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San Manuel Bueno, Martyr

Miguel de Unamuno

San Manuel Bueno, Martir
FOREWORD

In La Nación, Buenos Aires, and somewhat later in El Sol, Madrid, number 3 December 1931 issued a [...], Gregorio Marañón article on my San Manuel Bueno, Martyr, ensuring that she, this little novel, published in La Novela de Hoy, number 461 and last publication, for the day March 13, 1931, these details give to the greedy caste bibliographers, "must be one of my most widely read and enjoyed works forward as one of the most characteristic of my entire fictional output. And who says I-novel-add, says philosophical and theological. And as he I think, that I have the sense of having put into it my whole tragic sense of everyday life. Then
Marañón was a very brief nudity considerations of the purely material in my stories. And I think giving the spirit of the flesh, bone, rock, water, cloud, everything else visible, it gives the true and intimate reality, leaving the reader to the magazine's fantasy.
advantage is the leading theater. As my novel Nothing less than a whole man, then staged by Julius de Hoyos under the title A Man, I wrote and in view of the stage play, I saved all those physical descriptions of characters, of the rooms and landscapes, which should be looked after by actors, set designers and stagehands. This does not mean, of course!, The characters in the novel or play written not as flesh and blood as the actors themselves, and that the scope of its action is not as natural and as real as concrete and as a stage decoration. Scenario
is in San Manuel Bueno, Martyr, suggested by the wonderful and so charming Lake San Martín de Castañeda, in Sanabria, at the foot of the ruins of a convent of Bernards and where you live the legend of a city, Valverde de Lucerna, lying at the bottom of the lake. And I will print here two poems I wrote immediately after having first visited the lake the first day of June 1930. The first says:
San Martín de Castañeda, a mirror of solitude, the lake collects

ages before man and
is dreaming of the holy calm
sky high,
which add to drown in Honduras
, poor! the soul. Men
Rodriguez Sanabria Marsh
,
broken wing and do not rock the roost
to retrieve the conducho. Bell
submerged
of Valverde de Lucerna,
touch of eternal agony
under the flow of oblivion.
The story stopped, the path of San Bernardo

life returns, and everything is forgotten,
what has not been first.
And the second, and more artificial rhyming, he said, and says: Oh
Valverde de Lucerna,
dregs of Lake Sanabria
no rafter
legend of modern birth you out.
He complained in vain for your
bronze on the night of San Juan,
your bread ovens gave
history is in its Gonce.
Serve the trout
grass is still dead, bitter drink;
Riba dies
Lake shore of our struggles.
Indeed, the tragic and miserabilism village of Riba de Lago, on the shores of San Martín de Castañeda, dying and can say that he's dying. Is desolate as large as that of the farms, and famous, the Hurdes. In those very poor slums, shacks wooden frame covered with bricks and mud are piled up a people that neither is allowed to fish the rich trout which abound in the lake and on which an alleged lady thought to have inherited their monopoly of Bernard monks of San Martín de Castañeda.
The other village, San Martín de Castañeda, in the ruins of the humble monastery, also dying at the lake, something high on the shore. But neither Riba de Lago, and San Martín de Castañeda, nor Galende, the other closest pobladillo Lake Sanabria-this one better off, "none of the three can be nor was the model of my Valverde de Lucerna. The stage of the work of my Don Manuel Bueno and Angelina and Lazarus Carballino is a further development of public life, however poor and humble it may be, that the lives of these very poor and humble villages. This does not mean, of course!, I suppose that in these there has been no individual lives and still have very intimate and intense, and tragedies of conscience.
And on the merits of the tragedy of the three main characters in my novella, I might not add anything or owe her story itself. Even I wanted to add something to remember after having composed, and almost single-pull, is that when I asked a lady in Paris bereaved Religious scruples of a famous and very sharp abbot if he believed in hell and answer this: "Madam, I am a priest of the Holy Roman Catholic Church, and you know that the existence of hell this is true or dogmatic faith" the lady insisted, "But you, my lord, do you think about it?" and the abbot, at last: "But why worry you, Madam, whether or not hell, if no one in it ...?» do not know the lady added another question: "And in heaven, is there anyone?"
And now, trying to tell the dark and painful daily anguish that haunts the mind of the flesh and spirit bone of men and women of spiritual flesh, "was to entertain as practicable on the task of describing passengers and pure coverings viso? Here's what Francisco Manuel de Melo in his History of the movement, separation and war in Catalonia time of Philip IV and military policy, which says: "I wanted to show their courage, not dressed in silk, wool and hides, on which therefore revealed a great historian of these years, estimated in the world. "And the colossal Thucydides, historians sampler, disdaining such realism, claimed to have wanted to write" one thing forever, but a fair piece of time you hear '. Forever! [................................................
.................]
But I go further still, is that not only care little for a novel, for a truly novel to the tragedy or the comedy of some souls, faces, costumes, gestures, materials, material level, but it does not matter what is called the argument of it. [................................................

.................] [...] Putting myself to think, clear that redromano or downstream, in this, I realize that I believed to [...] Don Manuel Bueno [...] what was the horrible suffocating personality problem, if one is what it is and will remain what it is.
course, not due to a special mood that I were to write in just over two months [this novel with novel Don Sandalio, chess player and a poor man rich or the comic sense of life], but is a general mood in which I meeting, I can say that since I started writing. That problem, the heartache, better awareness of one's personality, sometimes grief and other comic-tragic is what has inspired me for most of my fictional characters. Don Manuel Bueno looking, going to die, or melt-save-your personality in that of his people [...].
Is not, at bottom, this anguished and glorious personality problem that guides your company to Don Quixote, who said of 'I I know who I am! "and wanted to save it for the sake of everlasting fame? And is not a personality problem which dismayed the prince Sigismund, Prince dreamed of making the dream of life?
Right now, when I'm writing this preface, I have finished reading the play or the one or the other (Whole-Eller) of my favorite Saren Kierkegaard, whose work I stopped reading years ago interrupted before my exile, "and section of it which is entitled "The balance between the aesthetic and ethical development of personality" I've come across a passage that has hurt me deeply and that comes as the wand strap to hold the paddle-here-with pen I'm paddling in this paper. The passage reads:
would be the most complete mockery of the world if that would have exposed the deepest truth had not been a dreamer, but a doubter. And it is unthinkable that anyone can explain the positive truth so excellently as a doubter, just that it does not believe it. If I were an impostor, the mockery would be theirs, but it was a doubter who wanted to believe what is applied, their derision would be as entirely objective, that there would laugh through it, expose a doctrine that could clarify it all, they could rest around the world, but that doctrine could not clarify anything to its author. If a man were exactly as advised that could hide that I was crazy, you could go crazy the world.
And I do not comment here and more or the martyrdom of Don Quixote and the Don Manuel Bueno, two quixotic martyrdom.
And goodbye, dear reader, and even more to find, and I want you to find yourself.
Madrid, 1932. ________________________________________


San Manuel Bueno, Martyr

If in this life only we have hope in Christ, we are
most miserable of all men.
