Page 116 - tess-of-the-durbervilles

home to the reader’s heart—

THY, DAMNATION, SLUMBERETH, NOT.
2 Pet. ii. 3.

Against the peaceful landscape, the pale, decaying tints
of the copses, the blue air of the horizon, and the lichened
stile-boards, these staring vermilion words shone forth.
They seemed to shout themselves out and make the at-
mosphere ring. Some people might have cried ‘Alas, poor
Theology!’ at the hideous defacement—the last grotesque
phase of a creed which had served mankind well in its time.
But the words entered Tess with accusatory horror. It was
as if this man had known her recent history; yet he was a
total stranger.
Having finished his text he picked up her basket, and she
mechanically resumed her walk beside him.
‘Do you believe what you paint?’ she asked in low tones.
‘Believe that tex? Do I believe in my own existence!’
‘But,’ said she tremulously, ‘suppose your sin was not of
your own seeking?’
He shook his head.
‘I cannot split hairs on that burning query,’ he said. ‘I
have walked hundreds of miles this past summer, paint-
ing these texes on every wall, gate, and stile the length and
breadth of this district. I leave their application to the hearts
of the people who read ‘em.’
‘I think they are horrible,’ said Tess. ‘Crushing! Killing!’
‘That’s what they are meant to be!’ he replied in a trade

116 Tess of the d’Urbervilles