“No: I do not think I can do any good by that. If I attempted to deny all guilt, you would only think I lied: though I should prove my innocence, yet my reputation, my career, my whole future, are ruined for ever. But will you listen to me for a little? I will tell you a little about myself.”
The rector sat down while his curate told him the story of his life, sitting by the empty grate with his chin resting on his clasped hands.
“I was at a big public school, as you know. I was always different from other boys. I never cared much for games. I took little interest in those [55] ]things for which boys usually care so much. I was not very happy in my boyhood, I think. My one ambition was to find the ideal for which I longed. It has always been thus: I have always had an indefinite longing for something, a vague something that never quite took shape, that I could never quite understand. My great desire has always been to find something that would satisfy me. I was attracted at once by sin: my whole early life is stained and polluted with the taint of sin. Sometimes even now I think that there are sins more beautiful than any thing else in the world. There are vices that are bound to attract almost irresistibly any one who loves [56] ]beauty above every thing. I have always sought for love: again and again I have been the victim of fits of passionate affection: time after time I have seemed to have found my ideal at last: the whole object of my life has been, times without number, to gain the love of some particular person. Several times my efforts were successful; each time I woke to find that the success I had obtained was worthless after all. As I grasped the prize, it lost all its attraction—I no longer cared for what I had once desired with my whole heart. In vain I endeavoured to drown the yearnings of my heart with the ordinary pleasures and vices that usually attract the young. [57] ]I had to choose a profession. I became a priest. The whole æsthetic tendency of my soul was intensely attracted by the wonderful mysteries of Christianity, the artistic beauty of our services. Ever since my ordination I have been striving to cheat myself into the belief that peace had come at last—at last my yearning was satisfied: but all in vain. Unceasingly I have struggled with the old cravings for excitement, and, above all, the weary, incessant thirst for a perfect love. I have found, and still find, an exquisite delight in religion: not in the regular duties of a religious life, not in the ordinary round of parish organizations;—against these I chafe incessantly;—no, [58] ]my delight is in the æsthetic beauty of the services, the ecstasy of devotion, the passionate fervour that comes with long fasting and meditation.”
“Have you found no comfort in prayer?” asked the rector.
“Comfort?—no. But I have found in prayer pleasure, excitement, almost a fierce delight of sin.”
“You should have married. I think that would have saved you.”
Ronald Heatherington rose to his feet and laid his hand on the rector’s arm.
“You do not understand me. I have never been attracted by a woman in my life. Can you not see that people are different, totally different, from one [59] ]another? To think that we are all the same is impossible; our natures, our temperaments, are utterly unlike. But this is what people will never see; they found all their opinions on a wrong basis. How can their deductions be just if their premisses are wrong? One law laid down by the majority, who happen to be of one disposition, is only binding on the minority legally, not morally. What right have you, or any one, to tell me that such and such a thing is sinful for me? Oh, why can I not explain to you and force you to see?” and his grasp tightened on the other’s arm. Then he continued, speaking fast and earnestly:—
[60] “For me, with my nature, to have married would have been sinful: it would have been a crime, a gross immorality, and my conscience would have revolted.” Then he added, bitterly: “Conscience should be that divine instinct which bids us seek after that our natural disposition needs—we have forgotten that; to most of us, to the world, nay, even to Christians in general, conscience is merely another name for the cowardice that dreads to offend against convention. Ah, what a cursed thing convention is! I have committed no moral offence in this matter; in the sight of God my soul is blameless; but to you and to the world I am guilty of an [61] ]abominable crime—abominable, because it is a sin against convention, forsooth! I met this boy: I loved him as I had never loved any one or any thing before: I had no need to labour to win his affection—he was mine by right: he loved me, even as I loved him, from the first: he was the necessary complement to my soul. How dare the world presume to judge us? What is convention to us? Nevertheless, although I really knew that such a love was beautiful and blameless, although from the bottom of my heart I despised the narrow judgment of the world, yet for his sake and for the sake of our Church, I tried at first to resist. I struggled against the fascination he [62] ]possessed for me. I would never have gone to him and asked his love; I would have struggled on till the end: but what could I do? It was he that came to me, and offered me the wealth of love his beautiful soul possessed. How could I tell to such a nature as his the hideous picture the world would paint? Even as you saw him this evening, he has come to me night by night,—how dare I disturb the sweet purity of his soul by hinting at the horrible suspicions his presence might arouse? I knew what I was doing. I have faced the world and set myself up against it. I have openly scoffed at its dictates. I do not ask you to sympathize with me, nor do I pray you to [63] ]stay your hand. Your eyes are blinded with a mental cataract. You are bound, bound with those miserable ties that have held you body and soul from the cradle. You must do what you believe to be your duty. In God’s eyes we are martyrs, and we shall not shrink even from death in this struggle against the idolatrous worship of convention.”
Ronald Heatherington sank into a chair, hiding his face in his hands, and the rector left the room in silence.