(SAN PABLO, I Corinthians XV, 19)

Now that the bishop of the Diocese of Renada, to which he belongs is my beloved village of Valverde de Lucerna, go, to what is said, promoting the process for the beatification of our Don Manuel, or rather, Saint Manuel Bueno, who was in this parish, I wish to set forth herein, by way of confession and God knows, not me, what fate, all I know and remembrance of the man matriarchal filled the whole life of my dearest soul, that was my true spiritual father, the father of my spirit, of mine, Angela Carballino.
the other, my father carnal and temporal, barely knew him because I fell when I was a child. I know that a stranger had come to our Valverde de Lucerna, which took root here when he married my mother here. He brought a few books Don Quixote, classic plays, novels, stories, Bertoldo, a mess, and those books, was almost unique in the whole village, I devoured dreams as a child. My good mother if I had just done or said my father. The Don Manuel, who, like everyone else, I adored, who was clearly in love, chaste, "I had erased the memory of her husband. Who prayed to God, and fervently every day to pray the rosary.
From our Don Manuel I remember as if it was so yesterday, when I was child, my ten years before they took me to the religious school of the cathedral city of Renada. Would have it, our saint, then about thirty-seven years. He was tall, slender, erect, his head was like our Peña del Vulture takes its peak and was in his eyes all the blue depths of the lake. It took all eyes, and behind them, hearts, and he seemed to watch us, transcending the flesh as a glass, look in the heart. Everyone loved him, but especially children. The things we say! Were things, not words. People began to sniff the holiness he was filled and drunk with its fragrance.
That was when my brother Lazarus, who was in America, where we regularly sent money to play decent lived in, made my mother sent me the religious school, to be completed outside the village my education, and that although he, Lazarus, did not make him very funny nuns. "But there, we wrote, there is as yet, to my knowledge, secular and progressive schools, and less for girls, must abide by what you have. The important thing is that Angelita is polished and does not follow from these uncouth villagers. "And I entered the school, thinking at first it master me, but then I choked on pedagogy.
At school I met girls from the city and intimate with some of them. But still attentive to the things and people from our village, which received frequent news and maybe a visit. And until the school reached the fame of our pastor, who began to speak in the cathedral city. The nuns did nothing but ask about it. As a child
fed, I'm not sure how, curiosities, worries and concerns, due in part at least, a jumble of books that my father, and that's all I thrived in school, in treatment, especially a partner who is inordinately fond me and sometimes I intended to enter together at once in one convent, swearing, and even signing the oath with our blood, sorority life, and sometimes spoke to me, with eyes half closed, the dating and marital adventures. Certainly I have not heard from her or her luck. And that when talking about our Don Manuel, or when my mother told me something of him in his letters, and was in almost all, "that I read to my friend, is like ecstasy exclaimed:" What a lucky girl , to be able to live near a holy well, a living saint, flesh and blood, and to kiss his hand! When you return to your people, write long, long and tell me about it. "
I spent in school about five years, now I'm lost like a dream at dawn in the distance of memory, and at fifteen became my Valverde de Lucerna. And all she was Don Manuel, Don Manuel with the lake and the mountains. I got anxious know him, to put myself under his protection, he dialed me the path of my life.
was said that he entered the seminary to become a priest, in order to serve the children of a recently widowed sister, father to serve, and that the Seminar had been distinguished for their wit and talent and had rejected Offers brilliant ecclesiastical career because he wanted to be but its Valverde de Lucerna, their remote village as a clasp between the lake and the mountain that looks into it.
And how he wanted his own! His life was to arrange marriages quarreling, parents reduce their unruly children or parents reduce their children, and especially comfort the bitter and atediados, and help everyone to die well.
I remember, among other things, that the city back from the unfortunate daughter of Rabona aunt, who had lost again, single and hopeless, bringing with him a son, Don Manuel did not stop until he had to marry her her old boyfriend, Perote, and recognize as their own for the little creature, saying
"Look, give this poor kid father who does not have more than the sky.
- But Don Manuel, if not my fault ...!
- Who knows, my son, who knows ...!, and, above all, not about blame. And today
Perote poor, disabled, paralyzed, is staff and consolation of his life to the child who, caught the sanctity of Don Manuel, acknowledged by his not so.
On the night of San Juan, the shortest of the year, and are often used to go to our lake all mujerucas poor, and not a few little men, believed to be owned, possessed, and it seems they are but sometimes hysterical and epileptic and Don Manuel set out to do it in the lake, the pool of Bethsaida, and try to relieve them and if possible to cure them. And such was the action of his presence, his looks, and maybe especially sweet authority of his words and especially his voice - what a miracle of voice! - Which got amazing cures. With which increased his fame, which attracted him to our lake and all the sick of the contour. And once was a mother asking him to do a miracle in his son, and he replied, smiling sadly: "I have no license
the bishop to perform miracles.
He was concerned, above all, as to go all clean. If anyone had a hole in his robe, he said:
"Go see the sexton, and you mend it." The sexton was a tailor. And when the first day of the year went to congratulate him to be his patron saint, his was the same Lord Jesus, "Don Manuel wanted everyone to submit to him a new shirt, and who did not have it gave himself.
For all showed the same affection, and if some further distinguished him was the most unfortunate and those who appeared to be more fractious. And as the people had a poor fool of birth, Blasillo the fool, this is the one most cherished and even got to teach things that seemed a miracle that could have been learned. And is that little glimmer of intelligence that remained in the fool is going on to emulate, as a poor monkey, its Don Manuel.
His voice was a wonder, a divine voice, I did mourn. When to officiate at solemn High Mass or the preface sang, shook the church and all who heard him felt themselves moved in her womb. His song, leaving the temple, went to sleep on the lake at the foot of the mountain. And when the Good Friday sermon that clamored for: 'My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me? "All the people passing by an earthquake deep as the waters of the lake's north wind days lash. And it was as if he heard Our Lord Jesus Christ himself, as if the voice springs from the old crucifix at the foot of many generations of mothers had deposited their sorrow. Like once, when he heard his mother, Don Manuel, could not restrain himself, and from the ODR of the temple, she sat and cried: "My son." And it was a downpour of tears together. You'd think that the scream had sprung from maternal half-open mouth that Dolorosa-the heart pierced by seven swords, which had one of the chapels of the temple. Then the fool went Blasillo repeating pathetically through the streets, as in echo, "My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?" And so that they are hearing it jumped to all tears, to the delight of his triumph silly imitation.
Its action on the people was such that no one dared to lie to him, and all without having to go to confession, he confessed. So much so that as he had once been a disgusting crime in a village Next, the judge, a fool who knew evil Don Manuel, called him and said,
"See if you, Don Manuel, this bandit gets to tell the truth.
- so then you punish him? "Replied the holy man. No, sir, no, I do not draw anyone a real chance to take you to death. Forth between him and God ... Human justice does not concern me. "Judge not, be not judged," said Our Lord.
"But me, Father ...
-Understood; give you, sir, to Caesar what is Caesar's, I give to God what is God's.
and out, staring at the alleged offender, said: "Look
whether God has forgiven you, that's all that matters.
