"Was she the sister of a Carmelite monk in Compatri?"
"Where did you learn this?" exclaimed Severinus, greatly agitated.
"What connection have you with my past? Speak; of what are you
thinking? Your eyes sparkle, your cheeks glow; do not torture me."
"Are you your mother's only child?"
"So truly as she expiated all her remaining days in a cloister, the one
error of her life."
"Then God has sent me to you to warn you at the right time not to
commit a most grievous wrong. Do you know who the man is whom you thus
inexorably pursue?"
A suspicion began to arise in Severinus's mind; he recoiled and
extended his hands repellently, as if he feared the words that hovered
upon Cornelia's lips.
"He is your brother!" she cried, tears gushing from her eyes.
Severinus involuntarily pressed his hand upon his brow, his fingers
quivered slightly as they touched the broad scar upon it, and he gazed
absently before him as if in a dream.
"Oh, do not crush the feeling that stirs in your heart! Give me your
hand, and let me tell you how warmly I greet the brother of my beloved!
Oh, God, to see the two men dearest to me on earth united, the souls
which always struggled with each other, and yet could never resist the
impulse of sympathy, reconciled in brotherly love! And it is I, I who
am permitted to bring you together, to give you to each other! Ah, my
friend, this is inexpressible joy!"
"And are you so sure you are not deceiving yourself?" asked Severinus,
gloomily.
"Deceiving? Oh, you incredulous man! Heinrich's father is yours also.
Ten years before his marriage in Germany he traveled in Italy. In wild,
romantic Compatri he was attracted by the beauty of your mother,
Angelina, who was living in the greatest poverty upon the products of
her vines and the scanty gifts of the Carmelite convent in that place,
then falling to decay. He took her to Rome, and remained there two
years,--until his duties compelled him to return to Germany and desert
Angelina, with her eleven-months-old boy. What afterwards became of her
and her child, Heinrich did not know."
"And how did Heinrich happen to tell you this?"
"He told me a great many things about his father's life."
"And where did he learn this sad history?"
"From Anton, who, as valet, accompanied old Herr von Ottmar on his
travels, and whose statements were confirmed by the dead man's papers.
Heinrich did not then foresee how important this discovery might some
day become. But if all this is not sufficient proof for you, question
your own heart; remember what an inexplicable affection still bound you
to Heinrich, even after you believed him lost to the church. Does not
this impulse of the heart harmonize with all that has been so strangely
revealed to you? Oh, you feel it yourself at this moment! I see it by
the tears that will steal out from beneath your lashes; you feel, you
believe, that he is your brother!"
Severinus covered his face. "He is! he is! Oh, God, and I must ruin my
brother!"
"Thank God," cried Cornelia, joyously, "you are moved, touched! The
voice of blood is again stirring within you; you will be reconciled to
him, will spare him! Oh, say you will!"
Severinus raised his head and leaned against the window-sill; the tears
that Cornelia had seen in his eyes were dried. "Do you believe that a
pupil of Loyola will listen to the voice of blood? Do you know what the
saint, who is our protector and pattern, did? He burned, unread, the
letters from his own family, that he might break off all ties with the
world; and I, should I spare the enemy of my church because he is
related to me? Should I allow my zeal in God's cause to grow cold
because my heart warms with a mere animal instinct? No, Cornelia, my
brothers are in Christ; he who does not belong to him is no brother of
mine."
"Cruel, hard-hearted man!" cried Cornelia, in horror. "I do not know
whether it is compassion or terror that seizes upon me, but my soul
trembles at the power of an illusion which can thus petrify the noblest
heart."
"Petrify!" cried Severinus. "Oh, do not speak so, child that you are!
Have you ever cast a glance into this 'petrified heart'? Have you a
suspicion of the strength of the love I must tear away from earth and
consecrate to God? Have you ever heard the outcry of the tortured man
when he is obliged to accomplish his regeneration from earthly to
heavenly things? Do you know how mighty nature writhes and struggles
and groans under the prickly iron ring of the cilicium?[2] You are
spared these agonies, because God requires only the easiest sacrifices
from you; but we, who are appointed to be the imitators of Christ upon
earth, are compelled taste them to the dregs. We must fulfill our great
task, and no human eye is permitted to see that the sacrifice it
admires trickles from the warm heart's blood."
"My poor Severinus!"
"Do not pity me; I want no one's compassion. I only want you to
understand me; the more difficult the victory, the greater the fame. I
shall one day be proud of my tortures. But I must labor without rest or
sleep, and watch over myself at every hour, for the enemy is cunning,
and if he chooses can clothe himself in the garb of an angel." His
large eyes rested ardently upon Cornelia.
