Evening was closing on Naples and Pausilippo—bright, serene, odoriferous. The sea spread its azure surface as smooth as glass—many a lateen sail was extended to the grateful breeze. The universal hum of a talkative city was continually broken by whoop and halloo, scream and laughter, snatch of song or the sound of some stringed or wind instrument. Now and then a church bell fell musically and mournfully on the ear.

A grave signor sat pensively at a table, with an open book before him. He was the true type of a Castilian hidalgo; tall, spare, with long, narrow face, classically cut features, the eyes almond-shaped and very dark, lighted as if from within: the face oval, the beard pointed, the skin clear olive, the brow high and pale.

His habit was of black velvet, slashed with satin and with buttons of jet: a small starched cambric ruff, edged with lace, was closed at the throat with white silken cords and tassels. A rapier at his side; a diamond of the purest water on his long, thin white hand.

"It must needs be so"—such was the tenor of his meditation. "The very image of God must be stamped on our souls like the cameo in soft wax, if we are to be His. Oh, my God, mould me with thine own impress! stamp me with thine own seal! keep my thoughts—I cannot keep them!—efface even the memories of sin. Make me a weapon for thine own armoury, whether to be used in actual service or to hang on the wall ready for use!"

He covered his face with his hand, and remained lost in thought, till some one tapped at the door. It was Fra Bernardino Ochino, the Capuchin.

I know not why Ochino should have had so white a beard; for his age, at most, was scarcely fifty: but so it was.

"Brother," said ValdÉs gladly, "you come at the right moment; for I am in a singular frame of mind."

"Strange!" cried Ochino; "I, too, found myself in a singular mood, and it was on that account that I sought you. There are times when I am oppressed by vain questionings; and nobody quiets them better than you do."

"I wonder whether your questionings relate to the same subject as my own," said ValdÉs, with his peculiarly sweet smile. "Come! let us talk it out. It wants half-an-hour yet to the time when Donna Isabella expects me."

"You know," said Ochino, "I am not book-learned—"

"My chief book is my mind," rejoined ValdÉs. "Therein I read a nature totally corrupt, and find an unutterable want of God. My other book is His word. Herein I find a solution to every question, a remedy for every want, in the blood of Christ. And that is my peace."

"Such is the substance of all my preaching. I aim not so much at pulling down rotten opinions as sowing good seed."

"You are right, you are right: that will carry us through. The rotten walls will fall of themselves. They already totter and crumble."

"But oh, what a God is ours!" cried Ochino, stretching his two arms straight upward. "His judgments are past finding out. How easy it would be to Him to make all straight!—I find myself ready to pray there may be no hell: that it may be a depopulated country—a burnt-out volcano: that all, all may be saved."

"Surely you may do that," said ValdÉs. "The Lord's hand is not shortened, that He cannot save. He stands at the door of our hard hearts and knocks. He cries 'turn ye, turn ye, for why will ye die?' Could a man say more? Excuse the bathos of the expression. It is man who says 'I will not.'"

"But what vindictive expressions—"

"Hush, hush, my brother. David's vindictive expressions were those of a Jew, not a Christian: and, after all, what a loving heart he had! If he stormed at his enemies one instant, he forgave them the next. Otherwise, he could never have been the man after God's own heart. His inner being is subjected to a test that none of us could stand—the Psalms are literally his heart-sighings—the thoughts and feelings that chased one another like cloud-shadows over waving corn. Oh! believe me, the fault is not in God, but in ourselves. Since we admit that He is not only round about us but within us, how is it that we have so little perception of Him? Because His grace does not operate in us. And why does not His grace operate in us? Because, in reality, we do not humbly, devoutly, and earnestly desire it.[13] Why do not we both desire it and seek it? Because we do not love God with the whole heart and with all the senses. Why not? Because we do not know Him. Why do not we know Him? Because we do not even know ourselves."

"All this is true and logical enough," said Ochino; "and brings us back to your starting-point, that your first book was your own mind. But that book cannot be read in the dark. Nor without the light of the Holy Spirit."

"Unquestionably not," said ValdÉs. "That light enables me to read my own book. It makes plain and full of interest what was arid, forbidding, and deeply disappointing. You know that the Scriptures have helped me to understand my own book. David and St. Paul are nothing to us, in comparison with God and Christ. In the Old Testament we read of a God of vengeance, and a Lord of hosts; for to the Jews he exhibited himself but through a glass darkly. But we know him through Christ, and, in seeing one, we see the other. Oh, then, how is it we are insensible to such love? A man would give the whole world, if he had it, to save the life of an only son: God gave His own Son to save an ungrateful world."

