That cry was thrown into my ears one tortured night, like a whisper from deeps below, when he of the broken wings was dying, when he struggled tumultuously against the opening of men's eyes; but I had always heard it round about me, always.
In official speeches, sometimes, at moments of great public flattery, they speak like the reformers, but that is only the diplomacy which aims at felling them better. They force the light-bearers to hide themselves and their torches. These dreamers, these visionaries, these star-gazers,—they are hooted and derided. Laughter is let loose around them, machine-made laughter, quarrelsome and beastly:—
"Your notion of peace is only utopian, anyway, as long as you never, any day, stopped the war by yourself!"
They point to the battlefield and its wreckage:—
"And you say that War won't be forever? Look, driveler!"
The circle of the setting sun is crimsoning the mingled horizon of humanity:—
"You say that the sun is bigger than the earth? Look, imbecile!"
They are anathema, they are sacrilegious, they are excommunicated, who impeach the magic of the past and the poison of tradition. And the thousand million victims themselves scoff at and strike those who rebel, as soon as they are able. All cast stones at them, all, even those who suffer and while they are suffering—even the sacrificed, a little before they die.
The bleeding soldiers of Wagram cry: "Long live the emperor!" And the mournful exploited in the streets cheer for the defeat of those who are trying to alleviate a suffering which is brother to theirs. Others, prostrate in resignation, look on, and echo what is said above them: "After us the deluge," and the saying passes across town and country in one enormous and fantastic breath, for they are innumerable who murmur it. Ah, it was well said:
"I have confidence in the abyss of the people."