DEATH of a PHILOSOPHER.
Let others bestrew the hearses of the great with panegyric. When a philosopher dies, I consider myself as losing a patron, an instructor, and a friend; I consider the world as losing one who might serve to console her amidst the desolations of war and ambition. Nature every day produces in abundance men capable of filling all the requisite duties of authority; but she is a niggard in the birth of an exalted mind, scarcely producing in a century a single genius to bless and enlighten a degenerate age. Prodigal in the production of kings, governors, mandarines, chams, and courtiers, she seems to have forgotten, for more than three thousand years, the manner in which she once formed the brain of a Confucius; and well it is she has forgotten, when a bad world gave him so very bad a reception.
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THE VICTIM OF MAGICAL DELUSION;
OR, INTERESTING MEMOIRS OF MIGUEL, DUKE DE CA*I*A.
UNFOLDING MANY CURIOUS UNKNOWN HISTORICAL FACTS.
Translated from the German of Tschink.
(Continued from [page 211].)
Alumbrado was of the same opinion, our advice was however neglected, for the next morning when I went to see the Duke, I found the Count had already been liberated. The matter happened in the following manner:
The Duke had paid him one more visit at night, in order to get some explanation of Amelia’s history, asking the Count whether his account of Amelia’s adventures had been strictly true, or intermixed with fiction? The Count confessed frankly that he had not been very conscientious in his relation, but had added to his picture many fictitious strokes; nay, that he had disfigured even the principal incidents by interpolation, in order to encrease by his adventrous tale, the Duke’s propensity to wonderful incidents, and thus to render Amelia more interesting to him. The Duke asked him how he could have risked a fraud which the first meeting with the Countess could have laid open to him. “I was well aware,” the Count replied, “that you as well as Amelia would be prompted by the tender harmony which made your hearts beat in unison, to avoid speaking of incidents which would have introduced Amelia’s late Lord and her love for him.” The Duke asked him whether the Irishman had not acted in concert with Lady Delier? “Only as far as he made use of her to direct the love that had taken place between your Grace and Amelia,” the Count answered; “the conditions and reflections under which the Baroness was to assist in forwarding your mutual union are unknown to me.” The Count being asked, whether that wonderful note by which Amelia had been released from her vow of eternal fidelity to her deceased Lord, had been a contrivance of Hiermanfor’s natural skill, or the effect of supernatural power; the Count replied, the latter had been the case. The Duke had been affected so much by the repeated mention of his Amelia, that he began to melt in tears. The Count thought this state of mind very propitious for regaining his liberty, and obtained it without difficulty. What could the Duke have refused in that situation to Amelia’s brother-in-law?
Alumbrado seemed to be not less displeased with this event than myself. My hope that the Count would entirely destroy, by an ample discovery of the juggling tricks of the Irishman, the Duke’s belief in the supernatural skill of the latter was now utterly destroyed, for he had not unfolded the most important mystery; the apparition of Antonio at the church-yard. Yet I derived some consolation from the papers of Clairval, which were still in the hands of the Duke, and proposed to throw some light on that extraordinary incident. My friend himself seemed to entertain the same hope, and although the papers had been partly consumed by the fire, yet he was not discouraged, and undertook the laborious task of decyphering them. We retired lest we should disturb him.
The next morning Alumbrado came to my palace, informing me that he went to pay a visit to the Duke, but had not been admitted. We concluded from this, that he had not yet finished decyphering of the papers.
The Duke joined us about an hour after with gloomy looks, he gave me some writings and said, “that is all that I could make out; read it and edify yourself.”---
I began to read aloud, “Beloved and trusty---” the Duke interrupted me—“It is a letter to Hiermanfor, written by the Lady of the late Duke of B——a, at a time when he had little hope of ascending the royal throne of P————l.”
“Beloved and trusty! I have read all your letters to our Privy Secretary, along with the note by which you acquaint him with your intention of introducing Miguel to the Hermit. I always read your letters with admiration, yet I cannot but confess that I have great reason to suspect you have it more at heart to be admired, than to gain Miguel over to our party. I should think Miguel could have been secured to us in a safer, easier, and more expeditious manner, and you would have saved yourself a great deal of time and trouble if you had attempted it. Why those superfluous machinations, why those expensive, intricate, artificial, and give me leave to add, those fragile machines which so easily may be destroyed? You could certainly have ensnared Miguel in a more simple and a less precarious manner. Machineries like those which you have made use of are always liable to the danger of being discovered by accident, which may ruin the whole plan.
