TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN.
Lady, when men pray to the,
Thou goest before of thy benignitie
And getest us the light of thy prayere
To giden us to thi Sonne so dere.
—Chaucer.
FLEURANGE.
BY MRS. CRAVEN, AUTHOR OF “A SISTER’S STORY.”
TRANSLATED FROM THE FRENCH, WITH PERMISSION.
PART SECOND.
THE TRIAL.
XXIV.
Fleurange hastily wrapped a large white burnous around her, drew the hood over her face, and then ran to the carriage, which was waiting for her. It seemed as if heaven had sent her aid in the very hour of her greatest need. She felt that her resolutions would be carried out by means of her cousin, but in what way she could not yet see. At all events, she was no longer friendless, and one of the difficulties she had to surmount was already smoothed away.
These thoughts prevailed over all others during her short ride from the palace to the hotel. At her arrival, the sight of Clara made her forget everything for a while but the sweet memories of the past.—The Old Mansion, the fireside around which they used to gather, the family all scattered since they last saw each other—all came back with sharp poignancy, and it was with tears of joy and regret they flew into each other’s arms.
This first emotion somewhat calmed, the two cousins looked at one another. Though they had not been separated more than a year, the appearance of both bore marks of the changes they had passed through. Clara was as fresh and pretty as ever, but her fine son, whose birth had delayed her return to Germany, added to the charm of youth a certain gravity which enters into all maternal joy, and gave to her beauty the crown of dignity it had hitherto lacked.
As to Fleurange, it would be difficult to say what had changed her. Was it the elegance of her dress, which the princess did not excuse her from, even when they were alone? Or the distinguished society in which she now moved? Or was it the increased paleness of her face, and her air of depression, that gave such sweetness to her look, lent such new grace to her form, and rendered her whole person more strikingly attractive than ever?
Fleurange had passed through too many sorrows, and at too early an age, for her face ever to reflect the careless gaiety of youth. And yet, after some weeks passed in her uncle’s family, the Old Mansion was lit up with no smile more radiant than hers—it resounded with no voice more joyful. Now, her pale and noble countenance seemed overshadowed with a premature gravity. Her serene eyes, with their expression of firmness, no longer displayed the sanguine enthusiasm of youth, which used at times to light them up and deepen the gray hue of the iris into the lively brilliancy of black. Without looking a day older, she seemed to have acquired the experience of maturity, and made a correct estimate of life without having taken a step further through it.
Clara and Julian gazed at her with a kind of anxious admiration, but forbore questioning her. They instinctively felt she would prefer not to answer their questions. Besides, her own inquiries left no room for theirs. The names so dear to them all were one by one pronounced, and for some moments everything was lit up with the warmth of the far-off fireside, which, amid all the young girl’s recent emotions, she had never ceased to feel. Everything was going on well among those dear absent ones. Comfort, peace, and even somewhat of ease gradually reappeared beneath their roof. And all this was owing to Clement’s activity and ability.
“Dear Clement!” said Clara with tears in her eyes. “What a providence he has been to them all! May God bless and reward this beloved brother!”
Then the travellers spoke of themselves. They were only passing through Florence, which they had previously visited. After going around to see Perugia, and all that region so attractive to artists, they intended resuming the route to Germany. They were to pass the following year at Heidelberg, where they were impatiently awaited, Julian feeling obliged to make up for the time he had lost in this delightful journey and to undertake with no further delay the orders he had received.
Perugia!—At the very mention of this place an idea suddenly occurred to Fleurange. Before arriving at Perugia they would have to pass near Santa Maria al Prato. Could she not accompany them thus far, and seek the advice and aid of the Madre Maddalena who had always shown so affectionate an interest in her? Guided by her, she would be sure of taking the wisest course in the perplexities of her situation. If she needed courage, where find it if not with her, the very remembrance of whom often sufficed to renew the vigor of her soul? If she needed consolation, who so able to impart it? Yes, this opportunity was providential; she must hasten to profit by it; and, without speaking for the present of absolute separation, she would only obtain the princess’ permission for a few days’ absence in order to make this short journey.
Having decided on this, Fleurange breathed as freely as if a weight had been removed from her heart. Before the end of the hour, she took leave of her cousin after appointing a meeting for the following day, and re-entered the carriage which had brought her.
It was in the month of May. The air was redolent of spring-time—and spring-time at Florence. Count George’s carriage was an open calèche. As she took her seat, one of the passers-by, doubtless struck with her beauty, threw her one of those large bouquets which in that city of flowers are in every one’s hands at that season. Fleurange, without even turning her head to look at the person who offered her this delicate homage, accepted it without any scruple, and inhaled its odor with delight. She felt an unusual pleasure in the sweet fresh night air which caressed her cheek, and at finding herself thus alone for a moment with uncovered head beneath so pure and brilliant a sky. After the long confinement she had endured—passing so many days and nights in a chamber the air and light scarcely penetrated—this moment of freedom was a mental and physical refreshment of which she unconsciously had absolute need. Besides, amid all the anxious care she lavished on the princess, one thought—a constant, painful thought—had not ceased to haunt her: She had been obliged to practise continual renunciation of a tenderness which, mute or sometimes murmured, had on a thousand occasions made itself understood or divined. It was an additional relief to feel this struggle would soon end, that a means of departure was at hand, or rather of flight, and she would only have to courageously struggle and repress her feelings a few days longer. After that, she would only have to suffer; there would be nothing more to fear, either from others or herself.
The young girl’s evening ride came to an end too soon. The horses went like the wind, and brought her in a few moments to the foot of the broad marble staircase. She ascended it slowly, and proceeded at the same pace through the large salons, till she came to the one in which she had left the princess and her son. This room, it will be remembered, was the last of the suite, and opened, as well as the one next it, upon the terrace, which thus afforded an exterior communication between the two rooms.
When Fleurange came to the latter, she stopped. She feared the princess might have retired without waiting for or needing her. But not so: her son was still with her. She could distinctly hear the sound of their voices. Owing to the vernal mildness of the evening, all the windows were open, and, instead of entering, Fleurange passed out on the terrace to await the conclusion of their conversation. And, moreover, it had not yet struck ten—the hour appointed for her return.
But she had scarcely gone out before she regretted it, for she could not help hearing, not only their voices, but their very words. She was about to return when she was stopped, and rooted as it were to the ground, by a word which her ear caught, and which gave her a thrill. That word was Cordelia; and almost immediately after she heard her own name—her name, not that of Gabrielle, the only one by which she was known, but the name of her childhood, the name unknown to every one at Florence except him who now uttered it—and in such a tone!
“Fleurange!” said Count George. “Yes, mother, this name which just escaped me in speaking of her; this name as strange as her beauty, and which, like the charm she is endowed with, belongs to no one else in the world, was the one her father called her by the first time I ever saw her—a thousand times more charming than the Cordelia of which she was the original—”
Fleurange heard nothing more.—For some moments she felt ready to faint, and it was only a resolute effort of her will that kept her from falling to the ground, overcome by surprise and emotion. Was it really the count she heard speaking? and could it be his mother to whom he was talking? What madness led him to brave the princess by using such language—her whom the slightest contradiction often threw into a violent state of impatience and anger—her who could not endure the least opposition from any one? What would she say? What reply was Fleurange about to hear?
She no longer thought of stirring. She felt incapable of deciding whether it were well or ill to remain; she had but one wish—to hear the princess’ reply, and to act in consequence. Perhaps, after hearing it, she would leave the place where she stood, never to appear before her again; who could tell? Already a confused idea entered her mind of leaving the palace and returning through the streets, alone and on foot—night though it was—to the Steinbergs.
After a long silence the princess spoke, but her trembling and subdued voice, to Fleurange’s great surprise, betrayed no signs of anger. The effect was only the more profound on her who now stood quivering with silent expectation.
“Then, George, you wish to cause me the greatest mortification it is possible for a son to cause his mother—you wish to violate the promise on which I relied with so much faith and confidence?”
“Mother, I have already told you I never made any promise.”
“Enough, George. I like your frankness. Do not spoil it now by prevarication. If you made her no promise, you made me one which you have not kept—me, your mother. This is sufficient, I think, to merit my reproaches.”
“Mother—!” And George rose with an impatient air, and turned as if to go out.
The princess rose too. She seemed completely cured. It often happened that some extraordinary excitement effaced in a moment the last traces of a long and severe attack.
She put her arm around her son’s neck and drew him towards her. “George,” said she, when he returned to the place he had just left, “I ought not to trust any more in your promises, and yet there is one I beg you to make.”
“What is it, mother?”
“You will not yield to this folly without taking time for reflection?”
“I can promise that.”
“Moreover—listen to what I am going to ask—Swear you will never yield to it till you have obtained my consent.”
George hesitated. “That would be a very serious promise,” said he at length in a caressing tone, “if I did not know that in the end you never refuse anything to your spoiled child.”
“Come, come, George,” resumed his mother in an eager tone of distress, “do not make me repent of my indulgence. Give me your promise!”
“Well, mother, it should be acknowledged I ought to hesitate to give it—without ever having asked her, without even knowing how, after all, I should be received.”
The princess shrugged her shoulders.
He continued: “I am persuaded she would dispense with your consent less readily than I, and consequently my submission is under the guard of a will stronger than mine.”
The princess at first looked astonished; then, after a moment’s reflection, she said: “Perhaps you are right. No matter, give me your hand on this promise.”
George bent down, kissed his mother’s hand, and pressed it in his. “There it is,” said he, “and my promise—on my word of honor.”
“That is right, my child, now leave me. It is time for Gabrielle to return, and it would be better for her not to find you here.”
George rose, and, embracing his mother once more, left the room.
As soon as she was alone, the princess threw herself on her chaise longue, put both hands to her face, and burst into sobs.
CHAPTER XXV.
Fleurange hesitated a moment, then followed her natural impulse, which was always straightforward and courageous. She resolutely entered the salon by the terrace window, and when the princess raised her head she saw the young girl before her, wrapped in her white burnous, with her bouquet in her hand. Though the princess was expecting her, this sudden apparition surprised her to such a degree that she gazed at her for a moment without speaking, as if she were a supernatural vision. But it was only for a moment. Fleurange perceived that the anger she repressed in her son’s presence was now about to burst forth.
The princess wiped away her tears. Her eyes expressed at once wrath and disdain. She hastily rose, and was about to add severe words to the imperious gesture with which she pointed towards the door with one hand, and had already placed the other rudely on the young girl’s shoulder, when the latter, without arrogance and without fear, looked her in the face.
The expression of Fleurange’s large eyes was such as can only be compared to that magnetic virtue—that sometimes subdues, they say, the fury of beings destitute of reason. No words could have expressed to such a degree the uprightness and purity of her soul. With all her faults, there was a nobleness in the princess’ nature which was touched by that look, and responded to it. Her eyes turned away: she fell back on her chaise longue, and unresistingly allowed Fleurange to take both her hands, which had just made so threatening a gesture. She held them for some moments grasped in her own, but neither of them spoke.
At last Fleurange said in a sweet, calm voice: “Princess, I was on the terrace, and heard everything.”
A new flash of indignation awoke in the princess’ eyes, and her mouth resumed its expression of disdain. The young girl’s face slightly flushed.
“You will readily believe,” she continued, “that I did not go there with the intention of listening. But hearing my name, I stopped. It was wrong, I acknowledge, but I had no time for reflection. Pardon me, and forgive also,” she added in a more troubled tone, “the momentary displeasure Count George has caused you on my account.”
“Momentary!” repeated the princess in a cold, ironical tone.
“At least,” continued Fleurange, “you will find it only for an instant that this notion, this folly—in short, what you have just heard—will be serious enough to annoy or afflict you.”
“Gabrielle!”
“Allow me to continue, princess; you shall reply afterwards. My heart is so full of gratitude towards you—”
“Do not talk to me of your gratitude,” cried the princess, interrupting her, and breaking out anew. “It is precisely because I thought I had some claims on it that I feel so deeply wounded. After loving you so much, I am tempted to hate you. It is your perfidy, your ingratitude—”
“I am neither perfidious nor ungrateful,” said Fleurange, turning pale. “Allow me to prove I am not. I ask it even more for your own sake than for mine.”
The princess became calm once more, as if appeased by her sweet voice, and seemed to resign herself to let Fleurange continue. She leaned her head on her hand, and listened some moments without changing her attitude.
“No,” repeated Fleurange, “I am neither perfidious nor ungrateful, and God knows what I am ready to suffer to spare you this mortification or any other!—My first thought was to go away—to flee—that you might be delivered from my presence and all the annoyance it might cause you. But, princess, that would not have been the best course. He must forget me. Therefore I must not disappear in so romantic a fashion.”
“What do you mean?” said the princess with surprise.
“That I must certainly go away, but not in a way that will induce him to pursue me. The less obstinate he is made by any appearance of opposition, the sooner I shall be effaced from his memory.”
“You understand him well,” said the princess, more and more astonished; “and you talk very coolly,” added she. “Then you do not love poor George at all?”
A moment before she had been greatly irritated at her protegée’s presumption, but now, mother-like, she seemed ready to take offence at her indifference.
A lively blush suddenly suffused Fleurange’s face, and great tears came into her eyes. “I do not love him?—My God! O my God!” murmured she in a stifled tone, “have pity on my poor heart!”
But she almost immediately regained her self-control, and the princess, more affected than she wished to appear, became attentive, and at length perceived the importance of what she was about to hear.
Fleurange then rapidly explained her design. It was the same she had formed an hour before at her cousin’s: only then she was desirous of concealing the motive and duration of her absence from the princess. Now everything was simplified; she would set out with the Steinbergs for Perugia, and afterwards find a pretext for prolonging her absence. Only it was important the princess should appear to expect her return, and, above all, should manifest no anxiety as to her son’s fidelity to his promise.
