Always he had been a law to himself, both morally and intellectually;
never before did it seem that genius had been cast in a mold so orderly
and calm. In that state of intense concentration which was his habitual
mood, he accomplished without apparent effort the things for which
others paid by a life-time of struggle; and morally he had no visible
combats, not seeming to be even reached by the things which tempted
other men. His wants were fewer than the simplest rule of his convent
allowed, and it seemed less that he had triumphed over the usual earthly
temptations than that he had been created abnormally free from them that
his whole strength might spend itself in the solving of problems. In a
certain sense he stood mysteriously alone, though his friends were many
and devoted and among the wise and venerated of the earth; but there was
always a door closed to them beyond the affection which he returned
them. "Always," he said once, "we veil our faces": yet none doubted his
sincerity.
From time to time, as the years sped, some echo of the jealousy which
his phenomenal success and the boldness of his bearing naturally evoked,
penetrated to the cloisters of the Servi; and more than once there had
been a denunciation to the Inquisition to discuss; some one in authority
had found fault with his theological opinions and denounced him for his
reading of a passage in Genesis, upon which he based his argument--the
affair was grave indeed.
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