human
I only know that I am free,
gpt
Not a bit of it; you have a wife.
human
A wife--yes; and that gives me ten times the freedom I ever had before. A man is like a bird with only one wing--before he finds a wife. His wife becomes his other wing. There isn't any height beyond him, when he has a wife.
gpt
Two wings! she mused....
human
What's between the wings?
gpt
A heart, you may say, if you will. Or a soul. A capacity. Words are fashioned by scholars--dull fellows. But you know what I mean.
human
Would you mind going into the church a minute?
gpt
No; but why?
human
Oh, anybody can go into those churches,
gpt
Anybody can go into _any_ church.
human
Yes, I suppose so. What I mean is that these old Catholic churches seem different. In our own churches you have a feeling of being--what do you say?--personally conducted. As if you were a visitor being shown children's trinkets. There is something impersonal--something boundless--in churches like this one here. The silence makes you think that there is nobody in them--or that perhaps ... God isn't far away.
gpt
But this is just where the trinkets are--in these churches: the images, the painted figures, the robes, the whole mysterious paraphernalia.
human
Yes ... but when there isn't anything going on. You feel an influence. I remember going into a church in San Antonio once--a Protestant chapel, and the only thing I could recall afterward was a Yankee clock that ticked too fast and too loud. I never heard of anything so horribly inappropriate. Time was what you thought of. Not eternity. You felt that the people would be afraid of wasting a minute too much--as if their real concerns were elsewhere.
gpt
But why shouldn't there be a clock? he asked.
human
If people feel that they ought to give a certain length of time to worship, and then go back to their work again, why shouldn't they have a clock?
gpt
I suppose it's all right, she conceded; and then, with a faint smile:
human
Yes, if it didn't tick too loud.