The Altar Steps by Compton MacKenzie

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On their way back to the Abbey Mark found himself walking with Mr.
Lamplugh, the ancient priest, who turned out to have known his father.

"Dear me, are you really the son of James Lidderdale? Why, I used to go
and preach at Lima Street in old days long before your father married.
And so you're Lidderdale's son. Now I wonder why you want to be a monk."

Mark gave an account of himself since he left school and tried to give
some good reasons why he was at Malford.

"And so you were with Rowley? Well, really you ought to know something
about missions by now. But perhaps you're tired of mission work
already?" the old priest inquired with a quick glance at Mark as if he
would see how much of the real stuff existed underneath that
probationer's cassock.

"This is an active Order, isn't it?" Mark countered. "Of course, I'm not
tired of mission work. But after being with Father Rowley and being kept
busy all the time I found that being at home in the country made me
idle. I told the Reverend Father that I hoped to be ordained as a
secular priest and that I did not imagine I had any vocation for the
contemplative life. I have as a matter of fact a great longing for it.
But I don't think that twenty-one is a good age for being quite sure if
that longing is not mere sentiment. I suppose you think I'm just
indulging myself with the decorative side of religion, Father Lamplugh?
I really am not. I can assure you that I'm far too much accustomed to
the decorative side to be greatly influenced by it."

The old priest laid a thin hand on Mark's sleeve.

"To tell the truth, my dear boy, I was on the verge of violating the
decencies of accepted hospitality by criticizing the Order of which you
have become a probationer. I am just a little doubtful about the
efficacy of its method of training young men. However, it really is not
my business, and I hope that I am wrong. But I _am_ a little doubtful if
all these excellent young brethren are really desirous . . . no, I'll
not say another word, I've already disgracefully exceeded the
limitations to criticism that courtesy alone demands of me. I was
carried away by my interest in you when I heard whose son you were. What
a debt we owe to men like your father and Rowley! And here am I at
seventy-six after a long and useless life presuming to criticize other
people. God forgive me!" The old man crossed himself.

That afternoon and evening recreation was unusually noisy, and during
Vespers one or two of the brethren were seized with an attack of giggles
because Brother Lawrence, who was in a rapt condition of mind owing to
the near approach of St. Lawrence's day when he was to be clothed as a
novice, tripped while he was holding back the cope during the censing of
the _Magnificat_ and falling on his knees almost upset Father Lamplugh.
There was no doubt that the way Brother Lawrence stuck out his lower jaw
when he was self-conscious was very funny; but Mark wished that the
giggling had not occurred in front of Father Lamplugh. He wished too
that during recreation after supper Brother Raymond would be less
skittish and Brother Dunstan less arch in the manner of reproving him.

"Holy simplicity is all very well," Mark thought. "But holy imbecility
is a great bore, especially when there is a stranger present."

Luckily Father Burrowes came back the following week, and Mark's
deepening impression of the monastery's futility was temporarily
obliterated by the exciting news that the Bishop of Alberta whom the
brethren were taught to reverence as a second founder would be the guest
of the Order on St. Lawrence's day and attend the profession of Brother
Anselm. Mark had not yet seen Brother Anselm, who was the brother in
charge of the Aldershot priory, and he welcomed the opportunity of
witnessing those solemn final vows. He felt that he should gain much
from meeting Brother Anselm, whose work at Aldershot was considered
after the Reverend Father's preaching to be the chief glory of the
Order. Brother Lawrence was a little jealous that his name day, on which
he was to be clothed in Chapter as a novice, should be chosen for the
much more important ceremony, and he spoke sharply to poor Brother
Walter when the latter rejoiced in the added lustre Brother Anselm's
profession would shed upon his own promotion.

"You must remember, Brother," he said, "that you'll probably remain a
postulant for a very long time."

"But not for ever," replied poor Brother Walter in a depressed tone of
voice.

