This is a lamentable state of things, and as fatal to Catholic writers as to their readers. It is this false idea of the character and requirements of Catholic literature which has brought it to the low ebb at which it now is among English-speaking Catholics, in spite of the growing numbers of a cultivated and intelligent audience. Every one recognizes the fact, and many deplore it, but no one has the courage to attempt the remedy. It would require, indeed, something more than any effort of individual influence to break down the prejudices and puerile traditions that fence in the authorized field of Catholic fiction in the present day, and it is difficult to say which calls for strongest denunciation—the prohibition which excludes certain subjects, or the large license given to the use of others. The Catholic
novelist is forbidden to strike the deep, vibrating chords of nature and of souls, but he believes himself free to handle the most sacred subjects, to preach and moralize to the top of his bent. It is hard to speak of this folly as dispassionately as we should wish; but looking at it with all possible indulgence, is there not something in the stupid conceit and self-complacent audacity of it that may justly rouse indignation? We see grave men, who have graduated in the schools, give up long years to the study of sacred science, in order that they may some day be competent to speak worthily on these high themes, that they may learn how to balance the relations of right and wrong, and define the limits of temptation and sin, of cause and effect; and when, with knowledge ripened by study and meditation, they venture to write, it is in a spirit of great reverence and in fear and trembling. On the other hand, we see incompetent laymen, young ladies and young gentlemen fresh from school, utterly inexperienced, but well supplied with the boldness of inexperience and incompetence, dipping a dainty pen into a silver inkstand and proceeding to discourse in a novel of pious subjects—of prayer, and temptation, and sacraments, and priests and the priestly character, and controversial subjects—as flippantly as they might discuss the merits of a new opera or a new costume. And they fancy, forsooth, that this is doing good and giving edification! They imagine that it is enough to mention sacred subjects and emit pious or quasi-pious sentiments in order to reach the human heart and strike the sursum corda on its springs! One could afford to laugh at the silly delusion, if the danger did not lie so close to the folly of it. A
moment’s reflection and a little humility would suffice to convince these well-meaning persons of their mistake. Many of them might really attain their end of edifying if they had only the sense to confine themselves within the range of their powers. If a beginner, or one endowed with a delicate sense of music but limited musical ability, should attempt to perform one of Beethoven’s glorious sonatas, he would only irritate us by spoiling the masterpiece; but if the same person wisely contented himself with playing some simple air, he might afford genuine and unalloyed pleasure, touching some chord of feeling in the listener’s heart, evoking, mayhap, sweet memories of childhood, sacred and long forgotten. Few things provoke the disgust of an intelligent reader, pious or not, more than to come upon religious platitudes in a book ostensibly written to amuse; and the prospect of meeting with this kind of thing at every page is sufficient to prejudice him against a book which bears a Catholic name on the title-page. Even the name of a Catholic publisher brands it at first sight as “dull and silly.” Here, as elsewhere, the cause and effect react upon each other, and the puerile tone and absence of artistic treatment in the author, by failing to gain the favor and attention of the public, paralyzes the most energetic efforts of Catholic publishers, and those few Catholic writers who can command a wider audience are unavoidably driven to the Protestant publishers in order to secure a hearing.
Is it too much to say that a Catholic novelist who would successfully break through these narrow-minded and false theories, and courageously inaugurate a new reign in Catholic
fiction, would be conferring a great benefit on our generation? We claim for Mrs. Augustus Craven the merit of having achieved this feat. The mission which she began in the Récit d’une Sœur was successfully continued in Fleurange, and may be said to triumph completely in The Veil Withdrawn. Her last novel is a book which appeals as strongly to the interest of the unbeliever and the heretic as of the most fervent Catholic. The moral lesson it conveys may be accepted or not, just as the reader pleases; it is there, brilliantly and powerfully delivered; but, like so many messages broadly written on the face of nature or faintly whispered to our hearts, we may hearken or we may close our ears to it, as we choose; the story still remains one of enthralling interest, full of tenderest romance, of fiery passion, of picturesque description, of sparkling repartee, of gay and pathetic and thrilling situations. With the skill of a real artist the author lifts the curtain and bids us look into the hearts of our fellow-creatures; she touches the hidden springs, reveals the dubious motives, evil sometimes blending with good so closely that it requires the finest analysis to discern their true proportions, to decompose the elements, and show where and how far each in turn prevails.
The two characters who stand out from the canvas as the leading figures in the picture are brought face to face in the most terrible conflict that human hearts can know. Ginevra—not a child, not a placid convent maiden suspecting no life beyond her “narrowing nunnery walls,” but a woman with a strong, impassioned soul—is first inebriated with the pure wine of permitted happiness; the cup is dashed from her, and she tries
to clutch it in defiance and despair. It eludes her still. She beholds her happiness wrecked, her life blighted, at the very outset. She does not take her rosary, and, with conventional propriety, accept the ruin of her young life with the resigned spirit and smiling countenance of a saint; far from it. The evil that is in her starts into activity and makes a fierce fight against her cruel lot. She plunges into the whirl of society, and tries to drown her misery in such consolations as excitement and gratified vanity can give. We follow her step by step in the perilous career, now trembling at her rashness, now rejoicing at her escape, but never, in the bottom of our hearts, believing that she will prove unworthy of her nobler self.
Let us glance over the story, not to analyze its merits as a work of high art and moral philosophy, but simply to review it in the light of a novel characteristic of our times and full of the stir of nineteenth-century life.
It opens at Messina, in an old palazzo, where Ginevra, blossoming out in her fifteenth summer, sits watching the sea through the half-closed window, listening to the wave sobbing on the beach, unconscious and dreamy, but already vibrating to the “low music of humanity” that stirs the unwakened pulses of her heart. She rivets our attention at the first glance as a creature whose beauty, sensitiveness, and dormant energy of character contain all the elements of some high romance. The description of her home and its inmates forms a charming and animated picture. Fabrizio, the learned and somewhat austere father; Bianca, the mother, with her tenderly brooding love; Livia, the sister, at first so misjudged,
but destined to rise to such prestige amidst them all; Ottavia, the fussy, superstitious, devoted old nurse; Mario, the sombre and jealous-tempered brother—they all come before us with the reality of living characters whom we love, fear, or suspect as they gradually reveal themselves. The episode of the flower flung from the window in a moment of frolic and girlish vanity, and which leaves so deep a mark on Ginevra’s life, is cleverly introduced and prepares us for the retribution which awaits the poor child’s innocent misdemeanor. Her life glides on peacefully in the old frescoed saloon, where she cons her book and tends her nightingales, until one day, while high perched on a stool, ministering to her singing bird, the old majordomo flings the door wide open and in a sonorous voice announces Sua eccellenza il Duca di Valenzano! Ginevra starts, and so does the reader; for he knows instinctively that this visitor is the fairy prince of the story, destined to make the golden-haired maiden supremely happy or supremely miserable. Ginevra’s confusion, at being discovered by this illustrious intruder in such an awkward attitude and so childishly engaged, is charmingly described. She knows not whether to be terrified or delighted when the handsome duke goes forward and assists her to descend from her aerial standpoint. But old Don Fabrizio knows what to feel about it, and surveys the group in the embrasure of the window with a glance of stern displeasure. This high-born client of his has nothing in common with Don Fabrizio’s daughter, and it is with undisguised reluctance that the proud lawyer obeys the duke’s request to introduce him to the signorina.