“Gold, gold, the talisman that rules the soul of man, gold that buys wisdom from the sage, Heaven from the priest, life from the leech, honor from the mighty, and virtue from woman, GOLD will be mine.”
Turning aside, Aldarin drew forth from a recess in the walls, a parchment scroll richly illuminated, and covered with characters in the Arabic tongue. He drew near the casement, and unclosed this scroll to the light of the declining day, gazing upon the dark characters while a singular agitation pervaded the lineaments of his face.
It was the Book of his Belief—in which he had long ago written his ideas of God and Man. Shall we look into these wierd pages, even for a moment, and learn the nature of the Theology which gave shape and purpose to the life of Aldarin? We will glance at a single page of
THE BIBLE OF ALDARIN.
I. Who shall describe the incomprehensible Power, which gives life and motion to the Universe?
II. An Almighty Intellect, dwelling in the solitudes of infinite space, and yet pervading all Nature, guiding by his silent and overshadowing will, the courses of the stars, the fate of empires, and the destinies of men, living for ever, the commencement of his being, dated by a past eternity, the duration of his existence, bounded by a future eternity, He is the SOUL OF THE UNIVERSE.
III. Men have blasphemed this Universal Soul, with their vain titles. They have mocked Him with vainer creeds. They have enshrouded this simple Idea with a multitude of cumbrous falsehoods. They have buried it in the Charnel house of festering superstitions. Yet the Idea has survived, and lived, despite all these systems of error. It can never die. It is written on the heart of the new-born child, and cannot be erased, until you destroy the body and kill the Soul of that child. Whether adored in the shape of an obscene reptile—as in ancient Egypt—or in the form of a marble image—as in Greece and Rome—the Soul of the World is still worshipped, as the fountain of all life and motion; his Thoughts the deeds of the Universe.
IV. The Soul, from time to time, and at long intervals, has enshrined his Being in flesh, and walked the earth in the form of living man, and appeared among men,—the Incarnate Universe.
V. As the sun gives forth light, and is not deprived of a single ray, so the Universal Soul, sends abroad, beams of his existence, which are at once, portions of his glory and eternity. These beams of the Soul, are clad in forms of flesh, they walk the earth, they share in the temptations and disquietudes of mankind. Or, they are Spirits, invisible to the gross senses of clay, and yet dwelling on the earth and sharing in the destinies of its people. Are they clad in humanity? Then their knowledge of their Eternal Source is dim, undefined, and only felt by broken gleams. Sometimes that Knowledge comes upon them in all its power; they feel they know, that they are of the Almighty Intellect, beams of his brightness and pulsations of his heart. When this Consciousness bursts upon them, they are men no longer, but Leaders of the human race, and are known among men, as Prophets, Apostles and Redeemers.
VI. Even in their worst state, when most beclouded by the appetites and misfortunes of flesh, these Souls, born of the Universal Soul, retain a consciousness, however dim, of their origin, a glimpse, vague as it may be, of their destiny, and a portion, of the might of their Creator and Father.