Everyone in the village went to church, if only to hear him and see him at the altar, where it seemed transfigured, his face encendiéndosele. There was a holy exercise introduced in the popular worship, and that is, gathering at the temple to all the people, men and women, old and young, a thousand people, recited in unison with one voice, the Creed: "I think God the Father Almighty, Creator of Heaven and Earth ... "and what follows. And it was not a choir, but one voice, one simple, unified voice,
cast all in one and making a mountain whose summit, at times lost in the clouds, was Don Manuel. And to get it to "believe in the resurrection of the body and life everlasting" the voice of Don Manuel plunged, like a lake in the whole town, and he was silent. And I heard the chimes of the town is said here that is immersed in the bed of the lake-strokes that are said also heard the night of San Juan, and the town were submerged in the lake spirit of our people heard the voice of our dead back to life in us in the communion of saints. Then, to get to know the secret of our saint, I realized that it was as if a caravan in the desert march, the caudillo faltered approaching the end of his career, he took on his own shoulders to put his lifeless body in the land of promise.
Most did not want to die but holding his hand as an anchor.
Never in his sermons he began to declaim against wicked, masons, liberals or heretics. What if there were none in the village? Or even against the bad press. Instead, one of the most frequent subjects of his sermons was against the evil tongue. Because he apologizing apologized everything and everyone. I did not want to believe in the evil intentions of anyone.
-Envy-like repeat, the remain those who insist on believing envy, and persecution are over effect of the persecution complex that the pursuer.
"But look, Don Manuel, what I meant to say ... He
:
-should not matter much what you want to say as you say not how ...
His life was active rather than contemplative, fleeing as he could have nothing to do. When I heard that from that idleness is the mother of all vices, he answered: "And the worst of all, it is idle to think." And I asked him once what he meant by that, he replied: "To think idly is to think to do nothing or dwelling on what has been done and not what to do. In fact the chest, and another thing worse than no remorse without amendment. " Do!, Do! Well I knew even then that Don Manuel fled to think idly and alone, which some thought haunted him.
So I was always busy, and often to invent occupations. Wrote very little for himself, so that just left us letters or notes, but instead acted as amanuensis for others, and mothers, especially, I was writing letters to their absent children.
worked manually, too, helping with their arms to certain people's work. Threshing season was found himself on the threshing and winnowing, and therefore lectured them or distract them. Replaced at times to a patient in his task. One day in the harshest winter he found a child dead child cold, whom his father sent him to pick an answer to long distance, on Mt.
"Look," he said to the boy, go back home to warm up, and tell your father I'm going to do the job.
And again with the cow found with the father, all confused, I was going to meet him. In winter he chopped wood for the poor. When dried this magnificent walnut - "a matriarchal walnut" calls ", in whose shadow he had played as a child and nuts which had given so many years, called the trunk, took it home and then tilled into the six tables, which he kept at the foot of his bed, made of wood to heat the rest to the poor.
used also make balls for them to play the boys and not a few toys for children.
used to accompany the doctor on his visit and stressed the requirements of this. He was interested especially in pregnancy and raising children, and considered as one of the greatest curses that of "Teta and glory, 'and the other of" cherub in heaven. " Moved him deeply for the children.
"A child born dead or dying newborn, and suicide," he once said to me are the most terrible mysteries: a child in cross!
And once, for having taken his own life, to ask the bomber's father, a stranger, if you would sacred land, he replied: "Probably
, because in the last minute in the second of agony, no doubt repented.
He was also often at the school to help the teacher, to teach him, and not just the catechism. And running away from idleness and solitude. So that by being with the people, and especially with the small fry Moceri and used to go dancing. And more than once he got to play the drum for the boys and the girls dance, and this, which in another would have seemed grotesque desecration of the priesthood, he took a sacred character and as a religious rite. The Angelus sounded, leaving the drum and stick, was discovered and all with him, and read: "The angel of the Lord declared to Mary: Hail Mary ...». And then: "And now to rest for tomorrow."
"First, he said, is that people are happy, they are all happy to live. Contentment in life is first of all. No one should want to die until God wills.
"Well I do," he once told a recent widow, I want to follow my husband ...
- What for? "He replied. Stay here to pray for his soul to God.
at a wedding once said, "Oh, if I could change all of our lake water into wine at a little wine for a long drink from it without always glad drunk ever ... or at least a happy drunk! ".
Once passed through the village a poor band of puppeteers. The head of it that came with the seriously ill and pregnant women, and three sons who helped him, played the clown. While he was in the town square making children laugh and even the great, she, feeling suddenly gravely ill, had to retire, and retired, escorted by a look of anguish of the clown and children's laughter. And escorted by Don Manuel, who later, in a corner of the block from the inn, helped them to die. And when the party finished, he knew the people and knew the clown tragedy, they all went to the inn and the poor man, saying with tears in his voice: "Well it is said, Father, that you are a saint" came to this wanting to take her hand to kiss it, but Don Manuel came forward and tomándosela the geek delivered to all:
"The holy are you, honest clown, I saw you work and realized that not only do you give bread to your children, but also to bring joy to those of others, and I tell you that your wife, the mother of your children, whom I have dismissed God while working and happy, rest in the Lord, and that you will join with it and pay you the angels laughing that you laugh with joy in heaven.
And all children and adults, crying and crying shame as both a mysterious pleased that the sentence was drowned. And later, remembering that solemn moment, I realized that Don Manuel unabashed joy was temporary and earthly form of an infinite and eternal grief that modestly heroic sanctity in the eyes and ears of others.
With this constant activity, with that mix in the work and entertainment of all, seemed to escape from himself, wanting to escape loneliness. "I am afraid of loneliness," he repeated. But even so, occasionally went alone, the lake, the ruins of that old abbey which still seem to rest the souls of the pious Cistercian who has buried and forgotten history. There is the cell called Father Captain, and on its walls is said that there are still signs of a drop of blood that splashed to mortify. What do you think there our Don Manuel? I do remember is that as once, speaking of the abbey, I asked him how it was that had happened not go to the cloister, he replied: "Not
especially since you have, as I have, or widowed sister and my nephews who hold that God helps the poor, but because I was not born to hermit to hermit, the loneliness would kill my soul, and as a monastery, my monastery is Valverde de Lucerna. I should not live alone, I should not die alone. I live for my people, dying for my people. How can I save my soul if you do not save that of my people?
"But there have been hermits, solitary ... "I said.
"Yes, to them He gave the Lord's grace alone that I refused, and I have to resign. I can not lose my village to earn the soul. So God made me. I could not withstand the temptations of the desert. I just could not bear the cross of birth.
I wanted with these memories, of living my faith, portraying our Don Manuel as it was when I young girl of about sixteen, I came home from religious school of our monastery Renada Valverde Lucerne. And I put my feet to the abbot.
- Hello, Simon's daughter, "he said when he saw me," and made a girl and all, and knowing French, and embroidery and playing the piano and I do not know what else! Now get ready to give us another family. And your brother Lazarus, when again? Continues in the New World, is not it?
"Yes, sir, is in America ...
