“Indeed!” she exclaimed, in real surprise. “I have always understood from Mr. Coleman that his family belonged to the English Episcopal Church.”
“We claim that to be the Catholic Church, madam,” the gentleman responded proudly. “Or, rather, we claim the title for that older branch of it which now restores the ceremonies and beliefs it laid aside for a while.”
“Oh! the family are Ritualists,” said the Signora.
The gentleman drew himself up. “The term does not describe us,” he said. “We have a ritual, of course; but that is not all. I consider the title trivial and disrespectful.”
“I did not intend the least disrespect in the world,” the Signora made haste to say. “I merely repeat the name I have heard. I have always considered Ritualism very—refined—and”—she seemed to be laboriously seeking some words of suitable praise—“and—delicate. It has many beauties—and—in short, is, it seems to me, an—eminently—lady-like religion.”
Mr. Vane took pity on the Englishman, who looked confounded, as if not knowing whether to believe his ears, which had heard, or his eyes, which beheld, the perfectly simple and courteous expression of his entertainer. Mr. Vane, without seeming to have heard a word, introduced the subject of property, on which men can always talk unflaggingly for any length of time.
The Signora gave her attention to an enthusiastic Catholic lady, who was making a pilgrimage of her visit to Italy. This lady was one of those charming Christians who sometimes puzzle us a little. Her whole life was given up to what may be called religious pursuits. She attended functions unceasingly, and on every day was to be found in the church dedicated to the saint whose day it was. She visited relics, shrines, and scenes of religious events, and she did all with an enthusiasm which expressed itself in the most gushing manner. In short, she luxuriated in religion. She knew all about the lives of the saints, and spoke of them with the ease and familiarity of an intimate friend. One could perceive by her conversation that she believed them to be particularly watchful over her, and rather more ready to do her favors than to attend to the wishes of most others. She exhorted people a little now and then, gently, with the air of one who knows. The whole manner of the woman, in things religious, was that of a favorite daughter in her own father’s house, to which the world at large was welcomed with a smiling charity and hospitality. But that others were there also in their own father’s house, and equally beloved by him, did not seem to occur to her. The clergy and all religious she admitted and gave precedence to, seeking and admiring them almost as she did the saints. But, after them, she seemed to walk alone; or rather, she entered with them, and others waited a permission. People in the laity, like herself, were, in some mysterious manner, assumed to be unlike her. The silence of deep religious feeling in others she treated as indifference, and sometimes strove, with seeming good intention, to stir up the souls of those already more deeply moved than herself. She abounded in little devotions, little pictures, little lamps and candles, a multiplicity of pious knick-knacks, enough to bewilder a person of simpler tastes. She wore every scapular, and all the medals she could get, and her girdle was laden with rosaries. By most people she was called a very pious woman; by many she was believed to be a saintly woman. She certainly was a fairly good woman and a nice lady of religious tastes. But, looked at by clear eyes, she was a little puzzling, like some others of her kind. One missed there a central virtue, the sweet humility that makes little of its own goodness, and the charity which rejoices to see others beloved and preferred. With such assumption, one would have expected these virtues. Looking so, moreover, one suspected the existence of a deep and pernicious pride. How did she receive a word of exhortation from an equal? Not as she expected her own exhortations to be received, certainly, but with an expression of astonishment, mortification, and even displeasure. When did she sacrifice herself for others, and say nothing about it? when did she do an act of charity, and conceal that she had done it? when did she hesitate to obtain for herself an advantage because it was to be at the cost of another, unless that other were a person in orders or in religion?
The Signora looked at this lady, and liked her, and admired her in many ways, but she could not help wishing that there were a little less self-complacency in spiritual matters, and a little more willingness to sacrifice her own wishes and aims at times. The thought would intrude itself into her mind that it was less a real, working Christian that she beheld than a religious sybarite. She could not say of her, as a famous author has said of some characters rather similar, that “their celestial intimacies did not seem to have improved their earthly manners, and their high motives were not needed to account for their conduct”; but she was frequently pained to perceive a striking discrepancy between the profession and the practice.
“I have been to-day for the first time to see Santa Maria degli Angeli,” the lady said, in the gay and pleasant way habitual to her. “There seems to be no one left there but a few old, old men. They were in choir when I went to the church, but I should never have suspected it. I asked the sacristan if there would be a Mass soon. 'After coro,’ he said. I asked when coro would be, and he replied, looking at me with some surprise, that it was going on then. I had heard a sound like a little company of bumble-bees among the clover, but that it had anything in common with the great, ringing chorus of St. Peter’s or the other great churches I never dreamed. By and by choir and Mass were over, and they all came out. Such a group of dear old Rip Van Winkles! They were all tall, had long hair and long beards of white, or streaked black and white; they drooped in walking, and their black and white robes, not very fresh, gave me a strange impression of antiquity and decay. It must have been the color and oldness of their clothes that made me think of Rip Van Winkle. I was quite ashamed of the thought. More than one head among them would have answered for a St. Jerome. That dear St. Jerome!” she added, drooping into pensiveness, as if, in uttering the name, she had been rapt away.
She recovered herself after an instant, and came back smilingly to the present. “You have no idea what a devotion I have for St. Jerome,” she said.