Page:Life of Thomas Hardy - Brennecke.pdf/121



Hardy learned to scorn the "heathen apathy" of the parsons and parishioners alike with regard to these wilful and stupid deletions of the artistic and associative treasures under their care. He derived small comfort from the reflection that some had been unwittingly preserved through the "happy accident of indifferentism in these worthies."

Here is the manner in which the novelist received the hint for his memorable scene of Jude’s gilding of the Ten Commandments: "I remember once going into the stonemason's shed of a builder's yard, where, on looking around, I started to see the Creed, the Lord's Prayer, and the Ten Commandments, staring emphatically from the sides of the shed. 'Oh, yes,' said the builder, a highly respectable man, 'I took 'em as old material under my contract when I gutted St.-Michael-and-All-Angels,