- The New World! And we in the Old. Well then, when you write him, tell him from me, part of the cure, I'm dying to know when to back the New World to this old, bringing us news from there. And tell him to find the lake and the mountains as they left.
When I went to confession to him my confusion was such that not manage to talk. I prayed the 'sinner I "stammered, almost sobbing. And he who watched him, I said,
"But what happens to you, lamb? What or whom are you afraid? Because you did not tremble now under the weight of your sin or fear of God, no, you shake me, eh?
I began to mourn.
"But what you have said about me? What legends are these? Does your mother? Come, come, calm down and do that you're talking to your brother ...
I cheered and began to confide my worries, my doubts, my sorrows.
- Bah, bah, bah! Where did you read that, bluestocking? All that is literature. Do not give too much of it, not even to Saint Teresa. And if you want to distract you, read the Bertoldo, I read your father.
I left that my first confession with the holy man deeply comforted. And that my first fear, but respect that fear, I approached him in a profound pity trocóse. I was then a young girl, a girl almost, but began to be a woman, I felt in my gut juice from maternity leave, and find me in the confessional with the holy man, I felt like a quiet whisper in his confession of his voice submissive and I remembered how when to claim it in church the words of Jesus: "My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?" his mother, Don Manuel, said from the floor: "My son!" I heard this scream that tore the stillness of the temple. And I went to confession with him to comfort him.
Once I explained in the confessional one of those questions, he replied: "That's
, you know, what the Catechism:" That I did not ask me to me, I am ignorant doctors have the Holy Mother Church who know how to answer. "
- But if the doctor here is you, Don Manuel ...! - Me, Doctor? "," Dr. I? Ni and think! I, little doctor, I am only a poor village priest. And those questions, you know who you the hint, who directs you? Well ... The Devil!
And then, emboldened, I snapped at close range - what if they are addressing you, Don Manuel?
- Who?, What me? What the Devil? We do not know, my dear, we do not know.
- What if they are directed? It would not
-case. And that's enough, huh?, Offices, waiting around I really sick.
I retired, thinking I do not know why, that our Don Manuel, so famous healer possessed, did not believe in the Devil. And to go to Blasillo stumbled home the fool, who perhaps was around the temple, and seeing me, to entertain me with his skills, he repeated - and how! - it's' My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me? ". Much troubled I got home and locked myself in my room to mourn, until my mother arrived.
"I think, Angelita, with so many denominations, you're going to get you a nun.
"Do not fear, mother," I replied, as I have plenty to do here in the village, which is my convent.
"Until you get married.
"I'm not in it," he replied.
And again I met Don Manuel, I asked, looking straight into Eyes:
- Is there hell, Don Manuel?
And he, undeterred:
- For you, child? No.
- For the others, you there?
- And do you care if you did not go to him?
"I care for others. Are you there?
-Cree in heaven, in heaven we see. Look at him and he showed me on the mountain and down, as reflected in the lake.
"But we must believe in hell as in heaven," I replied.
"Yes, we must believe what you believe and are taught to believe the Holy Mother Church Catholic, Apostolic, Roman. And that's enough! I read
not know what deep sadness in his eyes, blue as the waters of the lake.
Those years passed like a dream. The image of Don Manuel was growing on me without me in it I knew it, he was a man so everyday, so every day as daily bread that we in the Our Father. I helped him as he could in his occupations, visiting his patients, our patients, girls school, arranged the closet of the church, made him, as I called him, deaconess. Some days I was invited by a school friend to the city, and had to turn around, because I was drowning in the city, I was missing something, I felt thirst of the view of the lake, hungry for the sight of the rocks of the mountain was, above all, the lack of my Don Manuel and as if his absence I called, as if they are at risk away from me as if I needed it. I was beginning to feel a kind of motherly affection toward my spiritual father wanted to lighten the weight of his cross of birth.
So I was coming to my twenty-four years, which is when he returned from America with a fortune he had saved my brother Lazarus. Came here, in Valverde de Lucerna, in order to bring me and our mother to live in the city, perhaps to Madrid.
"In the village, he said, is unfocused, were brutalized and impoverished one.
He added:
"Civilization is the opposite of ruralization; aldeanerías no, did not you went to school for then you rot here, among these uncouth louts.
I was silent, still ready to resist migration, but our mother, who spent the sixties as opposed from the outset. "At my age, change of water!" Said the first, but then announced it clear that she could not live out of sight of the lake, its mountains, and especially of Don Manuel.
- are like the cats, which apegáis you home! "Repeated my brother.
When he realized that the empire of all the people and especially about ourselves, about my mother and me, exercised evangelical holy man was angry with this. It seemed an example of the dark theocracy in which he believed buried in Spain. He began to sputter without break all the old cliches and anti-clerical and even anti-religious progressives who had brought renewed the New World.
"In this Spain of wimp, he said, the priests managed to women and women to men ... And then the country!, The country!, This field feudal ...
For him, the term feudal was awesome, feudal and medieval were the two qualifiers when he wanted to condemn something lavish. He baffled the
no effect on us and did their diatribes that made virtually no impact on the village, where he listened with respectful indifference. "A These louts no one stirs them. " But being good for being intelligent, he soon realized the kind of empire that Don Manuel had over the people soon learned the work of the priest of his village.
- No, not like the others, he said, is a saint!
"But you know what are the other priests? "I said to myself, and him:" So I suppose
.
But still not entered or left the church to show off in all parts of their unbelief, but always seeking to indemnify and Don Manuel. And the people went their way, no how, an expectation of a duel between my brother Lázaro and Don Manuel, or rather expected conversion him through this. Nobody doubted that after the priest took him to his parish. Lazarus, meanwhile, was burning, "he said then," going to listen to Don Manuel, to see and hear in church, to approach him and talk with him, to know the secret of the spiritual over his empire souls. And it was to pray for it, until finally, out of curiosity, he said, was to hear him.
"Yes, this is something else," he said after hearing him, "not like the others, but I do not give it to me, is too smart to believe all that has to teach. "But do you think you a hypocrite? "I said.
- Hypocrite ... no, but it is the art of which has to live.
As for me, my brother insisted that I read the books he brought and others who encouraged me to buy.
- "So your brother Lazarus," he said Don Manuel insists that you read? Well read, my daughter, well read and give pleasure. I know you have not read anything but good, reads even novels. There are better stories true calling. It is better to read that you feed the gossip and comradery of the people. But read mostly devotional books that give you content to live a happy peaceful and quiet.
Have you had him?
At the time of death sick and we killed our mother, and in his last days was all his hiccups Don Manuel turned to the Lazarus whom he hoped to see a day in heaven, in a corner of the stars from where you could see the lake and the mountains of Valverde de Lucerna. She was already, to see God.
-You are not going, "he said Don Manuel, you stay. His body here on earth, and his soul here in this house, watching and listening to their children, although they neither see nor hear him.
"But I, the father said," I will see God.
-God, my daughter is here as everywhere, and you will see from here, from here. And all of us in Him and He in us.
"God bless you," he said.
"The content with your mother dies "I dijoserá his eternal life.
And turning to my brother Lazarus: "The sky is
continue seeing you, and now is the time to save her. Tell her to pray for her.