“That promise,” continued Fleurange, not without a tone of just pride, “I venture to say that M. le Comte George, in placing it under the protection of my will, was right in his conviction it would be well kept.”
While she was talking, all the princess’ resentment vanished, and changed gradually to profound gratitude. Looking at Fleurange as she stood before her, she realized, if she had wished to abuse her ascendency or even take advantage of it, no filial respect would have sufficed to bring George to submission: no maternal authority have succeeded in restraining him. Whatever it might cost her to acknowledge it, she could not deny that, if this double wound was spared her pride and her affection, it was due to the generous disinterestedness of her whom she had just treated with so much haughtiness, as well as to her clear judgment. Yes, she was perfectly right in thinking it would not do to disappear and suddenly tear herself away, as it were, from George. The princess knew, better than any one else, to what degree of tenacity this kind of contradiction might lead her son, and it was precisely this knowledge of his character alone that had just given her the power of restraining herself in his presence. The means suggested by Fleurange was therefore the best to ensure his future safety. The princess’ great hope was in the mobility of George’s nature, provided, on the one hand, he were withdrawn from the dangerous charm of Fleurange’s presence, and, on the other, they did not appear separated by the prestige of a great obstacle. Nothing, in fact, could be more judicious than the advice this young girl gave contrary to her own interests. She was too much a woman of the world not to comprehend this, and was grateful to her for it. Once more she might hope to attain the aim of her whole life, and with this end in view she yielded without remorse to the necessity of trampling under foot the noble heart that was immolating itself. We will even venture to affirm that, if she was preoccupied with anything beyond the present danger, it was not Fleurange’s crushed life, but rather the effect of this unfortunate occurrence on her own comfort and habits. Nevertheless, when they separated at the end of this long conversation, the princess folded Fleurange in her arms with many demonstrations of affection, and when the latter was once more alone in her chamber she felt comparatively happy. She abhorred all dissimulation, and the important step she had just taken in the path of courageous frankness seemed to have removed a burden from her heart. She was still in that state of somewhat excessive satisfaction which succeeds a great effort, when, in entering her chamber, she threw down the bouquet she had in her hand. In doing so, a paper she had not noticed fell from it to the floor. She picked it up with some surprise, opened it mechanically, saw the writing was unknown to her, and read it without comprehending it at first:
“To live without the power of reparation: to suffer without being able to expiate: are these torments that belong to earth, or hell? Not far from you a man lives and suffers thus. You who pray, pray for him!”
Fleurange read and re-read these words two or three times without attaching any special importance to them. Suddenly she shuddered and began to tremble. The concluding words were the refrain of a song sung at one of the soirées at the Old Mansion in the hearing of the only person she knew in the world who had reason to write the other part of the note she had just read.
But was it possible! Could it have been Felix, her guilty and unhappy cousin, who wrote it, and this very evening placed it in her bouquet? Was it his hand that threw it? At this thought she shivered as if the shadow of one dead had fallen upon her. Or was it simply a mystification? The history of the Dornthals’ ruin was not wholly unknown at Florence. Perhaps some one wished to frighten or puzzle her. She grew bewildered in trying to unravel this new mystery. How solve the doubt? How even speak of it without reviving a hateful remembrance, or making a painful revelation?
She finally bethought herself of Julian’s presence at Florence, and this relieved her mind: he would be able to discover the truth, and know better than any one else how to avoid injuring in his researches the unhappy man who was perhaps this very moment hiding not far from her a blasted and dishonored life.
If the Princess Catherine had been told the previous evening she was about to be deprived of her charming companion, the news would have been sufficient to cause a return of the alarming symptoms from which, thanks to her care, she had but just recovered. But greater interests than her fondness for Gabrielle were at stake, and her selfishness itself was overruled, or, rather, assumed another form, in view of the danger she reproached herself for not having foreseen, and which threatened an essential element in her happiness, as well as the accomplishment of one of her dearest wishes.
Not to be unjust to the princess, we must acknowledge this wish was reasonable, and in her persistency on this point she gave as great a proof of genuine maternal sagacity as of worldly ambition. We should also add that the wish in question was in accordance with one sacred in her eyes—the wish of the adored husband of her youth. His memory was interwoven with her earlier days, when her life, simpler and better, promised to be something higher than succeeding years had realized.
After she became a widow, she had no guide but herself, and when, beautiful, wealthy, and still young, she appeared in the fashionable world at St. Petersburg, her light and frivolous nature had no restraint but her pride. In the height of the intoxication of this second epoch of her life, she always respected the limits the fashionable world itself sets, and beyond which refuses its consideration and respect, even while still lavishing its flattery and incense. Her pride, in particular, prevented her from transgressing these limits—that was the dominant trait in her character—and prompted her to aim at the highest position at all times and in all places. And after conferring on her life a kind of dignity, it guided her in the choice of a second husband. She thought herself happy in obtaining rank, honors, and wealth, but she soon found she had paid too dear for these advantages; and perhaps she would not have passed through the trials of an ill-assorted union as irreproachably as the period of liberty that preceded it, if, at the end of two years, death had not restored that liberty a second time.
After this, nothing occurred to trouble the brilliant and prosperous course of a life which, in spite of generous instincts and a mind considerably cultivated, was given wholly up to frivolity, with the exception of her affection for her son. But however lively and passionate this affection might be, it was wanting in the dignity of maternal authority. Her charming boy, who from his earliest years possessed every grace and attraction which nature in her most generous mood could confer, as well as a rare mind and uncommon beauty, gratified her maternal pride, which is so excessive in proud natures. The princess, proud of her promising son, did not perceive she was not obeyed as fully as she was adored; and years passed away thus till the epoch,
“Ove uom s’innamora.”
Then the Princess Catherine began to realize she had no authority over her idolized son, and that she needed great prudence and skill to avoid what would have been the most trying of failures, for all her ambition was now centred in him—an ambition even more ardent than she had ever felt for herself.
Then sprang up the earnest desire of seeing his father’s wish realized—a wish expressed while George was still in his cradle.
The Count de Walden’s neighbor in Livonia was a brother in arms, a dear and intimate friend, named the Count de Liningen. Both noblemen of the highest rank in the province, wealthy, and possessing contiguous estates, they agreed to unite their children unless their wishes were opposed to it when old enough to fulfil the agreement.
Neither of the two friends lived long enough to catch even a glimpse of the dawn of that day. Three years after the birth of his son, the Count de Walden was no longer living, and before the young Vera, who was a year younger than George, reached her eleventh year, the death of her father, and, soon after, that of her mother, left her mistress of all their possessions. The young heiress was sent to St. Petersburg till she was of age, and there was reared in strict seclusion by one of her aunts, who long before had given up the world.
The Princess Catherine had always retained a respectful remembrance of the Count de Walden’s wish, which was renewed on his death-bed; but that wish assumed another aspect in her eyes when, towards the epoch of which we have been speaking, the young Vera suddenly emerged from her retirement and was presented at court. The sensation she produced, her immediate popularity, the place at once accorded her among the empress’ maids of honor, gave an éclat to her entrance into society which the princess deeply regretted George had not witnessed. But he had been absent several months from St. Petersburg, and was now visiting Paris for the first time. His mother neglected no opportunity of seeing the young maid of honor, and this was facilitated by the friendly relations that formerly existed between the two families. These relations were now renewed on both sides with an eagerness which seemed most favorable to the project formed during George’s and Vera’s infancy, though they had never met since that time. The princess’ impatience for her son’s return increased. Vera seemed formed to captivate him, and as to George, his mother could not be anxious as to the effect he would produce.
At last he returned, and everything indeed seemed to favor the princess’ plans. George was greatly struck, almost captivated. The lovely Vera was still more so. But the princess, in her ardor for this marriage, took the false step of speaking to her son with an anxiety that had precisely a contrary effect to that she wished to produce. George had not come from Paris quite disposed to relinquish his independence at once and bind himself for ever. He became cautious. The words Vera perhaps expected to hear died away on his lips, and changed into meaningless flattery. His mother, without abandoning her hopes, felt their realization must be deferred. But they were both young. With her penetration as a woman and a mother, she was sure she was not deceived as to the effect her son had produced. She thought she could trust to the durability of the sentiment he had inspired, and believed time would bring George back to the feet of her whom she destined for him; and she doubted this the less because, in one of their conversations on this subject, he acknowledged no woman had ever attracted him more strongly, and he almost promised his mother not to offer his hand to any one else.
In this way affairs remained. George returned to Paris, and thence to Italy, where his mother had decided to live. But meanwhile, as we know, Fleurange’s sudden appearance, and other influences we have caught a glimpse of, had gradually drawn his mind and heart in a very different direction from what his mother wished him to take. At his last visit to St. Petersburg, during which Fleurange became an inmate of the princess’ house, the latter had the double displeasure of learning her son avoided Vera, and that this coolness, so cutting to the young girl, was malevolently attributed by many to George’s political opinions. This greatly troubled his mother. Whoever knew Russia at that period is aware that the privation of its ruler’s favor was not regarded as a slight misfortune. If the insulting words of a former and not very remote epoch were no longer in force, “If the emperor no longer declared a man was only something when he was speaking to him, and as long as he was speaking to him,” many people at St. Petersburg acted as if he had so spoken; and the princess could not resign herself to see her son in the position of a man in disgrace. And yet his rash and imprudent language kept her constantly anxious on this point. It was therefore with something like a maternal instinct of approaching danger she ardently desired his marriage with Vera, which would give him the liberty of remaining at court or leaving it, and in the latter case of returning to Livonia under the safeguard of favor, and taking the position his rank and their united estates would entitle him—a position in which he could dispense with the favor of the court.
“Oh! why is it not so?” sometimes exclaimed the princess with mingled anguish and impatience. “Why is he not already sheltered from all I fear?”
And then, contrary to the suggestions of her prudence, she allowed herself to broach the subject to her son, which, in the interests of her design, it would have been better not to have done. She thus, in spite of herself, provoked a resistance, the real source of which, unsuspected by her, daily became more clear to himself.
We can now imagine the effect of the confidence George had been led to repose in the princess in a fit of capricious frankness. On the whole, he did not fear his mother; and though of course he had never subjected her condescension to such a trial, he was convinced, whatever repugnance she might at first manifest to his wishes, a little persistence on his part would triumph sooner or later.
For nearly four months he had, it is true, been endeavoring, contrary to his habit, to conceal the attraction he felt, but it was that he might not disturb his mother too soon, or the young girl either, and thereby perhaps deprive himself of the charm of her presence while he was still uncertain as to his own plans. These plans he now believed matured. Under the increasing ascendency of present influences, the remembrance of Vera gradually faded away, and the future as well as the present seemed linked with her who now filled his life. He therefore considered it opportune to allow his mother at once to have a glimpse of what was going on in his heart.
In spite of her inexpressible alarm, the princess had sufficient control over her feelings to receive this annoying disclosure with apparent calmness, and almost conceal from her son the effect of the most painful disappointment she had ever met with.
At first all seemed hopeless. As to Gabrielle’s grace and attractiveness, who knew and appreciated them more than herself? What could she do to counteract their influence, so long exercised unsuspected by too credulous a mother? How foolish she had been!—How imprudent!—How fatal her confidence!—Her reliance on Fleurange’s virtue, the only danger that had ever occurred to her, prevented her fears. And who would ever have suspected her of so much ambition or him of such folly?
Never had such a tempest raged in her bosom before. So violent a hatred had never succeeded to so much fondness. But before her anger had time to burst fully out, all these feelings underwent a new transformation, and one still more unforeseen than the first.
Her enemy became her ally—she against whom she felt herself powerless, now came to her aid against herself, and George was restored to her by the hand that could so easily have led him for ever away.
In view of so great a danger and such unexpected assistance, all the considerations that would so recently have made her dread Fleurange’s departure now induced her to hasten it, without losing sight, however, of the importance, so reasonably pointed out by her, of doing nothing to lead George to connect this departure with his disclosure and give it the appearance of an irrevocable separation. Self-interest was supreme, and there was no danger this time that the Princess Catherine would be wanting in prudence or shrewdness, or would not at need have recourse to skilful diplomacy.
XXVII.
Everything really seemed to favor the plan the princess had at heart. The opportune arrival of the Steinbergs afforded a reasonable pretext it might have been difficult to find at another time without exciting George’s suspicion.
The following day, when Fleurange timidly expressed a desire before them all of accompanying her cousin a part of the way to Perugia, the Marquis Adelardi, who was present, declared the excursion would prove very beneficial, and begged the princess to allow her young protégée a short vacation, of which her overtaxed strength had need. George joined his entreaties to those of the marquis, and the princess seemed to yield more through consideration for them than condescension to Fleurange.
She had preserved an appearance of sorrowful gravity since the night before, which did not suffer George to forget he was in disgrace. Nor did she conceal a certain coolness towards Fleurange, which he naturally attributed to his communication respecting her. It was the princess’ intention not to allow him to perceive the perfect reassurance which her conversation with the young girl had restored. George comprehended his mother was displeased with him, but he had expected this displeasure; he saw she suppressed her resentment and continued to treat Fleurange kindly, and he was touched by her forbearance. He felt she relied on his word, and was grateful for her trust.
Everything was therefore arranged in the most natural manner. A fortnight was the time allowed for the projected excursion. The Steinbergs, deceived like the rest, were as much overjoyed as surprised at the prospect of a pleasure they had not dared anticipate, and thus everything fell in with the princess’ wishes without her appearing to do anything but yield to the desires of the rest.
