LEFT IN THE LURCH.
Though I remained an invalid, there were times when I revived, and
almost flattered myself that I might yet, in spite of the
prognostications of my physician, recover. I was still comparatively
young, and I did not precisely like the thought of dying. The simple
pain of dying did not affright me; nor had I much reluctance to leave
the world, where there was little that had any charm for me. But I could
not help sending now and then uneasy glances beyond the tomb. There
might be a spirit-world beyond, and death might not after all extinguish
the life of the soul. I might, perhaps, live in that unknown world,
retain my personal identity, and distinct consciousness and memory. I
might, too, at least I could not say it was impossible, be punished
there for my sins in this world, and be condemned to have for my
companions those very devils whose acquaintance I had so assiduously
cultivated here. That might not be pleasant. Indeed, I began to have
many painful reflections, and to ask myself if I had not been all my
life making a fool of myself. I had been promised great things, but what
had I obtained?
“Your experience, my dear friend,” said Mr. Merton, “I doubt not, proves
the truth of the old saying, the devil always, sooner or later, leaves
his followers in the lurch. You remember, probably, I called the morning
after my introduction to you, to give you and Priscilla a warning as to
what awaited you. You were then too elated, too full of hope, to listen
to any thing I could say; at least, so it seemed to me at the time.”
“Yet you were mistaken. The few words you said interested me much, and I
wished at the time to hear more.”
“Alas! it is one of the miseries of the world, that the wicked are much
more active for mischief, than the virtuous are for good. Would to God
that the followers of Christ had a tithe of the industry and energy of
the followers of Satan. If I had been more earnest, more ready to
sacrifice my own ease and my own pride, perhaps——. But that is idle. You
will, I presume, readily concede now that you were then laboring under a
delusion, and indulged hopes which have not been realized?”
“Undoubtedly.”
“So it is. Satan never keeps his promises.”
“I wish you to explain,” said Jack, who that moment entered the room,—“I
wish you to explain how it is, if Satan is as powerful, and does as many
marvellous things as you pretend, that they who give themselves up soul
and body to him, always fail at last. Your mighty sorcerers and
magicians always find their master failing them when it comes to the
pinch. Ninety-nine times the devil enables the sorcerer to open the
prison doors, to become invisible to the sight or impervious to the
sword of his enemies, to overwhelm them, or to escape them by flying
away through the keyhole; but the hundredth time fails him, and leaves
him to be captured, to confess his crimes, and to be burnt alive.
According to all accounts, your witches are the most miserable old hags
one ever meets—wretched old crones, living in the most abject poverty,
and hardly able to procure the food necessary to keep soul and body
together. The devil never comes when wanted, never makes his appearance
before competent and credible witnesses. He performs his wonders in the
dark; and when one would really prove the fact of his presence, he is
away, and nobody can get a glimpse of him.”
“And what else,” replied Mr. Merton, “should be expected of the devil?
And yet I would not treat your objection lightly, for it is one which
has at times raised doubts in my own mind, and it makes me rather
sceptical as to most of the tales of witchcraft, ghosts, and hobgoblins
I hear or read of. But you should bear in mind that the devils are
capricious as well as malicious, or rather, their malice itself is full
of caprice. The devil, in all his invasions, seeks only to get himself
worshipped, and to ruin souls. When he has made a soul his slave, made
sure of its destruction in hell, his end is answered. He is a liar from
the beginning, and the father of lies. He is the inveterate enemy of
truth, and if he sometimes tells it, it is because compelled by a higher
power; or if now and then, of his own accord, it is only because it
serves his purpose of deception better than falsehood. If he sometimes
keeps his promises, and seems to do the best he can for his slaves, it
is for the same reason. Then, again, he is not omnipotent, he is not the
supreme Lord; and however powerful he may be, there is One mightier than
he, who can thwart him when he pleases. He can, as I often say, go only
the length of his chain. It may comport with the purposes of God to
suffer him to do many marvellous deeds, but never to suffer him to do
them so uniformly or in such a manner that his victims shall not be able
to detect the impostor, and know, if they will, that it is a foul and
lying spirit they follow. Satan’s delight is in deceiving, and he
delights as much in deceiving those already his slaves, as those he
would make such; and God so orders it, that his deceptions shall be
discoverable by all not wilfully blind.
“The devil is called the prince of this world, but he is not its
absolute lord. He can even here do only what he is, for the purposes of
love or justice, permitted to do. It may turn out, then, that he is
forbidden to come to the assistance of his servants in the nick of time,
even when he himself is disposed to do so. He may raise the storm, but
there is One asleep in the bark, who can at any instant awake, and say
to the winds and the waves, Peace, be still. It is not fitting that
Satan should be able to keep his promises in the great majority of cases
to the last, for that would leave too little chance of detecting his
delusions, and would confirm his worship. His failures prove his malice,
and also that his power is not his own, therefore that he is not God.