"But ...
- But ...? Tell her to pray for her, whom you life, and I know that once I promise I will pray and then to pray ...
My brother came and wiped his eyes tears, our mother, dying, he vowed to pray for her.
"And I in heaven for you, for you," replied my mother, and kissing the crucifix and put their eyes on Don Manuel, delivered his soul to God.
- "Into thy hands I commend my spirit", he prayed the holy man.
brother and I left my home alone. What happened in the death of our mother put Lazarus in relation to Don Manuel, who appeared somewhat neglecting their other patients, their other needy, to care for my brother. Ibans the evening stroll, the lake, or to the ruins, ivy-clad, old Cistercian Abbey.
"It's a wonderful man," he said Lazarus. You know they say that at the bottom of this lake is a submerged village on the night of San Juan, at midnight, you hear the bells of his church.
"Yes," I answered, "a feudal and medieval village ...
"And I think," added he, who in the depths of the soul our Don Manuel is also submerged, drowned, a village and once you hear their bells.
"Yes," I said, this villa immersed in the soul of Don Manuel, and why not also in yours?, Is the cemetery for the souls of our grandparents, this our Valverde de Lucerna ... Feudal and medieval!
my brother ended up going to church always, to listen to Don Manuel, and when he said he would meet with the parish, when others comulgaría commune, toured an intimate joy to all people who believed him recovered. But it was such a joy, so clean, that Lazarus did not feel either expired or declined.
Then came the day of communion to the people especially with all the people. When it came time for my brother could see that Don Manuel, as white as snow in January in the mountains shaking and trembling as he harasses the lake when the north wind, approached him with the holy form in hand, and thereby shook this to flush to the face of Lazarus that he dropped the form in time that made him dizzy. And it was my brother who picked up the Host and carried to the mouth. And the people saw Don Manuel mourn, he wept saying: "do you want!". And then it was dawn, the cock crowed.
On returning home and lock it with my brother threw my arms around his neck and kissing him said:
- Ay Lazarus, Lazarus, what joy you have given us all, all, all the people, to all the living and the dead, especially my mother, our mother! Did you see? Poor Don Manuel cried with joy. What joy you have given us all!
"That's why I did it," he said.
- Is that why? Why give us joy? You're done with it all by yourself, by conversion.
And then Lazarus, my brother, so pale and shaking like Don Manuel when he gave communion, made me sit on the couch right where our mother used to sit, took clearance, and then, as in domestic and family intimate confession, I said "Look
, Angelita, it's time to tell you the truth, the whole truth, and I'm going to say, because I tell you, for you I can not, I callártela and because it would have to guess and half , which is worse, sooner or later.
And then, quietly and calmly in a low voice, told me a story that I plunged into a lake of sadness. How Don Manuel had been working, especially in those walks to the ruins of the old Cistercian abbey, to not offend, to bear good example, to be incorporated into the religious life of people, that pretend to believe if believed to conceal their insights, but no attempt to catechize, make him otherwise.
"But is that possible? I exclaimed in dismay.
- And just as possible, sister, and so possible! And when I said: 'But you, you, the priest, who advised me to pretend? ", He stammered:" Pretend?, Pretending no, this is not fake! Take holy water, someone said, and you'll believe. " And like me, looking into his eyes, I say: "What you have finished celebrating Mass for believing?", He looked down at the lake and her eyes filled with tears. And that's how I tore her secret.
- Lazarus! I groaned. And
the time spent on the street Blasillo the fool, calling her: "My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?". And Lazarus shook believe the voice of Don Manuel, perhaps that of our Lord Jesus Christ.
"Then," said my brother, I understood his motives, and realized that his holiness for he is a saint, sister, a saint. He did not try to undertake to earn his holy cause and because it was the holy, holy ", assume a win, but he did it for peace, for happiness, for the illusion if you will, of its remit, I realized that if so tricked-if this is cheating, is not thrive. I gave his reasons, and here is my conversion. And I will never forget the day telling me: "But Don Manuel, the truth, the truth at all ', him, trembling, whispered in my ear and that we were alone in the countryside,"' Is right? Actually, Lazarus, is it something terrible, something intolerable, something deadly, people simply could not live with it. " "Why now suggests to me here, as in confession?" He said. And he: "Because otherwise torment me so, so, you end up screaming in the middle of the square, and that never, never, never. I am to do live in the souls of my parishioners, to make them happy, to make that dream and not to kill them immortal. What is needed here is to live healthy, live in a unanimous way, and the truth, my truth, not live. Living. And this makes the Church, let them live. True Religion "? All religions are true in spirit to give life to people who profess them, comfort them as having been born to die, and each village truest religion is yours, you have done. What about mine? Mine is comfort to comfort others, but the comfort that I give is not mine. " I will never forget these words.
- yours But that communion was a sacrilege! "I ventured to suggest, point regretting having suggested.
- Sacrilege? And he gave me? And their masses?
- What martyrdom! I exclaimed.
"Now," said my brother, "is another one to comfort the people.
- Why cheat? "I said.
"To deceive not replied to me but to prove it in their faith.
"And he, the people," I said, do you really?
- How do I know ...! Cree unintentionally, by habit, tradition. And what is needed is not to wake. And living in poverty of feeling that torture does not acquire luxury. Blessed are the poor in spirit!
"That, brother, you've learned from Don Manuel. And now tell me, have you met what you promised our mother when she was going to die, that they would pray for her?
- Well not had to deliver! But why do you take me, sister? Do you think I can break my word, a solemn promise and a promise, and in his deathbed, a mother?
- How do I know ...! Want to trick you could die consoled.
"But if I had not fulfilled the promise live without comfort.
- So?
-fulfilled the promise and have not stopped praying for a single day for her.
- Just for her? "Why, who else?
- For yourself! And from now on by Don Manuel.
We parted to go each to his room, I to mourn all night to pray for the conversion of my brother and Don Manuel, and he, Lazarus, I'm not sure what.
After that day I trembled to find myself alone with Don Manuel, who was attending their pious duties. And he seemed aware of my inner state and guess the cause. And when I finally approached him in the tribunal of penitence - who was the judge and who is guilty? - Both he and I, we turned in silence and we were head to mourn. And it was he, Don Manuel, who broke the terrible silence to say in a voice that seemed to come from a bone:
"But you, Angelina, you think like ten years, is not it? You think?
"Yes I think, Father. "But still believes
. And if you think of questions, cállatelas yourself. We must live ...
I dared, I said trembling:
"But you, Father, do you think?
hesitated a moment, recovering, he said,
- I think!
- But what, father, what? Do you believe in the afterlife?, Do you believe that at death we do not die at all?, Do you think we shall meet again, to love in another world to come?, do you believe in the afterlife?
The poor saint wept. - Look, daughter, stop that!
And now, writing this report, I say: Why not deceive me?, Why did not deceive me then as deceiving others? Why was grieved? Why could not deceive himself, or he could not deceive me? And I believe that grieved because I could not fool to deceive.
"Now," he added, "pray for me, for your brother, for yourself, for everyone. One must live. And we must give life.
And after a pause:
- Why not get married, Angelina?
