Pittsburg dispatch. [volume] (Pittsburg [Pa.]) 1880-1923, 1890-11-29
Resurrection of the Love Letters of a
Portuguese Nun.
A TALE OF TWO CENTURIES AGO
Henry C. Lea's Volume Dealing With the
Spanish InquiSitiOn.
LITERATURE OF GENERAL INTEREST.

Omcers VINO rOQe before Was Tue young
MARQUIS of Charnilly The Marquis OF
Charnilly was described by his cotempor-
aries as "the best man in the world, the
bravest, the most honorable" Perhaps he
was. 1t was bad world, that over which
Louis XIV was ruler, aud the Marquis
may have been the best man in it, and
rascal all the same. Anyway, he was a
rascal.
How many heads the young officer broke
in that grim game of war, we know not
He broke woman's heart. He may have
killed a good many men, he did kill one
woman. Back he rode after his sum-
mer of soldering, and brought a bun
die of letters with him as trophy
And be and his gallant companions
read them together and laughed over them,
and thought it all great fun. And by and
by the letters got even into print. And here
they are to-day, where he can read who will:
"The Love Letters of Portuguese Nun"
(Cassell Publishing Co.; j. R..Weldin &
Coz.
She only said my heart is dreary.
He cometh not, she said;
She said am aweary, aweary,
wish that were dead!
That is what the Mariana sighed who
lCOkeQ OUT OF IDe WluOOWS Ol lUS IuOdbtu
grange. The Portuguese Nuns name was
Mariana, too. At Beia she lived, ''be-
tween Estramadura and Andalusia." Here
one dav, from the convent balcony, in those
lax times, she saw the handsome young Off
Ger. And Mariana was not profoundly
religious She had no vocation" as they
say, nun as she was, and sne was very hu-
man. And then, after q summer of stolen
interviews and sweet words, away went
Charnilly to marry an heiress, like the pru-
dent man he was, and Mariana saw his
face no more
1t was then that she wrote these five
strange letters, all fire and tears-Heloise
and Abelard over again, with difference.
Full of tenderness and indignation, and re-
gret, and hate, and love-a heart speaking
straight out every thought of it
II.
Now, If the InqUisition could but have
spent its fine energies upon such heretics,as
the Marquis of CharniIly, il might have
been some help in the world, instead of the
long hIndrance that it was. Surely the
lnost damnable of heresies is the 'heresy of
Cain" who asked, cam L nv brothers
keeper" and answered NO." under his
breath.
But the good fathers of the Iuquisition
did not think SO. The worst offense which q
man could commit, they thought, was not to
be loose in his behavior, Dut to be lax in his
belief. Better break 20 commandments than
to tamper with a single syllable OF the creed!
No man was burned TO death, in all the
bonfres of that black time, for breaking a
woman's heart
And so the story of the Inquisition is the
record, grievous to read, OF a fearful misap-
pllcation of righteous energy. For several
hundreds of years. especially in Spain, the
whole energy of the Christian church was
exerted to keep men from thinking.
But men went on thinking, nevertheless.
You can't keep men from thinking. Good
Mrs. Partington, whose house was on the
seashore, piled her mop very diligently one
stormy morning to keep out the whole At
lantic Ocean. But the Atlantic Ocean
came in.
1t is with an account of the censorship of
the press that Mr.. Henry c. Lea begins his
chapters from the Religious History of
Spain" (Lea Brothers & Co.: j. r. We'll
din s. Coz Mr.. Lea, it NAV be remarked
in passing, is pretty well known just now,
quite outside of literary circles, by reason
of letter which he wrote to be read by Mr..
Matthew Stanley Quay. He knows more
than any man on this continent about the
Inguisitiou, but he knows a good deal about
politics, too.
The Critics Review of the fifteenth and
sixteenth centuries was a serious affair, In
deed. As the critic determined, so it was.
II he disapproved, that was the end of the
book. Sometimes it was the end of the au-
thor. Alas for the misguided commentator
who preferred the rules of grammar to the
definitions of orthodoxyp' Alas for the
journalist alas for the "pestilent news
monger," who ventured the most
remote allusion to matters about
oil nj
Every page, every paragraph, every
punctuation mark must be submitted to the
Royal Council; and, being approved and
printed, must then be taken with the copy"
TO the corrector general that he might satisfy
himself that there had been no change
betwi1t the pencil and the type; finally,
that official giving his sanction, permission
must be secured from some other department
of the State, to go ahead and publish the
paper. Of course, no newspaper could
breathe in that close atmosphere. 1t was as
bad as Russia.
The result of the Spanish Inquisition was
the intellectual morasnus" of Spain.
Spain, after that sort of discipline, has
never amounted to anything.
''The Mystics and Illumati" is the title of
another chapter. The condition ofdemoniacs
and their accusations against Jews in the
Middle Ages, are considered in carefully
written papers.
Mr.. Lea knows everything about his sub
ject which anyone can know at this remove
rom that blind generation. He has left no
book unopened which might teach him any
truth about it. He is perfectly fair, serene
of temper, contenting himself with stating
simply the absolute facts, and stating them
in style which is clearness itself, forcible
aud full of interest. This is book of
which American scholarship may be proud.
1t is OF permanent Importance.
III.
One of the points which the corrector gen.
eral was directed to look after in book was
its legibility. That would commend itself
to Mr.. Ruskin, who insists that next to the
importance of the work of the writer is the
work of the printer. 1t would be unspeak-
ably dreadful to have the Inquisition revived
in English-speakingc countries with Mr. Rus
kin for corrector general. 1t is bad enough to
have ones ears boxed in every other para
graph, and to be called all manner of bad
names. Such castigation, such injury and
insult, all disciples of Mr.. Ruskin endure
with patience, knowing what is coming. He
is as bad as DR.. Busby. But to give him
matches and faggots-whv the smoke of
burning Libraries and of singeing writers
would out-smoke the forest fires of Oregon
and Washington However, he is right in
this matter. Books ought to be both men,
tally and physically readable. The little
set of books by Mr.. Ruskin, which is pub
lshed by John Wiley & Sons, and sold
Isl a volume). by j. r. Weldin & Co., sat-
isles this condition. "Sesane and Lilies"
Queen of the Air." Grown of Wild
Olive" and Ethics of the Dust" are the