The Steinbergs were to leave the following morning. This last day was to be devoted to revisiting several museums, and would end with a walk to San Miniato. Fleurange boldly proposed to join them. A feverish agitation made inaction insupportable. She feared finding herself alone with George for an instant, and was sure of being readily dispensed from her attendance on this last day. The princess’ consent, in fact, was not difficult to obtain, and towards the middle of the day Fleurange set out with Julian and Clara for the Palazzo Pitti. After visiting that gallery and several others they continued their ride, and at length stopped at the foot of the ascent to San Miniato. There they left the carriage. While slowly ascending the steep hill, Fleurange took out the paper that fell from her bouquet the night before, and gave it to Julian to read, telling him the suspicion which had arisen in her mind.
“It is strange,” said the latter with an anxious look, after reading the note and carefully examining the writing. “Nothing could be more painful now than to meet Felix again, and yet this paper only reawakens a previous suspicion respecting him.”
“You had already suspected his return to Europe?”
“Yes, but only from a slight indication, and I should not have mentioned it if this new incident had not occurred. Several months ago, I was making some necessary researches at Bologna, when my attention was drawn to a work in the library in which I was taking notes. There was a question of some contested historical point, respecting which several passages had been copied from the curious manuscripts in the library. The writing was but recently interrupted, as was evident from the open page. I was reading it with a good deal of interest when my attention was completely withdrawn from the subject of the work by some words scribbled almost illegibly on a paper the copyist had used to try his pen on. Your name, Gabrielle, was written on it several times; then the two letters F. D.; and finally, ‘Felix—happy; what irony—Felix!’ I examined the extracts with increased attention. The writing did not look like his, but was a studied fac-simile of the manuscript he was copying. As to the scribbling on the loose paper, it was wholly unrecognizable. I asked the librarian some questions, and learned that the work was for some great Florentine nobleman whose name he was ignorant of, but the copyist was an Italian named Fabiano Dini.”
“Is that all?” asked Fleurange. “Were you not able to learn anything more definite?”
“Nothing. The next day the unfinished work had disappeared, and during the remainder of my stay at Bologna the copyist did not return to the library. I kept the scrawl that had puzzled me, but thought no more about it. Allow me to retain this note, that I may compare the writing with that.”
“Could it really have been Felix? Or is all this a mere accident?”
“It is impossible to tell. It might have been he, for you know he had a thorough knowledge of Italian, and it might also have been one of his friends familiar with his history. All we have ever been able to discover respecting him is, that he went to America with questionable travelling companions—Italians, Germans, and Poles—mostly driven out of their own country for good reasons.”
Clara’s smiling face grew sad during this account, and Fleurange felt her heart contract with increased melancholy. This revival of one of the saddest memories of her life seemed to add a mournful presage to the sad realities of the day.
However, she kept her sorrows to herself. Her cousin must for the present remain ignorant of the cause as well as the real length of the journey she would begin on the morrow, and on every account it was best for her to seek distraction from her thoughts. Therefore, after entering the church of San Miniato, she gave her whole attention for a while to the frescoes, paintings, and mosaics around her, and listened to the explanations Julian gave respecting the numerous symbols—a kind of Christian hieroglyphics which are alone comprehended by those who seek something in art beyond the mere form that strikes the senses. They spent nearly an hour in this manner without perceiving the flight of time and the increasing dimness of the church. They were at length preparing to leave, when at the door they found themselves face to face with Count George and the Marquis Adelardi. The former said in a gay tone he knew their excursion was to end at San Miniato, and he had proposed to his friend to join them here. “We were neither of us unworthy to hear what Steinberg would have to say, but unfortunately we are too late.”
While he was speaking, Fleurange, overcome with surprise, involuntarily shrank back as if to hide herself in the obscurity of the church, but daylight was rapidly disappearing, and they all agreed it was time to return to the carriage, which was awaiting them at the foot of the hill. She therefore followed the others, but, though she was the last, George waited for her, and before she had a chance to avoid him offered her his arm. Adelardi had given his to Clara, and Julian accompanied them. In this way they slowly descended this charming declivity, looking at the prospect—one of the finest views of Florence, over which the setting sun now cast the soft rays of its departing light.
George slackened his steps so as to allow the others to precede them, and was thus, in a manner, left alone with Fleurange. For a time neither of them spoke. Though very different in their natures, the emotion of both was profound. As for her, the consciousness that this must be their last interview, added to the repressed but profound tenderness of her nature, made this the sweetest but most heart-rending hour of her life. He, on the contrary, felt freed from his previous restraint by the explanation he had had with his mother. Besides, he was not unskilful in reading the feminine heart, and not without sufficient penetration to understand what was passing in that he imagined he could now hear beating beside him, and he felt at liberty to speak more openly than he had yet done.
“Fleurange!” he suddenly said. She trembled, and tried to withdraw the hand that rested on his arm, but he held it.
“No, no, allow me to retain your hand, and let me—me alone—call you by this name,” added he softly. “Let it be a name sacred to my use; you are willing, are you not?”
He pressed the hand he still held, and raised it to his lips. Fleurange clearly saw amid the soft tones of his words an assurance but feebly disguised. But, alas! if she had dared reveal her real sentiments at this moment, she would not have dreamed of showing any offence at this. Yes, she loved him; he did not doubt it, that was evident. But what of that? It would have been a great relief could she have avowed it boldly to every one as well as to himself. George’s assurance was certainly rather too evident, but how readily she pardoned him! How happy she would have been to tell him he was not mistaken, and that her whole life should prove it. This would have been the sincere cry of her heart, had the clearness of her conscience been for a moment obscured at this dangerous hour. But it was not so.
“Monsieur le Comte—” said she after a long silence.
“George! Oh! call me George!” he passionately cried. “Let me hear you, at least once, call me by my name.”
Poor Fleurange! She withdrew her hand from his arm and left him for a moment, endeavoring to control the too violent agitation of her heart. He followed her, and she soon resumed, with apparent calmness: “I never expected to hear you call me by my name again, and hoped I should not.”
“Hoped! Tell me then I am mistaken; that I am presuming and foolish; that I have been deceived in thinking I read in your eyes something besides absolute indifference.”
She made no reply.
“Fleurange!” continued he impetuously, “your silence wounds and chills me. Have I not, at least, a right to some answer?”
“But have you any right to question me? Ah! Monsieur le Comte, you would be more noble and generous were you more mindful of what you are and who I am.”
“Fleurange,” said the count with a grave accent of sincerity, far more dangerous than that of passion, “you shall be my wife if you will consent to be—if you will accept this hand I offer you.”
“With your mother’s consent?” said Fleurange slowly, and in a low tone. “Can you assure me of that?”
After a moment’s hesitation, George replied: “No, not to-day; but she will yield her consent, I assure you.”
Fleurange hesitated in her turn. She knew only too well to what a degree this hope was illusory, but this was her last opportunity of conversing with him. The next day would commence their lifelong separation, which time, distance, and prolonged absence would continually widen. There was no longer any danger in telling the truth—the truth, alas! so devoid of importance now, but which would, perhaps, second the duty she had to accomplish quite as well as contradiction.
“Ah! well,” she at last replied with simplicity. “Yes, why should I deny it? Should life prove more favorable to us; if by some unforeseen circumstance, impossible to conceive, your mother should cheerfully consent to receive me as a daughter, oh! then—what answer I would make you know without my telling you. You are likewise perfectly aware that until that day I will never listen to you.”
“But that day will come,” cried George vehemently, “and that speedily.”
“Perhaps—” said Fleurange. “Who knows what time has in store for us? And who knows that in time the obstacle may not come from yourself?”
She endeavored to say these last words in a playful tone. They were hardly uttered before she suddenly stopped, but the shade of the large cypresses that bordered the road prevented George from seeing the tears that inundated her face.
She then left him and walked rapidly on to overtake Julian, George soon joined them, and they all continued on the way for some time without speaking. The light was fading gradually away, and they walked more cautiously as they approached the foot of the hill. Just before reaching their carriage, they met two men walking rapidly along, and conversing too earnestly to notice them beneath the shade of the cypresses. But their features could be distinguished, and the two cousins and Julian felt a thrill of sympathetic horror as, in one of them, they recognized Felix!—
Adelardi, on his side, seemed surprised and annoyed also, but George, after following them with his eyes like the rest, left his party, turned back, and spoke to one of them. The latter at his approach respectfully uncovered. George said a few words to him in a low tone, and the two men then kept on their way. The count joined his party again.
“Who was that you were speaking to, if the question be not indiscreet?” said Adelardi.
“By no means,” replied George, unhesitatingly. “It was Fabiano Dini, the young Italian I spoke to you about, who is my agent, you know, and a very intelligent one, in purchasing curiosities, and who also aids me in my little historical and artistic researches. He has been away, and only returned two days ago. I had a word to say to him.”
“He was in very bad company,” said Adelardi, frowning.
The two cousins, meanwhile, entered the carriage; Julian, obliged to follow, heard no more.
THE SYMBOLISM OF THE CHURCH.
The Catholic Church has no forms—that is, meaningless ceremonies used to impress and awe the multitude; but she has symbols—that is, “signs by which things are distinguished one from another.”[136] According to the original meaning of the word, these symbols, the aggregate of which has come to be an outward and universal profession of faith, have each one a deep significance, sometimes even a double sense, and are, in fact, a silent compendium of the history as well as the doctrines of Catholic Christianity. But it cannot be too much insisted upon that their worth is entirely relative, depending solely on their authorized interpretation, and losing all their value if disconnected from it. Thus we can recognize no symbols, but mere forms, in the ritual of Anglicanism, Lutheranism, etc. Not only is their value relative, but their use is almost optional in the church—we mean as regards the use made of them by the individual soul. The church has “many mansions,” and sympathizes with the severe taste of the Northern races, as well as with the superabundant love of the gorgeous in observance, of the Southern and Eastern nations. Sprung from an Eastern people, her ritual is as manifold and dignified as that of her Hebrew precursor; but, deputed as she is to the universal world, and having built her later development upon the broad basis of the Gothic and Scandinavian natures, her exterior admits of the austere simplicity so dear to the last-mentioned races.
Still the principle of outward forms being a fitting expression of inward belief is so obvious and so wedded to the requirements of human nature, that it would need a second deluge to destroy it. When “forms” (so-called) were dethroned by the Reformation, they crept in again in real earnest among the reformers themselves. The phraseology of Cromwell and his Roundheads, the speech and garments of the Quakers, the splits among the Baptists and Anabaptists upon the “form” of administering what they did not even believe to be a sacrament, were so many involuntary acts of homage to the time-honored principle of symbolism. Of the good effect produced on all sorts of minds by the outward expression of the doctrine of Christ, we will quote two examples, taken from very opposite sources. In a note to the preface of Moehler’s Symbolik, we read: “There is at Bingen, on the Rhine, a beautiful little Catholic church dedicated to St. Roch, to which Goethe once gave an altarpiece. ‘Whenever I enter this church,’ he used to say, ‘I always wish I were a Catholic priest.’ In the great poet’s autobiography we also find an interesting description of the extraordinary love for the Catholic ritual and liturgy that had captivated his heart in boyhood.”
The other example is from the writer’s own experience among the agricultural poor of England. A poor and infirm woman, having come for the first time to a Catholic chapel, said afterwards that, often as she had read in the Bible the history of Our Lord’s Passion, she had never understood it so well as she did by once looking at the crucifix over the altar. This was the beginning of her conversion.
Of the great religious revival in Germany and the labors of Count Stolberg (the period which answers in time, as also in result, to the Tractarian or Oxford movement in England) the preface to Moehler’s Symbolik also says: “As the avenues that led to the Egyptian temples were bordered on either side by representations of the mystical sphinx, so it was through a mystical art, poetry and philosophy, that many minds were then conducted to the sanctuary of the true church.” Mrs. Jameson bears witness to a similar process within her own consciousness concerning the saints of the monastic orders. “We have in the monastic pictures a series of biographies of the most instructive kind.... After having studied the written lives of St. Benedict, St. Bernard, St. Francis, St. Clare, and St. Dominic, to enable me to understand the pictures which relate to them, I found it was the pictures which enabled me better to understand their lives and character.”[137] The same thought is expressed by a learned English antiquarian, speaking of the symbolical paintings of the Catacombs: “Moreover, because they [the artists] desire that the mind of those who see these paintings should not retain the outward semblance of the scene, but be carried forward to its hidden and mystical meaning, they always depart more or less from its literal truth, e.g., we never find seven or twelve baskets (the miracle of the multiplication of loaves), but eight; nor six water-pots of stone (marriage of Cana), but seven. It was the symbol of a religious idea they aimed at, not the representation of a real history.”[138] In a word, symbolism is as old as creation, and there never was a time when men did not make for themselves a language of signs. Heathendom was only a corruption of signs into realities; Judaism was a religion of signs carefully interpreted in view of the later and fuller revelation. Our faith is the realization, in part, of the Hebrew types; but since we are still clogged with mortality, and therefore still under an imperfect law, it follows that through symbols we must still be taught. An unsymbolical religion would be unscriptural, for Christ himself tells us he has come to “fulfil, not to destroy the law.” And this is not incompatible with the command to “worship God in spirit and in truth”; for without the spirit, of what use would be the form? It would be as valueless as words from the lips of a maniac, words which have no weight because the mind does not direct them. But who would contend that because the random words of a madman are meaningless, all speech is so? Even so, though mere forms would be idolatrous, forms hallowed by doctrinal and scriptural meaning are holy and venerable.
Having premised thus much, we will attempt some description of a few of those symbols most anciently used by the church, and of the significance of certain acts and ceremonies which usually are but superficially examined by our opponents, and, perhaps, not fully appreciated by Catholics themselves.