"You know, my father, why.
"But no, no, you must marry. Between Lazarus and I will look for a boyfriend. Why should I marry you to cure you of those concerns.
- Concerns, Don Manuel?
-I know what I'm saying. And do not grieve too much for others, which have fed each with having to answer for himself.
- And you are, Don Manuel, who tell me that!, It is you who advised me that my case to answer for myself and not be grieved for others!, It's you!
"You're right, Angelina, and I do not know what I'm saying I do not know and what I say since I'm confessing to you. And yes, yes, we must live, must live.
And when I would get up and leave the church, he said,
"And now, Angelina, on behalf of the people, do absolve me?
I felt imbued with a mysterious priesthood, and said
"In the name of God the Father, Son and Holy Spirit, I absolve you, Father.
And we left the church, and I shook out the maternal womb.
My brother, because of all the service and the work of Don Manuel, was his most frequent collaborator and companion. Les knotted also the common secret. He was accompanied on his visits to the sick, schools, and put his money available to the holy man. And very nearly not to learn to help mass. I was getting increasingly unfathomable soul of Don Manuel.
- What a man! "He said. Look, yesterday, walking by the lake, he said: "Behold my greatest temptation." And I will ask his eyes, added: "My poor father, who died nearly ninety years, he spent his life, he confessed to me himself, tortured by the temptation of suicide, which came not remember since when , nation, he said, and defending it. And that defense was his life. Not to succumb to such temptation extreme care to preserve life. He told me terrible scenes. It seemed as crazy. And I have inherited. And how I called the water with its apparent stillness, the current goes through within-mirrors the sky! My life, Lazarus, suicide is a kind of continuum, a battle against suicide, which is equal, but live them, live ours! ". And then he added: "Here the river eddies lake, and then, down to the plateau, rushing waterfalls, waterfalls and gorges and gullies by gorges, near the city, and so eddies of life, here in the village. But the temptation of suicide is higher here, next to the haven that mirrors at night the stars, not by the waterfalls that are scary. Look, Lazarus, I attended a good death to poor villagers, ignorant, illiterate had barely left the village, and I could hear from his lips, and when they guess, the real cause of disease death, and I could see, there, at the head of deathbed, all the black abyss of the tedium of life. A thousand times worse than hunger Let us follow Lazarus, committing suicide in our work and our people, and dream that his life as the lake dreams the sky. "
"Again, I also told my brother, when we came here, saw a shepherdess, a goatherd, who stand upon a peak of the slope, in view of the lake, was singing with a fresh voice that water this. Don Manuel señalándomela stopped me and said, 'Look, it looks as if it had run out of time, as if that lass had always been there as it is, and singing as it is, and as if it were to remain so forever, as was When I began my conscience, as it will be when I finish. This lass is a part, with the rocks, clouds, trees, water, nature, not history. " How do you feel, how Don Manuel encouraged to nature! Never forget the day of the snow when I said, 'Have you seen, Lazarus, a mystery greater than that of snow falling in the lake and dying with him while covering up to the mountain? ".
Don Manuel had to hold my brother in his zeal and his inexperienced neophyte. And he knew that walking preaching against certain popular superstitions, had to say:
- Leave them alone! It's so hard to make them understand where does the orthodox belief and where does the superstition! And more for us. Let, then, while comforted. It is better to believe it all, even contradictory things, not to create nothing. That he believes that too just by believing nothing, a thing of Protestants. No protest. The protest kills contentment.
A full moon night, I also had my brother returned to the village along the lake, which Sobrehaz
mountain breeze then curled and the curl wavelet races of the full moon, and Don Manuel told Lazarus
- Look, the water is praying the litany and now says annual caeli, ora pro nobis, Gate of Heaven, pray for us!
And trembling of her eyelashes fell to the grass of the ground two huideras tears also, as in dew, bathed shaking the glow of the full moon.
time I was running and my brother and I watched the forces of Don Manuel began to decline, which could not completely contain the unfathomable sadness that consumed him, that perhaps it was a treacherous disease undermining the body and soul. And Lazarus anything to distract you more, he suggested if it would be wrong in the church founded something like a Catholic union agriculture.
- Union? Don Manuel replied sadly. "Union? And what is that? I know no more union that the Church, and you know that "my kingdom is not of this world." Our kingdom, Lazarus, is not of this world ...
- And the other?
Don Manuel bowed his head:
"The other, Lazarus, is here too, because there are two kingdoms in this world. Or rather, the other world ... Come on, do not know what I'm saying. And as for that of the union, is you a remnant in your time of enlightenment. No, Lazarus, no; religion is not to solve the economic or political conflicts of this world that God gave to the disputes of men. Men think and act like men think and how to act, to be comforted by being born, living as happy as possible in the illusion that all this has a purpose. I have not come to bring the poor to the rich, not to preach to those who submit to those. Resignation and charity and for everyone. For even the rich have become resigned to their wealth, and life, and the poor must have charity for the rich. "Social question? Leave it, it does not concern us. That bring a new society, that has not already rich or poor, it is just spread the wealth, that everything belongs to everyone, so what? And do not think the general welfare will emerge stronger the tedium of life? Yes, I know that one of those leaders of the so called social revolution has said that religion is the opium of the people. Opium ... Opium ... Opium, yes. Let's opium, and sleep and dream. I myself crazy with this activity, I'm administering opium. And I can not sleep well and less well-dreaming ... This terrible nightmare! And I can also say with the Divine Master: "My soul is sorrowful even unto death." No, Lazarus, no unions on our part. If they make me look good, then so distracted. That play the union, if that were happy.
The whole town Don Manuel noted that it detracted from the strength, that tired. His very voice, that voice was a miracle, acquired a certain inner tremor. He poked the tears on every occasion. And especially when he spoke to the people of another world, another life, had to stop at times closing his eyes. "It's who is watching," they said. And in those moments was Blasillo the fool who wept over rennet. Blasillo because crying more than laughing, and even his laughter sounded like crying.
By the last week of passion with us in our world, our village celebrated Don Manuel, all the people sensed to the tragedy. And how
rang then that: "My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?", The last public sobbed Don Manuel! And when he spoke of the Divine Master to the good bandit - "all the bandits are good," he would say our Don Manuel, "that of" Tomorrow will be with me in paradise. " And the last general communion divided our holy! When he got to give it to my brother, this time with a steady hand, after the liturgy '.. in vitam aetemam "he bent his ear and said:" There is no eternal life that is ... the eternal dream ... a few years eternal ...». And when I gave it to me said: "Pray, my dear, pray for us." And then, something so extraordinary that it's in my heart as the greatest mystery, and it was that I said in a voice that seemed of another world: "... and pray also for our Lord Jesus Christ ...».
I got exhausted and like a sleepwalker. And everything around me seemed a dream. And I thought: 'Shall I pray also for the lake and the mountain. " And then: "Is that demon-possession?". And at home and I took the crucifix in his hands which God had given my mother's soul, and looking through my tears and recalling the "My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?" of our two Christs, of this land and this village, I prayed, "Thy will be done on earth as in heaven 'first, and then: "And lead us not into temptation, Amen." Then I turned to that image of the Dolorosa, his heart pierced by seven swords, which had been the most painful consolation of my poor mother, and prayed: "Holy Mary, Mother of God, pray for us sinners, now and in the hour of our death, Amen. " And just as he had prayed when I said: "sinners?, Us sinners?, And what is our sin, what? ". And I walked all day grieving for this question.