"That is a strong figure," said Ochino, with emotion.

"And since He and His Son are one, in a mystical manner which we cannot comprehend," pursued ValdÉs, "what is His giving His Son for us, but, in other words, giving himself? His alter ego. 'Greater love than this hath no man, that he lay down his life for his friends.' 'For scarcely for a righteous man (even) will one die:—but God commendeth His love towards us, in that, while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us.' Can you conceive a nobler antithesis?"

"Ah!" said Ochino, gladly extending his arms. "I see it! I embrace it!"

"Hold it fast, my brother. For on this rock is built the church. He was delivered (delivered up by man) for our sins, but was raised, by God, for our justification. Therefore, being justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ. Continue to hammer upon that, as you have done, and are still doing. Did you note an honourable woman who sate immediately before you, this morning, with Vittoria Colonna?"

"Yes. She was very attentive."

"She is Giulia, Duchess of Trajetto: one on whom the pure gospel light has not yet shined. I believe she is much under the influence of Cardinal Ippolito: as much as the Marchioness of Pescara is under that of Cardinal Pole. Pernicious directors, both! You must do them all the good you can, while they are under your ministry. There is much that is hopeful in the little circle of distinguished women who are now drawn together here. Isabella Manricha is far advanced in the spiritual life, and will faithfully guide her younger sisters along the narrow way. Speak the truth to them boldly: the word of God is not bound. And now the time is come for our evening reading at Donna Isabella's, and here comes Giulio Terenziano to join us."

As he spoke, a slender, intellectual-looking young man, with eyes full of spiritual light, entered, whom he embraced as a younger brother. This youth was afterwards a sufferer for the truth.

Nothing was more remarkable in the foregoing dialogue than the manner in which ValdÉs took the lead, though Ochino was a churchman and he was not, and he was Ochino's junior by twelve or fourteen years. It is currently believed that ValdÉs was at this time secretary to the Spanish Viceroy of Naples, Don Pedro de Toledo: he was certainly governor of the Hospital of Incurables. His remarkable personal influence was exercised both in conversation and by letters on special subjects; by meetings for the purpose of reading and exposition, either at his friends' houses or in his own in Naples, or at Pausilippo. Mr. Wiffen tells us that some interesting allusions in the "Dialogo de la Lengua" give an insight into his manner of reading and discoursing with his friends.

"He held frequent intercourse with them at his own residence in the city. His less divided leisure was given to them at his country house, situated in a garden, on the shore of the Bay of Naples, near Chiaja. At this country house, ValdÉs received on the Sunday a select number of his most intimate friends; and they passed the day together in this manner. After breakfasting and taking a few turns round the garden, enjoying its beauty and the pleasant prospect of the shores and purple ripples of the bay, where the isle of Capri on one side drew the eye to the luxurious mansion of Tiberius, and Ischia and Procida rose in sight on the other, they returned into the house, when ValdÉs read some selected portion of the Scriptures, and commented upon it, or some divine 'Consideration' which had occupied his thoughts during the week.... After this, they discussed the subject together, or discoursed on some other points which ValdÉs himself brought forward, until the hour for dinner. After dinner, in the afternoon, when the servants were dismissed to their own amusements, his friends and not himself proposed the subjects and led the conversation, and he had to discuss them agreeably to their desire. As they had been pleased to consecrate the morning according to his wishes, in reading 'The Book of the Soul,' or upon subjects like his 'Divine Considerations,' he in return devoted his acquirements to their gratification on themes of their selection. Such was the origin of the 'Dialogo de la Lengua,' a dialogue on the Spanish language, which occupied seven or more sittings, and was in all probability much more copious than the text which has come down to us, and which furnishes us with these particulars. At nightfall, ValdÉs and his friends returned to the city.

"The Sunday meetings may have continued four or five years. These Sabbaths of studious Christians, this exchange of subjects, this interchange of thought between the proposers, the day, the pure elevation of mind they brought as it were with them, the situation, the beauty of the country, the transparent skies of a southern climate, the low murmurs of the bay, would all be favourable to the purpose of ValdÉs."[14]

[14] Introduction to Wiffen's translation of the "Alfabeto Christiano."