He gave directions to his lawyer to discharge all claims upon him, to say that he had gone abroad, and would not return for some time, but begged him not to disclose his whereabouts to any one without first communicating with him at the address he should forward, when he had chosen his headquarters.
Now he began to enter into himself. He must seek some hallowed place of prayer to consecrate his remaining years to God, and renew his baptismal vows, to drink a deep draught of the Divine Spirit as he entered on his new work.
He turned into Notre Dame, to see the place again, and investigate some details of the architecture. He sat down on a bench before the high altar; they were singing the vesper service. A sense of heavenly calm pervaded his soul, his turbulent thoughts were quelled; his disquiet, his vague apprehensions, his disgust with life, all seemed to melt away as the influence of prayer lulled his troubled soul on the breast of God. The organ ceased to peal, the monotone of the priests and the clear young voices of the choir had died away. He peacefully slept in the house of prayer, and angels seemed to whisper sweet words to him, and glorified saints from out the storied panes to counsel him. He was aroused by a _Suisse_, who, noting him as a tourist, and having an eye to a douceur, invited him to come and see the relics, and the treasures in the sacristy and chapels. He declined, and moved away--moved to a less conspicuous place, and again sat down to muse on the great things the sacred fane had witnessed in the past. How many and great events of human history had been enacted under its shadow and beneath its roof! Here, and on that very altar, had been enthroned a vile woman to be worshipped as Goddess of Reason, a visible presentment of what a nation or a single human soul meant when it had cast out God. Could anything, had anything kept the intellect of man from madness when bereft of the idea of essential goodness outside the mean world of man? All history, he must confess, answered "No." And "No" was thunder-pealed from that desecrated altar, where the idea of God had been openly crucified amid the highest civilization of modern Europe, by the lusts and madness of the age of science. Dethroned and cast out for what? When all was gone, and the last traces of the faith stamped out, as far as might be, what was to come in its place? What for that market woman kneeling by his side rapt by devotion at least to an idea more exalted than her business or her pleasures could have suggested? Surely something ennobling her small surroundings, if only by its poetry and sentiment. And that workman there under the sculpture of the Cross-bearer? Not altogether waste of time for him to meditate a few moments on sacrifice of self for good of other men. It might help him perhaps to bear a hand at a neighbour's overpressing burden. And those little children before the picture of the Infant Saviour? At least for them such idealism must be a factor in their mental development which could ill be spared. Philosophy was good for men, the wisdom of the sages had often balanced a wavering mind, and strengthened the fibre of men to dare and do great things; but it was not possible for the masses of mankind to be so sustained any more than it was possible they could be all fed and housed like princes. Was not this contemned Christian religion which he had been helping to push aside, philosophy made easy for simple folk, unlearned and without culture? Would it not still further belittle their poor lives to take their faith from them? For them Plato, Dante, and Shakespeare were not horn-books. Was it so very wise to take away their gospels, and their psalms, and leave them nothing to elevate the daily round of life's task above the muddy floor of their miserable dwellings?