The soul of Lilith

by Marie Corelli

“Lilith! Lilith!” he exclaimed, “why leave me thus if you love me? Stay with me yet a little!”

But Lilith—or rather the strange Spirit that made the body of Lilith speak,—was gone. And all that night not another sound, either of music or speech, stirred the silence of the room. Dawn came, misty and gray, and found the proud El-Râmi kneeling before the unveiled picture of the Christ,—not praying, for he could not bring himself down to the necessary humiliation for prayer,—but simply wondering vaguely as to what could be and what might be the one positive reply to that question propounded of old—

“Whom Say Ye That I Am?”

XXXIV.

Of what avail is it to propound questions that no one can answer? Of what use is it to attempt to solve the mystery of life which must for ever remain mysterious? Thus may the intelligent critic ask, and, in asking, may declare that the experiments, researches, and anxieties of El-Râmi, together with El-Râmi himself, are mistaken conceptions all round. But it is necessary to remind the intelligent critic that the eager desire of El-Râmi to prove what appears unprovable is by no means an uncommon phase of human nature,—it is in fact the very key-note and pulse of the present time. Every living creature who is not too stunned by misery for thought craves to know positively whether the Soul,—the Immortal, Individual Ego, be Fable or Fact. Never more than in this, our own period, did people search with such unabated feverish yearning into the things that seem supernatural;—never were there bitterer pangs of recoil and disappointment when trickery and imposture are found to have even temporarily passed for truth. If the deepest feeling in every human heart to-day were suddenly given voice, the shout “Excelsior!” would rend the air in mighty chorus. For we know all the old earth stories;—of love, of war, of adventure, of wealth, we know pretty well the beginning and the end,—we read in our histories of nations that were, but now are not, and we feel that we shall in due time go the same way with them,—that the wheel of Destiny spins on in the same round always, and that nothing—nothing can alter its relentless and monotonous course. We tread in the dust and among the fallen columns of great cities and we vaguely wonder if the spirits of the men that built them are indeed no more,—we gaze on the glorious pile of the Duomo at Milan and think of the brain that first devised and planned its majestic proportions, and ask ourselves—Is it possible that this, the creation, should be Here, and its creator Nowhere? Would such an arrangement be reasonable or just? And so it happens that when the wielders of the pen essay to tell us of wars, of shipwrecks, of hair-breadth escapes from danger, of love and politics and society, we read their pages with merely transitory pleasure and frequent indifference, but when they touch upon subjects beyond earthly experience,—when they attempt, however feebly, to lift our inspirations to the possibilities of the Unseen, then we give them our eager attention and almost passionate interest. Critics look upon this tendency as morbid, unwholesome and pernicious; but nevertheless the tendency is there,—the demand for “Light! more light!” is in the very blood and brain of the people. It would seem as though this world has grown too narrow for the aspirations of its inhabitants;—and some of us instinctively feel that we are on the brink of strange discoveries respecting the powers unearthly, whether for good or evil we dare not presume to guess. The nonsensical tenets of “Theosophy” would not gain ground with a single individual man or woman were not this feeling very strong among many,—the tricky “mediums” and “spiritualists” would not have a chance of earning a subsistence out of the gullibility of their dupes, and the preachers of new creeds and new forms would obtain no vestige of attention if it were not for the fact that there is a very general impression all over the world that the time is ripe for a clearer revelation of God and the things of God than we have ever had before. “Give us something that will endure!” is the exclamation of weary humanity—“The things we have, pass; and, by reason of their ephemeral nature, are worthless. Give us what we can keep and call our own for ever!” This is why we try and test all things that appear to give proof of the super-sensual element in man,—and when we find ourselves deceived by impostors and conjurers our disgust and disappointment are too bitter to ever find vent in words. The happiest are those who, in the shifting up and down of faiths and formulas, ever cling steadfastly to the one pure example of embodied Divinity in Manhood as seen in Christ. When we reject Christ, we reject the Gospel of Love and Universal Brotherhood, without which the ultimate perfection and progress of the world must ever remain impossible.

A few random thoughts such as these occurred to El-Râmi now and then as he lived his life from day to day in perpetual expectation of the “sign” promised by Lilith, which as yet was not forthcoming. He believed she would keep her word, and that the “sign” whatever it was would be unmistakable; and,—as before stated—this was the nearest approach to actual faith he had ever known. His was a nature which was originally disposed to faith, but which had persistently fought with its own inclination till that inclination had been conquered. He had been able to prove as purely natural much that had seemed supernatural, and he now viewed everything from two points—Possibility and Impossibility. His various confusions and perplexities, however, generally arose from the frequent discovery he made that what he had once thought the Impossible suddenly became, through some small chance clue, the Possible. So many times had this occurred that he often caught himself wondering whether anything in very truth could be strictly declared as “impossible.” And yet, ... with the body of Lilith under his observation for six years, and an absolute ignorance as to how her intelligence had developed, or where she obtained the power to discourse with him as she did, he always had the lurking dread that her utterances might be the result of his own brain unconsciously working upon hers, and that there was no “soul” or “spirit” in the matter. This, too, in spite of the fact that she had actually given him a concise description of certain planets, their laws, their government, and their inhabitants, concerning which he could know nothing,—and that she spoke with a sure conviction of the existence of a personal God, an idea that was entirely unacceptable to his nature. He was at a loss to explain her “separated consciousness” in any scientific way, and, afraid of himself lest he should believe too easily, he encouraged the presence of every doubt in his mind, rather than give entrance to more than the palest glimmer of faith.

