Читать книгу The End of the Middle Ages - A. Mary F. Robinson - Страница 20

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Miracles exist in the mind of the witnesses. “Le miracle,” said Lamennais, “existe quand on y croit.” To the latter-day sceptic, the marvels which procured the canonization of Gertrude are such natural trifles that it is difficult to imagine they could ever have filled a whole countryside with rapture and thanksgivingthanksgiving. A sudden downfall of rain, the ceasing of a shower, the finding of a needle—such are her miracles. But hear with what pomp and circumstance the chronicler narrates them.

“One evening when the nuns had finished supper, they went into the court to finish a certain piece of work that they were set to do, and it happened that at this time the sun still shone, notwithstanding that in the sky there were several clouds which threatened rain; wherefore she, sighing, began heartily to converse with the Lord, I hearing all she said, as follows: ‘O Lord God, Creator of everything, I do not wish that thou, as if compelled, should obey the will of me unworthy; none the less would it be very dear to me, if pleasing to Thee, if Thy most liberal goodness shouldst prevail against Thine honest justice to retard a little, for my sake, this rain. None the less, Thy will be done.’ She said these latter words resigning herself into the hands of God, not thinking of aught but the fulfilment of His good pleasure; a marvellous thing it must certainly be accounted, that scarcely had she finished speaking when lightning, thunder, and great drops of rain burst forth with great fury; for which cause, moved with pity for the other sisters, she remained altogether filled with fear, and again she said to the Lord, ‘Let Thy goodness, O most clement God, last at least so long as while we finish our appointed task.’ At these words the most clement God, to show how in everything He was pleased to grant her prayer, held up the rain until the nuns had finished the task they were at work upon; which done, they returned to the convent, and scarcely had they reached the gate when there began a tempest of rain and thunder and lightning, so that some of the sisters who had lingered behind could not enter the door before they were soaked to the skin.”