A Canticle For Leibowitz

by Walter M. Miller, Jr.

  "You are the continuity of the Order," he told them. "With you goes the Memorabilia. With you also goes the apostolic succession, and, perhaps — the Chair of Peter.

  "No, no," he added in response to the murmur of surprise from the monks. "Not His Holiness. I had not told you this before, but if the worst comes on Earth, the College of Cardinals — or what's left of it — will convene. The Centaurus Colony may then be declared a separate patriarchate, with full patriarchal jurisdiction going to the cardinal who will accompany you. If the scourge falls on us here, to him, then, will go the Patrimony of Peter. For though life on Earth may be destroyed — God forbid — as long as Man lives elsewhere, the office of Peter cannot be destroyed. There are many who think that if the curse falls on Earth, the papacy would pass to him by the principle of Epikeia if there were no survivors here. But that is not your direct concern, brothers, sons, although you will be subject to your patriarch under special vows as these which bind the Jesuits to the Pope.

  "You will be years in space. The ship will be your monastery. After the patriarchal see is established at the Centaurus Colony, you will establish there a mother house of the Visitationist Friars of the Order of Saint Leibowitz of Tycho. But the ship will remain in your hands, and the Memorabilia. If civilization, or a vestige of it, can maintain itself on Centaurus, you will send missions to the other colony worlds, and perhaps eventually to the colonies of their colonies. Wherever Man goes, you and your successors will go. And with you, the records and remembrances of four thousand years and more. Some of you, or those to come after you, will be mendicants and wanderers, teaching the chronicles of Earth and the canticles of the Crucified to the peoples and the cultures that may grow out of the colony groups. For some may forget. Some may be lost for a time from the Faith. Teach them, and receive into the Order those among them who are called. Pass on to them the continuity. Be for Man the memory of Earth and Origin. Remember this Earth. Never forget her, but — never come back." Zerchi's voice went hoarse and low. "If you ever come back, you might meet the Archangel at the east end of Earth, guarding her passes with a sword of flame. I feel it. Space is your home hereafter. It's a lonelier desert than ours. God bless you, and pray for us."

  He moved slowly down the aisle, pausing at each seat to bless and embrace before he left the plane. The plane taxied onto the runway and roared aloft, He watched until it disappeared from view in the evening sky. Afterward, he drove back to the abbey and to the remainder of his flock. While aboard the plane, he had spoken as if the destiny of Brother Joshua's group were as clear-cut as the prayers prescribed for tomorrow's Office; but both he and they knew that he had only been reading the palm of a plan, had been describing a hope and not a certainty. For Brother Joshua's group had only begun the first short lap of a long and doubtful journey, a new Exodus from Egypt under the auspices of a God who must surely be very weary of the race of Man.

  Those who stayed behind had the easier part. Theirs was but to wait for the end and pray that it would not come.

  27

  * * *

  "THE AREA AFFECTED BY LOCAL fallout remains relatively stationary," said the announcer, "and the danger of further windspread has nearly vanished..."

  "Well, at least nothing worse has happened yet," remarked the abbot's guest. "So far, we've been safe from it here. It looks like we'll stay safe, unless the conference falls apart."

  "Will we now," Zerchi grunted. "But listen a moment."

  "The latest death toll estimate," the announcer continued, "on this ninth day after the destruction of the capital, gives two million, eight hundred thousand dead. More than half of this figure is from the population of the city proper. The rest is an estimate based on the percentage of the population in the fringe and fallout areas known to have received critical doses of radiation. Experts predict that the estimate will rise as more radiation cases are reported.

