Page:Fountains Abbey.djvu/103

From Wikisource
Jump to navigation Jump to search
This page has been validated.

Thus the service begins; the commemoration of the supreme self-sacrifice. The smoke of incense drifts across the light of the east window; and there is a sound of chanting, imploring, adoring voices. Hands are outstretched to receive the mystic bread and wine. And presently they go out to undertake again their homely tasks in the name of Him to whom belong the church and themselves.

To these repeated acts of worship, the monks came with a faith which asked no questions. The services, it is true, were very frequent, and human nature was with them what we know it to be with us; the thoughts of the brethren would sometimes wander, and the devout words would be words only. They were of our own kin and kind. Thomas Kydde and Lawrence Benne, and Henry Jackson and John Walworth, and their fellows who were here at the time of the suppression had their bad and their good, as

71