"There may not be time to attend to you," said Brother Lawrence
spitefully. "You may have to wait until the Bishop has gone."

"Oh dear, oh dear," sighed Brother Walter looking woeful. "Brother Mark,
do you hear what they say?"

"Never mind," said Mark, "we'll take our final vows together when
Brother Lawrence is still a doddering old novice."

Brother Lawrence clicked his tongue and bit his under lip in disgust at
such a flippant remark.

"What a thing to say," he muttered, and burying his hands in his sleeves
he walked off disdainfully, his jaw thrust before him.

"Like a cow-catcher," Mark thought with a smile.

The Bishop of Alberta was a dear old gentleman with silvery hair and a
complexion as fresh and pink as a boy's. With his laced rochet and
purple biretta he lent the little matchboarded chapel an exotic
splendour when he sat in a Glastonbury chair beside the altar during the
Office. The more ritualistic of the brethren greatly enjoyed giving him
reverent genuflexions and kissing his episcopal ring. Brother Raymond's
behaviour towards him was like that of a child who has been presented
with a large doll to play with, a large doll that can be dressed and
undressed at the pleasure of its owner with nothing to deter him except
a faint squeak of protest such as the Bishop himself occasionally
emitted.

CHAPTER XXV

SUSCIPE ME, DOMINE

Brother Anselm was to arrive on the vigil of St. Lawrence. Normally
Brother Walter would have been sent to meet him with the Abbey cart at
the station three miles away. But Brother Walter was in a state of such
excitement over his near promotion to postulant that it was not
considered safe to entrust him with the pony. So Mark was sent in his
place. It was a hot August evening with thunder clouds lying heavy on
the Malford woods when Mark drove down the deep lanes to the junction,
wondering what Brother Anselm would be like and awed by the imagination
of Brother Anselm's thoughts in the train that was bringing him from
Aldershot to this momentous date of his life's history. Almost before he
knew what he was saying Mark was quoting from _Romeo and Juliet_:

_My mind misgives_
_Some consequence, yet hanging in the stars,_
_Shall bitterly begin his fearful date_
_With this night's revels._

"Now why should I have thought that?" he asked himself, and he was just
deciding that it was merely a verbal sequence of thought when the first
far-off peal of thunder muttered a kind of menacing contradiction of so
easy an explanation. It would be raining soon; Mark thumped the pony's
angular haunches, and tried to feel cheerful in the oppressive air.

Brother Anselm did not appear as Mark had pictured him. Instead of the
lithe enthusiast with flaming eyes he saw a heavily built man with
blunted features, wearing powerful horn spectacles, his expression
morose, his movements ungainly. He had, however, a mellow and strangely
sympathetic voice, in which Mark fancied that he perceived the power he
was reputed to wield over the soldiers for whose well-being he fought so
hard. Mark would have liked to ask him about life in the Aldershot
priory; perhaps if Brother Anselm had been less taciturn, he would have
broken if not the letter at any rate the spirit of the Rule by begging
the senior to ask for his services in the Priory. But no sooner were
they jogging back to Malford than the rain came down in a deluge, and
Brother Anselm, pulling the hood of his frock over his head, was more
unapproachable than ever. Mark wished that he had a novice's frock and
hood, for the rain was pouring down the back of his neck and the
threadbare cassock he wore was already drenched.

"Thank you, Brother," said the new-comer when the Abbey was attained.

It was dark by now, and, with nothing visible of the speaker except his
white habit in the gloom, the voice might have been the voice of a
heavenly visitant, so rarely sweet, so gentle and harmonious were the
tones. Mark was much moved by that brief recognition of himself.

The wind rose high during the night; listening to it roaring through the
coppice in which the Abbey was built, Mark lay awake for a long time in
mute prayer that Brother Anselm might find peace and felicity in his new
state. And while he prayed for Brother Anselm he prayed for Esther in
Shoreditch. In the morning when Mark went from cell to cell, rousing the
brethren from sleep with his hammer and salutation, the sun was climbing
a serene and windless sky. The familiar landscape was become a mountain
top. Heaven was very near.

