The Complete Works of Brann, the Iconoclast — Volume 10Brann, William Cowper
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The Complete Works of Brann, the Iconoclast — Volume 10
Brann, William Cowper
Brann, William Cowper, 1855-1898; Essays; Reformers
"Ginx's face grew dark. He was thinking of 'all those years' and
the poor creature that, from morning to night and Sunday to
Sunday, in calm and storm, had clung to his rough affections; and
the bright eyes and the winding arms so often trellised over his
tremendous form, and the coy tricks and laughter that had cheered
so many tired hours. He may have been much of a brute, but he
felt that, after all, that sort of thing was denied to dogs and
pigs."
The philosopher could not answer these thoughts nor the rejoinder
question to his own: what is a man or woman to do that doesn't
marry?
And so the argument proceeds, the philosopher losing ground all
the time because his rationality is based upon changing man's
nature, not on making something out of "what's nateral to human
beings." The act of parliament idea of solving the problem is
riddled effectively by a stonemason, who points out that the
head-citizen is not so worthy as the heart-citizen. In brief, the
philosopher is routed by the doctrine that love is better than
law.
Ginx proceeds to the river again, but is stopped by a nun who
asks for the child. She uncovers the queer ruby face and kisses
it. After this Ginx could not have touched a hair of the child's
head. His purpose dies but his perplexity is alive. The nun takes
the child, and Ginx, in gratitude for her assurance that the
child shall not be sent back to him, stands treat for the crowd.
The child's life in the convent is material for some good satiric
writing upon the question of his salvation. The picture is
absurdly over-drawn so far as its effectiveness against
conventional charity is concerned, but it touches the question of
religious bigotry surely and strongly. Indeed the method of
treatment here verges closely upon the Rabelaisian, as where the
sisters want to make the sign of the cross upon Mrs. Ginx's
breasts before allowing the baby to suck. Mrs. Ginx refused "the
Papish idolaters" and the Protestant Detectoral Association is
brought to the rescue of the child from superstition.
A little man with a keen Roman nose--he could scent Jesuits a
mile off--took up the cause of the child and it got into court.
The matter became a cause celebre. London was in a turmoil over
"the Papal abduction." The author sketches it all graphically
with a convincing fidelity of caricature. The "Sisters of Misery"
triumphed. They retained the baby. Then after attempting to
sanctify the baby--a ceremony wholly imaginary and described with
a smutch of revolting coarseness--the sisters send the baby
packing back to the Protestant Detectoral Association.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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