CHAPTER I THE CONVENT AS AN ABSTRACT IDEA
This book is a drama, whose leading personage is the Infinite.
Man is the second.
Such being the case, and a convent having happened to be on our road, it has been our duty to enter it. Why? Because the convent, which is common to the Orient as well as to the Occident, to antiquity as well as to modern times, to paganism, to Buddhism, to Mahometanism, as well as to Christianity, is one of the optical apparatuses applied by man to the Infinite.
This is not the place for enlarging disproportionately on certain ideas; nevertheless, while absolutely maintaining our reserves, our restrictions, and even our indignations, we must say that every time we encounter man in the Infinite, either well or ill understood, we feel ourselves overpowered with respect. There is, in the synagogue, in the mosque, in the pagoda, in the wigwam, a hideous side which we execrate, and a sublime side, which we adore. What a contemplation for the mind, and what endless food for thought, is the reverberation of God upon the human wall!
一 从抽象意义谈修院
本书是一个剧本，其中的主要角色是无极。
人是次要角色。
既是这样，我们在路上又遇到了一个修院，我们便应当走进去。为什么？因为修院，西方有，东方也有，现代有，古代也有，基督教有，异教、佛教、伊斯兰教也都有，它是人类指向无极的测量仪。
这里不是过分发挥某些思想的地方，不过，在绝对坚持我们的保留态度时，我们的容忍，甚至我们的愤慨，我们应当这样说，每次当我们遇见无极存在于一个人的心中时，无论他的理解程度如何，我们总会感到肃然起敬。圣殿、清真寺、菩萨庙、神舍，所有那些地方都有它丑恶的一面，是我们所唾弃的，同时也有它卓绝的一面，是我们所崇敬的。人类心中的静观和冥想是了无止境的，是照射在人类墙壁上的上帝的光辉。