They serve, too, as punishments to his dupes, for it is fitting that
they who, through evil inclination and undue love of the world or of
pleasure, trust to him, should ultimately fail in the very goods
promised.
“The principles of God’s providence are always and everywhere the same,
and there is a close analogy between the natural and the supernatural.
God has given to the universe its law. He has placed before man a real,
substantial, and desirable good; but he has made this good attainable
only in one way, by obedience to his law, which is not an arbitrary law,
but a law founded in his own eternal reason, in his own infinite,
eternal, and immutable justice. He who attempts to attain his good, his
beatitude, by any other means, invariably and inevitably fails. It is as
our Lord said,—‘I am the door;’ and ‘he that entereth not by the door,
but climbeth up another way, the same is a thief and a robber.’ Whoever
seeks entrance into the fold of happiness by another than the
God-appointed way, whatever that way may be, is predoomed to
disappointment. All experience proves it. The departure by the ancient
Gentiles from the patriarchal or primitive religion, led to the
confusion of their understandings, and to the adoption and practice of
the grossest and most abominable superstitions—the extreme of moral or
spiritual misery. The man who seeks happiness, even in this life, from
acquiring or possessing riches and honor, always fails, even when he
apparently succeeds. The most miserable of men are they who make
pleasure their sole pursuit. The reason is, that beatitude is not
promised to those pursuits, lies not on their plane, and is not
attainable by following them. He who attempts to attain it in any of
those ways is no wiser than those philosophers of Laputa who sought to
extract sunbeams from cucumbers. It is only in accordance with the same
principle, that they who seek worldly felicity, by consorting with
devils, should in like manner be disappointed.”
“All that is very wise, and would do very well for a sermon,” said Jack.
“It may, for aught I know, be very true. I have no knowledge on the
subject, and no acquaintance with the devil or his angels. But I wish
you would tell me how it happens that the witnesses to these marvellous
phenomena are seldom if ever men of real science, well known, and of
name in the scientific world?”
“I thought you were one of those who would not admit authority even in
matters of faith, and yet you demand authority in matters of science,”
replied Mr. Merton, in a tone slightly sarcastic. “You would have the
French Academy, for instance, in science what Rome claims to be in
religion, and admit a historical fact or a scientific conclusion only on
academic authority.”
“But you know,” replied Jack, “that scientific commissions appointed to
investigate and report on particular cases in France, never succeed in
getting a sight of those marvellous facts which are so readily exhibited
to others. Is not this a suspicious circumstance?”
“Not in my mind,” replied Mr. Merton. “Your learned academicians
generally commence their investigations with the persuasion that all
facts of the kind alleged are impossible, and they seldom pay attention
to the actual phenomena passing before them. They are busy only with
their scepticism, and do not see what really takes place. Their study is
simply how to explain away the phenomena they do see, without admitting
their supernatural or superhuman character. Lawyers are said to be the
worst witnesses in the world. Academicians are the very worst people in
the world to observe facts. I would trust, in what depends on the
senses, a plain, honest, unscientific peasant, much quicker than I would
an Arago or a Babinet, for he has no theory to disturb him, no
conclusion to establish or refute. The science of all your learned
academies is infidel in regard to religion. Babinet, of the Institute,
has just written an Essay in the _Revue des Deux Mondes_, in which he
pronounces the phenomena alleged by our recent spiritists impossible,
because they contradict the laws of gravitation. Poor man! he reasons as
if the phenomena repugnant to the laws of gravitation are supposed to be
produced by it, or at least without a power that overcomes it. Why, the
very marvellousness of the phenomenon is that it is contrary to the law
of gravitation; and because it is contrary to the law of gravitation, we
infer that it is preternatural. The learned member of the Institute
argues that the fact is impossible, because it would be preternatural,
and the preternatural is impossible, because the preternatural would be
preternatural! When I see a man raised, without any visible means, to
the ceiling, and held there by his feet with his head downwards for half
an hour or more without a visible support, I do not pretend that it is
in accordance with the law of gravitation, but the essence of the fact
is precisely in that it is not. Now, to deny the fact for that reason,
is to say that the law of gravitation cannot be overcome or suspended,
and precisely to beg the question. When I throw a stone into the air, my
force, in some sense, overcomes that of gravitation. How does M. Babinet
know that there are not invisible powers who can take a man and hold him
up with his feet to the ceiling, or a table, as easily as I can a little
child? The fact of the rising of a table or a man to the ceiling is one
that is easily verified by the senses, and if attested by witnesses of
ordinary capacity and credibility, must be admitted. That it is contrary
to the law of gravitation, proves not that it is impossible, but that it
is possible only preternaturally. It would be a real relief to find a
distinguished academician who had learned practically the elements of
logic.