The next day I went to Don Manuel, who was becoming solemnity of religious decline, and said: - Do you remember, my father, when years ago, by addressing a question I answered: "That I did not ask me to me , I am ignorant doctors have the Holy Mother Church who know how to answer? "
- That if I remember! ... and I remember that I said that these were questions that will dictate the Devil.
"Well, Father, today I am me, the devilish, to address another question that gives me my guardian demon.
-Q.
"Yesterday, when I going to Communion asked me to pray for us all and even ...
"Well, cállalo and on.
-I got home and I began to pray, and to reach that of "Pray for us sinners now and at the hour of our death", an inner voice told me: "sinners?", "Us sinners?, And what is our sin? ". What is our sin, Father?
- What? "He replied. Already said a great doctor of the English Catholic Church, I said the great doctor of Life is a dream, and said that "the felony of man is being born." That is, daughter, our sin: he was born.
- What heals, father?
- Go back and pray! Back to pray for us sinners now and at the hour of our death ... Yes, finally cured the dream ... in the end life is cured ... at last ends the cross of birth ... And Calderon said, doing well, and the trick well, even in dreams is lost ...
And the time of his death came at last. All the people saw it coming. And it was his greatest lesson. He would not die either alone or idle. He died preaching to the people in the temple. First, before sending him to be brought to him, he could not move and the palsy, we called home to Lazarus and myself. And there, three solo, he said: "Listen
: take care of these poor sheep who are comforted to live, creating what I could not believe. And you, Lazarus, when you die, die like me, as die our Angela, in the bosom of the Holy Mother Roman Catholic Church of the Holy Mother of Valverde de Lucerna, well understood. And to never see, because just this dream of life ...
- Father, father! "I moaned.
"Do not worry, Angela, and continues to pray for all sinners, for all infants. And to dream, to dream. What I have wanted to sleep, sleep, endless sleep, sleep for all eternity and never dreaming!, Forgetting the dream! When they bury me, whether in a box made with those six tables of the old carved walnut, poor!, in whose shadow played as a child, she began to dream ... And then I believed in the life everlasting! That is, I suppose now I believed then. For a child to believe is just dreaming. And for a town. These six tables carved with my own hands, find the foot of my bed. He gave a choking
and replace him, continued: "You remember that when we prayed all in one, in a unanimous way, people made the creed, to reach the end I said nothing. When the Israelites were nearing the end of their journey through the desert, the Lord told Moses and Aaron not having believed that his people would be put not in the promised land, and gave them up unto mount Hor, where Moses stripped Aaron, who died there, and then Moses went up from the plains of Moab to Mount Nebo, to the Phasga summit, opposite Jericho, and the Lord showed him all the land promised to his people, but telling him: "Do not go over there, 'and there Moses died and no one knew its grave. And he made as leader Joshua. Be yourself, Lazarus, my Joshua, and if you stop the sun, stop it, and do not mind progress. Like Moses, I met the Lord, our ultimate dream, face to face and you know that Scripture says that he sees the face of God, that you go to sleep the eyes of the face to us, it dies hopelessly and forever. Do not you see, then, the face of God that our people while alive, that after death there is no care, they do not see anything ...
- Father, father, father! "I went to moan. He
:
"You, Angela, pray always, keep on praying for all sinners to death dream the resurrection of the body and life everlasting ...
I expected "and who knows ...?», when she gave him a choke to Don Manuel.
"Now," he added, "Now, at the hour of my death, it's time you do that I take, in this same chair, to the church to say goodbye to my people there, which I expected.
He was taken to the church and placed in the chair in the chancel, at the foot of the altar. He had in his hands a crucifix. My brother and I stood beside him, but was Blasillo the fool who was pulled over. I wanted to take the hand of Don Manuel, kiss. And as some try to stop him, Don Manuel rebuked them saying
"Let him come near me. Come Blasillo Give me your hand.
The fool cried with joy. Then Don Manuel said: "Very few words, my children, just because I feel strong but to die. And I have to say anything new. See, I told you everything. Live in peace and happy and we all are waiting for a day at the Valverde de Lucerna in there, among the stars of the night as reflected in the lake on the mountain. And pray, pray for Mary, pray to our Lord. Be good, that is enough. Forgive the wrong that may have made inadvertently and unknowingly. And now, after I give my blessing, all to pray the Our Father, Hail Mary, Hail, and finally the Creed.
Then, with the crucifix in his hand gave his blessing to the people, crying women and children and not a few men, and then began the prayers, that Don Manuel listened in silence and fucked Blasillo the hand, that is the prayer was going to sleep. First the Lord's Prayer with "Thy will be done on earth as in heaven", then the Santa Maria with his "pray for us sinners now and at the hour of our death," Hail to follow with his "moaning and weeping in this valley of tears ", and finally the Creed. And to get to the "resurrection of the body and life everlasting," all the people felt his saint had given his soul to God. And it had to close his eyes, because he died with them closed. And to go wake up Blasillo we find that he had fallen asleep in the Lord forever. So there after burying two bodies.
The people all went at once to the house to collect the holy relics, and to share bits of their clothing, to take what could be a relic and reminder of the blessed martyr. My brother kept his breviary, whose leaves found, dried, and as in a herbarium, a carnation stuck to a paper and this is a cross with a date.
None of the people wanted to believe in the death of Don Manuel, everyone expected him daily, and perhaps you were, passing along the lake and mirror in it or having as background the mountains, all continued to hear his voice, and all went to his grave, around which grew a cult. Now came the devilish playing walnut cross, also made through his hands and removed from the same tree where he got the six tables in which it was buried. And the least wanted to believe that had died were my brother and me. He
Lazarus, continuing the tradition of the saint and began to write what he had heard, notes that I have served for this my memory.
"He made me a new man, a true Lazarus, a ghost," he said. He gave me faith.
- Faith? "He interrupted me.
"Yes, faith, faith in the solace of life, faith in the happy life. He cured me of my progress. For there, Angela, two kinds of harmful and dangerous men: those who believe in life after death, resurrection meat, torment, as inquisitors are others that, disregarding this life as transitory, to earn the other, and those who believe not only in this ...
"As perhaps you ... "I told him.
"And yes, as Don Manuel. But more than not believing in this world, hope I do not know what future society, and strive to deny the people of the consolation to believe in another ...
"So ...
"So you have to do to live the illusion.
The poor priest who came to replace the parish Don Manuel Valverde de Lucerna became overwhelmed by the memory of the saint and gave my brother and me to guide you. Would do nothing but follow in the footsteps of saint. And my brother said, "Little theology, eh, little theology, religion, religion." And I smiled to hear it I think if it was not theology also ours.
then I began to fear for my poor brother. Since Don Manuel died we could not say that he lived. He visited her grave daily and spent hours staring at the lake dead. I felt homesick for real peace.