And so time went on, and May passed into June, and June deepened into its meridian glow of bloom and sunlight, and he remained shut up within the four walls of his house, seeing no one, and displaying a total indifference to the fact that the “season” with all its bitter froth and frivolity was seething on in London in its usual monotonous manner. Unlike pretenders to “spiritualistic” powers, he had no inclination for the society of the rich and great,—“titled” people had no attraction for him save in so far as they were cultured, witty, or amiable,—“position” in the world was a very miserable trifle in his opinion, and, though many a gorgeous flunkied carriage at this time found its way into the unfashionable square where he had his domicile, no visitors were admitted to see him,—and “too busy to receive any one” was the formula with which young Féraz dismissed any would-be intruder. Yet Féraz himself wondered all the while how it was that, as a matter of fact, El-Râmi seemed to be just now less absorbed in actual study than he had ever been in his whole life. He read no books save the old Arabic vellum-bound volume which held the explanatory key to so many curious phenomena palmed off as “spiritual miracles” by the theosophists, and he wrote a good deal,—but he answered no letters, accepted no invitations, manifested no wish to leave the house even for an hour’s stroll, and seemed mentally engrossed by some great secret subject of meditation. He was uniformly kind to Féraz, exacting no duties from him save those prompted by interest and affection,—he was marvellously gentle too with Zaroba, who, agitated, restless and perplexed as to his ultimate intentions with respect to the beautiful Lilith, was vaguely uneasy and melancholy, though she deemed it wisest to perform all his commands with exactitude, and, for the present, to hold her peace. She had expected something—though she knew not what—from his last interview with her beautiful charge—but all was unchanged,—Lilith slept on, and the cherished wish of Zaroba’s heart, that she should wake, seemed as far off realisation as ever. Day after day passed, and El-Râmi lived like a hermit amidst the roar and traffic of mighty London,—watching Lilith for long and anxious hours, but never venturing to call her down to him from wherever she might be,—waiting, waiting for her summons, and content for once to sink himself in the thought of her identity. All his ambitions were now centred on the one great object, ... to see the Soul, as it is, if it is indeed existent, conscious and individual. For, as he argued, what is the use of a “Soul” whose capacities we are not permitted to understand?—and if it be no more to us than the intelligent faculty of brain? The chief proof of a possible something behind Man’s inner consciousness was, he considered, the quality of Discontent, and, primarily, because Discontent is so universal. No one is contented in all the world from end to end. From the powerful Emperor on his throne to the whining beggar in the street, all chafe under the goading prick of the great Necessity,—a something better,—a something lasting. Why should this resonant key-note of Discontent be perpetually resounding through space, if this life is all? No amount of philosophy or argument can argue away Discontent—it is a god-like disquietude ever fermenting changes among us, ever propounding new suggestions for happiness, ever restless, never satisfied. And El-Râmi would ask himself—Is Discontent the voice of the Soul?—not only the Universal Soul of things, but the Soul of each individual? Then, if individual, why should not the individual be made manifest, if manifestation be possible? And if not possible, why should we be called upon to believe in what cannot be manifested?

Thus he argued, not altogether unwisely; he had studied profoundly all the divers conflicting theories of religion, and would at one time have become an obstinately confirmed Positivist, had it not been for the fact that the further his researches led him the more he became aware that there was nothing positive,—that is to say, nothing so apparently fixed and unalterable that it might not, under different conditions, prove capable of change. Perhaps there is no better test example of this truth than the ordinary substance known as iron. We use in common parlance unthinkingly the phrase “as hard as iron”—while to the smith and engineer, who mould and twist it in every form, it proves itself soft and malleable as wax. Again, to the surface observer, it might and does seem an incombustible metal,—the chemist knows it will burn with the utmost fury. How then form a universal decision as to its various capabilities when it has so many variations of use all in such contrary directions? The same example, modified or enlarged, will be found to apply to all things, wherefore the word “Positivism” seems out of place in merely mortal language. God may be “positive,” but we and our surroundings have no such absolute quality.

During this period of El-Râmi’s self-elected seclusion and meditation his young brother Féraz was very happy. He was in the midst of writing a poem which he fondly fancied might perhaps—only perhaps—find a publisher to take it and launch it on its own merits,—it is the privilege of youth to be over-sanguine. Then, too, his brain was filled with new musical ideas,—and many an evening’s hour he beguiled away by delicious improvisations on the piano, or exquisite songs to the mandoline. El-Râmi, when he was not upstairs keeping anxious vigil by the tranced Lilith’s side, would sit in his chair, leaning back with half-closed eyes, listening to the entrancing melodies like another Saul to a new David, soothed by the sweetness of the sounds he heard, yet conscious that he took too deep and ardent a pleasure in hearing, when the songs Féraz chose were of love. One night Féraz elected to sing the wild and beautiful “Canticle of Love” written by the late Lord Lytton, when as “Owen Meredith” he promised to be one of the greatest poets of our century, and who would have fulfilled more than that promise if diplomacy had not claimed his brilliant intellectual gifts for the service of his country,—a country which yet deplores his untimely loss. But no fatality had as yet threatened that gallant and noble life in the days when Féraz smote the chords of his mandoline and sang:

“I once heard an angel by night in the sky