“The devils, again,” continued Mr. Merton, “may not choose to exhibit
their superhuman powers before your scientific commissions. It might be
against their interest. He is sure of the commissioners as long as he
can keep them in their scepticism; but were he to suffer them to escape
it, he might lose them. Compelled to acknowledge the existence of Satan,
they might go further and acknowledge that of Christ, and become
Christians, and labor to harmonize science with faith. Even God himself
may choose to let them remain in their scepticism as a just punishment
of their intellectual pride, their indocility, and their preferring
their own darkness to his light. They take pleasure in sin, and he gives
them up to their own delusions, and permits them to believe a lie, that
they may be damned, as they deserve, for their sins. The malice, the
cunning, the astuteness, the caprice of the devils, the prepossessions
of the scientific, and the purposes of God are amply sufficient to
account for the fact that these commissions never succeed in witnessing
the preternatural or superhuman phenomena said to be witnessed by
others.”
“But how am I,” asked Jack, “to believe that a poor old crone, who is
half dying of starvation, is in league with the devil? Why does she not
make use of her power to procure decent clothing and maintenance?”
“The devil is by no means a trustworthy or a kind and generous friend.
He is a philanthropist, and never relieves the suffering under his nose,
or cares for that of individuals.”
“I have read,” Jack went on, “a great many witch stories, and
descriptions of witch feasts, and I cannot discover what there is in
them to attach these hell-cats to their alleged orgies. I came across,
yesterday, an account of the witches’ sabbath. I can conceive nothing
more absurd, ridiculous, or rather disgusting. The acquaintances of the
devil generally represent him as respectable at least for his intellect,
and many insist that he is a gentleman. But if all accounts are true, he
is very low and vulgar in his tastes, has very little sense of dignity,
and is in fact a very shabby fellow. In these orgies he appears, it is
said, sometimes in the form of a big negro, more generally under the
form of a black ram with immense horns, and in that form is very
indecently kissed and worshipped by Mesdames the witches. We know from
Tam O’Shanter that on these occasions there is much fiddling and
dancing, but I cannot conceive how there can be much pleasure. The whole
scene is fitted only to turn one’s stomach.”
“There is no doubt of that,” replied Mr. Merton. “The devil and his
worshippers certainly cut a very sorry figure in these nocturnal orgies,
as they are represented; but I am not certain that that should be
regarded as good ground of scepticism. I never understood that the devil
was a _clean_ spirit, and I should naturally expect some degree of
filthiness in his worshippers. You must know something of the sins or
moral diseases of mankind. Has it not sometimes occurred to you that
some apparently very respectable people,—people who go well dressed and
wear clean linen,—under the influence of their passions, acting out
their natures, cut, to an impartial spectator, about as sorry a figure
as Master Leonard and his witches? In the eyes of Infinite Holiness, I
am inclined to think there is much that passes in refined and cultivated
society that does not appear at all more clean and respectable than do
these nocturnal orgies in yours. I do not vouch for the correctness of
the popular descriptions of these orgies, but they are in accordance
with the well known principles of depraved nature. The indulgence of any
of our morbid passions degrades us; and in following our lusts, there is
no beastliness which is not for the moment charming to us. How much
more, then, when to our natural passions, rendered morbid by indulgence,
is added the superhuman influence of unclean spirits! The sensualist
lives constantly in a state as disgusting as ever the nocturnal orgies
of witches were represented to be. It is the law of all vice to descend,
and consequently, the more intimate we are with the devil, only the more
rapid and deep is our descent. The moral of the witches’ orgies is true,
whether the particular descriptions be or not. He who takes the devil
for God, must expect to have hell for his heaven.”
“The academicians are right,” I remarked, “in telling us that the whole
of the alleged _diablerie_ is all a delusion or an imposition.”
“Not precisely in their sense, however,” interrupted Mr. Merton. “The
whole is unquestionably a delusion, a sheer imposture, but of the devil,
not always of man. The devil promises according to the respective
inclinations of his servants—to some riches and honors, to some sensual
pleasures, to others power, dominion over men, and the secrets of
nature. I doubt not that he knows more than men, but he can never be
relied on, for he so mingles his lies with the truth, that we cannot
separate the one from the other.”