Mark was glad that the day was so fair for the profession of Brother
Anselm, and at Lauds the antiphon, versicle, and response proper to St.
Lawrence appealed to him by their fitness to the occasion,

_Gold is tried in the fire: and acceptable men in the furnace of
adversity._

_V. The Righteous shall grow as a lily._
_R. He shall flourish for ever before the Lord._

Mark concerned himself less with his own reception as a postulant. The
distinction between a probationer and a postulant was very slight,
really an arbitrary one made by Father Burrowes for his own convenience,
and until he had to decide whether he should petition to be clothed as a
novice Mark did not feel that he was called upon to take himself too
seriously as a monk. For that reason he did not change his name, but
preferred to stay Brother Mark. The little ceremony of reception was
carried through in Chapter before the brethren went into the Oratory to
say Terce, and Brother Walter was so much excited when he heard himself
addressed as Brother Simon that for a moment it seemed doubtful if he
would be sufficiently calm to attend the profession of Brother Anselm at
the conventual Mass. However, during the clothing of Brother Lawrence as
a novice Brother Simon quieted down, and even gave over counting the
three knots in the rope with which he had been girdled. Ordinarily,
Brother Lawrence would have been clothed after Mass, but this morning it
was felt that such a ceremony coming after the profession of Brother
Anselm would be an anti-climax, and it was carried through in Chapter.
It took Brother Lawrence all he had ever heard and read about humility
and obedience not to protest at the way his clothing on his own saint's
day, for which he had been made to wait nearly a year, was being carried
through in such a hole in the corner fashion. But he fixed his mind upon
the torments of the blessed archdeacon on the gridiron and succeeded in
keeping his temper.

Mark felt that the profession of Brother Anselm lost some of its dignity
by the absence of Brother George and Brother Birinus, the only other
professed members of the Order apart from Father Burrowes himself. It
struck him as slightly ludicrous that a few young novices and postulants
should represent the venerable choir-monks whom one pictured at such a
ceremony from one's reading of the Rule of St. Benedict. Moreover,
Father Burrowes never presented himself to Mark's imagination as an
authentic abbot. Nor indeed was he such. Malford Abbey was a courtesy
title, and such monastic euphemisms as the Abbot's Parlour and the
Abbot's Lodgings to describe the matchboarded apartments sacred to the
Father Superior, while they might please such ecclesiastical enthusiasts
as Brother Raymond, appealed to Mark as pretentious and somewhat silly.
In fact, if it had not been for the presence of the Bishop of Alberta in
cope and mitre Mark would have found it hard, when after Terce the
brethren assembled in the Chapter-room to hear Brother Anselm make his
final petition, to believe in the reality of what was happening, to
believe, when Brother Anselm in reply to the Father Superior's
exhortation chose the white cowl and scapular (which in the Order of St.
George differentiated the professed monk from the novice) and rejected
the suit of dittos belonging to his worldly condition, that he was
passing through moments of greater spiritual importance than any since
he was baptized or than any he would pass through before he stood upon
the threshold of eternity.

But this was a transient scepticism, a fleeting discontent, which
vanished when the brethren formed into procession and returned to the
oratory singing the psalm: _In Convertendo_.

_When the Lord turned again the captivity of Sion: then were we
like unto them, that dream._

_Then was our mouth filled with laughter: and our tongue with joy._

_Then said they among the heathen: The Lord hath done great things
for them._

_Yea, the Lord hath done great things for us already: whereof we
rejoice._

_Turn our captivity, O Lord: as the rivers in the south._

_They that sow in tears: shall reap in joy._

_He that now goeth on his way weeping, and beareth forth good seed:
shall doubtless come again with joy, and bring his sheaves with
him._