The Catacombs, where the ecclesiastical life of the church was first brought into shape, furnish the most interesting material on the subject of Christian symbolism. The times required great caution—here was one motive for secret and hieroglyphic instruction; the first converts were Jews, Orientals deeply imbued with the love of imagery and poetry—here was a second reason for the rapid development of symbolism; our Lord himself had deigned to use figures and parables in his teaching—here was also a model and a permission for the copious use of signs. Almost the earliest, and certainly the most interesting, Christian symbol was the fish. The Greek word for fish contained five letters, Ἰχθύς, each of which was the initial of the following words: Jesus, Christ, Son (of) God, Saviour. Dr. Northcote says of it: “It became a profession of faith, as it were, both of the two natures, the unity of person and the redemptorial office of our Lord.”[139] Besides this ingenious meaning, the fish signified “the human soul in the first or natural creation, the same soul as regenerate or created anew, and Christ himself as uniting the two creations of nature and grace. In the first or natural creation, life began in the waters and from the waters, of which the fish is the inhabitant. In the spiritual or new creation, all life begins from the waters of baptism.”[140] The fish also bears a reference to the story of Tobias, where the application of its entrails “defeats devils and restores sight.”[141] In three or four instances the fish is depicted bearing a ship on its back, and this combination naturally suggests to us Christ upholding his church.[142] The epitaph of St. Abercius, Bishop of Hierapolis in Phrygia at the end of the second century, has the following allusion to the symbolic fish: “Faith led me on the road, and set before me for food from the one fountain the great and spotless fish which the pure Virgin embraced; and this fish she (Faith) gave to friends to eat everywhere, having good wine, giving wine mixed with water, and bread. May he who understands these things pray for me.” In a fresco in the crypt of Santa Lucina is seen a fish carrying on its back a basket of bread, the latter being of an ashen color, like that offered by the Jews to their priests on festival days, and in the midst of the bread appears something red, partly effaced, but resembling a cup of red wine.[143] This, of course, was intended for the Holy Eucharist, as we shall see further on. In the work of Aringhi on the Catacombs, we find it mentioned that a sarcophagus was found of the date of the very earliest centuries, whereon the story of the paralytic is represented (a very favorite simile in the Catacomb list of subjects). The bed of the subject of the cure is shaped like a fish.[144] The baptismal font first received the name of “piscina,” and the Christians often called each other “pisciculi,” little fishes, as we learn from Perret. He also tells us too that this emblem reminded the early Christians of the very scenes of the Gospel connected with Christ’s miracles, the apostles’ calling, and the establishment of the church; Christ walking on the waters; preaching from a bark; allaying the tempest; causing a miraculous draught of fishes to be taken; finding the coin of the tribute in the mouth of a fish—all this was suggested by the simple figure of a fish. St. Jerome says that “the fish that was taken in whose mouth was the coin of the tribute was Christ, the second Adam, at the cost of whose blood the first Adam and Peter, that is, all sinners, were redeemed.” Origen speaks of our Lord as “he who is figuratively called the fish.” This symbol leads naturally to that obvious one of the loaves, which typifies the Holy Eucharist. Abundant proof of this is found in the writings of the fathers. The types of this sacrifice and sacrament are unmistakable. In the cemetery of St. Callixtus is a painting representing the mystical supper (not the historical one) of the Eucharist. “The seven disciples seated at the table represent all the disciples of Christ. The number seven signifies universality. The two fishes on the table remind us of the multiplication of the five loaves and two fishes. The seven baskets are filled with whole loaves, not fragments, and the addition of an eighth hints that we are not to think of the literal history, ... but of that ulterior and spiritual sense to which they all (the three occurrences represented in this one fresco) point, and in which they all unite, that is, the doctrine of the Blessed Eucharist.”[145] A lamb carrying a milk-pail on its back is sometimes used as an eucharistic emblem. The Acts of St. Perpetua give us her dream, or rather vision, in which the Good Shepherd gave her the curds to drink, after he had milked his flocks. She received it with her arms crossed on her breast, while all the assistants said “Amen”! These words and posture were those used during the administration of the Blessed Sacrament. Milk is perpetually used in Scripture to denote the good things of God; and in early times, according to Tertullian and St. Jerome, milk and honey were given with this meaning to newly baptized infants or adults. The practice was continued, on Holy Saturday at least, as late as the ninth and tenth centuries. This symbol of the milk-pail is, however, rarer than any other, and is by no means on the same level as that of the fish, the lamb, and the loaves.[146]
The Good Shepherd is a pictorial symbol that has never fallen into disuse, and that of Orpheus with his lute or pipe is analogous to it. The adaptation of the heathen myth of Orpheus training wild beasts by the sweet sounds of his lyre to the hidden meaning of Christ curbing men’s passions by his doctrine, is vouched for by St. Clement of Alexandria. In a painting of the Good Shepherd in the cemetery of St. Saturninus, a goat appears in place of the lost sheep. “This,” says Dr. Northcote, “was intended as a protest against the hateful severity of the Novatians and other heretics who refused reconciliation to penitent sinners.” In some of these representations, we see several sheep at the feet of Jesus, in attitudes pregnant with meaning; some “listening attentively, not quite understanding as yet, but meditating and seeking to understand; others turning their tails—it is an unwelcome subject, and they will have nothing to do with it”;[147] or, again, “one of the two sheep is drinking in all that he hears with simplicity and affection; the other is eating grass—he has something else to do; he is occupied with the cares, pleasures, and riches of this world.”[148]
Dr. Northcote says that as the sheep represent the flock of Christ in life, so the dove is more especially the symbol of the soul after death. It is primarily a type of the Holy Ghost, as the Scriptures suggest and the writings of the fathers assert. They call the Holy Spirit figuratively “a dove without gall,” the expression which is found repeated on some of the sepulchres of children, as indicative of their innocence. Later on, we find the soul of St. Scholastica appearing to her brother, St. Benedict, under this form. A dove pecking at grapes denotes the soul’s enjoyment of the fruits of eternal happiness.[149] Tertullian calls the dove “a herald of peace from the beginning,” and, when painted with an olive-branch in its mouth, it is to be taken in this sense. It is a symbol that we use in our own times. Noah’s ark, a type of the church often seen in the Catacombs, is connected with the dove. Perret tells us of a picture, noticed by Bottari in his Sculture e Pitture, of Noah in the ark, and the ark again within a ship. The form of the ark, according to Hebrew calculations, was a long square, but it is generally represented in the Early Christian paintings as a cube, a figure suggestive of greater stability.[150] This system of departure from the literalness of history is too universal not to be intentional. For instance, none of these representations of the ark are without a dove, but in some a woman appears instead of Noah. Tertullian in his work on baptism says that this symbol meant the general doctrine of “the faithful, having obtained remission of their sins through baptism, receive from the Holy Spirit [the dove] the gift of divine peace [the olive-branch], and are saved in the mystical ark of the church from the destruction of the world.”
The resurrection of Lazarus, and Moses striking the rock, are both types of the resurrection and eternal life, and are often seen in juxtaposition. In one of these paintings, Lazarus is like a little child, and is clothed in bands that more resemble swaddling-clothes than a winding-sheet. Our Lord also is quite boyish. The apostles likewise are often represented as young men, so is Moses in many instances. This is thought by Perret to be symbolical of the immutability of heavenly glory. Among other types often found in the Catacombs are the anchor with a cross-shaped handle, the symbol of hope from time immemorial; the palm, a sign of victory; and the ship, the invariable type of the church of Christ. The Scriptures themselves suggest this latter idea, as they also do that of the rock, petrus. This subject is fully treated in some frescoes of the cemetery of St. Callixtus. The rock (Christ) pours down streams of living waters, which two apostles join their hands to catch and collect for the benefit of the world. In other compositions, the rock does not pour forth water spontaneously (this was a reference to the day of Pentecost), but emits it at the touch of the rod held by Moses (the type of Peter); and in other paintings, two men appear carrying away from it baskets of bread, which are then touched with a rod by a figure supposed to be Christ. This would denote the sacramental change from bread to the flesh of Christ.[151] Thus one type is always presupposing another or merging itself into another. In a fresco of several subjects, all referring to the Holy Eucharist, found in an ancient Christian cemetery at Alexandria, there is written over the heads of several persons assembled at a feast these words: “Eating the benedictions of the Lord.”
Now, the Greek word here used is the same that St. Paul uses (1 Cor. x. 16) to denote the communion of the body and blood of Christ, and, furthermore, is the identical word by which St. Cyril of Alexandria denotes the consecrated elements.[152]
Daniel in the lions’ den and the three children in the fiery furnace are constantly represented in the Catacombs as types of the persecutions of the church and the fortitude under them. The phœnix or palm-bird occurs as a symbol of immortality, and was graven on the tomb of Maximus by order of St. Cecilia.[153] The peacock also signified immortality, and came to be so used from being the bird of Juno, or the supposed emblem of the apotheosis of the Roman empresses. In one fresco in the cemetery of St. Sixtus, we find SS. Peter and Paul represented as standing on either side of a crowned tower, doubtless a symbol of strength, figurative of the church. Perret also tells us that God the Father, “himself invisible, while his power is manifested by his works,” is typified “with singular aptitude by a hand coming forth from the clouds.” This is in a picture of Moses striking the rock.
A very beautiful representation of the Lamb, Jesus Christ, of later date however than the Catacombs, but not so late as to have lost their informing spirit, occurs in a mosaic that formerly decorated the apse of the basilica of St. Peter in Rome. The Lamb stands at the foot of a jewelled cross, on a rock, with four streams, one running from each of its feet, and a fifth from the foot of a chalice into which the blood of the Lamb spurts down from its wounded breast. An evident allusion to the five wounds of the Lord is here combined with the type of the Holy Eucharist (for the cup suggests the latter). The cross, as such, is rarely found in the Catacombs, but the Acts of the Martyrs mention a soldier, St. Orestes, who, while playing at throwing the disc, let fall from his garments a small cross (which, discovering his religion, procured him the glory of martyrdom), so that we may suppose that this sign of Christianity was sometimes secretly worn about the person during the early centuries. St. Augustine, St. Hilary, St. Jerome, St. Chrysostom, and our own countryman, Venerable Bede, agree in the cross being “the sign of the Son of Man” of which Jesus himself speaks in the Gospel. Tertullian quotes the vision of Ezechiel (ix. 4), and interprets thus the sign Tau: “Now, the Greek letter Tau and our own T is the very form of the cross, which he predicted would be the sign on our foreheads in the true Catholic Jerusalem.” Dr. Northcote tells us that the number 300, “being expressed in Greek by the letter Tau, came itself, even in apostolical times, to be regarded as the equivalent of the cross.” We know how St. Paul speaks of the cross, as meaning the whole Christian faith. The sign of the cross, however, was contained in or appended to the monogram ΧΡ. (the first two letters of the Greek word Christ—ΧΡΙΣΤΟΣ). This was sometimes written P, while in some ancient manuscripts the Tau itself was written +, forming an exact Greek cross. Sometimes to this monogram (worn to this day as a badge by the Passionist Friars) was added the letter Ν, the initial of Νικητής, the Greek for conqueror. This is something similar to the inscription translated “In hoc signo vinces,” seen by Constantine in his vision outside the gates of Rome. It was in this shape that the inscription was afterwards put on the “Labarum” or banner of the cross, and also on many coins struck during the reign of Constantine.[154]
Not to prolong the subject of the Catacombs too indefinitely, let us end with these words of Dr. Northcote: “Nothing was likely to be more familiar to the early Christians than the symbolical and prophetical meaning of the Gospels and the Old Testament, so that the sight of these paintings on the walls of the subterranean chapels was probably as a continual homily set before them.... Indeed, it is scarcely too much to say that some of these artistic compositions might be made to take the place of a well-ordered dogmatic discourse.”
When the immediate fear of persecution was removed, the church gradually added to her alphabet of symbols. The cross became more general, at first ornamented and wreathed, jewelled and gilt, as it was by order of Constantine, then by an easy transition becoming a simple crucifix, with the image of the Redeemer plainly wrought upon it. Constantine forbade the cross to be any longer used as an instrument of torture or punishment; while the finding of the true cross and the honor paid to it soon familiarized the people with its exclusively divine associations. From Mrs. Jameson’s researches we gather that the “fashion of decorating the cross with five jewels, generally rubies, typified the five sacred wounds.”[155] We also learn from her the origin of the nimbus, or glory, so generally used after the fifth century as an attribute of holiness. At first it was borrowed from pagan sources, the “luminous nebula” of Homer—that, is the divine essence standing “a shade in its own brightness”—being, as she informs us, the first trace of it to be found in antiquity. Rays or plates of brass were sometimes fixed to the heads of imperial busts and statues in Rome, and later on it is seen round the heads of Christian emperors (Justinian in particular) who were not canonized. It strikes one as curious that Mrs. Jameson should have omitted all mention of Moses and the horns or rays of light that adorned his countenance as he came down from Mount Sinai. In the transfiguration, our Lord’s face “did shine as the sun,”[156] and the angel that sat over against the sepulchre on the morning of the resurrection had a “countenance as lightning.”[157] After the fifth century the nimbus became universal, and was adopted as a symbol of holiness. A cruciform glory was the distinctive emblem of God, and also a triangular one, which typifies the Trinity, and was often used later round the head of figures representing God the Father, and entirely surrounding the Holy Spirit, who was painted as a dove.
It would be quite impossible to go through the cycle of all the symbols now in use. They have varied very little since the days of Constantine, but they cover so vast a field that it would take a lifetime to study each one in detail.
