during his abode at the Castle: and both were concerning the duty of implicit obedience to the Church. Father Nicholas had preached about a dozen; some on the virtues—dreary classical essays; three concerning the angels; and one (on a Good Friday) which was a series of fervent declamations on the Passion.
But this time it was Bruno who preached; and on a very different topic from any mentioned above. His clear, ringing voice was in itself a much more interesting sound than Father Nicholas’s drowsy monotone, or Father Warner’s dry staccato. He at least was interested in his subject; no one could doubt that. As soon as the last note of the last chant had died away, Bruno came forward to the steps of the altar. He had given due notice of his intention beforehand, and every one (with Beatrice in particular) was prepared to listen to him.
The text itself—to hearers unfamiliar with the letter of Scripture—was rather a startling one.
“‘O all ye that pass by the way, hearken and see if there be sorrow like unto my sorrow, wherewith the Lord hath trodden me as in the wine-press, in the day of the wrath of His anger.’”
Margaret looked up quickly. This seemed to her the very language of her own heart. She at least was likely to be attentive.
Perhaps no medieval preacher except Bruno de Malpas would even have thought of alluding to the literal and primary meaning of the words. From the first moment of their joint existence, Jerusalem and Rome have been enemies and rivals. Not content with, so far as in her lay, blotting out the very name of Israel from under heaven, Rome has calmly arrogated to herself—without even offering proof of it—that right to the promises made to the fathers, which, Saint Paul tells us, belongs in a higher and richer sense to the invisible Church of Christ than to the literal and visible Israel. But Rome goes further than the Apostle: for in her anxiety to claim the higher sense for herself, she denies the lower altogether. No Romanist will hear with patience of any national restoration of Israel. And whether the Anglo-Israelite theory be true or false, it is certainly, as a theory, exceedingly unpalatable to Rome.
With respect, moreover, to this particular passage, it had become so customary to refer it to the sufferings of Christ, that its original application to the destruction of Jerusalem had been almost forgotten.