Yes: my servant had thought it prudent to fetch the doctor, and he has been here and felt my pulse, and ordered cold to my temples, and a calming draught. It is clear, then, that I have been ill, and I must write no more!
CHAPTER XI.
Gasthaus, Zum Bär, Dallas, Tyrol.
It is exactly seven weeks this day since I last opened my journal. I promised Guckhardt not to look into it for a month, and so I have well kept my word! It would seem, indeed, a small privation in most circumstances to abstain from chronicling the ebbing hours of a life; but Egotism is next of kin to Sickness, and I can vent mine more harmlessly here than if spent in exhausting the patience of my friends. Some listener must be found to the dreamy querulousness of the invalid, and why not his own heart?
Even to those nearest and dearest to our affections, there is always a sense of shame attendant on the confessions of our weakness, more so than of our actual vices. But what a merciful judge is Self! how gentle to rebuke! how reluctant to punish! how sanguine to hope for reformation! Hence is it that I find a comfort in jotting down these “mems” of the past; but from a friend, what shaking of the head, what regretful sorrowings, should I meet with! How should I hear of faculties and fortune—life itself—wasted without one object, even a wish, compassed! When I reflect upon the position in life attainable by one who starts with moderate abilities, a large fortune, reasonable habits of industry, and a fair share of well-wishers, and then think of what I now am, I might easily be discontented and dispirited; but if I had really reached the goal, can I say that I should be happy? can I say, that all the success within my reach could have stilled within me the tone of peaceful solitude I have ever cherished as the greatest of blessings? But why speculate on this? I never could have been highly successful. I have not the temper, had I the talent, that climbs high. I must always have done my best at once; put forth my whole strength on each occasion—husbanded nothing, and consequently gained nothing.
Here I am at Dallas, in the Tyrol, a wild and lonely glen, with a deep and rushing river foaming through it. The mountain in front of me is speckled with wooden chalets, some of them perched on lofty cliffs, not distinct from realms of never-melting snow.
All is poverty on every side; even in the little church, where Piety would deck its shrine at any sacrifice, the altar is bare of ornament. The Cure’s house, too, is humble enough for him who is working yonder in his garden, an old and white-haired man, too feeble and frail for such labour; and already the sun has set, and now he ceases from his toil: for the “Angelus” is ringing, and soon the village will be kneeling in prayer. Already the bell has ceased, and through the stilly air rises the murmur of many voices.
There was somewhat of compassionate pity in the look of the old man who has just passed the window; he stopped a moment to gaze at me—at the only one whose unbended knee and closed lips had no brotherhood in the devotion. He seemed very poor, and old, and feeble, and yet he could look with a sense of pity upon me, as an outcast from the faith. So did I feel his steady stare at least; for, at that instant, the wish was nearest to my heart that I, too, could have knelt and prayed with the rest. And why could |I not? was it that my spirit was too stubborn, too proud, to mingle with the humble throng? did I feel myself better, or nobler, or greater than the meanest there, when uttering the same words of thankfulness or hope? No, far from it; a very different, but not less powerful barrier interposed. Education, habits of thought, prejudices, convictions, even party spirit, had all combined to represent Romanism to my mind, in all the glaring colours of its superstitions, its cruelties, and its deceptions. Then arose before me a kind of vision of its tyranny over mankind,—its inquisitions, its persecutions, its mock miracles, and its real bloodshed; and I could not turn from the horrible picture, even to the sight of those humble worshippers who knelt in all the sincerity of belief.
I actually dreaded the sway of the devotional influence, lest, when my heart had yielded to it, some chance interruption of ceremonial, some of those fantastic forms of the Church, should turn my feelings of trust and worship to one of infidelity and scorn.