But the main thing was that the 250 books I own have been removed (by me) from the shelf and placed on the floor; and we shall, please God, get new bookcases for my innumerable volumes. Anyway, it is time I made some more progress with Hilaire Belloc.
But first I want to say - read Hilaire Belloc! He is one of the greatest poets, and one of the greatest prose writers, and one of the greatest historians, and one of the greatest Catholics, and one of the most versatile writers, and one of the greatest geniuses, in the history of the English-speaking world; and for that reason he is so much neglected - at least outside the Catholic body - with the exception of his children's comic verse. Perhaps some of those who read that do investigate his other works. It is to be hoped so.
I shall now endeavour to prove at least some of these assertions. First, one of the greatest poets:
Strong God which made the topmost stars
To circulate and keep their course,
Remember me; whom all the bars
Of sense and dreadful fate enforce.
Above me in your heights and tall,
Impassable the summits freeze;
Below the haunted waters call
Impassable beyond the trees.
I hunger and I have no bread.
My gourd is empty of the wine.
Surely the footsteps of the dead
Are shuffling slowly close to mine!
It darkens. I have lost the ford.
There is a change on all things made.
The rocks have evil faces, Lord,
And I am awfully afraid.
Remember me: the Voids of Hell
Expand enormous all around.
Strong friend of souls, Emmanuel,
Redeem me from accursed ground.
The long descent of wasted days
To these at last have led me down.
Remember that I filled with praise
The meaningless and doubtful ways
That lead to an eternal town.
I challenged and I kept the Faith,
The bleeding path alone I trod;
It darkens. Stand about my wraith,
And harbour me - Almighty God!
That is a great poem. I wish the English language had not been so weakened. That is, in the full sense of the words, a great poem; the child of a great poet.
Then I said he was a great prose writer: here is a passage selected at random from Napoleon Bonaparte:
Talleyrand was a noble of the very highest rank, the head of one of the oldest and most powerful of the French families: and though he had been destined for the church on account of physical infirmity, and though the actual headship of the Talleyrand-Périgord family had therefore been given to his brother, his social status, coupled with his unique genius for diplomacy, his knowledge and judgment in international affairs and in the personnel which conducted them, made him necessary to Bonaparte. Necessary to Bonaparte he remained year after year, although there could be no personal devotion from such a man to such a leader, though he remained to the end ready enough to leave that new master for the old dynasty, and was prepared to plot against Napoleon at any stage of his career, and to stand always ready for a leap if the power of the army-chief should break down. Talleyrand, I say, was necessary to Napoleon: on Talleyrand's judgment he was compelled over and over again to depend; he found by experience that when he did not follow it he commonly came to a worse decision himself. There is therefore a general presumption that in these major decisions, including that of the Duke of Enghien, Talleyrand was Napoleon's adviser. But it remains a presumption only, and there is quite as much against it as for it.
I selected this at random; it is not a piece of what is called fine writing - it is prose. It is real, rumbling, rhythmical prose. It would be a pleasure to read more such. I would venture a long quotation from pages 32 to 46 of this work, but I suppose I had better content myself with a few paragraphs - and this is fine writing:
The kings who had conquered allowed him the Island of Elba for a kingdom, and the Imperial title for a name.
He returned the next year to prove that the French people would not recognize defeat, nor he. Of those who had deserted him, some rallied - none whom he could trust. His genius, re-aroused in a last flame from its embers, thrust in between the armies of the Allies, twice his own in number, thrust back the Prussians at Ligny, while Ney desperately held the British, Belgian, and Dutch, and Hanoverians under Wellington at Quatre-Bras. He failed in a decision against the first through the error of a subordinate, Erlon, which perhaps his old energy would have prevented; he met the allies combined upon the field of Waterloo, and so finally fell.
Driven to take refuge upon the Bellerophon, after failing to find any other issue, he was closely shut up in St. Helena, under conditions of ignominy which are a commonplace of history.
His fatal illness which had perhaps been long upon him - a cancer - ran its course. There, almost alone, his wife having deserted him, communication with his kind being forbidden him, even that child whom he so loved and who was to have been the heir of the Fourth Race shut off from him altogether, he, reconciled at last with a Faith for the fruits of which in civilization he had, not consciously, struggled, the greatest of Captains went through the last gates.
A line has been written worthy of that moment.
"He rose in glory, and his eagle died."
As for "one of the greatest historians", I invite you to read his historical writings. He attained a first-class degree in history. One of the greatest Catholics - this is evident from his writings and from his life. As for a great genius, that is not my own word. I have just searched for the quotation on Google, and have not immediately found it, and I am very tired and so I shall not make further search now, nor further commentary on this great man, who should be better known.
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