He awoke from his study and said mournfully; "Dear child, thou dost not yet understand thyself, thy destiny, or the world. I am not frivolous enough to enter into thy plans, or to encourage thee in them in the innocency of thy youth. What thou wishest cannot, must not be; and in another year, or less perhaps, thou wilt see thyself how impossible it is. We should both become wretched, and to deepen our misery should despise each other. May heaven guide thy steps: but I love and prize thee so much, that I cannot ruin thee. Pray to God: he will support thee."
"He talks for all the world just like my father!" cried Rose, and walkt away, half in sorrow, half in anger; while Edward went musing to his room.
"Is Balthasar right then after all?" he said to himself; "is human nature so utterly depraved? or is it not rather the business of energy, resolution, and reason, to transform those very qualities in us as in all other things into virtues and excellencies, which else if they are neglected would become malignant and base?"
He then wrote a long letter to Herr Balthasar, and once more told him positively that he must quit his house and the country, if the marriage of Eleazar and Rose was irrevocably fixt; and that he would readily forgo his promist fortune, if Balthasar would only afford him some degree of support in his plans for his future life. He again however called upon him as a father to consider the unsuitable, nay the shocking nature of the projected match. He conjured him to look at the happiness of his child with a steadier, more impartial eye. At the same time he begged for another, a last interview, and said he had a request which the old man must needs grant him, if he would have him leave the mountains with honour, with peace of mind, and without repenting of the years he had past there.
It was with a very heavy heart that Edward went to his old master. The whole destiny of mankind lay darkly and with a crushing weight upon his breast. Anguishing was the conviction he felt, that in the very sweetest and purest innocence all the roots of evil and sin were already lurking, and that there needed only chance and caprice to foster their growth, for them to put forth their calamitous fruits. His situation was so completely changed, his chief wish was that the house which had so long been his home, the country he was become so fond of, were but far behind him, that gradually and with a steady hand he might eraze all the recollections of the time he had spent there. He was resolved that at all events he would not be a witness of the disasters to which, he was persuaded, the dark spirits brooding there must infallibly give birth; that he would not stay to behold them; for he did not feel sure of being so firm, that his own passion and frailty might not lend a hand in bringing down the impending ruin. Heartily as at this moment he abhorred such a thought, he yet knew full well from observation and experience that no man is always the same, and that even the best are not braced with the same strength at all hours: he knew how the sophistry of our passions will come athwart all our good feelings and resolves, and that the more secure they feel the more easily it trips them up and overthrows them.
He found the old man in a serious mood, but without the agitation he had feared. "Come and shake hands with me," cried Balthasar as he entered, "although you choose to leave me. How I shall support your absence I cannot yet conceive, anymore than I should know how I could live without light and warmth: but nevertheless I shall be forced to learn this lesson, if nothing can alter or upset your determination."
"My fatherly friend," Edward began, "can you then persist in your determination, which to me is so utterly incomprehensible? Is it quite impossible for you to consent to what alone will make me happy, and assuredly will make your daughter so too?"
"I had hoped, my dear friend," answered the old man very mildly, "you would not have toucht on this string again, which thrills far too painfully through my whole frame. Pray convince yourself that this long-formed resolution, which you if you please may term a whim, I cannot possibly revoke; it is much too firmly intertwined with my whole being. What we do from conviction as we call it, from pondering about a matter and balancing it first in one scale and then in the other, over and over again, is seldom worth much. Whatever is permanent, characteristic, genuine in our nature, is instinct, prejudice, call it superstition;—a conclusion without question or inquiry, an act because one cannot help it. Such is this of mine! You may look upon it as a vow, a solemn oath which I have sworn to myself, and which I cannot violate without the most atrocious perjury against my own heart. I owe my poor good Eleazar much amends for having let my soul entertain and cherish disgust, bitterness, and aversion toward him for so many years.—And as to the happiness of the pair!—on this point my opinion is just the reverse of yours. He is wise, sensible, virtuous; he is happy already, and will keep so, whether he marry or not. It is an act of condescension in a person of his grave character to take up with my daughter. A man who has got the philosopher's stone can never be harmed by any of earth's paltry troubles. And my Rose! O my dear friend, the truly dreadful thing would be, if I were to give her to you to wife: this being, this child, that I cannot help loving so dearly, that I fold up with remorse and sorrow in my heart, would go to wreck like others amid the pleasures of the world, in self-will and frivolity, in dissipation and recklessness. You would indulge her out of love in all sorts of follies, and so make her and yourself miserable. No, it cannot be on any terms; and you yourself will thank me hereafter for my reasonable refusal. And now not a word more, dearest Edward, on this subject: let us come to your other request, which I can safely promise to grant you."
Edward began, with a cheerless spirit, to reckon up the damage his master had sustained from the robberies that were carried on in such an inexplicable manner, and urged the absolute necessity that, before he left the country, effective measures should at length be taken to get some trace of the thief. The old man wanted to break off the discussion; but Edward reminded him of his promise. Above all was Balthasar averse to a proposal made by his young friend, to set a spring-gun secretly in the warehouse, whereby the audacious robber might at length be caught and punisht. The old man regarded such a measure as impious, unlawful, and nearly akin to wilful murder.