The Theme in the Work
God enters late in One, No One, and One Hundred Thousand, in Book VII, and enters in a particular way: as the name that Vitangelo Moscarda gives to the vital point that Dida's laughter wounded. Up to then the book had spoken of nose, mirror, bank, and a hundred thousand Moscardas, without resorting to any authority above men. In Chapter V of Book VII, walking the dog Bibi through the churches of Richieri, he recalls that she wanted to go in at all costs, and that he explained to her that inside there is the most respectable of human feelings. From this he draws the distinction that organizes the theme: there is a God within, the feeling each person has in his own way, and a God without, the one who has a house, zealous servants, and established powers in the world. Men build a house for the feeling because it is not enough for them to have it in the heart, and they want to touch it. What the novel shows next is what happens when the God within must ask help of the God without.
In Chapter V of Book VII, after explaining to the dog why men have churches, Vitangelo names what he felt in the living room at home, when Dida laughed:
Quel punto vivo che s’era sentito ferire in me quando mia moglie aveva riso nel sentirmi dire che non volevo più mi si tenesse in conto d’usurajo a Richieri, era Dio senza alcun dubbio: Dio che s’era sentito ferire in me, Dio che in me non poteva più tollerare che gli altri a Richieri mi tenessero in conto d’usurajo., that vital point that had felt itself wounded in me, when my wife laughed on hearing me say that I no longer wanted to be considered a usurer in Richieri, was God, without any doubt: God who had felt himself wounded in me, God who in me could no longer tolerate that others in Richieri should consider me a usurer.
The house he had explained to the dog does not serve only to shelter:
Non basta loro averli dentro, nel cuore, i sentimenti: se li vogliono vedere anche fuori, toccarli; e costruiscono loro una casa., it is not enough for them to have feelings inside, in the heart: they want to see them outside as well, to touch them; and they build them a house.
The plan that arises is practical: the God within, who will seem mad to everyone, goes to visit the God without to ask for protection.
Bisognava invece che il Dio di dentro, questo Dio che in me sarebbe a tutti ormai apparso pazzo, andasse quanto più contritamente gli fosse possibile a far visita e a chiedere ajuto e protezione al saggissimo Dio di fuori, a quello che aveva la casa e i suoi fedelissimi e zelantissimi servitori e tutti i suoi poteri sapientemente e magnificamente costituiti nel mondo per farsi amare e temere., it was necessary, on the contrary, that the God within, this God who in me would now seem mad to everyone, should go, as contritely as possible, to pay a visit and ask help and protection from the all-wise God without, the one who had the house and his most faithful and most zealous servants and all his powers wisely and magnificently established in the world to make himself loved and feared.
In Chapter VI of Book VII he chooses as interlocutor a bishop who is not comfortable, and understands why:
Un vescovo così non è comodo per tutti coloro che han voluto mettere fuori di sè il sentimento di Dio costruendogli una casa fuori, tanto più bella quanto maggiore il bisogno di farsi perdonare., a bishop like this is not comfortable for all those who wanted to put the feeling of God outside themselves by building him a house outside, all the more beautiful the greater the need to be forgiven.
In Chapter VII of Book VII he recognizes, in the bishop's room, that the God he feels cannot be spoken of there, because it would be one more proof of madness, and that he must keep silent about him:
Il Dio che in me voleva riavere il danaro della banca perchè io non fossi più chiamato usurajo, era un Dio nemico di tutte le costruzioni., the God who in me wanted to get back the bank's money so that I would no longer be called a usurer was a God who was the enemy of all constructions.
In Chapter III of Book VIII Canon Sclepis devises the possible salvation, that of public penance, and Vitangelo himself sees in him the measure of how much the God without can achieve: someone who lives entirely for the house of God.
Ecco: per sè, nessuno., there: for himself, no one.
The theme is not religious in the doctrinal sense. Pirandello does not ask whether God exists; he shows what a man does with what he feels when he needs a lofty reason for a decision that the world calls madness. Vitangelo calls God the point that has no other name, and the bishop frames it as a scruple of conscience, which shows the distance between the two forms: the feeling that fits in no house and the house that has no place for the feeling. The novel leaves both sides unjudged: the God without protects Vitangelo from commitment, and the protection costs money, which is the price of the house.
Who Embodies It
Vitangelo Moscarda is the God within, that feeling that fits in the chest and not in a house, and that seems to him the enemy of all constructions. Monsignor Partanna is the God without in his most serious form: the austere bishop who retires his carriage and demands of nuns and canons the observance of every duty. Canon Don Antonio Sclepis, director of the College of the Oblates, is the zealous servant, and the text describes him as someone who exercises will with fine art, not for his own profit, but for the merit that would come to the house of God, of whom he is a most faithful servant. Vitangelo sees in him the pride of his own power and his own knowledge, and concludes that wanting to be one for oneself, distinct from the others, is still wanting to be someone. Anna Rosa is the one who leads Vitangelo to the bishop: she knows of the visit to the Abbey and wants him to speak with Monsignor in time to prevent the commitment (Chapter IV of Book VII).
Where It Appears
- Book VII, Chapter III: The old nuns of the Abbey come cheeping at the shot, with a terror that is for the bishop's arrival, not for the wound.
- Book VII, Chapter IV: Anna Rosa knew that Monsignor Partanna would visit the nuns that morning and wanted Vitangelo to speak with him.
- Book VII, Chapter V: The vital point wounded in Vitangelo was God, who could not tolerate being taken for a usurer.
- Book VII, Chapter VI: The austere bishop, on foot, who dismisses the servants and retires the carriage, is an inconvenience to those who built the house of God to be forgiven.
- Book VII, Chapter VII: The God within, enemy of all constructions, asks help of the God without, who builds, and obtains it only if the money serves a house for charity.
- Book VIII, Chapter III: Sclepis plans the public penance and the surrender of everything to an almshouse.
- Book VIII, Chapter IV: At the end, the bells ring far away, outside him, for those who still need to think of death and pray.
Where the Readings Diverge
The God of whom Vitangelo speaks has two readings, and the text leaves them both standing. In the first, he truly feels that God was wounded in him, and the decision to close the bank and abandon the life that sustained him is a response to this. In the second, he chooses that name because he has no other for what he feels, and because he needs a lofty reason for the decision that the rest of the world calls madness. The reading of the God without also divides: for some, it is the power that has the house, the servants, and the means to protect Vitangelo; for others, it is an apparatus that only takes in what fits its calculation and that translates the vital point into scruple and money into works.
Vitangelo's God within does not invent a person out of nothing, as Mattia in The Late Mattia Pascal tries to do: he undoes the ones that others invented. This is why he is "enemy of all constructions," while Mattia is a builder. The point where the two come close is the last one, when Vitangelo, without name and without mirror, no longer has anyone to give him existence and begins to exist in things. It is a version of the divine without a God without, and the end of the book does not say whether it is the one the novel recommends.