For the Right

by Karl Emil Franzos

"But more than this, even the ill habits of others would be a burden to me in the same way. For instance, to exemplify it by the most frequent occurrence, it was a real pain to me to see any neighbour of mine yield to drink, carrying not only his earthly gains but his very manhood into the public house, there to lose them. Others would find it best to mind their own business, but that pride of mine left me no peace. 'What is the use of your being so good, Taras,' it would say, 'unless you strive to help and save? What is the use of your being so sensible, so sober and self-denying, except that you should be an example to these besotted fools?' I was just driven to do what I could to rescue the man; my pride would have torn me to pieces had I forborne; and if I failed in my endeavour, as in most cases I could not but fail, it made me sad at heart, and I believed myself bad and useless because of it. It was the same regarding the laziness or unfitness of any in their daily work. I would try to get hold of such men gently, teaching them without hurting their vanity. In these things I mostly succeeded, for a man will more readily take your advice concerning the ploughing of his field or the management of his cattle, than he will take it in matters of drink or ill-usage to some poor girl. Moreover, I could always fall back on myself--I mean, if some idle or besotted neighbour would let his farm go to ruin I could come to his assistance; for the diligent man is never short of time, and my own farm need not suffer because of my helping another. Indeed, I have often thus helped a neighbour, sometimes because compassion was strong in me, but more often it was just that same pride that made me do it."

"You should not say so!" broke in a voice, quivering with emotion. "You should not, indeed! How dare you call it pride--how dare you make a vice of what is the rarest of virtues?"

It was Father Leo. With a troubled heart, shaken to its depth with pity and with grief, he had listened to his friend. He alone had understood what Taras meant in saying he must "separate from those that dwell in peace," and he knew that the terrible forebodings which had come to him during the interview with Jemilian were about to be fulfilled. But how to prevent it--ah, how, indeed? Every fibre of his honest soul trembled with the apprehension of it; every faculty of his brain was bent on finding a means of averting the great sorrow at hand. "I am unable to hold back ruin," he murmured, pressing closer to the table, longing to be nearer his friend when the terrible word would be spoken. And standing there with a beating heart, the whole history of the strangest of men once more passed before his soul--all the shaping of so dread a fate--since first he beheld Taras, the leader of the community gathered by the Pruth to receive him on making his entry into the parish; all he had known of him since, until the interview by the window in the past night, until that cry of despair still ringing in his ears but far distant already, for God only could tell how much of the terrible history had been woven even since that cry....

"It is all as it must be," sighed he, bowing his head; "there is no help for it!" But his impassioned heart could not surrender without a struggle. If he could do nothing else for his friend, he at least would not allow that best of men to accuse himself unjustly before this crowd of listeners, of whom few indeed were fit to look upon so noble a soul thus laid bare to their gaze. It was for this reason he had interrupted him at the risk of a sharp rebuke from the highly-wrought speaker.

But Taras was calm, smiling even as he made answer: "Nay, your reverence, I must distinctly contradict you--I know it was pride. But I will own to you that the only man to whom I ever opened my heart before this hour, speaking to him about this vice, shared your error. The man I mean was that honest compatriot of ours at Vienna, Mr. Broza, and he spoke words to me which I should not repeat if I were not a dying man. 'This is sheer blasphemy,' he said, 'do you not see whom you accuse of sin, if you call that kind of disposition pride? None other, let me say it reverently, than the Saviour Himself--Christ Jesus, the Lord! In this sense He also was proud--ay, a thousand times prouder than you--the very proudest man that ever lived.... But happily,' he added, 'happily we call it by another name--the beneficence of him who being a law to himself is filled with tenderest love to his neighbours.... I do not mean thereby to compare you with our Lord, Taras,' he concluded, 'but you are a rare man nevertheless--a Christ-like man.' Bear with me, men and women, for let me say it over again, it is a dying man that dares repeat such words to you. And surely I know my own heart better than another can know it. It was pride that moved me; it was sin.

"But having now laid bare my inmost heart to you, showing you the good and the bad within me, you may judge for yourselves how I must have felt when first I came among you. It was as though I had entered a strange world, it was all so different from the lowlands--different and, as I was ready to say, worse. But my pride did not permit me to look down upon you on that account, or to rejoice in finding you wanting; on the contrary, it urged me at all hazards to correct your ill habits. It was no easy matter for me to understand you, and find a reason for your doings; but I set about it and perceived where to make a beginning, and to what length I could go. My task grew plain. There was need to improve your agriculture, giving you for your low-lying fields the ploughshare of the plain. There was need to show you how to benefit your live stock by increasing the number of herdsmen and providing the cattle with shelter. There was need to accustom you to a garb more suitable to your labour, need to teach you the advantage of adding rye-bread and beef to your staple food. There was need, above all things, to break you from that wildest of your habits, so full of danger to yourselves, the constant wearing of arms...."

He stood erect, stretching forth his hand, as he scanned the people proudly. His eyes shone, and his voice increased in fervour.

"For twelve years I have lived in this village. As a poor serving man I came hither, and for years I bore the scorn of many. I have never boasted of what you owe me; no word or look of mine ever called your attention to what I have done for you. Nor would I do so now. What, indeed, were the gain of your thanks to a man in my position? But I will have you know the truth about me, and justly you shall judge me; it is therefore I ask you--Have I done these things, and were they for your good? Have I benefited you, and is it my doing--mine alone?"

His voice swelled like thunder: "Speak the truth, men of Zulawce--yes or no!"

There was a breathless silence, broken after a minute or two, as the forest silence is broken by a gust of wind when the branches whistle, the stems bend and creak, and every creature starts up affrighted, the many voices blending in one mighty sound; and thus to the pale, proud man but a single answer was given, bursting simultaneously from these hundreds of men.