The chief service of the church, the Mass, naturally strikes us first. Nearly every ceremony is connected with it, and is only complete when preceded or followed by it. Churches (often symbolical in their form and arrangement), vestments with their many hidden meanings, lights, incense, holy water, music, processions, group themselves as mere accessories round the sacrificial act which gives them their importance. The word Mass is supposed by some to be derived from the Hebrew Missach, a voluntary offering,[158] but the most widely received opinion is that it comes from Missa or Missio, the dismissal of the catechumens before the most solemn part, the consecration. The word itself is of very ancient use, as appears from the letters of St. Ambrose, St. Leo, and St. Gregory.[159] The Gloria Patri, which is often used in the liturgy as well as constantly in the hours of the divine office, was introduced in 325 as a protest against the Arian heresy which contended that the Son was not equal to the Father.[160] The custom of standing during the gospel signifies our readiness to defend its truths and practice its precepts. We sign our foreheads, lips, and breast in token of our resolve not to be ashamed of the cross of Christ, to profess it always in words, and to keep it for ever in our hearts. At the “Incarnatus est” in the Credo we kneel in reverence to the mystery of the God made man, and at the “Domine non sum dignus” we strike our breasts in token of penance and humiliation, as we have before done at the Confiteor. This has always been the conventional sign of sorrow, as we read of the publican in the gospels.
Of the use of lights, St. Jerome says in his letter against the heretic Vigilantius: “Throughout all the churches of the East, when the gospel is to be recited, they bring forth lights, though it be at noonday, not certainly to drive away darkness but to manifest some sign of joy, that under the type of corporal light may be indicated that light of which we read in the Psalms—‘Thy word is as a lamp unto my feet and a light unto my path.’”[161] Everywhere in the Old and New Testaments, light is the type of knowledge; in the parable of the virgins, it is also the symbol of fidelity. In Rome, torches were carried at weddings as a sign of honor. St. Chrysoston says that lights are carried before the dead to show that they are champions and conquerors. What more natural than that these usages should have been transferred to the Christian churches? “Within the sanctuary and in front of the altar,” says the anonymous author of the Explanation of the Sacrifice and Liturgy of the Mass, “a lamp is kept day and night, to warn us that Jesus Christ, the light of the world, is present on our altars, ... and that our lives should, by their holiness, shine like a luminary.” Candles are used in several mystical senses by the church during the ceremonies of Holy Week, as chiefly the Paschal candle. This is fraught with many meanings. Unlighted, it is an emblem of Christ in the tomb, while the five grains of incense put into it in the shape of a cross typify both the five wounds of our Blessed Lord and the spices with which his dead body was buried. Contrary to the usual custom, which requires a priest to bless any holy thing, the Paschal candle is blessed by the deacon, to denote that Christ was buried by his disciples (Joseph of Arimathea and Nicodemus), not by his apostles. When lighted, the candle prefigures Christ arisen. The Pavia Missal makes it signify, while unlighted, the pillar in the cloud which guided the Israelites by day through the desert, and, after being lighted, the fiery column that directed them at night. The columnar shape of the candlestick in many Italian churches is thought to refer to this part of the interpretation. The triple candle, which is lighted with new fire on Holy Saturday, signifies the Trinity, and in connection with this we are reminded of a curious ceremony in the Greek ritual, which consists in the benediction given by a bishop whenever he says Mass. He holds in each hand a candle—one triple, denoting the Trinity; and the other double, and symbolizing the union of two natures in Jesus Christ.[162] The manual of Holy Week tells us that the fifteen candles on the triangular candlestick, used during the office of Tenebræ, represent the “disciples whose fervor cooled at the approach of danger, and who dispersed here and there, wavering in faith, forgetful of their promises, and all seeking safety in flight, abandoning their Master. The candle that remains lit and is finally concealed behind the altar is a figure of Jesus Christ. He came to enlighten the world; but ungrateful, perverse men made every effort to obscure and extinguish his glory. When they fancied they had succeeded, he rose from death to an immortal life, more glorious than the former.”
The whole of the ceremonies of Holy Week are nothing but a literal “showing forth of the death of the Lord until he come”—a yearly rehearsal, as it were, of the great drama of human life and destiny, of the rejection of the elder and the adoption of the younger branch of the family of men—that is, the choice of the Gentiles after the trial of the Jews. Incense, the recognized emblem of prayer, and spoken of as such in the well-known passages of the Apocalypse,[163] also reminds us of the perfumes used in the East as a sign of honor towards kings and princes, and of the gift of the Magi to the infant Saviour. Dr. Rock says that “a venerable antiquity (522) informs us that the incense burning round the altar, whence, as from a fountain of delicious fragrance, it emits a perfume through the house of God, has ever been regarded as a type of the good odor of Jesus Christ which should exhale from the soul of every true believer.”[164] The frequent use of holy water is above all typical of purity, the great preparation of the soul for any holy action.
Salt is a preservative against corruption, and also reminds us of the miracle of Eliseus,[165] when, to make the drought cease, he asked for a vessel with water and salt. The apostles are called the “salt of the earth,” and salt is recognized as the emblem of wisdom. Oil, used in many functions, is typical of sweetness and mildness, in consideration of its natural powers of healing, and from time immemorial anointing has been considered a consecration to God.[166] Oil was also used in the old Hebrew sacrifices, together with cakes as well as salt.[167] The “Agnus Dei” perhaps requires a fuller explanation than the former symbols. It is a waxen cake stamped with the figure of a lamb. The Pope blesses a certain quantity of these cakes every seventh year of his reign. “The origin of this rite seems to have been the very ancient custom of breaking up the Paschal candle of the preceding year and distributing the fragments among the faithful. Alcuin, a disciple of the Venerable Bede, describes the blessing in these words: ‘In the Roman Church, early on the morning of Holy Saturday, the archdeacon comes into the church and pours wax in a clean vessel, and mixes it with oil; then blesses the wax, and molds it in the form of lambs; ... the lambs which the Romans make represent to us the spotless Lamb made for us; for Christ should be brought to our memories frequently by all sorts of things.’”[168] The Asperges, or sprinkling with holy water before Mass, reminds us of the sprinkling of the blood of the Paschal lamb on the door-posts of the Israelites—a ceremony which was to be performed with a bunch of hyssop.[169] It also refers to the Psalm Miserere, in which we pray to be “sprinkled with hyssop, and we shall be cleansed”—a prayer which forms part of the prescribed orisons to be repeated during the Asperges.
Of the symbolical meaning of the sacred vestments, and their colors, we will only speak briefly. The most obvious apology for them is their use as prescribed in the Old Testament, where they are made the subject of the most minute directions. Many things came to us through the Temple traditions, the Gregorian chant, for instance, which closely resembles that still used in the orthodox synagogues of our own day. It is not improbable that something of Hebrew traditions entered into the custom, early adopted by the Christians, of wearing specified and holy garments during the celebration of Mass. But the church, ever mindful of her mission of teaching, could not let such vestments be mere ornaments, however fitting and seemly. The author of the Explanation of the Mass says that “ceremonies are a kind of illustration of our sacred mysteries; they represent them to the eye, to a certain extent, as a look or a discourse do to the ear or mind, especially to the uneducated, who are always the greater number.” The vestments are a very prominent part of the externals of the Mass; their color announces at one glance whether a virgin or a martyr is being commemorated, whether we are to join in prayer for some unknown brother deceased in Christ, or to lament in a penitential spirit the sins of mankind and our own. Green, very seldom used, is the normal color for Sundays, denoting hope and joy in the promise of the new spring. There are two meanings attached to the different component parts of the holy vesture. The “amice” which covers the head (in ancient times entirely) represents the “helmet of salvation,” divine hope; the “alb,” innocence of life, because it clothes the celebrant from head to foot in spotless white; the “girdle,” with which the loins are girt, purity and chastity (also referring to the text of St. Luke, “Let your loins be girt”),[170] and possibly bearing some allusion likewise to the journey of life, and the command anciently given to the Jews at the first Pasch, “You shall gird your reins”;[171] the “maniple,” which is put on the left arm, patience under the burdens of this mortal life; the “stole,” which is worn on the neck and shoulders, the yoke of Christ; and the “chasuble,” which, as uppermost, covers all the rest, charity—according to the saying of St. Peter, that “charity covereth a multitude of sins.”[172] The author of The Following of Christ, speaking of the duties and dignity of the priesthood, thus beautifully interprets the ecclesiastical apparel: “A priest clad in his sacred vestments is Christ’s vicegerent, to pray God for himself and for all the people in a suppliant and humble manner. He has before him and behind him the sign of the cross of the Lord, that he may always remember the passion of Christ. He bears the cross before him in his vestment, that he may diligently behold the footsteps of Christ, and fervently endeavor to follow them. He is marked with the cross behind, that he may mildly suffer, for God’s sake, whatsoever adversities shall befall him from others. He wears the cross before him that he may bewail his own sins, and behind him that through compassion he may lament the sins of others, and know that he is placed, as it were, a mediator between God and the sinner.”[173]
Besides this mystical signification, the vestments also have a representative meaning. The amice is intended to recall the rag with which the Jews bandaged our Saviour’s eyes;[174] the alb, the white garment in which Herod, in derision, clothed him; the girdle, maniple, and stole, the cords with which he was bound; the chasuble, the purple garment with which the soldiers covered him when they hailed him as a mock king, and as a complement, the cross on the chasuble represents that which Christ bore on his wounded shoulders on his way to Calvary. The priest’s tonsure, worn very conspicuously by most of the religious orders, is a type of the crown of thorns.
The ceremonies of marriage are interesting from their symbolical meaning, but are so familiar that it is useless to dwell on them. In the Greek Church, a glass of wine is partaken of by the bride and bridegroom, as a type of the community of possession which is henceforth to exist between them. The use of the ring is not confined to earthly nuptials; it is worn, as we know, by bishops as a sign of union with their sees, and also by many orders of nuns, as a pledge of their mystical bridal with their heavenly Spouse. The rites of initiation and profession in some of the religious orders of women are full of symbolism. In the taking of the white veil among the Dominicanesses at Rome, the novice is asked to choose between a crown of thorns and a wreath of roses placed before her on the altar. The hair is shorn, as a sign of detachment from the vanities of this world. At the profession the nun prostrates herself, and is entirely covered with a funereal pall, while the choir chants in solemn cadence the psalm for the dead—De Profundis.[175] This awful expression of her utter renunciation of the world has a most mysterious effect on any one who is happy enough to witness it. The grating and curtains that, in some orders, screen the religious from view, even during their friends’ visits to the “parlor,” are only a visible sign of the entire separation between them and all, even the most innocent, earthly ties. And speaking of religious orders, we are reminded of the peculiar ceremonies which, with some of them, enhance the solemnity of the divine office. Of these, a biographer of St. Dominic says, with true mediæval instinct, that it was no wonder that Dominic should have tried to imitate, in the many bowings and prostrations of the white-robed monks, the pageantry of angelic adoration which he had so often seen in visions—the folding of the many myriad wings, and the casting down of golden crowns before the throne of the Lamb.[176] And yet, while we are thinking of this beautiful interpretation, there comes another thought—that of churches as bare as the monastery itself, and of a ritual so simple that it would satisfy the veriest Covenanter. The Trappists especially, the Cistercians and Franciscans also, are forbidden any display in ceremonial, and any costliness in material, with regard to the worship of God. Poverty is to reign even in their churches; and thus we have an asylum provided for those minds whose ascetic turn inclines them to ignore everything but the most spiritual and internal expression of faith. Thus, in old times, St. Paul of the Desert abode among caves and wild beasts, and St. Simeon Stylites passed his life on the summit of an isolated column. Prayer without the slightest incentive to it, meditation without any outward suggestions to strengthen it—such was their life. They never heard glorious chants nor saw processions of clerics clad in golden robes; no ritual, no symbol even, was there to help them on; and yet they were saints. There are such minds still now; the church has a place for them—a place among her rarest and choicest children, for, after all, “they have chosen the good part, and it shall not be taken from them.”
But for the majority symbolism is language, ceremonial is reading. And because others who do not understand this language rail at it, should we forget or give it up? Rather should we explain it to them; for who does not know how much pleasure may one day be derived from a tongue that to-day seems barbarous? Who can read Goethe till he has mastered the grammar of one of the richest languages in the world? or who can enjoy Dante till he has learnt to read him familiarly in the liquid original? Even so with Catholics; others must learn the Catholic alphabet before they pronounce upon the magnificent poems contained in our ceremonial. See this picture of the crucifixion—for in this one subject all our religion is enfolded. It is a mediæval painting. The arms of our Saviour are spread wide, almost on a level with his head; Mary, John, and Magdalen stand beneath; the penitent thief is beside him on his own cross. Two angels in flowing robes hold jewelled chalices under his pierced hands to collect the drops of blood, and other angels are seen in the clouds above, with musical instruments in their hands. This is no literal representation of the scene on Mount Calvary, no realistic picture of the thunder cloud, the brutal soldiery, the opened graves, such as we see by the dozen nowadays. It is not so much a picture of the crucifixion as of the redemption. It occupies itself merely with the mystical sense of the great sacrifice; the figures beneath the cross are not portraits, in attitudes of human desolation, but representatives of the church of the faithful on earth; the good thief is put there for the aggregate of repentant sinners; the angels in the clouds rather celebrate the redemption of the world than lament the death of God; and the instruments they play are—we may well suppose it—meant to typify the consecration of art to religious purposes; the cup-bearing angels, catching the drops of blood as they fall, are types of the adoration paid to the saving blood of Jesus through all generations, and of the untold preciousness of this great treasure; in the chalices, also, we see a distinct allusion to the sacrifice of the Mass; finally, the widely extended arms mean—at least, they came to mean it not long after—the universal nature of the redemption; and therefore the Jansenists, when they taught that Christ died only for those who are actually saved, painted their crucifixes with the arms uplifted high above the head.
So our Catholic symbolism is an open book, a text for the highest art, and a guide to the humblest mind. It has chapters for all—for poverty, nudity, and coarseness are as symbolical as magnificence and oriental grace. The despoiled altars of Good Friday are as eloquent as the procession of Palms or the Easter exuberance of decoration; the crib and the straw of Christmas are not less fraught with meaning than the decked tabernacles of Corpus Christi.
