I
would undergo any thing--any thing, to obtain it.” “There is no such
hope,” said the dying man, “deceive not yourself with it. The repetition
of religious duties, without the feeling or spirit of religion, produces
an incurable callosity of heart. There are not more irreligious people
to be found on earth than those who are occupied always in its
_externals_. I verily believe half our lay-brothers to be Atheists. I
have heard and read something of those whom we call heretics. They have
people to open their pews, (shocking profanation you will call it, to
sell seats in the house of God, and you are right), they have people to
ring bells when their dead are to be interred; and these wretches have
no other indication of religion to give, but watching during the whole
time of service, (in which their duties forbid them to partake), for the
fees which they extort, and dropping upon their knees, ejaculating the
names of Christ and God, amid the rattling of the pew-doors, which
always operates on their associations, and makes them bound from their
knees to gape for a hundredth part of the silver for which Judas sold
his Saviour and himself. Then their bell-ringers--one would imagine
_death might humanize them_. Oh! no such thing--they _extort money in
proportion to the depth of the grave_. And the bell-ringer, the sexton,
and the survivors, fight sometimes a manual battle over the senseless
remains, whose torpidity is the most potent and silent reproach to this
unnatural conflict.” I knew nothing of this, but I grasped at his former
words, “You die, then, without hope or confidence?” He was silent. “Yet
you urged me by eloquence almost divine, by a miracle verified before my
own eyes.” He laughed. There is something very horrible in the laugh of
a dying man: Hovering on the verge of both worlds, he seems to give the
lie to both, and proclaim the enjoyments of one, and the hopes of
another, alike an imposture. “I performed that miracle myself,” he said
with all the calmness, and, alas! something of the triumph of a
deliberate impostor. “I knew the reservoir by which the fountain was
supplied--by consent of the Superior it was drawn off in the course of
the night. We worked hard at it, and laughed at your credulity every
pump we drew.” “But the tree--” “I was in possession of some chemical
secrets--I have not time to disclose them now--I scattered a certain
fluid over the leaves of the poplar that night, and they _appeared_
withered by the morning--go look at them a fortnight hence, and you will
see them as green as ever.” “And these are your dying words?” “They
are.” “And why did you deceive me thus?” He struggled a short time at
this question, and then rising almost upright in his bed, exclaimed,
“Because I was a monk, and wished for victims of my imposture to gratify
my pride! and companions of my misery, to soothe its malignity!” He was
convulsed as he spoke, the natural mildness and calmness of his
physiognomy were changed for something that I cannot describe--something
at once derisive, triumphant, and diabolical. I forgave him every thing
in that horrible moment. I snatched a crucifix that lay by his bed--I
offered it to his lips. He pushed it away. “If I wanted to have this
farce acted, I should choose another actor. You know I might have the
Superior and half the convent at my bed-side this moment if I pleased,
with their tapers, their holy water, and their preparations for extreme
unction, and all the masquerade of death, by which they try to dupe even
the dying, and insult God even on the threshold of his own eternal
mansion. I suffered you to sit beside me, because I thought, from your
repugnance to the monastic life, you might be a willing hearer of its
deceptions, and its despair.”

“Deplorable as had been the image of that life to me before, this
representation exceeded my imagination. I had viewed it as excluding all
the enjoyments of life, and thought the prospect blasting; but now the
other world was weighed in the balance, and found wanting. The genius of
monasticism seemed to wield a two-edged sword, and to lift it between
and against time and eternity. The blade bore a two-fold inscription--on
the side next the world was written the word “suffer,”--on that opposed
to eternity, “despair.” In the utter hopelessness of my soul, I still
continued to question _him_ for hope--him! while he was bereaving me of
its very shadow, by every word he uttered. “But, must all be plunged in
this abyss of darkness? Is there no light, no hope, no refuge, for the
sufferer? May not some of us become reconciled to our situation--first
patient of it, then attached to it? Finally, may we not (if our
repugnance be invincible) make a merit of it with God, and offer to him
the sacrifice of our earthly hopes and wishes, in the confidence of an
ample and glorious equivalent? Even if we are unable to offer this
sacrifice with the unction which would ensure its acceptance, still may
we not hope it will not be wholly neglected?--that we may become
tranquil, if not happy--resigned, if not content. Speak, tell me if this
may be?” “And you wish to extort deception from the lips of death--but
you will fail. Hear your doom--Those who are possessed of what may be
called the religious character, that is, those who are visionary, weak,
morose, and ascetic, may elevate themselves to a species of intoxication
in the moments of devotion. They may, while clasping the images, work
themselves into the delusion, that the dead stone thrills to their
touch; that the figures move, assent to their petitions, and turn their
lifeless eyes on them with an expression of benignity. They may, while
kissing the crucifix, believe that they hear celestial voices
pronouncing their pardon; that the Saviour of the world extends his arms
to them, to invite them to beatitude; that all heaven is expanded to
their view, and the harmonies of paradise are enriched to glorify their
apotheosis. But this is a mere inebriation that the most ignorant
physician could produce in his patients by certain medicines. The secret
of this ecstatic swoon might be traced to an apothecary’s shop, or
purchased at a cheaper rate. The inhabitants of the north of Europe
procure this state of exaltation by the use of liquid fire--the Turks by
opium--the Dervises by dancing--and Christian monks by spiritual pride
operating on the exhaustion of a macerated frame. It is all
intoxication, with this difference only, that the intoxication of men of
this world produces always _self_-complacency--that of men of the other
world, a complacency whose supposed source is derived from God. The
intoxication is, therefore, more profound, more delusive, and more
dangerous. But nature, violated by these excesses, exacts a most
usurious interest for this illicit indulgence. She makes them pay for
moments of rapture with hours of despair. Their precipitation from
extasy to horror is almost instantaneous.