Now, it is from the point of view of art itself that I ask the following
questions: Was Delsarte a devout Catholic? Was he orthodox?
Devout? He gloried in it, he insisted on it; I will not say that he
_affected_ minute daily acts of devotion, for that word would not accord
with the spontaneity of his nature; but he accented his demonstrations,
he spoke constantly of his religion. Without any intention to wrong the
serious side of his religious feelings, it seemed to be a bravado put on
for the incredulous, a toy which he converted into a weapon.
Orthodox? He made it his boast, and he certainly intended to be so; he
loved, in many circumstances, to show his humility of heart. His faith,
he used to say, "was the charcoal-burner's faith."
And yet, the charcoal-burner would have been strangely puzzled if he had
had to sustain the ceaseless contests which the artist accepted or
provoked from philosophers and free-thinkers; and, perhaps, no less
frequently, from his fellow-religionists, and the priests themselves.
With the former, it was a mere question of dogmatic forms or of the
necessity for some form of religion; with the latter, he entered upon a
more peculiarly theological order of ideas, such as the attributes
proper to each of the three divine persons, and other mystical subjects.
Here, as elsewhere, Delsarte brought to bear his personality, his stamp,
his breadth of comprehension.
Pages:
245
246
247
248
249
250
251
252
253
254
255
256
257
258
259
260
261
262
263
264
265
266
267
268
269