The Father Superior of the Order sang the Mass, while the Bishop of
Alberta seated in his Glastonbury chair suffered with an expression of
childlike benignity the ritualistic ministrations of Brother Raymond,
the ceremonial doffing and donning of his mitre. It was very still in
the little Oratory, for it was the season when birds are hushed; and
even Sir Charles Horner who was all by himself in the ante-chapel did
not fidget or try to peep through the heavy brocaded curtains that shut
out the quire. Mark dared not look up when at the offertory Brother
Anselm stood before the Altar and answered the solemn interrogations of
the Father Superior, question after question about his faith and
endurance in the life he desired to enter. And to every question he
answered clearly _I will_. The Father Superior took the parchment on
which were written the vows and read aloud the document. Then it was
placed upon the Altar, and there upon that sacrificial stone Brother
Anselm signed his name to a contract with Almighty God. The holy calm
that shed itself upon the scene was like a spell on every heart that was
beating there in unison with the heart of him who was drawing nearer to
Heaven. Prostrating himself, the professed monk prayed first to God the
Father:

_O receive me according to thy word that I may live; and let me not
be disappointed of my hope._

The hearts that beat in unison with his took up the prayer, and the
voices of his brethren repeated it word for word. And now the professed
monk prayed to God the Son:

_O receive me according to thy word that I may live; and let me not
be disappointed of my hope._

Once more his brethren echoed the entreaty.

And lastly the professed monk prayed to God the Holy Ghost:

_O receive me according to thy word that I may live; and let me not
be disappointed of my hope._

For the third time his brethren echoed the entreaty, and then one and
all in that Oratory cried:

_Glory be to the Father and to the Son and to the Holy Ghost; as it
was in the beginning, is now, and ever shall be, world without end.
Amen._

There followed prayers that the peace of God might be granted to the
professed monk to enable him worthily to perform the vows which he had
made, and before the blessing and imposition of the scapular the Bishop
rose to speak in tones of deep emotion:

"Brethren, I scarcely dared to hope, when, now nearly ten years ago, I
received the vows of your Father Superior as a novice, that I should one
day be privileged to be present at this inspiring ceremony. Nor even
when five years ago in the far north-west of Canada I professed your
Father Superior and those two devoted souls who will soon be with you,
now that their work in Malta is for the time finished, did I expect to
find myself in this beautiful Oratory which your Order owes to the
generosity of a true son of the Church. My heart goes out to you, and I
thank God humbly that He has vouchsafed to hear my prayers and bless the
enterprise from which I had indeed expected much, but which Almighty God
has allowed to prosper more, far more, than I ventured to hope. All my
days I have longed to behold the restoration of the religious life to
our country, and now when my eyes are dim with age I am granted the
ineffable joy of beholding what for too long in my weakness and lack of
faith I feared was never likely to come to pass.

"The profession of our dear brother this morning is, I pray, an earnest
of many professions at Malford. May these first vows placed upon the
Altar of this Oratory be blessed by Almighty God! May our brother be
steadfast and happy in his choice! Brethren, I had meant to speak more
and with greater eloquence, but my heart is too full. The Lord be with
you."

Now Brother Anselm was clothed in the blessed habit while the brethren
sang:

_Come, Holy Ghost, our souls inspire,_
_And lighten with celestial fire._

The Father Superior of the Order gave him the paternal kiss. He begged
the prayers of his brethren there assembled, and drawing the hood of his
cowl over his head prostrated himself again before the Altar. The Mass
proceeded.

If the strict Benedictine usage had been followed at Malford, Brother
Anselm would have remained apart from the others for three days ofter
his profession, wrapped in his cowl, alone with God. But he was anxious
to go back to Aldershot that very afternoon, excusing himself because
Brother Chad, left behind in charge of the Priory, would be overwhelmed
by his various responsibilities. Brother Dunstan, who had wept
throughout the ceremony of the profession, was much upset by Brother
Anselm's departure. He had hoped to achieve great exaltation of spirit
by Brother Anselm's silent presence. He began to wonder if the newly
professed monk appreciated his position. Had himself been granted what
Brother Anselm had been granted, he should have liked to spend a week in
contemplation of the wonder which had befallen him. Brother Dunstan
asked himself if his thoughts were worthy of a senior novice, of one who
had for a while acted as Prior and been accorded the address of Reverend
Brother. He decided that they were not, and as a penance he begged for
the nib with which Brother Anselm had signed his profession. This he
wore round his neck as an amulet against unbrotherly thoughts and as a
pledge of his own determination to vow himself eternally to the service
of God.

