"That repentance, contrition, and awe dwell under these dark vaults, among these heavy pillars, in this fortress, as it were, where the elect shut themselves in to resist the assaults of the world, is quite certain—but this mystical Romanseque also suggests the notion of a sturdy faith, of manly patience, and stalwart piety—like its walls.
"It has not the flaming raptures of the mystical Gothic, which finds utterance in all these soaring shafts of stone; the Romanesque lives self-centred, in reserved fervour, brooding in the depths of the soul. It may be summed up in this saying of Saint Isaac's: In mansuetudine et in tranquillitate, simplifica animam tuam.'"
"You will confess, Monsieur l'Abbé, that you have a weakness for the style."
"Perhaps I have, in so far as that it is less petted, more humble, less feminine, and more claustral than the Gothic."
"On the whole," the priest concluded, as he shook hands with Durtal at his own door, "it is the symbol of the inner life, the image of the monastic life; in a word, the true architecture of the cloister."
"On condition, nevertheless," said Durtal to himself, "that it is not like that of Notre Dame de Poitiers, where the interior is gaudy with childish colouring and raw tones; for there, instead of expressing regret and tranquillity, it rouses a suggestion of the childish glee of an old savage in his second childhood, who laughs when his tattoo marks are renewed, and his skin rough-cast with crude ochres."
[!-- Page 117 --]CHAPTER VII.
"How many worshippers can the Cathedral contain? Well, nearly 18,000," said the Abbé Plomb. "But I need hardly tell you, I suppose, that it is never full; that even during the season for pilgrimages the vast crowds of Mediæval times never assemble here. Ah, no! Chartres is not exactly what you would call a pious town!"
"It strikes me as indifferent to religion, to say the least, if not actually hostile," said the Abbé Gévresin.