En Route [Paperback]

Joris-Karl Huysmans (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: August 16, 2009

Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: CHAPTER III. Before his conversion he had said like all unbelievers : " If I believed that Jesus Christ is God, and that eternal life is not a decoy, I would not hesitate to change all my habits, to follow as far as possible the rules of religion, and, in any case, to live chaste." And he was surprised that people he knew, who were in these conditions, did not maintain an attitude higher than his own. He who had so long indulgently forgiven himself became singularly intolerant, so soon as he had to do with a Catholic. He now understood the injustice of his judgments, and confessed that between faith and practice was a gulf difficult to overpass. He did not like to discuss this question with himself, but it returned and took possession of him all the same, and he was obliged to admit the meanness of his arguments, the despicable reasons for his resistance. He was still honest enough to say : " I am no longer a child ; if I have Faith, if I admit Catholicism, I cannot conceive it as lukewarm and unfixed, warmed up again and again in the saucepan of a false zeal. I will have no compromise or truce, no alternations of debauch and communions, no stages of licentiousness and piety, no, all or nothing ; to change from top to bottom, or not change at all." Then he drew back in alarm, endeavoured to escape the part he was about to take, endeavoured to exculpate himself, cavilling for hours, invoking the most wretched motives for remaining as he was, and not budging a jot. " What am I to do ? If I do not obey orders, which I feel with increasing force, I am preparing for myself a life of uneasiness and remorse, for I know well I ought not to remain for ever on the threshold, but to penetrate into the sanctuary and stay there. And if I make up my mind— no indeed—for then...

Product Details

• Paperback: 234 pages
• Publisher: General Books LLC (August 16, 2009)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0217713084
• ISBN-13: 978-0217713085
• Product Dimensions: 9 x 6 x 0.5 inches
• Shipping Weight: 12 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (1 customer review)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #5,286,711 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Most Helpful Customer Reviews

25 of 25 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Beautiful book, August 30, 1999

By A Customer

This review is from: En Route (Hardcover)

Anyone who has read "La Bas" (the novel Huysmans wrote before this one) needs to read "En Route", since the former plumbs the depths of evil, and this one scales the heights of Catholic devotion. It is really the story of a soul struggling to believe, and marked the turning point in Huysmans' life as he embraced Christianity. The scene where he meditates on a large crucifix as it is reflected in the water of a pond is a masterpiece of religious introspection.