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"I believed it once, yes But you see, it was not a belief based on reason and on observation of mankind as I told myself it was It was never that, and I came to realize it and when I did, when I saw it for what it was-a blind desperate irrational prejudice-I felt it suddenly and completely collapse
"Ars because I had to hold them to be true They were their own creed, the creed of the rational, the creed of the atheistic, the creed of the logical, the creed of the sophisticated Ro realities of the world around him, because if he were to admit what he saw in the wretchedness of his brothers and sisters, he would go mad "
He drew in his breath and continued, turning his back to the bright roos from the heat of his words, as surely as I wanted him to do it
"I know history, I read it as others read their Bibles, and I will not be satisfied until I have unearthed all stories that are written and know-able, and cracked the codes of all cultures that have left ht pry loose from earth or stone or papyrus or clay
"But I rong in norant as I accused others of being, and refusing to see the very horrors that surrounded me, all the worse in this century, this reasonable century, than ever before in the world
"Look back, child, if you care to, if you would argue the point Look back to golden Kiev, which you knew only in songs after the raging Mongols had burnt its Cathedrals and slaughtered its population like so h the Kiev Rus for two hundred years Look back to the chronicles of all Europe and see the aged everywhere, in the Holy Land, in the forests of France or Gerland, yes, blessed England, and in every Asian corner of the globe
Oh, why did I deceive rasslands, those burnt cities Why, all of Europe lish Cathedrals torn down to rubble by the arrogant King Henry
Think of the books of the Mayas heaved into the flames by Spanish priests Incas, Aztecs, Olround to oblivion-
"It's horrors, horrors upon horrors, and it alas, and I can pretend no longer When I see assed to death for the whims of an Austrian madman, when I see whole African tribes massacred till the rivers are stuffed with their bloated bodies, when I see rank starvation clailuttonous plenty, I can believe all these platitudes no more
"I don't knohat single event it was that destroyed my self-deception I don't knohat horror it was that ripped the mask from my lies Was it the millions who starved in the Ukraine, imprisoned in it by their own dictator, or the thousands after who died frorasslands, unprotected by the sa poho had starved them before? Was it the race that had stood for thousands of years, older even than rasping ed ithout quarter upon monks in their saffron robes, and priceless books which they heaved into the fire, and ancient bells which they entle to prayer? And this, this within two decades of this very hour, while the nations of the West danced in their discos and swilled their liquor, la in casual tones for the poor sad fate of the distant Dalai La the television dial
"I don't knohat it was Perhaps it was all the millions-Chinese, Japanese, Cambodian, Hebrew, Ukrainian, Polish, Russian, Kurdish, oh, God, the litany goes on without end I have no faith, I have no optimism, I have no firm conviction in the ways of reason or ethics I have no reproof for you as you stand on the Cathedral steps with your ar and all-perfect God
"I know nothing, because I know too h and never will But this you taught me as much as any other I've ever known, that love is necessary, as much as rain to the flowers and the trees, and food to the hungry child, and blood to the starving thirsting predators and scavengers that we are Love we need, and love canelse can
"And so I took the modern world with its diseased and desperate ht I possess, and I did it for you I gave them ti now may never know
"That was it, all of it And I knew you would cry, and I knew you would suffer, but I knew you would have them and love them when it was finished, and I knew that you needed them desperately So there you arejoined noith the serpent and the lion and the wolf, and far superior to the worst of men who have proved themselves in this time to be colossal monsters, and free to feed with care upon a world of evil that can s every bit of pruning they care to do "
A silence fell between us