"Severinus," she answered, sadly, "do you take me for this false
angel--me, who preach nothing to you except the first and simplest laws
of Christianity? Do you think the 'foul fiend' is in me, because I
oppose a belief which rejects the purest impulse of nature as a mere
animal instinct, if it is not of use to its plans,--denies the tie God
himself has hallowed, if it bars its progress; and acknowledges nothing
which does not----"
"Redound to the greater honor of God," interrupted Severinus. "Yes, we
do all for the honor of God. That is the word which permits no false
meaning; the path from which we cannot deviate an inch; the object from
which we dare not turn our eyes, even though we trample underfoot the
bodies of our dearest friends. He who opposes us must fall, for we
cannot allow ourselves to be stopped. For the honor of God we live, and
are ready to die."
"And are you sure that in this you act only for the honor of God? Are
you sure you do not abuse this great word as a pretext for an act of
selfishness?"
Severinus looked at her inquiringly.
She struggled with her Feelings, and then began, gently: "Tell me, my
friend, if in the execution of a punishment commanded by the order a
Jesuit should also find the gratification of a personal desire for
revenge, would he not profane the cause of God by making it his own?"
"Certainly," replied Severinus, in a hollow tone, fixing his eyes upon
the floor.
"There are many kinds of passions, of which the man who ardently
desires only what is right is scarcely conscious, because he does not
even allow them to take the form of a thought; yet they are there, and
the so-called foul fiend undermines in them the more securely, because
concealed, the toilsomely-erected structure of virtue. Let me quote an
example. Suppose a Jesuit hated an enemy of his order, not only because
the order hates him, but because he is loved by a girl who is dear to
the Jesuit himself?"
Severinus started; a deep flush suffused his face.
Cornelia continued: "Suppose he used against him the weapons the order
placed his hands, not for the sake of the church, but to serve the
instincts of his own jealousy, and should suddenly perceive what he had
not confessed, even to himself, what would be his duty then?"
Severinus was now as pale as he had before been red. He stood like a
marble statue, not a breath stirred his breast; but at last his
delicate lips opened to utter the words, "Then it would be his duty to
resign the work he would profane to another, who could perform it with
pure hands, solely for the sake of God and the order."
"Well, then, Severinus, do what you believe to be your duty. I have
nothing more to say."
A deep silence followed. Severinus still stood motionless, and Cornelia
did not venture to look at him; she did not wish to read the pale face.
She was terrified at what, for Heinrich's sake, she had done to this
noble man, and involuntarily feared the results.
Severinus slowly approached her, laid his hand upon her head, and said,
"Let us bid each other farewell."
Cornelia looked up. The pure features expressed no bitterness, no
anger, only the repose of an immovable resolution. "Farewell?" she
asked, in surprise.
"For life!"
Remorse suddenly seized upon her. She had overstepped the bounds of
womanly delicacy, and pitilessly assailed the heart which, in spite of
its errors, she had always seen rise superior to every weakness. She
now felt for the first time how much she should lose in him, and, with
sincere shame, bent down, and before he could prevent it, pressed her
lips to his hands. "Severinus, can you forgive me?"
"I have nothing to forgive," he replied, gently drawing back.
"Where are you going?"
"To Rome."
"And what takes you to Rome so suddenly?"
"I had already resolved to return there some weeks ago; only the hope
of still winning you for the church, and the hostile mission against
Heinrich, detained me. This hour is the destruction of all my plans.
Nothing is left for me to do except to place the papers intrusted to me
in the General's hands, and explain to him that I am unworthy of his
confidence,--that I am not fit for the business of the world."
"And then,--what will happen then?"
"Then the General will commit the office I held to another, and, if God
wills, sanction the penance I shall impose upon myself of voluntary
seclusion in the monastery during the remainder of my life."
"Will you retire from the world,--bury yourself within the walls of a
cloister?"
"That I may the more surely rise again in God."
"And is such a resolution compatible with your zeal for the order?
Suppose your office falls into the hands of a man who will not act with
the wisdom and dignity you have shown,--who will perhaps injure the
interests and authority of your association,--would you not reproach
yourself for having been to blame for this injury by resigning the
'holy cause' into unworthy hands?"
"There are many among our ranks who are perfectly competent to fill my
place; the General's keen eye will discover the right man. I can
perform my duties to the order. Even in the silence of a convent-cell,
I can write the words with which I should cheer souls and strengthen
them in the faith, and, in undisturbed intercourse with the Highest
One, they will gain more sanctity and power than in the profane society
of the world. Nay, my writings may perhaps influence future generations
long after spoken words have died away. Is not such an expectation
edifying to true faith?--such a resolution the highest victory over our
earthly nature?"
"A victory! Oh, Severinus, do not deceive yourself! A spark of the warm
life you wish to deny still glows in your breast. Suppose, Severinus,
you should perceive too late that you had formed your resolution too
early? Suppose you should long despairingly for a breath of freedom,
and in the suffocating agony of being walled up alive in the wild
struggle of its contending elements, your soul should forget itself and
God, and fall into the apparently liberating hand of Satan?"