  "This station is required by law to broadcast the following announcement twice daily for the duration of the emergency: 'The provisions of Public Law 10-WR-3E in no way empower private citizens to administer euthanasia to victims of radiation poisoning. Victims who have been exposed, or who think they have been exposed, to radiation far in excess of the critical dosage must report to the nearest Green Star Relief Station, where a magistrate is empowered to issue a writ of Mori Vult to anyone properly certified as a hopeless case, if the sufferer desires euthanasia. Any victim of radiation who takes his own life in any manner other than that prescribed by law will be considered a suicide, and will jeopardize the right of his heirs and dependents to claim insurance end other radiation relief benefits under the law. Moreover, any citizen who assists such a suicide may be prosecuted for murder. The Radiation Disaster Act authorizes euthanasia only after due process of law. Serious cases of radiation sickness must report to a Green Star Relief—"

  Abruptly, and with such force that he twisted the dial knob free of its shaft, Zerchi switched off the receiver. He swung himself out of his chair and went to stand at the window and look down on the courtyard where a crowd of refugees were milling around several hastily built wooden tables: The abbey, old and new, was overrun by people of all ages and stations whose homes had been in the blighted regions. The abbot had temporarily readjusted the "cloistered" areas of the abbey to give the refugees access to virtually everything except the monks' sleeping quarters. The sign outside the old gate had been removed, for there were women and children to be fed, clothed, and given shelter.

  He watched two novices carrying a steaming cauldron out of the emergency kitchen. They hoisted it onto a table and began ladling out soup.

  The abbot's visitor cleared his throat and stirred restlessly in his chair. The abbot turned.

  "Due process, they call it," he growled. "Due process of mass, state-sponsored suicide. With all of society's blessings."

  "Well," said the visitor, "it's certainly better than letting them die horribly, by degrees."

  "Is it? Better for whom? The street cleaners? Better to have your living corpses walk to a central disposal station while they can still walk? Less public spectacle? Less horror lying around? Less disorder? A few million corpses lying around might start a rebellion against those responsible. That's what you and the government mean by better, isn't it?"

  "I wouldn't know about the government," said the visitor, with only a trace of stiffness in his voice. "What I meant by better was 'more merciful.' I have no intention of arguing your moral theology with you. If you think you have a soul that God would send to Hell if you chose to die painlessly instead of horribly, then go ahead and think so. But you're in a minority, you know. I disagree, but there's nothing to argue about."

  "Forgive me," said Abbot Zerchi. "I wasn't getting ready to argue moral theology with you. I was speaking only of this spectacle of mass euthanasia in terms of human motivation. The very existence of the Radiation Disaster Act, and like laws in other countries, is the plainest possible evidence that governments were fully aware of the consequences of another war, but instead of trying to make the crime impossible, they tried to provide in advance for the consequences of the crime. Are the implications of that fact meaningless to you, Doctor?"

  "Of course not, Father. Personally, I am a pacifist. But for the present we're stuck with the world as it is. And if they couldn't agree on a way to make an act of war impossible, then it is better to have some provisions for coping with the consequences than to have no provisions."

  "Yes and no. Yes, if it's in anticipation of somebody else's crime. No, if it's in anticipation of one's own. And especially no if the provision to soften the consequences are criminal too."

  The visitor shrugged. "Like euthanasia? I'm sorry, Father, I feel that the laws of society are what makes something a crime or not a crime. I'm aware that you don't agree. And there can be bad laws, ill-conceived, true. But in this case, I think we have a good law. If I thought I had such a thing as a soul, and that there was an angry God in Heaven, I might agree with you."

>   Abbot Zerchi smiled thinly. "Yon don't have a soul, Doctor. You are a soul. You have a body, temporarily."

  The visitor laughed politely. "A semantic confusion."

  "True. But which of us is confused? Are you sure?"

  "Let's not quarrel Father. I'm not with the Mercy Cadre. I work on the Exposure Survey Team. We don't kill anybody."

  Abbot Zerchi gazed at him in silence for a moment. The visitor was a short muscular man with a pleasant round face and a balding pate that was sunburned and freckled. He wore a green serge uniform, and a cap with the Green Star insignia lay in his lap.

