{"id":"01KG8AJV0MN856C9CFJRZ1KR9A","cid":"bafkreifdvn3g7hinrjspcw3n6gwxkogmf6aa2awb32xln2vrnt5lav7qte","type":"segment","properties":{"description":"# Segment XX from Billy Budd and Other Prose Pieces\n\n## Overview\nThis segment, labeled \"XX,\" is an excerpt from Herman Melville's novel, [Billy Budd and Other Prose Pieces](arke:01KG8AJ7CG8SS24T79X9YN19QH). It spans lines 3029-3084 of the source text and discusses the chaplain's attempts to minister to Billy Budd.\n\n## Context\nThis segment is part of the larger work, [Billy Budd and Other Prose Pieces](arke:01KG8AJ7CG8SS24T79X9YN19QH), which is itself contained within the [Melville Complete Works](arke:01KG89HMDZKNY753EZE1CJ8HZW) collection. The text was extracted from the digital file [billy_budd.txt](arke:01KG89J1FFTGRE9J93Z3K29NGY). It follows segment [XIX](arke:01KG8AJV0G9GSCTD1A2Z8CY0S5) and precedes segment [XXI](arke:01KG8AJV0MKBFJ15C7CPJVE1BM) in the narrative flow of the novel.\n\n## Contents\nSegment XX details the chaplain's unsuccessful efforts to impart religious concepts of death and salvation to Billy Budd. Billy's polite but unappreciative reception of the chaplain's discourse is likened to a \"savage\" receiving Christianity. The segment emphasizes the chaplain's discretion and good sense, noting that he ultimately withdraws, feeling that Billy's innocence is more significant than religious conversion. In a poignant moment, the chaplain kisses Billy's cheek. The text then reflects on the chaplain's role as a \"minister of the Prince of Peace serving in the host of the God of War,\" highlighting the inherent incongruity of his position within a military context and suggesting his indirect subservience to military force. A footnote in the original manuscript indicates an \"irruption of heretic thought hard to suppress.\"","description_generated_at":"2026-01-30T20:49:29.763Z","description_model":"gemini-2.5-flash-lite","description_title":"Segment XX from Billy Budd and Other Prose Pieces","end_line":3084,"extracted_at":"2026-01-30T20:47:42.596Z","extracted_by":"structure-extraction-lambda","label":"XX","source_file":"01KG89J1FFTGRE9J93Z3K29NGY","start_line":3029,"text":"                                  XXI\r\n\r\n\r\nIf in vain the good chaplain sought to impress the young barbarian with\r\nideas of death akin to those conveyed in the skull, dial, and\r\ncross-bones on old tombstones; equally futile to all appearance were his\r\nefforts to bring home to him the thought of salvation and a Saviour.\r\nBilly listened, but less out of awe or reverence, perhaps, than from a\r\ncertain natural politeness; doubtless at bottom regarding all that in\r\nmuch the same way that most mariners of his class take any discourse,\r\nabstract or out of the common tone of the workaday world. And this\r\nsailor way of taking clerical discourse is not wholly unlike the way in\r\nwhich the pioneer of Christianity, full of transcendent miracles, was\r\nreceived long ago on tropic isles by any superior _savage_ so called--a\r\nTahitian, say, of Captain Cook’s time or shortly after that time. Out of\r\nnatural courtesy he received but did not appreciate. It was like a gift\r\nplaced in the palm of an outstretched hand upon which the fingers do not\r\nclose.\r\n\r\nBut the _Indomitable’s_ chaplain was a discreet man possessing the good\r\nsense of a good heart. So he insisted not on his vocation here. At the\r\ninstance of Captain Vere, a lieutenant had apprised him of pretty much\r\neverything as to Billy; and since he felt that innocence was even a\r\nbetter thing than religion wherewith to go to judgment, he reluctantly\r\nwithdrew; but in his emotion not without first performing an act strange\r\nenough in an Englishman, and under the circumstances yet more so in any\r\nregular priest. Stooping over, he kissed on the fair cheek his\r\nfellow-man, a felon in martial law, one who, though in the confines of\r\ndeath, he felt he could never convert to a dogma; nor for all that did\r\nhe fear for his future.\r\n\r\nMarvel not that having been made acquainted with the young sailor’s\r\nessential innocence, the worthy man lifted not a finger to avert the\r\ndoom of such a martyr to martial discipline. So to do would not only\r\nhave been as idle as invoking the desert, but would also have been an\r\naudacious transgression of the bounds of his function, one as exactly\r\nprescribed to him by military law as that of the boatswain or any other\r\nnaval officer. Bluntly put, a chaplain is the minister of the Prince of\r\nPeace serving in the host of the God of War--Mars. As such, he is as\r\nincongruous as a musket would be on the altar at Christmas. Why, then,\r\nis he there? Because he indirectly subserves the purpose attested by the\r\ncannon; because, too, he lends the sanction of the religion of the meek\r\nto that which practically is the abrogation of everything but force.[7]\r\n\r\n-----\r\n\r\nFootnote 7:\r\n\r\n  There is an author’s note in the margin of the MS. reading:--_An\r\n  irruption of heretic thought hard to suppress._\r\n\r\n------------------------------------------------------------------------\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n\r","title":"XX"},"relationships":[{"peer":"01KG8AJ7CG8SS24T79X9YN19QH","peer_type":"novel","predicate":"in"},{"peer":"01KG89J1FFTGRE9J93Z3K29NGY","peer_type":"file","predicate":"extractedFrom"},{"peer":"01KG89HMDZKNY753EZE1CJ8HZW","peer_type":"collection","predicate":"collection"},{"peer":"01KG8AJV0G9GSCTD1A2Z8CY0S5","peer_type":"segment","predicate":"prev"},{"peer":"01KG8AJV0MKBFJ15C7CPJVE1BM","peer_type":"segment","predicate":"next"}],"ver":3,"created_at":"2026-01-30T20:47:44.660Z","ts":"2026-01-30T20:49:30.223Z","edited_by":{"method":"manual","user_id":"01KFF5C36SQEVDHC9CBNZZJH9K"}}