Page:Karel Čapek - The Absolute at Large (1927).djvu/48

 "I expect," said Marek with a breath of relief, "that the authorities will prohibit my Karburator."

"Oh, no they won't," said G. H. Bondy. "The Clerical party are making a fearful row about your Karburator, and for that very reason the progressive parties have taken it under their wing. In reality no one knows what it's all about. It's evident that you don't read the papers, man. It's developed into a quite needless attack upon clericalism, and the Church happens to have a little right on its side in this case. That confounded Bishop informed the Cardinal Archbishop"

"What Bishop?"

"Oh, some Bishop by the name of Linda, quite a sensible man in other respects. You see, I took him up there as an expert, to inspect the wonderworking Absolute. His inspection lasted a full three hours, and he spent the whole time in the cellar, and "

"He got religion?" burst out Marek.

"Not a bit of it! Perhaps, he's had too long a training with God, or else he's a more hard-baked atheist than you; I don't know. But three days later he came to me and told me that from the Catholic standpoint God cannot be brought into the matter, that the Church absolutely rejects and forbids the pantheistic hypothesis as heresy. In short, that this isn't any legal, duly recognized God, supported by