"Still," said Cromwell thoughtfully, "there must be ways of avoiding the ingratitude of a master: either by the minister imputing to the King openly, and upon every possible occasion, all actions, whether of good or evil; or else by his fortifying himself with powerful friendships, and seeking in every way to gain the voice of popular favour, so that becoming greater than his master he may withstand him."
Machiavelli shifted a little in his chair, and the darkness hid an ironic smile.
To ALBERT HOUTIN
VI
THE PARADISE OF THE DISILLUSIONED
VI
THE PARADISE OF THE DISILLUSIONED
"The final Vale!"
He spoke, and lay silent. The dim figures in the crowded room seemed to slip away from him, his mind ceased to grasp at earthly realities, a thick darkness enveloping it and them; but the frail, wasted body still clung insatiably to life, and answered the phrases of the litany with long quavering sobs. At last it, too, resigned its hold on life. He seemed to see again, for one brief moment, the kneeling cardinals; and then to join some great current of being which swept him away beyond the consciousness of time and space. Gradually another consciousness dawned on him. Upon the golden brown clouds, which seemed to limit his vision, there was projected suddenly a huge grotesque figure; the shadow of a being more or less similar to man.