  Why quarrel, indeed? The man was a medical worker, not an executioner. Some of the Green Star's relief work was admirable. Occasionally it was even heroic. That in some instances it wrought evil, according to Zerchi's belief, was no reason to regard its good works as tainted. The bulk of society favored it, and its workers were in good faith. The doctor had tried to be friendly. His request had seemed simple enough. He had been neither demanding nor officious about it. Still, the abbot hesitated before saying yes.

  "The work you want to do here — will it take long?"

  The doctor shook his head. "Two days at most, I think. We have two mobile units. We can bring them into your courtyard, hitch the two trailers together, and start right to work. We'll take the obvious radiation cases, and the wounded, first. We treat only the most urgent cases. Our job is clinical testing; The sick ones will get treatment at an emergency camp.

  "And the sickest ones get something else at a mercy camp?"

  The worker frowned. "Only if they want to go. Nobody makes them go."

  "But you write out the permit that lets them go."

  "I've given some red tickets, yes. I may have to this time. Here — " He fumbled in his jacket pocket and brought out a red cardboard form, something like a shipping label with a loop of wire for attaching it to a buttonhole or a belt loop. He tossed it on the desk. "A blank 'crit-dose' form. There it is. Read it. It tells the man he's sick, very sick. And here — here's a green ticket too. It tells him he's well and has nothing to worry about. Look at the red one carefully! 'Estimated exposure in radiation units.' 'Blood count.' 'Urinalysis,' On one side, it's just like the green one. On the other side, the green one's blank, but look at the back of the red one. The fine print — it's directly quoted from Public Law 10-WR-3E. It has to be there. The law requires it. It has to be read to him. He has to be told his rights. What he does about it is his own affair. Now, if you'd rather we parked the mobile units down the highway, we can—"

  "You just read it to him, do you? Nothing else?"

  The doctor paused. "It has to be explained to him, if he doesn't understand it." He paused again, gathering irritation. "Good Lord, Father, when you tell a man he's a hopeless case, what are you going to say? Read him a few paragraphs of the law, show him the door, and say: 'Next, please!'? 'You're going to die, so good day'? Of course you don't read him that and nothing else, not if you have any human feeling at all!"

  "I understand that; What I want to know is something else. Do you, as a physician, advise hopeless cases to go to a mercy camp?"

  "I—" The medic stopped and closed his eyes. He rested his forehead on his hand. He shuddered slightly. "Of course I do," he said finally. "If you'd seen what I've seen, you would too. Of course I do."

  "You'll not do it here."

  "Then we'll—" The doctor quenched an angry outburst. He stood up, started to put on his cap, then paused. He tossed the cap on the chair and walked over to the window. He looked gloomily down at the courtyard, then out at the highway. He pointed. "There's the roadside park. We can set up shop there. But it's two miles. Most of them will have to walk." He glanced at Abbot Zerchi, then looked broodingly down into the courtyard again. "Look at them. They're sick, hurt, fractured, frightened. The children too. Tired, lame, and miserable. You'd let them be herded off down the highway to sit in the dust and the sun and—"

  "I don't want it to be that way," said the abbot. "Look — you were just telling me how a man-made law made it mandatory for you to read and explain this to a critical radiation case. I offered no objection to that in itself. Render unto Caesar to that extent, since the law demands it of you. Can you not, then, understand that I am subject to another law, and that it forbids me to allow you or anyone else on this property, under my rule, to counsel anyone to do what the Church calls evil?"

  "Oh, I understand well enough."

  "Very well. You need only make me one promise and you may use the courtyard."

  "What promise?"

  "Simply that you won't advise anyone to go to a "mercy camp." Limit yourself to diagnosis. If you find hopeless radiation cases, tell them what the law forces you to tell them, be as consoling as you wish, but don't tell them to go kill themselves."

  The doctor hesitated. "I think it would be proper to make such a promise with respect to patients who belong to your Faith."

  Abbot Zerchi lowered his eyes. "I'm sorry," he said finally, "but that's not enough."