Mark was glad that Brother Anselm was going back so soon to his active
work. It was an assurance that the Order of St. George did have active
work to do; and when he was called upon to drive Brother Anselm to the
station he made up his mind to conquer his shyness and hint that he
should be glad to serve the Order in the Priory at Aldershot.

This time, notwithstanding that he had a good excuse to draw his hood
close, Brother Anselm showed himself more approachable.

"If the Reverend Father suggests your name," he promised Mark, "I shall
be glad to have you with us. Brother Chad is simply splendid, and the
Tommies are wonderful. It's quite right of course to have a Mother
House, but. . . ." He broke off, disinclined to criticize the direction
of the Order's policy to a member so junior as Mark.

"Oh, I'm not asking you to do anything yet awhile," Mark explained. "I
quite realize that I have a great deal to learn before I should be any
use at Aldershot or Sandgate. I hope you don't mind my talking like
this. But until this morning I had not really intended to remain in the
Order. My hope was to be ordained as soon as I was old enough. Now since
this morning I feel that I do long for the spiritual support of a
community for my own feeble aspirations. The Bishop's words moved me
tremendously. It wasn't what he said so much, but I was filled with all
his faith and I could have cried out to him a promise that I for one
would help to carry on the restoration. At the same time, I know that
I'm more fitted for active work, not by any good I expect to do, but for
the good it will do me. I suppose you'd say that if I had a true
vocation I shouldn't be thinking about what part I was going to play in
the life of the Order, but that I should be content to do whatever I was
told. I'm boring you?" Mark broke off to inquire, for Brother Anselm was
staring in front of him through his big horn spectacles like an owl.

"No, no," said the senior. "But I'm not the novice-master. Who is, by
the way?"

"Brother Jerome."

The other did not comment on this information, but Mark was sure that he
was trying not to look contemptuous.

Soon the junction came in sight, and from down the line the white smoke
of a train approaching.

"Hurry, Brother, I don't want to miss it."

Mark thumped the haunches of the pony and drove up just in time for
Brother Anselm to escape.

"Thank you, Brother," said that same voice which yesterday, only
yesterday night, had sounded so rarely sweet. Here on this mellow August
afternoon it was the voice of the golden air itself, and the shriek of
the engine did not drown its echoes in Mark's soul where all the way
back to Malford it was chiming like a bell.

CHAPTER XXVI

ADDITION

Mark's ambition to go and work at Aldershot was gratified before the end
of August, because Brother Chad fell ill, and it was considered
advisable to let him spend a long convalescence at the Abbey.

The Priory,

17, Farnborough Villas,

Aldershot.

St. Michael and All Angels.

My dear Rector,

I don't think you'll be sorry to read from the above address that
I've been transferred from Malford to one of the active branches of
the Order. I don't accept your condemnation of the Abbey as
pseudo-monasticism, though I can quite well understand that my
account of it might lead you to make such a criticism. The trouble
with me is that my emotions and judgment are always quarrelling. I
suppose you might say that is true of most people. It's like the
palmist who tells everybody that he is ruled by his head or his
heart, as the case may be. But when one approaches the problem of
religion (let alone what is called the religious life) one is
terribly perplexed to know which is to be obeyed. I don't think
that you can altogether rule out emotion as a touchstone of truth.
The endless volumes of St. Thomas Aquinas, through which I've been
wading, do not cope with the fact that the whole of his vast
intellectual and severely logical structure is built up on the
assumption of faith, which is the gift of emotion, not judgment.
The whole system is a petitio principii really.

