“Is there nothing,” she breaks out, “which can give life beauty, since you have taken from me God and immortality?”
“Work,” answers the old man.
But she looks out again, and a feeling of scorn for that poor wisdom creeps over her. The unfathomable rises before her; she feels the spirit dwelling in everything; she is sensible of the power which lies bound in seemingly dead material, but which can develop into a thousand forms of shifting life. Dizzily she seeks for a name for the presence of God’s spirit in nature.
“Oh, Eberhard,” she says, “what is work? Is it a god? Has it any meaning in itself? Name another!”
“I know no other,” answered the old man.
Then she finds the name which she is seeking,—a poor, often sullied name.
“Uncle Eberhard, why do you not speak of love?”
A smile glides over the empty mouth where the thousand wrinkles cross.
“Here,” says the philosopher, and strikes the heavy packet with his clenched hand, “here all the gods are slain, and I have not forgotten Eros. What is love but a longing of the flesh? In what does he stand higher than the other requirements of the body? Make hunger a god! Make fatigue a god! They are just as worthy. Let there be an end to such absurdities! Let the truth live!”
The young countess sinks her head. It is not so, all that is not true; but she cannot contest it.