Read Online The Poor Mouth by Flann O’Brien, Patrick C. Power - Free Book Online Page A
Authors: Flann O’Brien, Patrick C. Power
Tags: Fiction, Literary, General, Humorous, Social Science, Family Life, Satire, Poverty, Ireland, Poor, Poor in Literature, Ireland - Fiction, Poor - Fiction
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–I suppose that’s what I mean—you are for ever double-thinking and double-talking. You slither everywhere like quicksilver. There’s no pinning a Jesuit down. Then we’re told it is a mendicant order. Sure there isn’t a better-got collection of men on the face of the earth, churches and palaces all over the world. I know a thing or two. I’ve read books. I’ll tell you something about 35 Lower Leeson Street, the poor cave you hid in yourself.
–What?
–The emaciated friars in that place have red wine with their dinners. That’s more than Saint Peter himself had. But Saint Peter got himself into a sort of a divarsion with a cock. The holy fathers below in Clongowes Wood know all about cocks, too. They have them roasted and they eat them at dinner. And they are great men for scoffing claret.
–Such talk is most unworthy. We eat and drink according to our means. The suggestion that we are, well … sybarites and gluttons is nonsense. And offensive nonsense, Collopy. I do not like such talk.
–Well, is that so? Mr Collopy said testily. Is criticizing the Jesuits a new sin? Would you give somebody five rosaries in the confessional for that? Faith then, if criticizing the Jesuits is a fall from grace, let us say a Hail Mary for the repose of the soul of Pope Paul IV, for he told Ignatius Loyola that there were a lot of things wrong with the Order that would have to be put right. Did you know that? And did Ignatius bend the knee in front of the Holy Father? Not on your life. Give me your damn glass.
–Thanks. I do not say that Ignatius was without fault. Neither was Peter. But Ignatius was canonized in 1622 by Pope Gregory XV, only sixty-six years after his death. He is now in Paradise.
–You know he died without the last rites?
–I do. He was called suddenly. He was weak of body but his labours in this world were prodigious, and nobody can take from him credit for the great deed of founding the Order, which is now and ever has been the intellectual vanguard of the Catholic Church.
–I wouldn’t say the story is quite so simple as that, Father Fahrt. By Dad, the same Order caused a lot of bad bloody ructions at one time.
–The Fathers are all over the world, they speak and write in all languages, they have built a wonderful apparatus for the propagation of the faith.
–Some people at one time thought they were trying to banjax and bewilder the One, Holy and Apostolic. Oh and there are good people who are alive today and think the Church had a very narrow escape from the boyos of yesteryear.
–I know it is useless asking who those important people are.
–In the days of my youth I met a Jesuit in Belfast and he said the Jesuits were the cause of the Franco-Prussian War and the Boer War, for ever meddling in politics, and keeping a sharp eye out for Number One—money.
–Do you tell me so? A Jesuit?
–Yes, a Jesuit. He was a married man, of course.
–Some dreadful apostate, you mean?
–He was a most religious man, and told me he hoped his daughter would become a nun.
–You must have been talking to the ghost of Martin Luther.
–I think the Jesuits are jealous of Luther. He also tried to destroy the Catholic Church. I often think he made a better attempt than you people did.
–Dear me, Collopy, you are very irresponsible. If you talked like that among strangers, you would be in grave danger of giving scandal, of leading others on to sin. You should be more circumspect.
–I am as fond of my altar and my home, Father Fahrt, as the next. But I revere truth. I love truth.
–Well, that is good news.
–I think you are fond of truth, too, provided it is the truth you like, the truth that suits your book.
–Nonsense. Truth is truth.
–There is a phrase in Irish—I’m sorry that through no fault of mine I am largely unacquainted with the old tongue. But the phrase says this: The truth does be bitter.’ I think you know how right that is.
– Magna est Veritas et
–I suppose that’s what I mean—you are for ever double-thinking and double-talking. You slither everywhere like quicksilver. There’s no pinning a Jesuit down. Then we’re told it is a mendicant order. Sure there isn’t a better-got collection of men on the face of the earth, churches and palaces all over the world. I know a thing or two. I’ve read books. I’ll tell you something about 35 Lower Leeson Street, the poor cave you hid in yourself.
–What?
–The emaciated friars in that place have red wine with their dinners. That’s more than Saint Peter himself had. But Saint Peter got himself into a sort of a divarsion with a cock. The holy fathers below in Clongowes Wood know all about cocks, too. They have them roasted and they eat them at dinner. And they are great men for scoffing claret.
–Such talk is most unworthy. We eat and drink according to our means. The suggestion that we are, well … sybarites and gluttons is nonsense. And offensive nonsense, Collopy. I do not like such talk.
–Well, is that so? Mr Collopy said testily. Is criticizing the Jesuits a new sin? Would you give somebody five rosaries in the confessional for that? Faith then, if criticizing the Jesuits is a fall from grace, let us say a Hail Mary for the repose of the soul of Pope Paul IV, for he told Ignatius Loyola that there were a lot of things wrong with the Order that would have to be put right. Did you know that? And did Ignatius bend the knee in front of the Holy Father? Not on your life. Give me your damn glass.
–Thanks. I do not say that Ignatius was without fault. Neither was Peter. But Ignatius was canonized in 1622 by Pope Gregory XV, only sixty-six years after his death. He is now in Paradise.
–You know he died without the last rites?
–I do. He was called suddenly. He was weak of body but his labours in this world were prodigious, and nobody can take from him credit for the great deed of founding the Order, which is now and ever has been the intellectual vanguard of the Catholic Church.
–I wouldn’t say the story is quite so simple as that, Father Fahrt. By Dad, the same Order caused a lot of bad bloody ructions at one time.
–The Fathers are all over the world, they speak and write in all languages, they have built a wonderful apparatus for the propagation of the faith.
–Some people at one time thought they were trying to banjax and bewilder the One, Holy and Apostolic. Oh and there are good people who are alive today and think the Church had a very narrow escape from the boyos of yesteryear.
–I know it is useless asking who those important people are.
–In the days of my youth I met a Jesuit in Belfast and he said the Jesuits were the cause of the Franco-Prussian War and the Boer War, for ever meddling in politics, and keeping a sharp eye out for Number One—money.
–Do you tell me so? A Jesuit?
–Yes, a Jesuit. He was a married man, of course.
–Some dreadful apostate, you mean?
–He was a most religious man, and told me he hoped his daughter would become a nun.
–You must have been talking to the ghost of Martin Luther.
–I think the Jesuits are jealous of Luther. He also tried to destroy the Catholic Church. I often think he made a better attempt than you people did.
–Dear me, Collopy, you are very irresponsible. If you talked like that among strangers, you would be in grave danger of giving scandal, of leading others on to sin. You should be more circumspect.
–I am as fond of my altar and my home, Father Fahrt, as the next. But I revere truth. I love truth.
–Well, that is good news.
–I think you are fond of truth, too, provided it is the truth you like, the truth that suits your book.
–Nonsense. Truth is truth.
–There is a phrase in Irish—I’m sorry that through no fault of mine I am largely unacquainted with the old tongue. But the phrase says this: The truth does be bitter.’ I think you know how right that is.
– Magna est Veritas et
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