In a Benedictine abbey you will hear soul-stirring strains of the most solemn harmony; in a Carmelite convent you will listen to a chorus of nuns who are forbidden to use more than three notes with which to vary their singing of the divine office; in a Trappist retreat you will watch for the slightest sound, and hear nothing save the muffled fall of clods of earth as a monk digs his own grave, or the salutation, “Brother, we must all die,” as another monk passes him on his way to a similar occupation. Let those who do not understand our symbolical language pause and learn it; and no doubt, learning to read it as we do, they will soon come to read it with us in the brotherhood of the faith.
THE PROGRESSIONISTS.
FROM THE GERMAN OF CONRAD VON BOLANDEN.
CHAPTER II.—CONTINUED.
THE LEADERS.
“I do not catch the gist of your simile of the blind man and colors,” interrupted Greifmann.
“I wanted to intimate that thousands swear allegiance to the banner of progress without comprehending its nature. Very many imagine progress to be a struggle in behalf of Germany against the enfeebling system of innumerable small states, or a battling against religious rigorism and priest-rule in secular concerns. In unpretending guises like these, the spirit of the age circulates among the crowd travestied in the fashionable epithet progressive. Were you, however, to remove the shell from around the kernel of progress, were you to exhibit it to the multitude undisguised as the nullification of religion, as the denial of the God of Christians, as the rejection of immortality, and of an essential difference between man and the beast—were you to venture thus far, you would see the millions flying in consternation before the monster Progress. Now, just because the multitude, although progressive-minded, everywhere judges men by Christian standards, very often, too, unconsciously, therefore Shund has to pass, not for an able speculator, but for a miserable usurer and an unconscionable scoundrel.”
“For this very cause, the liberal leaders of this city should stand up for Shund,” opposed the banker. “Just appreciation and respect should not be denied a deserving man. To speak candidly, Mr. Schwefel, what first accidentally arrested my attention, now excites my most lively interest. I wish to see justice done Mr. Shund, to see his uncommon abilities recognized. You must set his light upon a candlestick. You must have him elected mayor and member of the legislature; in both capacities he will fill his position with distinction. I repeat, our deeply indebted city stands in want of a mayor that will reckon closely and economize. And in the legislative assembly Shund’s fluency will talk down all opposition, his readiness of speech will do wonders. Were it only to spite the stupid mob, you must put Shund in nomination.”
“It will not do, Mr. Greifmann! it is impracticable! We have to proceed cautiously and by degrees. Our policy lies in conducting the unsophisticated masses from darkness into light, quite gradually, inch by inch, and with the utmost caution. A sudden unveiling of the inmost significance of the spirit of the age would scare the people and drive them back heels over head into the clerical camp.”
“I do not at all share your apprehensions,” contended the millionaire. “Our people are further advanced than you think. Make the trial. Your vast influence will easily manage to have Shund returned mayor and delegate.”
“Undoubtedly, but my standing would be jeopardized,” rejoined Schwefel.
“That is a mistake, sir! You employ four hundred families.”
“Four hundred and seventy now,” said the manufacturer, correcting him blandly.
“Four hundred and seventy families, therefore, are getting a living through you, consequently you have four hundred and seventy voters at your command. Add to these a considerable force of mechanics who earn wages in your employ. You have, moreover, a number of warm friends who also command a host of laborers and mechanics. Hence you risk neither standing nor influence, that is,” added he with a smile, “unless perhaps you dread the anathemas of Ultramontanes and impostors.”
“The pious wrath of believers has no terrors deserving notice,” observed the leader with indifference.
“And yet all this time Shund’s remarkable abilities have not been able to win the slightest notice on the part of progressive men—it is revolting!” cried the banker. “Mr. Schwefel, I will speak plainly, trusting to your being discreet; I will recommend your factory at Vienna, but only on condition that you have Hans Shund elected mayor and member of the legislature.”
“This is asking a great deal—quite flattering for Shund and very tempting to me,” said the leader with a bright face and a thrice repeated nod to the banker. “Since, however, what you ask is neither incompatible with the spirit of the times nor dishonorable to the sense of a liberal man, I accept your offer, for it is no small advantage for me from a business point of view.”
“Capital, Mr. Schwefel! Capital, because very sensible!” spoke Carl Greifmann approvingly. A short groan, resembling the violent bursting forth of suppressed indignation, resounded from the adjoining apartment. The banker shuffled on the floor and drowned the groan by loudly rasping his throat.
“One condition, however, I must insist upon,” continued the manufacturer of straw hats. “My arm might prove unequal to a task that will create no ordinary sensation. But if you succeeded in winning over Erdblatt and Sand to the scheme, it would prosper without fail and without much noise.”
“I shall do so with pleasure, Mr. Schwefel! Both those gentlemen will, in all probability, call on me to-day in relation to matters of business. It will be for me a pleasing consciousness to have aided in obtaining merited recognition for Hans Shund.”
“Our agreement is, however, to be kept strictly secret from the public.”
“Of course, of course!”
“You will not forget, at the same time, Mr. Greifmann, that our very extraordinary undertaking will necessitate greater than ordinary outlay. It is a custom among laborers not to work on the day before election, and the same on election day itself. Yet, in order to keep them in good humor, they must get wages the same as if they had worked. This is for the manufacturer no insignificant disadvantage. Moreover, workingmen and doubtful voters require to be stimulated with beer gratis—another tax on our purses.”
“How high do these expenses run?” asked the millionaire.
“For Sand, Erdblatt, and myself, they never fall short of twelve hundred florins.”
“That would make each one’s share of the costs four hundred florins.”
Taking a five-hundred florin banknote between his thumb and forefinger, the banker reached it carelessly to the somewhat puzzled leader.
“My contribution to the promotion of the interests of progress! I shall give as much to Messrs. Sand and Erdblatt.”
“Many thanks, Mr. Greifmann!” said Schwefel, pocketing the money with satisfaction.
The millionaire drew himself up. “I have no doubt,” said he, in his former cold and haughty tone, “that my recommendation will secure your establishment the custom already alluded to.”
“I entertain a similar confidence in your influence, and will take the liberty of commending myself most respectfully to your favor.” Bowing frequently, Schwefel retreated backwards towards the door, and disappeared. Greifmann stepped to the open entrance of the side apartment. There sat the youthful landholder, his head resting heavily on his hand. He looked up, and Carl’s smiling face was met by a pair of stern, almost fierce eyes.
“Have you heard, friend Seraphin?” asked he triumphantly.
“Yes—and what I have heard surpasses everything. You have bargained with a member of that vile class who recognize no difference between honor and disgrace, between good and evil, between self-respect and infamy, who know only one god—which is money.”
“Do not show yourself so implacable against these vile beings, my dearest! There is much that is useful in them, at any rate they are helping me to the finest horses belonging to the aristocracy.”
A stealthy step was heard at the door of the cabinet.
“Do you hear that timid rap?” asked the banker. “The rapper’s heart is at this moment in his knuckles. It is curious how men betray in trifles what at the time has possession of their feelings. The mere rapping gives a keen observer an insight into the heart of a person whom he does not as yet see. Listen—” Rapping again, still more stealthily and imploringly. “I must go and relieve the poor devil, whom nobody would suspect for a mighty leader. Now, Mr. Seraphin, Act the Second. Come in!”
The man who entered, attired in a dress coat and kids, was Erdblatt, a tobacco merchant, spare in person, and with restless, spering eyes. The millionaire greeted him coldly, then pointed him to the chair that had been occupied by Schwefel. The impression produced by the two hundred thousands on the man of tobacco was far more decided than in the case of the manufacturer of straw hats. Erdblatt was restless in his chair, and as the needle is attracted by the pole, so did Erdblatt’s whole being turn towards the money. His eyes glanced constantly over the paper treasures, and a spasmodic jerking seized upon his fingers. But he soon sat motionless and stiff, as if thunderstruck at Greifmann’s terrible words.
“Your substantial firm,” began the mighty man of money, after some few formalities, “has awaked in me a degree of attention which the ordinary course of business does not require. I have to-day received notice from an English banking-house that in a few days several bills first of exchange, amounting to sixty thousand florins, will be presented to be paid by you.”
Erdblatt was dumfounded and turned pale.
“The amount is not precisely what can be called insignificant,” continued Greifmann coolly, “and I did not wish to omit notifying you concerning the bills, because, as you are aware, the banking business is regulated by rigorous and indiscriminating forms.”
Erdblatt took the hint, turned still more pale, and uttered not a word.
“This accumulation of bills of exchange is something abnormal,” proceeded Greifmann with indifference. “As they are all made payable on sight, you are no doubt ready to meet this sudden rush with proud composure,” concluded the banker, with a smile of cold politeness.
But the dumfounded Erdblatt was far from enjoying proud composure. His manner rather indicated inability to pay and panic terror. “Not only is the accumulation of bills of exchange to the amount of sixty thousand florins something abnormal, but it also argues carelessness,” said he tersely. “Were it attributable to accident, I should not complain; but it has been occasioned by jealous rivalry. Besides, they are bills first of exchange—it is something never heard of before—it is revolting—there is a plot to ruin me! And I have no plea to allege for putting off these bills, and I am, moreover, unable to pay them.”
The banker shrugged his shoulders coldly, and his countenance became grave.
“Might I not beg you to aid me, Mr. Greifmann?” said he anxiously. “Of course, I shall allow you a high rate of interest.”
“That is not practicable with bills of exchange,” rejoined the banker relentlessly.
“When will the bills be presented?” asked the leader, with increasing anxiety.
“Perhaps as early as to-morrow,” answered Greifmann, still more relentless.
The manufacturer of tobacco was near fainting.
“I cannot conceive of your being embarrassed,” said the banker coldly. “Your popularity and influence will get you assistance from friends, in case your exchequer happens not to be in a favorable condition.”
“The amount is too great; I should have to borrow in several quarters. This would give rise to reports, and endanger the credit of my firm.”
“You are not wrong in your view,” answered the banker coldly. “Accidents may shake the credit of the most solid firm, and other accidents may often change trifling difficulties into fatal catastrophes. How often does it not occur that houses of the best standing, which take in money at different places, are brought to the verge of bankruptcy through public distrust?”
The words of the money prince were nowise calculated to reassure Mr. Erdblatt.
“Be kind enough to accept the bills, and grant me time,” pleaded he piteously.
“That, sir, would be contrary to all precedents in business,” rejoined Greifmann, with an icy smile. “Our house never deviates from the paths of hereditary custom.”
“I could pay in ten thousand florins at once,” said Erdblatt once more. “Within eight weeks I could place fifty thousand more in your hands.”
“I am very sorry, but, as I said, this plan is impracticable,” opposed Greifmann. “Yet I have half a mind to accept those bills, but only on a certain condition.”
“I am willing to indemnify you in any way possible,” assured the tobacco merchant, with a feeling of relief.
“Hear the condition stated in a few words. As you know, I live exclusively for business, never meddle in city or state affairs. Moreover, labor devoted by me to political matters would be superfluous, in view of the undisputed sway of liberalism. Nevertheless, I am forced to learn, to my astonishment, that progress itself neglects to take talent and ability into account, and exhibits the most aristocratic nepotism. The remarkable abilities of Mr. Shund are lost, both to the city and state, merely because Mr. Shund’s fellow-citizens will not elect him to offices of trust. This is unjust; to speak plainly, it is revolting, when one considers that there is many a brainless fellow in the City Council who has no better recommendation than to have descended from an old family, and whose sole ability lies in chinking ducats which he inherited but never earned. Shund is a genius compared with such boobies; but genius does not pass current here, whilst incapacity does. Now, if you will use your influence to have Shund nominated for mayor of this city, and for delegate to the legislature, and guarantee his election, you may consider the bills of exchange as covered.”
Not even the critical financial trouble by which he was beset could prevent an expression of overwhelming surprise in the tobacco man’s face.
“I certainly cannot have misunderstood you. You surely mean to speak of Ex-Treasurer Shund, of this place?”
“The same—the very same.”
“But, Mr. Greifmann, perhaps you are not aware—”
“I am aware of everything,” interrupted the banker. “I know that many years ago Mr. Shund awkwardly put his hand into the city treasury, that he was sent to the penitentiary, that people imagine they still see him in the penitentiary garb, and, finally, that in the stern judgment of the same people he is a low usurer. But usury has been abrogated by law. The theft Shund has not only made good by restoring what he stole, but also atoned for by years of imprisonment. Now, why is a man to be despised who has indeed done wrong, but not worse than others whose sins have long since been forgotten? Why condemn to obscurity a man that possesses the most brilliant kind of talent for public offices? The contempt felt for Shund on the part of a population who boast of their progress is unaccountable—may be it would not be far from the truth to believe that some influential persons are jealous of the gifted man,” concluded the banker reproachfully.
“Pardon me, please! The thief and usurer it might perhaps be possible to elect,” conceded Erdblatt. “But Shund’s disgusting and shameless amours could not possibly find grace with the moral sense of the public.”
“Yes, and the origin of this moral sense is the sixth commandment of the Jew Moses,” said the millionaire scornfully. “I cannot understand how you, a man of advanced views, can talk in this manner.”
“You misinterpret my words,” rejoined the leader deprecatingly. “To me, personally, Shund exists neither as a usurer nor as a debauchee. Christian modes of judging are, of course, relegated among absurdities that we have triumphed over. In this instance, however, there is no question of my own personal conviction, but of the conviction of the great multitude. And in the estimation of the multitude unbridled liberty is just as disgraceful as the free enjoyment of what, morally, is forbidden.”
“You are altogether in the same rut as Schwefel.”
“Have you spoken with Schwefel on this subject?” asked Erdblatt eagerly.
“Only a moment ago. Mr. Schwefel puts greater trust in his power than you do in yours, for he agreed to have Shund elected mayor and delegate. Mr. Schwefel only wishes you and Sand would lend your aid.”
