"They could not," continued St. Augustine. "And if, Lord, in your wisdom, you
pour an mortal" target="_blank" title="a.不死的n.不朽的人物">immortal soul into them, they will burn eternally" target="_blank" title="ad.永久地；不朽地">eternally in hell in virtue of

your adorable decrees. Thus will the transcendent order, that this old
Welshman has disturbed, be re-established."

"You propose a correct solution to me, son of Monica," said the Lord, "and one
that accords with my wisdom. But it does not satisfy my mercy. And, although

in my essence I am immutable, the longer I endure, the more I incline to
mildness. This change of character is evident to anyone who reads my two

Testaments."
As the discussion continued without much light being thrown upon the matter

and as the blessed showed a disposition to keep repeating the same thing, it
was decided to consult St. Catherine of Alexandria. This is what was usually

done in such cases. St. Catherine while on earth had confounded fifty very
learned doctors. She knew Plato's philosophy in addition to the Holy

Scriptures, and she also possessed a knowledge of rhetoric.
VII. AN ASSEMBLY IN PARADISE (Continuation and End)

St. Catherine entered the assembly, her head encircled by a crown of emeralds,
sapphires, and pearls, and she was clad in a robe of cloth of gold. She

carried at her side a blazing wheel, the image of the one whose fragments had
struck her persecutors.

The Lord having invited her to speak, she expressed herself in these terms:
"Lord, in order to solve the problem you deign to submit to me I shall not

study the habits of animals in general nor those of birds in particular. I
shall only remark to the doctors, confessors, and pontiffs gathered in this

assembly that the separation between man and animal is not complete since
there are monsters who proceed from both. Such are chimeras--half nymphs and

half serpents; such are the three Gorgons and the Capripeds; such are the
Scyllas and the Sirens who sing in the sea. These have a woman's breast and a

fish's tail. Such also are the Centaurs, men down to the waist and the
remainder horses. They are a noble race of monsters. One of them, as you know,

was able, guided by the light of reason alone, to direct his steps towards
eternalblessedness, and you sometimes see his heroic bosom prancing on the

clouds. Chiron, the Centaur, deserved for his works on the earth to share the
abode of the blessed; he it was who gave Achilles his education; and that

young hero, when he left the Centaur's hands, lived for two years, dressed as
a young girl, among the daughters of King Lycomedes. He shared their games and

their bed without allowing any suspicion to arise that he was not a young
virgin like them. Chiron, who taught him such good morals, is, with the

Emperor Trajan, the only righteous man who obtained celestial glory by
following the law of nature. And yet he was but half human.

"I think I have proved by this example that, to reach eternalblessedness, it
is enough to possess some parts of humanity, always on the condition that they

are noble. And what Chiron, the Centaur, could obtain without having been
regenerated by baptism, would not the penguins deserve too, if they became

half penguins and half men? That is why, Lord, I entreat you to give old
Mael's penguins a human head and breast so that they can praise you worthily.

And grant them also an mortal" target="_blank" title="a.不死的n.不朽的人物">immortal soul--but one of small size."
Thus Catherine spoke, and the fathers, doctors, confessors, and pontiffs heard

her with a murmur of approbation.
But St. Anthony, the Hermit, arose and stretching two red and knotty arms

towards the Most High:
"Do not so, O Lord God," he cried, "in the name of your holy Paraclete, do not

so!"
He spoke with such vehemence that his long white beard shook on his chin like

the empty nose-bag of a hungry horse.
"Lord, do not so. Birds with human heads exist already. St. Catherine has told

us nothing new."
"The imagination groups and compares; it never creates," replied St. Catherine

drily.
"They exist already," continued St. Antony, who would listen to nothing. "They

are called harpies, and they are the most obscene animals in creation. One day
as I was having supper in the desert with the Abbot St. Paul, I placed the

table outside my cabin under an old sycamore tree. The harpies came and sat in
its branches; they deafened us with their shrill cries and cast their

excrement over all our food. The clamour of the monsters prevented me from
listening to the teaching of the Abbot St. Paul, and we ate birds' dung with

our bread and lettuces. Lord, it is impossible to believe that harpies could
give thee worthy praise.