I did not mean to embark on a discussion of the question of the
Ultimate Cause of religion, but to argue with you about the
religious life! The Abbot Paphnutius told Cassian that there were
three sorts of vocation--ex Deo, per hominem, and ex necessitate.
Now suppose I have a vocation, mine is obviously per hominem. I
inherit the missionary spirit from my father. That spirit was
fostered by association with Rowley. My main object in entering the
Order of St. George was to work among soldiers, not because I felt
that soldiers needed "missionizing" more than any other class, but
because the work at Chatsea brought me into contact with both
sailors and soldiers, and turned my thoughts in their direction. I
also felt the need of an organization behind my efforts. My first
impulse was to be a preaching friar, but that would have laid too
much on me as an individual, and from lack of self-confidence,
youthfulness, want of faith perhaps, I was afraid. Well, to come
back to the Abbot Paphnutius and his three vocations--it seems
fairly clear that the first, direct from God, is a better vocation
than the one which is inspired by human example, or the third,
which arises from the failure of everything else. At the same time
they ARE all three genuine vocations. What applies to the vocation
seems to me to apply equally to the community. What you stigmatize
as our pseudo-monasticism is still experimental, and I think I can
see the Reverend Father's idea. He has had a great deal of
experience with an Order which began so amateurishly, if I may use
the word, that nobody could have imagined that it would grow to the
size and strength it has reached in ten years. The Bishop of
Alberta revealed much to us of our beginnings during his stay at
the Abbey, and after I had listened to him I felt how presumptuous
it was for me to criticize the central source of the religious life
we are hoping to spread. You see, Rector, I must have criticized it
implicitly in my letters to you, for your objections are simply the
expression of what I did not like to say, but what I managed to
convey through the medium of would-be humorous description. One
hears of the saving grace of humour, but I'm not sure that humour
is a saving grace. I rather wish that I had no sense of humour.
It's a destructive quality. All the great sceptics have been
humourists. Humour is really a device to secure human comfort. Take
me. I am inspired to become a preaching friar. I instantly perceive
the funny side of setting out to be a preaching friar. I tell
myself that other people will perceive the funny side of it, and
that consequently I shall do no good as a preaching friar. Yes,
humour is a moisture which rusts everything except gold. As a
nation the Jews have the greatest sense of humour, and they have
been the greatest disintegrating force in the history of mankind.
The Scotch are reputed to have no sense of humour, and they are
morally the most impressive nation in the world. What humour is
allowed them is known as dry humour. The corroding moisture has
been eliminated. They are still capable of laughter, but never so
as to interfere with their seriousness in the great things of life.
I remember I once heard a tiresome woman, who was striving to be
clever, say that Our Lord could not have had much sense of humour
or He would not have hung so long on the Cross. At the time I was
indignant with the silly blasphemy, but thinking it over since I
believe that she was right, and that, while her only thought had
been to make a remark that would create a sensation in the room,
she had actually hit on the explanation of some of Our Lord's human
actions. And his lack of humour is the more conspicuous because he
was a Jew. I was reading the other day a book of essays by one of
our leading young latitudinarian divines, in which he was most
anxious to prove that Our Lord had all the graces of a well-bred
young man about town, including a pretty wit. He actually claimed
that the pun on Peter's name was an example of Our Lord's urbane
and genial humour! It gives away the latitudinarian position
completely. They're really ashamed of Christianity. They want to
bring it into line with modern thought. They hope by throwing
overboard the Incarnation, the Resurrection of the Body, and the
Ascension, to lighten the ship so effectually that it will ride
buoyantly over the billows of modern knowledge. But however lightly
the ship rides, she will still be at sea, and it would be the
better if she struck on the rock of Peter and perished than that
she should ride buoyantly but aimlessly over the uneasy oceans of
knowledge.

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