“With pleasure! If Schwefel and Sand are won over, then all is right.”
“From a hint of Schwefel’s,” said Greifmann, taking up a five-hundred-florin banknote from the table, “I infer that the election canvass is accompanied with some expense. Accept this small contribution. As for the bills of exchange, the matter is to rest by our agreement.”
Erdblatt also backed out of the cabinet, bowing repeatedly as he retreated.
Seraphin rushed from his hiding-place in great excitement.
“Why, Greifmann, this is terrible! Do you call that advanced education? Do you call that progress? Those are demoralized, infernal beings. I spit upon them! And are these the rabble that are trying to arrogate to themselves the leadership of the German people?—rabble who ignore the Deity, the human soul, and morality generally! But what completely unsettles me is your connivance—at least, your connection with these infernal spirits.”
“But be easy, my good fellow, be easy! I connected with tobacco and straw?”
“At all events, you have been ridiculing the ten commandments and Christian morals and faith.”
“Was I not obliged to do so in order to show how well the thief, usurer, and filthy dog Shund harmonizes with the spirit of progress? Can he who wishes to make use of the devil confer with the devil in the costume of light? Not at all; he must clothe himself in the mantle of darkness. And you must not object to my using the demon Progress for the purpose of winning your span of horses and saving my stakes. Let us not have a disgraceful altercation. Consider me as a stage actor, whilst you are a spectator that is being initiated into the latest style of popular education. Ah, do you hear? The last one is drawing near. Be pleased to vanish.”
The third leader, house-builder Sand, appeared. The greater portion of his face is hidden by a heavy black beard; in one hand he carries a stout bamboo cane; and it is only after having fully entered, that he deliberately removes his hat.
“I wish you a pleasant morning, Mr. Greifmann. You have sent for me: what do you want?”
The banker slowly raised his eyes from the latest exchange list to the rough features of the builder, and remembering that the man had risen up from the mortar board to his present position, and had gained wealth and influence through personal energy, he returned the short greeting with a friendly inclination of the head.
“Will you have the goodness to be seated, Mr. Sand?”
The man of the black beard took a seat, and, having noticed the handsome collection of banknotes, his coarse face settled itself into a not very attractive grin.
“I want to impart to you my intention of erecting a villa on the Sauerberg, near the middle of our estate at Wilheim,” continued the millionaire.
“Ah, that is a capital idea!” And the man of the beard became very deeply interested. “The site is charming, no view equal to it; healthy location, vineyards round about, your own vineyards moreover. I could put you up a gem there.”
“That is what I think, Mr. Sand! My father, who has been abroad for the last three months, is quite satisfied with the plan; in fact, he is the original projector of it.”
“I know, I know! your father has a taste for what is grand. We shall try and give him satisfaction, which, by the bye, is not so very easy. But you have the money, and fine fortunes can command fine houses.”
“What I want principally is to get you to draw a plan, consulting your own taste and experience in doing so. You will show it to me when ready, and I will tell you whether I like it or not.”
“Very well, Mr. Greifmann, very well! But I must know beforehand what amount of money you are willing to spend upon the house; for all depends upon the cost.”
“Well,” said the millionaire, after some deliberation, “I am willing to spend eighty thousand florins on it, and something over, perhaps.”
“Ah, well, for that amount of money something can be put up—something small but elegant. Are you in a hurry with the building?”
“To be sure! As soon as the matter is determined upon, there is to be no delay in carrying it out.”
“I am altogether of your opinion, Mr. Greifmann—I agree with you entirely!” assented the builder, with an increase of animation. “I shall draw up a plan for a magnificent house. If it pleases you, all hands shall at once be set at work, and by next autumn you shall behold the villa under roof.”
“Of course you are yourself to furnish all the materials,” added the banker shrewdly. “When once the plan will have been settled upon, you can reach me an estimate of the costs, and I will pay over the money.”
“To be sure, Mr. Greifmann—that is the way in which it should be done, Mr. Greifmann!” responded the man of the black beard with a satisfied air. “You are not to have the slightest bother. I shall take all the bother upon myself.”
“That, then, is agreed upon! Well, now, have you learned yet who is to be the next mayor?”
“Why, yes, the old one is to be re-elected!”
“Not at all! We must have an economical and intelligent man for next mayor. Of this I am convinced, because the annual deficit in the treasury is constantly on the increase.”
“Alas, ’tis true! And who is the man of economy and intelligence to be?”
“Mr. Hans Shund.”
“Who—what? Hans Shund? The thief, the usurer, the convict, the debauchee? Who has been making a fool of you?”
“Pardon me, sir! I never suffer people to make a fool of me!” rejoined the banker with much dignity.
“Yes, yes—somebody has dished up a canard for you. What, that good-for-nothing scoundrel to be elected mayor! Never in his life! Hans Shund mayor—really that is good now—ha, ha!”
“Mr. Sand, you lead me to suspect that you belong to the party of Ultramontanes.”
“Who—I an Ultramontane? That is ridiculous! Sir, I am at the head of the men of progress—I am the most liberal of the liberals—that, sir, is placarded on every wall.”
“How come you, then, to call Mr. Sand a good-for-nothing scoundrel?”
“Simply for this reason, because he is a usurer and a dissipated wretch.”
“Then I am in the right, after all! Mr. Sand belongs to the ranks of the pious,” jeered the banker.
“Mr. Greifmann, you are insulting!”
“Nothing is further from my intention than to wound your feelings, my dear Mr. Sand! Be cool and reasonable. Reflect, if you please. Shund, you say, puts out money at thirty per cent. and higher, and therefore he is a usurer. Is it not thus that you reason?”
“Why, yes! The scoundrel has brought many a poor devil to ruin by means of his Jewish speculations!”
“Your pious indignation,” commended the millionaire, “is praiseworthy, because it is directed against what you mistake for a piece of scoundrelism. Meanwhile, please to calm down your feelings, and let your reason resume her seat of honor so that you may reflect upon my words. You know that in consequence of recent legislation every capitalist is free to put out money at what rate soever he pleases. Were Shund to ask fifty per cent., he would not be stepping outside of the law. He would then be, as he now is, an honest man. Would he not?”
“It is as you say, so far as the law is concerned!”
“Furthermore, if after prudently weighing, after wisely calculating, the pros and cons, Shund concludes to draw in his money, and in consequence many a poor devil is ruined, as you say, surely no reasonable man will on that account condemn legally authorized speculation!”
“Don’t talk to me of legally authorized speculation. The law must not legalize scoundrelism; but whosoever by cunning usury brings such to ruin is and ever will be a scoundrel.”
“Why a scoundrel, Mr. Sand? Why, pray?”
“Surely it is clear enough—because he has ruined men!”
“Ruined! How? Evidently through means legally permitted. Therefore, according to your notion the law does legalize scoundrelism; at least it allows free scope to scoundrels. Mr. Sand, no offence intended: I am forced, however, once more to suspect that you do, perhaps without knowing it, belong to the pious. For they think and feel just as you do, that is, in accordance with so-called laws of morality, religious views and principles. That, judged by such standards, Shund is a scoundrel who hereafter will be burned eternally in hell, I do not pretend to dispute.”
“At bottom, I believe you are in the right, after all—yes, it is as you say,” conceded the leader reluctantly. “Ahem—and yet I am surprised at your being in the right. I would rather, however that you were in the right, because I really do not wish to blame anybody or judge him by the standard of the Ultramontanes.”
“That tone sounds genuinely progressive, and it does honor to your judgment!” lauded the banker. “Again, you called Shund a good-for-nothing scoundrel because he loves the company of women. Mr. Sand, do you mean to vindicate the sacred nature of the sixth commandment in an age that has emancipated itself from the thrall of symbols and has liberated natural inclinations from the servitude of a bigoted priesthood?—you, who profess to stand at the head and front of the party of progress?”
“It is really odd—you are in the right again! Viewed from the standpoint of the times, contemplated in the light of modern intellectual culture, Shund must not really be called good-for-nothing for being a usurer and an admirer of women.”
“Shund’s qualifications consequently fit him admirably for the office of mayor. He will be economical, he will make the expenditures balance with the revenue. Even in the legislature, Shund’s principles and experience will be of considerable service to the country and to the cause of progress. I am so much in favor of the man that I shall award you the building of my villa only on condition that you will use all your influence for the election of Shund to the office of mayor and to the legislature.”
“Mayor—assemblyman, too—ahem! that will be hard to do.”
“By no means! Messrs. Schwefel and Erdblatt will do their best for the same end.”
“Is that so, really? In that case there is no difficulty! Mr. Greifmann, consider me the man that will build your villa.”
“The canvass will cost you some money—here, take this, my contribution to the noble cause,” and he gave him a five-hundred-florin banknote.
“That will suffice, Mr. Greifmann, that will suffice. The plan you cannot have until after the election, for Shund will give us enough to do.”
“Everything is possible to you, Mr. Sand! Whatever Cæsar, Lepidus, and Antony wish at Rome, that same must be.”
“Very true, very true.” And the last of the leaders disappeared.
“I would never have imagined the like to be possible,” spoke the landholder, entering. “They all regard Shund as a low, abandoned wretch, and yet material interest determines every one of them to espouse the cause of the unworthy, contemptible fellow. It is extraordinary! It is monstrous!”
“You cannot deny that progress is eminently liberal,” replied the banker, laughing.
“Nor will I deny that it possesses neither uprightness nor conscience, nor, especially, morals,” rejoined the young man with seriousness.
Carl saw with astonishment Seraphin’s crimsoned cheeks and flaming eyes.
“My dear fellow, times and men must be taken as they are, not as they should be,” said the banker. “Interest controls both men and things. At bottom, it has ever been thus. In the believing times of the middle ages, men’s interest lay in heaven. All their acts were done for heaven; they considered no sacrifice as too costly. Thousands quit their homes and families to have their skulls cloven by the Turks, or to be broiled by the glowing heats of Palestine. For the interests of heaven, thousands abandoned the world, fed on roots in deserts, gave up all the pleasures of life. At present, the interest lies in this world, in material possessions, in money. Do not therefore get angry at progress if it refuses to starve itself or to be cut down by Moorish scimitars, but, on the other hand, has strength of mind and self-renunciation enough to promote Hans Shund to honors and offices.”
Seraphin contemplated Greifmann, who smiled, and hardly knew how to take him.
“An inborn longing for happiness has possession of all men,” said he with reserve. “The days of faith were ruled by moral influences; the spirit of this age is ruled by base matter. Between the moral struggles of the past strong in faith, and the base matter of the present, there is, say what you will, a notable difference.”
“Doubtless!” conceded Greifmann. “The middle ages were incontestably the grandest epoch of history. I am actuated by the honest intention of acquainting you with the active principles of the present.”
“Yes, and you have been not immaterially aided by luck. But for the order from Vienna for straw hats, the bills of exchange, and that villa, you would hardly have attained your aim.”
Greifmann smiled.
“The straw-hat story is merely a mystification, my dear friend. When the end will have been reached, when Hans Shund will have been elected mayor and assemblyman, a few lines will be sufficient to inform Mr. Schwefel that the house in Vienna has countermanded its order. Nor is any villa to be constructed. I shall pay Sand for his drawings, and this will be the end of the project. The matter of the bills of exchange is not a hoax, and I am still free to proceed against Erdblatt in the manner required by the interests of my business.”
Seraphin stood before the ingenuous banker, and looked at him aghast.
“It is true,” said Greifmann gaily, “I have laid out fifteen hundred florins, but I have done so against one hundred per cent.; for they are to secure me victory in our wager.”
“Your professional routine is truly admirable,” said Gerlach.
“Not exactly that, but practical, and not at all sentimental, my friend.”
“I shall take a walk through the garden to get over my astonishment,” concluded Gerlach; and he walked away from the astute man of money.
CHAPTER III.
SERAPHIN AND LOUISE.
Sombre spirits flitted about the head of the young man with the blooming cheeks and light eyes. He was unable to rid himself of a feeling of depression; for he had taken a step into the domain of progress, and had there witnessed things which, like slimy reptiles, drew a cold trail over his warm heart. Trained up on Christian principles, schooled by enlightened professors of the faith, and watched over with affectionate vigilance by a pious mother, Seraphin had had no conception of the state of modern society. For this reason, both Greifmann Senior and Gerlach Senior committed a blunder in wishing to unite by marriage three millions of florins, the owners of which not merely differed, but were the direct opposites of each other in disposition and education.
Louise belonged to the class of emancipated females who have in vain attempted to enhance the worth of noble womanhood by impressing on their own sex the sterner type of the masculine gender. In Louise’s opinion, the beauty of woman does not consist in graceful gentleness, amiable concession and purity, but in proudly overstepping the bounds set for woman by the innate modesty of her sex. The beautiful young lady had no idea of the repulsiveness of a woman who strives to make a man of herself, but she was sure that the cause and origin of woman’s degradation is religion. For it was to Eve that God had said: “Thou shalt be under thy husband’s power, and he shall have dominion over thee.” Louise considered this decree as revolting, and she detested the book whose authority among men gives effect to its meaning. On the other hand, she failed to observe that woman’s sway is powerful and acknowledged wherever it exerts itself over weak man through affection and grace. Quite as little did Miss Louise observe that men assume the stature of giants so soon as women presume to appear in relation to them strong and manlike. Least of all did she discover anything gigantic in the kind-hearted Seraphin. In the consciousness of her fancied superiority of education, she smiled at the simplicity of his faith, and, as the handsome young gentleman appeared by no means an ineligible parti, she believed it to be her special task to train her prospective husband according to her own notions. She imagined this course of training would prove an easy undertaking for a lady whose charms had been uniformly triumphant over the hearts of gentlemen. But one circumstance appeared to her unaccountable—that was Seraphin’s cold-bloodedness and unshaken independence. For eight days she had plied her arts in vain, the most exquisite coquetry had been wasted to no purpose, even the irresistible fire of her most lovely eyes had produced no perceptible impression on the impregnable citadel of the landholder’s heart.