"Do not look to the lake so I told him.
"No, sister, fear not. It is another lake called me, is another mountain. I can not live without it.
- And the happy life, Lazarus, content to live? "That
for sinners, not for us, we've seen the face of God, who has looked with his eyes the dream of life.
- What, you prepare to go see Don Manuel?
"No, sister, and now and here at home, among ourselves, the whole truth is bitter, bitter as the sea that go into this sweet water lake, the whole truth to you, you are entrench against it ...
- No, no, Lazarus that's not true!
"Mine, yes.
"Yours, but what for ...?
-also his.
- Not now, Lazarus now! Now create another thing, now think ...
"Look, Angela, one of the times that Don Manuel say that although there are things they are saying one should keep quiet yourself to others, I replied telling me that by saying them to him, the same, himself, and ended up confessing that he believed more than one of the greatest saints, perhaps the largest, had died without believing in the afterlife.
- Is it possible?
- Y as possible! And now, sister, take care not suspect that even here in the village, our secret ... - Suspicion? "I said. If attempted, for madness, to explain, would not understand. The people do not understand words, the people have not understood more than you did. We want to tell that would be like reading about children in eight years, some pages St. Thomas Aquinas ... in Latin.
"Well, when I am gone, pray for me and for him and for all. And finally
also came on time. A disease that was undermining its robust nature seemed exacerbársele with the death of Don Manuel. "I do not feel so
have to die," he said in his last days as it dies with me another piece of the soul of Don Manuel. But the rest of him will live with you. Until one day even the dead will die totally. When he was dying
entered, as is customary in our villages, the people to see him dying, and entrusted his soul to Don Manuel, San Manuel Bueno, Martyr. My brother told nothing, had nothing more to say, let them all told, all that was said. Other wool was more between the two Valverdes of Lucerne, the lake bottom and in its sobrehaz looks, he was one of our dead to life, one also, in its way, our saints.
I was more than desolate, but in my town and my people. And now, having lost my San Manuel, the father of my soul, my Lazarus, my brother even more than carnal, spiritual, now is when I realize I am old and how I've aged. But is that I lost, is it that I am old, is it that I go to my death?
must live! And he taught me to live, he taught us to live, to feel life, to feel the meaning of life, to dive into the soul of the mountains in the soul of the lake, in the soul of the people of the village, lost in them to be in them. He taught me to lose his life in the life of the people of my village and I felt no more to spend hours and days and years, was not passing the water of the lake. It seemed as if my life would always be the same. I did not feel old. I already did not live in me, but lived in my town and my people lived in me. I wanted to say what they, mine, said accidentally. Out into the street, which was the road, and as he knew all lived in them and forgetting about me, while in Madrid, where I spent some time with my brother as anyone knew, sentíame in terrible loneliness and tortured by strangers.
And now, writing this report, this intimate confession of my experience of the holiness of others, I think Don Manuel Bueno, my San Manuel and my brother Lazarus died believing not believe what we are most interested, but do not believe believe , believing in an active and resigned despair.
But why, "I have asked many times," Don Manuel did not try to convert my brother is also a deception, a lie, pretending to be Christian without being one? And I understand that was because he realized that not cheat, that would not serve him cheating, that only the truth, your truth, we become, that would not have achieved anything if he tried to represent to him a comedy-tragedy-rather , which accounted to save the people. And so I won, in fact, for his pious fraud, and beat the truth of death to the reason for living. And I beat me, I never stopped transparent to the other the divine, the holy game. And I believed and believe that God our Lord, not sacred and do not know what escrudiñaderos designs, made them believe in disbelief. And perhaps in the finishing of traffic they dropped the band. What I think?
And as I write this now, right here in my old mother's house, my more than fifty years, they begin to whiten my head my memories, it's snowing, snowing on the lake, snow on the mountain, snow on the reports my father, the stranger, of my mother, my brother, Lazarus, of my people, my San Manuel, and also on Blasillo poor memory, my san Blasillo, and that he would protect me from heaven. And this snow clears corners and removes shadows, even at night because the snow shines. And I do not know what is truth and what is a lie, and what I saw and what I dreamed, or rather what I dreamed and what only vi-, or what I knew not what I thought. I do not know if I'm transferring to the paper, as white as snow, my conscience that it has to be, leave me without it. Why have it already ...?
Do they know something?, Do you believe something? Is that what I am here telling happened has happened and as I tell? Do these things can happen? Is that all this is but a dream dreamed within a dream? Am I, Angela Carballino, now fifty, the only person in this village is thrust of these strange thoughts to others? And these, the others around me believe? What is that to believe? For at least live. And now believe in Saint Manuel Bueno, martyr, without waiting for immortality were kept in the hope of it.
seems that the illustrious bishop, who has promoted the beatification of our saint of Valverde de Lucerna, intends to write his life, a kind of manual of the perfect pastor, and collect for it all kind of news. I strongly submitter has had interviews with me, I have given all sorts of data, but I always silent tragic secret of Don Manuel and my brother. It is curious that he would not have suspected. And I hope that they come to learn everything you leave recorded herein. I am afraid of the authorities of the land, temporary authorities, even those of the Church.
But here is this, and their fate is whatever.
How did my hands to stop this document, the memory of Angela Carballino? Here's something, the reader, something I keep secret. I give it to me as it has come, no more than correct a few, very few specific wording. What is a lot like other things I've written? This proves nothing against its objectivity, its originality. And I know also, if I did not create out of me real beings and effective, immortal soul? Do I know if that Augusto Pérez, the fog of my novel, I had no reason to pretend to be real, more objective than myself, who thought him up? The reality of this San Manuel Bueno, Martyr, as revealed to me his disciple and spiritual daughter Angela Carballino, this really can not think of doubting. I believed in it but it holy in it but I believe in my own reality.
And now, before closing this epilogue, I remind you, patient reader, the ninth Versillo the Epistle of St. Jude the Apostle forgotten - what a name! - Where we are told how my heavenly patron, St. Michael the Archangel - Michael means "Who is like God?" and the archangel, archimensajero-disputed with the devil-devil means accuser tax-for the body of Moses and not allowed to take him on trial a curse, but told the devil: "The Lord rebuke you." And who wants to understand who understands.
I too, as Angela Carballino mixed his story his own feelings, I do not know what else will fit, I comment on what she left here saying that if Don Manuel and his disciple Lazarus had confessed the people's state of belief, this , the people would not have understood. Neither would have thought, I'd say. Would have believed his works and not their words, because words do not serve to support the works, but it works enough. And for a town like Valverde Lucerne there is no confession that behavior. Neither knows the people what it is faith, or perhaps not care much.
I know that when it counts in this story, if you want romance, and the novel is the more intimate story, the truest, so I do not understand that anyone be outraged that novel call to the Gospel which is high, in fact, and a chronicle any-well know that in what is told in this story, nothing happens, but hope it is because it all stays, as are the lakes and mountains and holy souls settled beyond simple faith and despair, that in them, in the lakes and mountains, outside history, in divine novel, were sheltered.
Salamanca, November 1930.