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Penguin Island-Part1_Anatole France_English Literature(文学名著)-第2页

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force from a distance than when they are close at hand. The less they satisfy

desire the more they inspire it. This is the reason why a poet wrote this



verse to one of them:

When present I avoid thee, but when away I find thee.



Thus we see, my son, that the blandishments of carnal love have more power

over hermits and monks than over men who live in the world. All through my



life the demon of lust has tempted me in various ways, but his strongest

temptations did not come to me from meeting a woman, however beautiful and



fragrant she was. They came to me from the image of an absent woman. Even now,

though full of days and approaching my ninety-eighth year, I am often led by



the Enemy to sin against chastity, at least in thought. At night when I am

cold in my bed and my frozen old bones rattle together with a dull sound I



hear voices reciting the second verse of the third Book of the Kings:

'Wherefore his servants said unto him, Let there be sought for my lord the



king a young virgin: and let her stand before the king, and let her cherish

him, and let her lie in thy bosom, that my lord the king may get heat,' and



the devil shows me a girl in the bloom of youth who says to me: 'I am thy

Abishag; I am thy Shunamite. Make, O my lord, room for me in thy couch.'



"Believe me," added the old man, "it is only by the special aid of Heaven that

a monk can keep his chastity in act and in intention."



Applying himself immediately to restoreinnocence and peace to the monastery,

he corrected the calendar according to the calculations of chronology and



astronomy and he compelled all the monks to accept his decision; he sent the

women who had declined from St. Bridget's rule back to their convent; but far



from driving them away brutally, he caused them to be led to their boat with

singing of psalms and litanies.



"Let us respect in them," he said, "the daughters of Bridget and the betrothed

of the Lord. Let us beware lest we imitate the Pharisees who affect to despise



sinners. The sin of these women and not their persons should be abased, and

they should be made ashamed of what they have done and not of what they are,



for they are all creatures of God."

And the holy man exhorted his monks to obey faithfully the rule of their



order.

"When it does not yield to the rudder," said he to them, "the ship yields to



the rock."

III. THE TEMPTATION OF SAINT MAEL



The blessed Mael had scarcely restored order in the Abbey of Yvern before he

learned that the inhabitants of the island of Hoedic, his first catechumens



and the dearest of all to his heart, had returned to paganism, and that they

were hanging crowns of flowers and fillets of wool to the branches of the



sacred fig-tree.

The boatman who brought this sad news expressed a fear that soon those



misguided men might violently destroy the chapel that had been built on the

shore of their island.



The holy man resolvedforthwith to visit his faithless children, so that he

might lead them back to the faith and prevent them from yielding to such



sacrilege. As he went down to the bay where his stone trough was moored, he

turned his eyes to the sheds, then filled with the noise of saws and of



hammers, which, thirty years before, he had erected on the fringe of that bay

for the purpose of building ships.



At that moment, the Devil, who never tires, went out from the sheds and, under

the appearance of a monk called Samsok, he approached the holy man and tempted



him thus:

"Father, the inhabitants of the island of Hoedic commit sins unceasingly.



Every moment that passes removes them farther from God. They are soon going to

use violence towards the chapel that you have raised with your own venerable



hands on the shore of their island. Time is pressing. Do you not think that

your stone trough would carry you more quickly towards them if it were rigged



like a boat and furnished with a rudder, a mast, and a sail, for then you

would be driven by the wind? Your arms are still strong and able to steer a



small craft. It would be a good thing, too, to put a sharp stem in front of

your apostolic trough. You are much too clear-sighted not to have thought of



it already."

"Truly time is pressing," answered the holy man. "But to do as you say,



Samson, my son, would it not be to make myself like those men of little faith

who do not trust the Lord? Would it not be to despise the gifts of Him who has






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