Carlos Fuentes - Terra Nostra

“Doubt no more, Guzmán: the soul of Christ abandoned the suffering body of Jesus, who upon dying was again only the son of Mary and an unknown father. Write, Guzmán, write the principal section of my testament, dictated today, the day of the final burial of all my ancestors whom I shall one day join, write: In the name of the Holy Trinity, the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost who are one Being, unique, three names that are one essence, as the body, the intelligence, and the soul are the one essence of every man, and if we do not doubt the existence of this union, mysterious though it may be, why would we doubt the substantive union of our dogma: the intelligence of the Father, the body of the Son, and the soul of the Holy Spirit, like the Sun a unique substance that manifests itself as light, heat, and as the sphere itself: light, the Spirit; heat, the Son; and the sphere, the Father. So was the Son one day sent forth, like a ray of light; but doubt this, too, and believe in what this painting is telling us; I told you it would speak to us as we spoke to it, look at its space, suddenly empty, or invaded by a light so white it erases everything, blinds everything, converts everything into blackness, into absence of light…”

The painting: Because I am God I am unique; and I, that unique God, was the One who descended unto Mary the virgin and got her with child, and from her I was born, the only God who had never been born before: I, Father of Myself; I, Son of Myself; a unique, indivisible God, it was I who suffered and I who died, men crucified the one God, I, the Father.

“And so you will accept, Guzmán, that our Christianity bleeds because of simple arithmetic, and attempts to explain the inexplicable with the weapon of the Devil instead of forever defeating the Devil by denying the temptation of the rational, by drawing the fangs of the forbidden, by accepting that everything is magic, that everything is mystery, that everything is the intellectual liberty of the few — faithful, persecuted, eternally heretical, and eternally nonconformist: God’s triumph, Guzmán, is that enduring, persecuted, and ever triumphant Christian community; Christianity exists because Jesus was defeated, not because Constantine triumphed; I know Nero’s temptation, I sometimes dream it, I ask myself whether in order to strengthen my Faith there are not, in truth, more than two roads: to be either the persecutor or the persecuted…”

“You, Señor, ordered the unruly mob in your father’s castle to be killed and you led your armies in crusades against the Waldensian, Abelite, Adamite, and Cathari heretics. Whom, then, did you persecute?”

“Ease my heavy spirit, Guzmán; perhaps that tiny community of true Christians is hidden in the souls of madmen and rebels, of children and lovers, those who live without need of me or need of the Faith … and by persecuting them and killing them, perhaps without knowing it I have strengthened that Faith.”

“You are the Defender. Your battles, your escutcheon, and your laws so proclaim; and also a papal bull.”

“Yes, yes, the Defender; seal my mouth, Guzmán, as you will put the seal to this my testament when it is completed, and repeat with me, now, this very moment, on your knees, the eternal truth: We believe in one God, a supernatural Father, the Maker, Creator, and providential Monarch of the Universe, from whom cometh all things, and in one Lord, Jesus Christ, His Son, a God procreated by the Father before the beginning of time, God of a God, totality issued from totality, unity of unity, King of a King, Lord of a Lord, the Word Incarnate, living wisdom, the true light, the way, the resurrection, the shepherd, the door, the essence, the purpose, power, and the glory of the Father; eternal image of the Deity, irreplaceable image, the unique image that no infidel can exchange for one of sullen stone and harrowing grimaces: Your image, Lord, is the sweet face of the Italian painting that stares down upon me as, kneeling, I praise your Name, and that image can be no other: God the Creator, divine Christ, most human Jesus, but only in that face consecrated by tradition, and never in the stone masks of savage idolaters; those who attempt to change your face, O God, shall see their works burned, torn down, destroyed by the combined anger and piety of my armies; never again will new Babylons arise to deform your sweet likeness, my God. Repeat with me, Guzmán, this credo, for if doubt transforms the dogma of the Trinity or stains the conception of Mary or separates Christ’s divinity from his humanity or changes the most precious face of Jesus, endangered all by the heresies I have exposed for the purpose of exorcising them, then I would lose my power and it would be gained by madmen, rebels, children, and lovers; and it is not that they may not deserve it, no; it is that they would not know how to use it, it would be useless to them, and above all, a contradiction: once they had the power they would cease to be what they are: children and madmen, lovers and rebels. Better it be this, better it be I, better one single dogma, any dogma, than a million doubts and debates, whatever they may be. Now you must understand the reasoned order of my apparent lack of reason, Guzmán: all doubts are consigned to paper, dictated by me, written by you. They are there, and they will remain written; but they will remain in my possession, like black envoys of the luminous truth of the Faith, they will not be loosed and rained and carried and fluttered in the wind of temptation and the incoherent noise of mockery. Let us incorporate evil into knowledge, Guzmán, and it will be but a healthful contrast and warning to the life of truth and good. Write my words, Guzmán: evil is only that which we do not know; and only that which does not know us is evil; and it is that unknown and unknowing evil, unsubmitting, irreducible, not to be possessed even through the writing that is our privilege, which we must extirpate without mercy.”

“Amen, Señor, amen.”

“Peace, and an early death, Guzmán. Bocanegra was more fortunate than we; what we seek, he has already obtained.”

“El Señor is unjust with me. I only fulfilled my duty, as I fulfill it now, by writing down El Señor’s words.”

“Truly, I am not reproaching you. Come, Guzmán, come nearer; let me tell you something, in confidence…”

“Señor…”

“That dog attacked me on the stairway … one morning … attacked me … he didn’t know me … that’s why I tore off his bandages … to defend myself from him … and you treated him, Guzmán … you were right; he had rabies. You treated him, not knowing; when you knew, you killed him … Loyal and efficient Guzmán; thank you, Guzmán, thank you for doing what is necessary, while I live in the realm of the imagination; thank you; I am not reproaching you…”

“Señor, I beg you; let us put an end to these words. Today is a memorable one; you have brought together all your ancestors in your own palace erected for that purpose; and, in so doing, you have raised your dynasty above any other in this land. Rest, Señor; your words are dictated by your soul’s fatigue…”

“Guzmán, Guzmán, what intolerable pain … come, place the red stone in the palm of my hand … You see, my body pains me even more; Guzmán, do you never doubt?”

“If I had power, Señor, I would never doubt anything.”

“But you do not have it, poor Guzmán; come, kiss my bone ring, kiss my hand, thank me for having taken you from nothing and given you a place in my service, in which you have risen, I recognize, by your own merits and well-proven abilities. Let me see what you have written … Where did you learn such a fine hand?”

“Although in straitened circumstances, I was able to spend a year in Salamanca.”

“You learned a beautiful hand.”