  "Why? Others are not bound by your principles. If a man is not of your religion, why should you refuse to allow—" He choked off angrily.

  "Do you want an explanation?"

  "Yes."

  "Because if a man is ignorant of the fact that something is wrong, and acts in ignorance, he incurs no guilt, provided natural reason was not enough to show him that it was wrong. But while ignorance may excuse the man, it does not excuse the act, which is wrong in itself. If I permitted the act simply because the man is ignorant that it is wrong, then I would incur guilt, because I do know it to be wrong. It is really that painfully simple."

  "Listen, Father. They sit there and they look at you. Some scream. Some cry. Some just sit there. All of them say, "Doctor, what can I do?' And what am I supposed to answer? Say nothing? Say, 'You can die, that's all.' What would you say?"

  " 'Pray.' "

  "Yes, you would, wouldn't you? Listen, pain is the only evil I know about. It's the only one I can fight."

  "Then God help you."

  "Antibiotics help me more."

  Abbot Zerchi groped for a sharp reply, found one, but swiftly swallowed it. He searched for a blank piece of paper and a pen and pushed them across the desk. "Just write: 'I will not recommend euthanasia to any patient while at this abbey,' and sign it. Then you can use the courtyard."

  "And if I refuse?"

  "Then I suppose they'll have to drag themselves two miles down the road."

  "Of all the merciless—"

  "On the contrary. I've offered you an opportunity to do your work as required by the law you recognize, without overstepping the law I recognize. Whether they go down the road or not is up to you."

  The doctor stared at the blank page. "What is so magic about putting it in writing?"

  "I prefer it that way."

  He bent silently over the desk and wrote. He looked at what he had written, then slashed his signature under it and straightened. "All right, there's your promise. Do you think it's worth any more than my spoken word?"

  "No. No indeed." The abbot folded the note and tucked it into his coat. "But it's here in my pocket, and you know it's here in my pocket, and I can look at it occasionally, that's all. Do you keep promises, by the way, Doctor Cors?"

  The medic stared at him for a moment. "I'll keep it." He grunted, then turned on his heel and stalked out.

  "Brother Pat!" Abbot Zerchi called weakly. "Brother Pat, are you there?"

  His secretary came to stand in the doorway. "Yes, Reverend Father?"

  "You heard?"

  "I heard some of it. The door was open, and I couldn't help hearing. You didn't have the silencer—"

  "You heard him say it? 'Pain's the only evil I know about.' You heard that?"

  The monk nodded solemnly.

  "And that society is the only thing which determines whether an act is wrong or not? That too?"

  "Yes."

  "Dearest God, how did those two heresies get ba
ck into the world after all this time? Hell has limited imaginations down there. 'The serpent deceived me, and I did eat.' Brother Pat, you'd better get out of here, or I'll start raving."

  "Domne, I—"

  "What's keeping you? What's that, a letter? All right, give it here."

  The monk handed it to him and went out. Zerchi left it unopened and glanced at the doctor's pledge again. Worthless, perhaps. But still the man was sincere. And dedicated. He'd have to be dedicated to work for the kind of salary the Green Star paid. He had looked underslept and overworked. He'd probably been living on benzedrine and doughnuts since the shot that killed the city. Seeing misery everywhere and detesting it, and sincere in wanting to do something about it. Sincere — that was the hell of it. From a distance, one's adversaries seemed fiends, but with a closer view, one saw the sincerity and it was as great as one's own. Perhaps Satan was the sincerest of the lot.

  He opened the letter and read it. The letter informed him that Brother Joshua and the others had departed from New Rome for an unspecified destination in the West. The letter also advised him that information about Quo peregrinatur had leaked to the ZDI, who had sent investigators to the Vatican to ask questions about the rumored launching of an unauthorized starship... Evidently the starship was not yet in space.

  They'd learn soon enough about Quo peregrinatur, but with the help of Heaven, they'd find out too late. What then? he wondered.