“He is a mere child as yet, the most spotless innocence,” she would muse hopefully. “He has been sheltered under a mother’s wings like a pullet, and for this I am beholden to Madame Gerlach, for she has trained up an obedient husband for me.”
Seraphin sauntered through the walks of the garden, absorbed in gloomy reflections on the leaders of progress. Their utter disregard of honor and unparalleled baseness were disgusting to him as an honorable man, whilst their corruption and readiness for deeds of meanness were offensive to him as a Christian. Regarding Greifmann, also, he entertained misgivings. Upon closer examination, however, the unsuspecting youth thought he discovered in the banker’s manner of treating the leaders and their principles a strong infusion of ridicule and irony. Hence, imposed upon by his own good nature, he concluded that Greifmann ought not in justice to be ranked among the hideous monstrosities of progress.
With head sunk and rapt in thought, Gerlach strayed indefinitely amid the flowers and shrubbery. All at once he stood before Louise. The young lady was seated under a vine-covered arbor; in one hand she held a book, but she had allowed both hand and book to sink with graceful carelessness upon her lap. For some time back she had been observing the thoughtful young man. She had been struck by his manly carriage and vigorous step, and had come to the conclusion that his profusion of curling auburn hair was the most becoming set-off to his handsome countenance. She now welcomed the surprised youth with a smile so winning, and with a play of eyes and features so exquisite, that Seraphin, dazzled by the beauty of the apparition, felt constrained to lower his eyes like a bashful girl. What probably contributed much to this effect was the circumstance of his being at the time in a rather vacant and cheerless state of mind, so that, coming suddenly into the presence of this brilliant being, he experienced the power of the contrast. She appeared to him indescribably beautiful, and he wondered that this discovery had not forced itself upon him before. Unfortunately, the young gentleman possessed but little of the philosophy which will not suffer itself to be deceived by seductive appearances, and refuses to recognize the beautiful anywhere but in its agreement with the true and good.
Louise perceived in an instant that now was at hand the long-looked-for fulfilment of her wishes. The certainty which she felt that the conquest was achieved diffused a bewitching loveliness over her person. Seraphin, on the other hand, stood leaning against the arbor, and became conscious with fear and surprise of a turmoil in his soul that he had never before experienced.
“I have been keeping myself quiet in this shady retreat,” said she sweetly, “not wishing to disturb your meditations. Carl’s wager is a strange one, but it is a peculiarity of my brother’s occasionally to manifest a relish for what is strange.”
“You are right—strange, very strange!” replied Seraphin, evidently in allusion to his actual state of mind. The beautiful young lady, perceiving the allusion, became still more dazzling.
“I should regret very much that the wager were lost by a guest of ours, and still more that you were deprived of your splendid racehorses. I will prevail on Carl not to take advantage of his victory.”
“Many thanks, miss; but I would much rather you would not do so. If I lose the wager, honor and duty compel me to give up the stakes to the winner. Moreover, in the event of my losing, there would be another loss far more severe for me than the loss of my racers.”
“What would that be?” inquired she with some amazement.
“The loss of my good opinion of men,” answered he sadly. “What I have heard, miss, is base and vile beyond description.” And he recounted for her in detail what had taken place.
“Such things are new to you, Mr. Seraphin; hence your astonishment and indignation.”
The youth felt his soul pierced because she uttered not a word of disapproval against the villany.
“Carl’s object was good,” continued she, “in so far as his manœuvre has procured you an insight into the principles by which the world is just now ruled.”
“I would be satisfied to lose the wager a thousand times, and even more, did I know that the world is not under such rule.”
“It is wrong to risk one’s property for the sake of a delusion,” said she reprovingly. “And it would be a gross delusion not to estimate men according to their real worth. A proprietor of fields and woodland, who, faithful to his calling, leads an existence pure and in accord with nature’s laws, must not permit himself to be so far misled by the harmlessness of his own career as to idealize the human species. For were you at some future day to become more intimately acquainted with city life and society, you would then find yourself forced to smile at the views which you once held concerning the present.”
“Smile at, my dear miss? Hardly. I should rather have to mourn the destruction of my belief. Moreover, it is questionable whether I could breathe in an atmosphere which is unhealthy and destructive of all the genuine enjoyments of life!”
“And what do you look upon as the genuine enjoyments of life?” asked she with evident curiosity.
He hesitated, and his childlike embarrassment appeared to her most lovely.
“I beg your pardon, Mr. Seraphin! I have been indiscreet, for such a question is allowable to those only who are on terms of intimacy.” And the beauty exhibited a masterly semblance of modesty and amiability. The artifice proved successful, the young man’s diffidence fled, and his heart opened.
“You possess my utmost confidence, most esteemed Miss Greifmann! Intercourse with good, or at least honorable, persons appears to me to be the first condition for enjoying life. How could any one’s existence be cheerful in the society of people whose character is naught and whose moral sense expired with the rejection of every religious principle?”
“Yet perhaps it might, Mr. Seraphin!” rejoined she, with a smile of imagined superiority. “Refinement, the polished manners of society, may be substituted for the rigor of religious conviction.”
“Polished manners without moral earnestness are mere hypocrisy,” answered he decidedly. “A wolf, though enveloped in a thousand lambskins, still retains his nature.”
“How stern you are!” exclaimed she, laughing. “And what is the second condition for the true enjoyment of life, Mr. Seraphin?”
“It is evidently the accord of moral consciousness with the behests of a supreme authority; or to use the ordinary expression, a good conscience,” answered the millionaire earnestly.
A sneering expression spontaneously glided over her countenance. She felt the hateful handwriting of her soul in her features, turned crimson, and cast down her eyes in confusion. The young man had not observed the expression of mockery, and could not account for her confusion. He thought he had perhaps awkwardly wounded her sensitiveness.
“I merely meant to express my private conviction,” said Mr. Seraphin apologetically.
“Which is grand and admirable,” lauded she.
Her approbation pleased him, for his simplicity failed to detect the concealed ridicule. After a walk outside of the city which Gerlach took towards evening, in the company of the brother and sister, Carl Greifmann made his appearance in Louise’s apartment.
“You have at last succeeded in capturing him,” began he with a chuckle of satisfaction. “I was almost beginning to lose confidence in your well-tried powers. This time you seemed unable to keep the field, to the astonishment of all your acquaintances. They never knew you to be baffled where the heart of a weak male was to be won.”
“What are you talking about?”
“About the fat codfish of two million weight whom you have been successful in angling.”
“I do not understand you, most mysterious brother!”
“You do not understand me, and yet you blush like the skies before a rainstorm! What means the vermilion of those cheeks, if you do not understand?”
“I blush, first, on account of my limited understanding, which cannot grasp your philosophy; and, secondly, because I am amazed at the monstrous figures of your language.”
“Then I shall have to speak without figures and similes upon a subject which loses a great deal in the light of bare reality, which, I might indeed say, loses all, dissolves into vapor, like will-o’-the-wisps and cloud phantoms before the rising sun. I hardly know how to mention the subject without figures. I can hardly handle it except with poetic figures,” exclaimed he gaily, seating himself in Louise’s rocking-chair, rocking himself. “Speaking in the commonest prose, my remarks refer to the last victim immolated to your highness—to the last brand kindled by the fire of your eyes. To talk quite broadly, I mean the millionaire and landholder Seraphin Gerlach, who is head and ears in love with you. Considered from a business and solid point of view, it is exceedingly flattering for the banker’s brother to see his sister adored by so considerable a sum of money.”
“Madman, you profane the noblest feelings of the heart,” she chidingly said, with a smile.
“I am a man of business, my dear child, and am acquainted with no sanctuary but the exchange. Relations of a tender nature, noble feelings of the heart, lying as they do without the domain of speculation, are to me something incomprehensible and not at all desirable. On the other hand, I entertain for two millions of money a most prodigious sympathy, and a love that casts the flames of all your heroes and heroines of romance into the shade. Meanwhile, my sweet little sister, there are two aspects to everything. An alliance between our house and two millions of florins claims admiration, ’tis true; yet it is accompanied with difficulties which require serious reflection.” The banker actually ceased rocking and grew serious.
“Might I ask a solution of your enigma?”
“All jesting aside, Louise, this alliance is not altogether free from risks,” answered he. “Just consider the contrast between yourself and Seraphin Gerlach’s good nature is touching, and his credulous simplicity is calculated to excite apprehension. Guided, imposed upon, entirely bewitched by religious phantasms, he gropes about in the darkness of superstition. You, on the contrary, sneer at what Seraphin cherishes as holy, and despise such religious nonsense. Reflect now upon the enormous contrast between yourself and the gentleman whom fate and your father’s shrewdness have selected for your husband. Honestly, I am in dread. I am already beginning to dream of divorce and every possible tale of scandal, which would not be precisely propitious for our firm.”
“What contradictions!” exclaimed the beauty with self-reliance. “You just a moment ago announced my triumph over Seraphin, and now you proclaim my defeat.”
“Your defeat! Not at all! But I apprehend wrangling and discord in your married life.”
“Wrangling and discord because Seraphin loves me?”
“No—not exactly—but because he is a believer and you are an unbeliever; in short, because he does not share your aims and views.”
“How short-sighted you are! As you conceive of it, love is not a passion; at most, only, a cool mood which cannot be modified by the lovers themselves. Your apprehension would be well grounded concerning that kind of love. But suppose love were something quite different? Suppose it were a passion, a glowing, dazzling, omnipotent passion, and that Seraphin really loved me, do you think that I would not skilfully and prudently take advantage of this passion? Cannot a woman exert a decisive and directing influence over the husband who loves her tenderly? I have no fears because I do not view love with the eyes of a trader. I hope and trust with the adjurations of love to expel from Seraphin all superstitious spirits.”
“How sly! Surely nothing can surpass a daughter of Eve in the matter of seductive arts!” exclaimed he, laughing. “Hem—yes, indeed, after what I have seen to-day, it is plain that the Adam Seraphin will taste of the forbidden fruit of ripened knowledge, persuaded by this tenderly beloved Eve. Look at him: there he wanders in the shade of the garden, sighing to the rose-bushes, dreaming of your majesty, and little suspecting that he is threatened with conversion and redemption from the kingdom of darkness.”
THE NECESSITY OF PHILOSOPHY AS A BASIS OF HIGHER EDUCATION.
BY F. RAMIERE, S. J.
FROM THE ETUDES RELIGIEUSES.
We have shown what secondary education does for the formation of man, and how powerfully it is aided by philosophy in the accomplishment of its task. Secondary education in the soul of the young man completes the work sketched out by the primary lessons given to the child; it develops his faculties, teaches him their use, invests him with full dominion over himself, and prepares him to carry out, according to his high vocation, the great duty of life. Philosophy is the necessary complement of this education, since it is indispensable for the development of the sovereign faculty, reason, and consequently for the complete formation of the man, and the perseverance of the Christian.
We might dispense with further proofs of the utility of philosophy, although we are still very far from having examined it from every point of view. The man whom primary and secondary education have placed in possession of his faculties is not destined to live alone in the world, and employ those admirable instruments wherewith his Creator has endowed him simply for his own advantage. He is made to live in society; it is to society he owes, after God, his existence, his nurture, his instruction, his development, his physical and moral being, in a word, all that he is. During the period of his education, he has remained almost passive in its hands, and has received everything from it. Arrived at the term of this long career, justice obliges him to set to work to pay back to it the immense debt he has contracted. Moreover, that which in him is but a just duty is at the same time a necessary condition of his dignity and happiness. For, if he does not force himself to utilize his faculties in the interests of his fellows, those faculties will infallibly become for him a source of wasting ennui and cruel torment. If, then, he wishes to become an honorable man, let him see that he become a useful citizen.
For this purpose a multitude of careers open out before him; for there is many a way of serving society; and the most useful of all is not always that whose results are the most immediate, and whose fruits are the most easily gathered.
Undoubtedly the father of a family who improves his land or devotes himself laboriously to the exercise of a mechanical profession accomplishes his whole duty to society; and, if he gives to it virtuous children, he pays it in overrunning measure the debt which he has contracted in its regard. We do not deny that these more humble callings are the most common, and we acknowledge that to fulfil all their conditions it is enough to have learned well that divine philosophy which is contained in the maternal teachings of the church. But a society could never attain a great development, it could scarcely exist, whose members possessed no higher knowledge than that which goes to make a good agriculturist, a diligent workman, or an honest father of a family. Beyond these common callings there are others more choice which present themselves to souls more richly endowed. Some more inclined to the theoretical, rush at the conquest of science; others of a more practical tendency betake themselves to the study of laws and the administration of justice. One studies deep the experience of the past in order to illustrate the present; another would be an orator, and is ambitious of the triumphs of eloquence; a third is a poet, and he believes, and believes rightly, that he makes himself of use enough to his fellows by lifting up their souls to the contemplation and love of the beautiful. Others, again, feel themselves called upon from on high to become the representatives of God before men, and the interpreters to them of his oracular teachings. We have named the principal careers which lie open to the young man whose mind has been cultivated by a liberal education. But to whatever side his choice may bend, he will find philosophy of an almost indispensable utility for the attainment of solid success. After having made him a finished man, it will aid powerfully in making him a true scholar; it will provide the lawyer, the historian, the orator, the poet, with the seeds of truth, which each one of them should cause to fructify after his fashion. In fine, to form the summit of its glory, it will lend to revelation an invincible arm for the defence of its dogmas; and in uniting its light to that flowing from this divine torch, it will form the first and most divine of all sciences—theology. Such in a few words are the various aspects under which we have still to present its utility.