“That is true,” I remarked; “and those secrets he promises we never
gain. We grow proud, we assume airs, we feel that we are making
marvellous discoveries; we talk large, use big swelling words, and seem
to penetrate the secret of the universe; but we have only clutched at
the air, and when we open our hand, it is empty. We had made no advance,
we had found no vein of knowledge; and when the spell was broken, we
found ourselves weaker and more ignorant than ever. The fairy gold was
chips and stubble. The palace of wisdom we saw before us, and in which
we proposed to live with the Sultan’s fair daughter, disappears, carries
her away in it, and leaves us only empty space. I well remember some of
my early aspirations. I thought I was illumined by a more than natural
light. The clouds rolled back before my searching glance; the darkness
disappeared; there was no dread Unknown to confront me; I rose to the
empyrean; I was all intelligence; I looked, as a lady of my acquaintance
expressed it, ‘into the very abyss of Being.’ Yet it was all illusion—a
devilish illusion—and my understanding was all the time darkened, and my
eyes closed to the plainest and most obvious truths before me.”
“It was a deception practised upon you—a deception practised alike upon
all who would attain to a forbidden knowledge, or to knowledge by ways
not permitted by the Supreme Intelligence—upon the Neoplatonists, the
Gnostics, the Transcendentalists, and false mystics of every age,” added
Mr. Merton. “The light we hail in those forbidden ways or aspirations,
is the light which we see when our eyes are shut. It is a preternatural
hallucination, and he who follows it is sure not only to go astray, but
to fall into the greatest absurdities, and to utter the most ridiculous
nonsense.”
“The same principle,” I added, “is true with regard to the promised
power over men. These Satanic revolutions, and the terrible doings of
our revolutionary Berserkirs, all prove failures in the end. Cromwell
supplants Hampden, and Napoleon Lafayette. The devil always leaves us in
the lurch.”
“This fact should be borne in mind,” added Mr. Merton, “and if so, might
save the world from much superstition. The superstition is not in
believing in the reality of demonic invasions, or in believing that the
devil sometimes exhibits a superhuman power, tells us, in dreams,
visions, necromancy, or other forms of divination, facts of which we
were ignorant; but in practising these forms, in confiding in the
communications, and in seeking to avail ourselves of the power
displayed. No reliance can ever be placed upon them, for supposing the
demonic presence real, we have still only a lying spirit on which to
depend. The dream of yesternight has come true, that of to-night will
prove false. The _medium_ you consulted the other day foretold correctly
what was to happen; to-day her familiar spirit is a lying spirit, and
her tale is false in all its parts. The predictions of the
fortune-teller last year have been fulfilled; his predictions of to-day
are a tissue of lies. If Ahab goes up to battle, he shall not die; yet
is shot by a bow drawn at a venture. To trust in these things is gross
superstition, and tends only to degrade, to render immoral, weak, timid,
and miserable. The way of wisdom is to let them alone, turn your back on
them, and never suffer your mind or imagination to run on them.”
“It is worthy of remark, that the men who declaim the most against
superstition are unbelievers in Christianity, and who, under pretext of
making war on superstition, attack religion itself. And yet the Church
has always forbidden all superstitious practices, and she commands her
children to have no dealings with the devil, to forbear all resort to
fortune-tellers or divination, and to pay no attention to dreams, omens,
&c. Of course all such things are wrong, are sin, are treason against
God; but they are also, and because treason against God, and a dealing
with the enemy, unwise and degrading. There is no saying to what depths
he may fall who gives way to them, or the misery and wretchedness he may
bring upon himself, and even upon those dear to him. I could, were I
disposed, draw proofs enough from my own experience, while I was a prey
to the superstitions still so rife in our country; but I will not
trouble you with them. But of this be sure, that you will never root out
that superstition by denying the existence and influence of demons. The
remedy is in religious faith, in cultivating a firm trust in God, in
obedience to his commands,—and in the firm persuasion that all dealings
with devils is unlawful, and that all regard paid to signs, dreams, and
omens is superstitious and sinful, and, what will weigh perhaps still
more with our age, wholly unprofitable. No good can come from seeking
knowledge by forbidden paths, and much evil is sure to come.”
“I am glad,” said Jack, “that Mr. Merton has the grace to admit so much.
It would have been a blessed thing for me, if I had been taught to
regard mesmerism as unlawful; better still, if it had never been
recommended to me as a legitimate science. I do not believe in Satanic
invasions; but I do believe little good comes from departing from the
old ways, and attempting to be wiser than our fathers were.”