"Truly in my temptations I have seen many hybrid beings, not only
women-serpents and women-fishes, but beings still more confusedly formed such

as men whose bodies were made out of a pot, a bell, a clock, a cupboard full
of food and crockery, or even out of a house with doors and windows through

which people engaged in their domestic tasks could be seen. Eternity would not
suffice were I to describe all the monsters that assailed me in my solitude,

from whales rigged like ships to a shower of red insects which changed the
water of my fountain into blood. But none were as disgusting as the harpies

whose offal polluted the leaves of my sycamore."
"Harpies," observed Lactantius, "are female Monsters with birds' bodies. They

have a woman's head and breast. Their forwardness, their shamelessness, and
their obscenity proceed from their female nature as the poet Virgil

demonstrated in his 'Aeneid.' They share the curse of Eve."
"Let us not speak of the curse of Eve," said the Lord. "The second Eve has

redeemed the first."
Paul Orosius, the author of a universal history that Bossuet was to imitate in

later years, arose and prayed to the Lord:
"Lord, hear my prayer and Anthony's. Do not make any more monsters like the

Centaurs, Sirens, and Fauns, whom the Greeks, those collectors of fables,
loved. You will derive no satisfaction from them. Those species of monsters

have pagan inclinations and their double nature does not dispose them to
purity of morals."

The bland Lactantius replied in these terms:
"He who has just spoken is assuredly the best historian in Paradise, for

Herodotus, Thucydides, Polybius, Livy, Velleius Paterculus, Cornelius Nepos,
Suetonius, Manetho, Diodorus Siculus, Dion Cassius, and Lampridius are

deprived of the sight of God, and Tacitus suffers in hell the torments that
are reserved for blasphemers. But Paul Orosius does not know heaven as well as

he knows the earth, for he does not seem to bear in mind that the angels, who
proceed from man and bird, are purity itself."

"We are wandering," said the Eternal. "What have we to do with all those
centaurs, harpies, and angels? We have to deal with penguins."

"You have spoken to the point, Lord," said the chief of the fifty doctors,
who, during their mortal life had been confounded by the Virgin of Alexandria,

"and I dare express the opinion that, in order to put an end to the scandal by
which heaven is now stirred, old Mael's penguins should, as St. Catherine who

confounded us has proposed, be given half of a human body with an eternal soul
proportioned to that half."

At this speech there arose in the assembly a great noise of private
conversations and disputes of the doctors. The Greek fathers argued with the

Latins concerning the substance, nature, and dimensions of the soul that
should be given to the penguins.

"Confessors and pontiffs," exclaimed the Lord, "do not imitate the conclaves
and synods of the earth. And do not bring into the Church Triumphant those

violences that trouble the Church Militant. For it is but too true that in all
the councils held under the inspiration of my spirit, in Europe, in Asia, and

in Africa, fathers have torn the beards and scratched the eyes of other
fathers. Nevertheless they were infallible, for I was with them."

Order being restored, old Hermas arose and slowly uttered these words:
"I will praise you, Lord, for that you caused my mother, Saphira, to be born

amidst your people, in the days when the dew of heaven refreshed the earth
which was in travail with its Saviour. And will praise you, Lord, for having

granted to me to see with my mortal eyes the Apostles of your divine Son. And
I will speak in this illustriousassembly because you have willed that truth

should proceed out of the mouths of the humble, and I will say: 'Change these
penguins to men. It is the only determination conformable to your justice and

your mercy.'"
Several doctors asked permission to speak, others began to do so. No one

listened, and all the confessors were tumultuously shaking their palms and
their crowns.

The Lord, by a gesture of his right hand, appeased the quarrels of his elect.
"Let us not deliberate any longer," said he. "The opinion broached by gentle

old Hermas is the only one conformable to my eternal designs. These birds will
be changed into men. I foresee in this several disadvantages. Many of those

men will commit sins they would not have committed as penguins. Truly their