CHAPTER VI.
CONTINUATION OF MORAL REACTION.—TARTUFFE, 1664-1669.—REAL TARTUFFES.—WHY TARTUFFE IS NOT YET A QUIETIST.
The devotee caught in the fact by the man of the world, the churchman excommunicated by the comedian—this is the meaning and aim of the Tartuffe.
Plato, in his Athenian Tartuffe (the Euthyphron), put this grand moral question, "Can there be sanctity without justice?" This question, so clear in itself but so skilfully obscured by casuists, was again put forward in open daylight. The Theatre re-established religious morality which had been so endangered in the Churches.
The author of the Tartuffe chose his subject, not in society in general, but in a more limited space, in the family circle, the fireside, the holy of holies of modern life. This dramatist, this impious being was, of all men in the world, the one who had most at heart the religion of the family, though he had no family himself. He was both tender and melancholy, and sometimes, in speaking of himself and his domestic griefs, he would utter this grave but characteristic sentence: "I ought to have foreseen that one thing made me unfit for family society; which is my austerity."
The Tartuffe, that grand and sublime picture, is very simple in its outline. Had it been more complicated it had been less popular. Mental restriction and the direction of intention, which everybody had laughed at since the "Provincial Letters," were sufficient matter for Molière. He did not venture to bring the new doctrine of mysticism on the stage, being as yet too little known or too dangerous.
Had he employed the jargon of Desmarets and the earlier quietists, and put into the mouth of Tartuffe their mystic tendernesses, the result would have been the same as that of his ridiculous sonnet in the Misanthrope—the pit would have wondered what it meant.
The evening before the first representation of Tartuffe, Molière read the piece to Ninon; "and to pay him back in his own coin, she related to him a similar adventure she had had with a wretch of that species, whose portrait she drew in such lively and natural colours, that if the piece had not been composed, he said he never would have undertaken it."
What, then, could be wanting to this master-piece, this drama of such profound conception and powerful execution? Nothing, certainly, but what was excluded by the state of religion at that time, and by the customs of our theatre.
Still one thing was wanting, which was impossible to be shown in so short a drama (though, in fact, it constitutes the real essence of the characters), I mean the preparatory management, the long windings by which he makes his approaches, his patience in stratagems, and his gradual fascination.
Everything is strongly told, but rather abruptly. This man, received into the house out of charity—this low rogue, this glutton who eats as much as six, this red-eared villain—how did he grow bold so suddenly and aspire so high? A declaration of love from such a man to such a lady, from an intended son-in-law to his future mother-in-law, still astonishes when we read it. On the stage, perhaps, we countenance it more easily.
Elmira, when the holy man makes this surprising avowal to her face is by no means prepared to listen to him. A real Tartuffe would have acted in a very different manner: he would have quietly sat down, humble and patient, and waited for the favourable moment. If, for instance, Elmira had experienced the indiscretions and fickleness of those worldly lovers whom Tartuffe mentions, then, indeed, when she was worn out by these trials, and become weak, weary, and dispirited, he might have accosted her; then perhaps she would have allowed him to say, in the smooth quietist jargon, many things that she cannot listen to at the moment when Molière presents her before us.
Mademoiselle Bourignon, in her curious Life, which well deserves another edition, relates what danger she was in through a saint of this species. I shall let her speak for herself. But first you must know that the pious damsel, who had just become an heiress, was thinking about laying out her wealth in endowing convents, and in other similar acts of piety.
"Being, one day, in the streets of Lille, I met a man whom I did not know, who said to me as he passed, 'You will not do what you wish; you will do what you do not wish.' Two days after, the same man came to my house and said, 'What did you think of me?' 'That you were either a fool or a prophet,' replied I. 'Neither,' said he; 'I am a poor fellow from a village near Douai, and my name is Jean de St. Saulieu; I have no other thought but that of charity. I lived first of all with a hermit, but now I have my curé, Mr. Roussel, for a director. I teach poor children to read. The sweetest—the most charitable act you could do would be to collect all the little female orphans; they have become so numerous since the wars! The convents are rich enough.' He spoke for three hours together with much unction.
"I inquired about him of the curé, his director, who assured me that he was a person of a truly apostolical zeal. (We should observe that the curé had tried at first to catch this rich heiress for his own nephew; the nephew not succeeding, he employed one of his own creatures.) Saint Saulieu frequently repeated his visits, speaking divinely of spiritual things. I could not understand how a man without any preparatory study could speak in so sublime a manner of the divine mysteries. I believed him to be really inspired by the Holy Ghost. He said himself that he was dead to nature. He had been a soldier, and had returned from the wars as chaste as a child. By dint of abstinence he had lost the taste of food, and could no longer distinguish wine from beer! He passed the greater part of his time on his knees in the churches. He was seen to walk in the street with a modest air and downcast eyes, never looking at anything, as if he had been alone in the world. He visited the poor and sick, giving away all he possessed. In winter time, if he saw a poor man without a garment, he would draw him aside, take off his own coat, and give it him. My heart overflowed with joy to see that there were still such men in the world. I thanked God, and thought I had found the counterpart of myself. Priests and other pious persons put the same confidence in him, went to consult him, and receive his good advice.