“You will perhaps reply, that, if he should make such a discovery, it would be of little consequence; that you know this Miguel too well, are too sensible of your superiority, that he cannot do without you, and that you keep him in chains which he will not be able to shake off, though your whole miraculous web should be dissolved in smoke. But, if so, wherefore those needless artifices? What benefit will arise from your miracles and ghosts? The love intrigue with Amelia, and the charm of your eloquence would have been sufficient for gaining Miguel over to our party.
“I may be mistaken, your proceedings are however riddles to me, if I do not suppose that an arrogant activity has prompted you to contrive extraordinary intrigues, and to have recourse to marvellous machineries. People of your genius are wont to do so. You despise the ways of common men, force new roads through insurmountable rocks, entangle your man in numberless magic fetters, with no other view, than to have the pleasure of seeing your prisoner insnare himself deeper and deeper by his attempts to regain his liberty. The simple, artless turn of a play, does not suit a genius like your’s, which delights only in knitting and dissolving intricate knots, and in having recourse to artificial, complicated machines; obstacles and dangers serve only to give additional energy to your activity. Miguel was, perhaps, only an object which was to serve you for trying your skill and art, in order to see how far you could rely on your capacities for more important opportunities.
“But however it be, I am rather bound to thank you for your zeal to serve our cause, than to criticise the choice of the means you have made use of. Accomplish what you have begun, and you may be sure of my favour and active gratitude.”
While I had been reading, the Duke walked up and down the room with hasty strides. He now stopped. “Well, Marquis! well, Alumbrado!” said he, “do I not act a charming part in this letter?”
We remained silent, became we saw that he was violently agitated.
“They treat me as a simpleton, as a blockhead. Is it not true?”
“How you exaggerate it!” said I. “They ascribe to you want of experience, and that is all.”
“O Marquis, don’t you see in what a tone, and with how much contempt the proud woman speaks of me?”
“She is a woman who mistakes you.”
“Heavens and earth! and I should brook her injuries without taking revenge?”
“My Lord!” Alumbrado said, “in what relation have you been to the Dutchess? I cannot see the connection of the whole affair?”
The Duke explained this connection to him, by discovering the share he had had in the revolution.
Alumbrado was all attention during this account, and when it was finished seemed to be absorbed in profound meditation.
“Friend!” said I to the Duke, “there are some more written leaves”————
“It is Hiermanfor’s answer to the letter you have been reading.”
I read the letter aloud.
“It is with no I small astonishment that I find myself called to an account, in the letter which your Grace did me the honour of writing to me, for a point which I sincerely wish never had been mentioned. The remarks you have made on it redound as much to the honour of your Grace’s penetration and sagacity, as they tend to mortify me by betraying me into a confession, which I would have refused to make to any mortal living, except to so noble a challenger.
“My second letter to your Privy Secretary, explaining sufficiently the motives which have prompted me to gain Miguel over to our party by the arts of natural magic, I think I need not add new arguments to those contained in that letter, if your Grace will take the trouble to re-peruse and to ponder them attentively. Besides the reprehension of your Grace is directed less against the means which I have made use of, than against the manner of their application. You ask in your letter, why I have had recourse to such superfluous machinations, to such expensive, intricate, artificial, and fragile machines? Indeed you think too contemptibly of Miguel. His penetration, as well as his great knowledge, raise him far above the common men of his age; his understanding, which has been improved under the tuition of an Antonio de Galvez, is not to be imposed upon so easily as you think. Besides, you will have the goodness to consider that he was not the only person I had to deal with, and that his tutor, who never stirred from his side, was always ready to cut asunder the magical bonds in which I had entangled him, but why do I hesitate any longer to tell you the plain truth? My design was not directed against Miguel alone, but on his tutor too. It was the most ardent wish of my heart to gain this man to our party by my magical arts, and that it was which forced me to have recourse to so many machinations, and such expensive and complicated machines. If my design upon him had been crowned with success, Miguel too would have been an easy and certain conquest.
“If your Grace should ask what has prompted me to form so daring a plan, and what reasons I had to hope for success? I beg you will condescend to ponder the following points: Count Galvez was an insurmountable obstacle in my way to Miguel, which rendered it necessary either to draw him in our interest, or to remove him from his pupil. It will be obvious to you for what reason I resolved to attempt the former, if you will consider how much advantage our affairs would have derived from so valuable a conquest. If we could have made sure of Antonio, we then should also have drawn the court of Rome in our interest by his intercession. Before the present Pope was raised to the papal throne, he and a number of persons of the highest rank were intimately connected with him. We could, therefore, have expected to interest for our cause by his influence a court, which will become our most dangerous enemy, if it should not take our part; and I apprehend this will be the case.”*
(To be continued.)
* On the margin of the manuscript, the following note was written by an unknown hand: “The Irishman has not been mistaken, for nine years are now past since the revolution has taken place, and the new king of Port***l has not yet been acknowledged by the court of Rome.”