#God’s Armor#

You remember “Bishop Blougram’s Apology,” Browning’s study of the psychology of a modern Catholic ecclesiastic.  He is not unaware of modern thought, this bishop; he is a man of culture, who wants to have beauty about him, to be a “cabin passenger”: 

  There’s power in me and will to dominate
  Which I must exercise, they hurt me else;
  In many ways I need mankind’s respect,
  Obedience, and the love that’s born of fear.

He wishes that he had faith—­faith in anything; he understands that faith is all-important—­

  Enthusiasm’s the best thing, I repeat.

But you cannot get faith just by wishing for it—­

  But paint a fire, it will not therefore burn!

He tries to imagine himself going on a crusade for truth, but he asks what there would be in it for him—­

     State the facts,
  Read the text right, emancipate the world—­
  The emancipated world enjoys itself
  With scarce a thank-you.  Blougram told it first
  It could not owe a farthing,—­not to him
  More than St. Paul!

So the bishop goes on with his role, but uneasily conscious of the contempt of intellectual people.

  I pine among my million imbeciles
  (You think) aware some dozen men of sense
  Eye me and know me, whether I believe
  In the last winking virgin as I vow,
  And am a fool, or disbelieve in her,
  And am a knave.

But, as he says, you have to keep a tight hold upon the chain of faith, that is what

  Gives all the advantage, makes the difference,
  With the rough, purblind mass we seek to rule. 
  We are their lords, or they are free of us,
  Just as we tighten or relax that hold.

So he continues, but not with entire satisfaction, in his role of shepherd to those whom he calls “King Bomba’s lazzaroni,” and “ragamuffin saints.”

I wander into a Catholic bookstore and look to see what Bishop Blougram is doing with his lazzaroni and his ragamuffin saints here in this new country of the far West.  It is easy to acquire the information, for the saleswoman is polite and the prices fit my purse.  America is going to war, and Catholic boys are being drafted to be trained for battle; so for ten cents I obtain a firmly bound little pamphlet called “God’s Armor, a Prayer Book for Soldiers.”  It is marked “Copyright by the G.R.C.  Central-Verein,” and bears the “Nihil Obstat” of the “Censor Theolog.” and the “Imprimatur” of “Johannes Josephus, Archiepiscopus Sti.  Ludovici”—­which last you may at first fail to recognize as a well-known city on the Mississippi River.  Do you not feel the spell of ancient things, the magic of the past creeping over you, as you read those Latin trade-marks?  Such is the Dead Hand, and its cunning, which can make even St. Louis sound mysterious!