"It was quite foreign to my feelings to quit my peaceful retreat, and establish the asylum for children that Saint Saulieu had recommended to me. But he brought me a tradesman who had begun the same thing, and who offered me a house where he had already located a few poor girls. I took possession in November, 1653. I cleaned these children. They were shockingly dirty, but after a great deal of trouble, I cleaned them myself, having nobody with me who liked the occupation. But at last I made a rule, and followed it myself, putting every thing in common, and making every one eat at the same table. I kept myself as retired as I could; but I was obliged to speak to all sorts of persons. Friars came, as well as devotees whose conversations did not much please me... I was frequently sick to death.
"The house in which Saint Saulieu taught having been destroyed, and himself sent away, he went to live with the tradesman of whom I have already spoken. They solicited me to make an asylum, like mine, for boys. In order to raise a necessary fund, Saint Saulieu was to take an office in the town on lease, that brought in two thousand francs a-year, and the revenue was to be applied to this foundation, myself being security for him. He received the produce of one year, and then said it was necessary, before anything was done, to receive for another year, to furnish the house. This made four thousand franks; and when he had got six thousand, he kept the whole, saying it was the fruit of his labour, and that he had well earned it.
"I had not waited for this to make me distrustful of the man; I had had some strange inward misgivings on his account. One day methought I saw a black wolf sporting with a white lamb. Another day it was the heart of Saint Saulieu, and a little Moorish child with a crown and sceptre of gold sitting upon it, as if the devil had been the king of his heart. I did not conceal these visions from him; but he grew angry, and said I ought to confess myself, for thinking so badly of my neighbour; that he could not be a black wolf; for, on the contrary, the more he approached me, the more pure and chaste he became.
"One day, however, he told me that we ought to be married, only for spiritual love; and that such a union would enable us to do still more good. To this I answered, that marriage was not requisite for such a union. He made me, however, little demonstrations of friendship, to which, at first, I paid no attention. At last, he suddenly threw off the mask, told me he loved me desperately; that for many years he had studied spiritual books, the better to win me; and that now having so much access to me, I must be his wife, either by love or force and he approached to caress me. I was very angry, and commanded him to go. Then he burst into tears, fell on his knees, and said, 'The devil tempted me.' I was simple enough to believe and to pardon him.
"This was not the end of the affair: he was always recommencing his attack, following me everywhere, and entering my house in spite of my girls. He went so far as to hold a knife to my throat to force me to yield... At the same time he said everywhere that he had gained his suit, and that I was his promised wife. I complained in vain to his confessor; I then appealed to justice, who allowed me two men to guard my house, and began an enquiry. Saint Saulieu soon absconded from Lille, and went to Ghent, where he found one of my girls, who was a great devotee and passed for a mirror of perfection: he lived with her, and she became enceinte. The way he arranged the Lille affair was this: he had a brother among the Jesuits, and they employed their friends so well, that he got off by paying the costs of justice, retracting his calumny, and acknowledging that I was an honest women."[[1]]
This took place between 1653 and 1658, consequently only a few years before the representation of Molière's Tartuffe, who wrote the three first acts in 1664. Everything leads us to believe that such adventures were not rare at that period. Tartuffe, Orgon, and all the other personages of this truly historical piece, are not abstract beings, pure creations of art, like the heroes of Corneille or Racine; they are real men, caught in the act, and taken from nature.
What strikes us in Mademoiselle de Bourignon's Flemish Tartuffe is his patience to study and learn mysticism in order to speak its language; and, again, his perseverance in associating himself for whole years with the thoughts of the pious maiden.
If Molière had not been confined in so narrow a frame, if his Tartuffe had had the time to prepare better his advances, if he had been able (the thing was then, no doubt, too dangerous) to take the cloak of Desmarets and Quietism in its birth, he might have advanced still further in his designs without being discovered. Then he would not in the very beginning have made to the person he wants to seduce the very illogical confession, that he is a cheat. He would not have ventured the expression, "If it be only heaven" (Act iv. scene 5). Instead of unmasking abruptly this ugly corruption, he would have varnished it over, and unveiled it by degrees. From one ambiguous phrase to another, and by a cunning transition, he would have contrived to make corruption take the appearance of perfection. Who knows? He might perhaps at last have succeeded, like many others, in finding it unnecessary to be a hypocrite any longer, and have finished by imposing on himself, cheating and seducing himself into the belief that he was a saint. It is then he would have been Tartuffe in the superlative degree, being so not only for the world, but for himself, having perfectly confounded within himself every ray of good, and reposing in evil with a tranquillity secured by his ignorance, counterfeit at first, but afterwards become natural.
[[1]] The two accounts given by Mademoiselle de Bourignon are abridged and united. See at the end of Vol. I. of her OEuvres (Amsterdam, 1686), pp. 68-80, and pp. 188-197.