The New Zealand Tablet THURSDAY, OCTOBER 7, 1920. JEANNE D’ARC

New Zealand Tablet, 7 October 1920, Page 25

The New Zealand Tablet THURSDAY, OCTOBER 7, 1920. JEANNE D’ARC

SN i splendid passage de Quincey says: “She never sang together with the.songs that rose in her native Domremy, as echoes to the departing footsteps of the invaders. She mingled not in the festive dances at Vancouleurs which celebrated in rapture the redemption of France. No ! for her voice was then silent; no ! for her feet were then dust. Pure, innocent, noblehearted girl, this was among the strongest pledges for thy truth, that never once no, not for, a moment of ; weakness— didst thou revel in the vision of coronets and honor from man. Coronets for thee! Oh no! Honors, if they come when all is over, are for those who share thy blood. Daughter of Domremy, when the gratitude of thy king shall awaken, thou -wilt be sleeping the sleep of the dead. . . When the thunders of universal France, as even yet may happen, shall proclaim the grandeur of the shepherd girl that gave up all for her country, thy ear, young shepherd girl, shall have been dead for five centuries. . To suffer and to do, that was thy portion in life; that was thy destiny; and not for a moment was it hidden from thy-

self. Life, thou saidst, is short arid'the sleep which is in the grave is long. .Let.us use that life, so transitory, for the glory of those heavenly dreams destined to ■comfort the sleep that is so long." Thus did an Englishman, with reverent hand, come, after long centuries, to lay a wreath on the tomb of the Maid whom his countrymen murdered to their everlasting dishonor. De Quincey was a true prophet. The thunders of universal France—nay, of the universal Church whose eldest daughter is France, have proclaimed the glory of Jeanne and the grandeur of her work. In this year of grace victorious France has witnessed the canonisation of her whom the enemies of France made to walk the furnaces of Rouen.

No figure like hers ever appeared on the stage of history. The facts of her life are more wonderful than fiction; the story of her death is a tragedy that still burns the eyes of those who. read it. Miraculous force and courage were inspired by her words she won battles . without - striking a blow; she rode lonely amid 'armies into the smoke of conflict to return in triumph amid the wild enthusiasm of her people. All that is now of the long, long past; and all that matters much to France and little to Jeanne in comparison of the fact that under her coat of mail beat the innocent heart of a virginal girl who had no other motive in all she did than to follow where God called : all her mortal glory, as all her mortal sufferings, matter little compared to her simple piety and her flaming charity that embraced even her bitter foes. In the eyes of the world her victories were her glory, but in the sight of God there was no victory like that which was hers on the day when the fires of her martyr's pile blackened her young limbs and destroyed all that was mortal of her. "Jeanne d'Arc," said Pope Benedict XV., "ought for ever be crowned with flowers, for her virtues were countless. And the flowers that ought to adorn her elect brow ought to be of the rarest, because the virtues that shone forth in her are of incomparable splendor." Jeanne saved France; but she could never have done so were it not for her virtues. And we who talk and plan to-day concerning a reconstruction that is to save not only France but the world must learn from Jeanne's example that there can be no salvation except by virtues such as hers. Without a fundamental reconstruction of private lives on the lines of Christian virtues there can be no hope of those vaunted social and political reconstructions of which statesmen talk : without Christian virtues there can be built only a tower of Babel that will be a monument to a new confusion worse than the old.

Half a century ago now, pronouncing a panegyric on Jeanne at Orleans, Monsignor Freppel said: "Patriotism is certainly a most lawful sentiment; but how often is it not combined with hatred for foreigners. In the heart of Jeanne there was no room for that. Her mission was to expel the English from France because they had no right to be there; but what glowing charity was manifest in the efforts she made to accomplish her mission by ways of peace ! Perhaps some might be inclined to regard as too ingenuous her repeated invitations to her foes before attacking them. No ; these letters of hers which we still possess are simply sublime : they are sealed with the seal of a virtue which divine grace purified from every imperfection." There is one lesson that those who rule ought to learn from the Maid of Orleans. Egotism, pagan ideals, covetousness, have divided men and nations. Only Christian charity like that of Jeanne d'Arc can ever again unite them in a common brotherhood. Her canonisation, reserved for the end of the greatest, war of all time, seems in a providential manner to point the moral for those who can profit by it. As her victorious oriflamme united France in bygone days, Sainte Jeanne now offers us all in her virtues a standard iwhich we may follow to that blessed union and lasting peace of which we all dream.