I have delayed speaking of the last vision of St. Antonius because it
seems to me the most remarkable of all, and was undoubtedly the poet's
own vision. After all the gods have vanished, and the journey through
the heavens has come to an end, Antonius beholds, upon the opposite
shore of the Nile, the Sphinx, lying on its belly, with outstretched
claws. But springing, flying, howling, snorting fire through its
nostrils, and beating its wings and its dragon's tail, Chimera is
circling about the Sphinx. What is the Sphinx? What else than the
gloomy riddle that is chained to earth, the eternal question,--brooding
science! What is the Chimera? What else than the winged imagination,
which speeds through space, and touches the stars with the tips of its
wings.
The Sphinx (the word is of the masculine gender in French) says: "Stand
still, Chimera! Do not run so fast, do not fly so high, do not howl so
loud. Cease snorting thy flames into my face; thou canst not possibly
melt my granite."
The Chimera replies, "I never stand still. Thou canst never grasp me,
thou dread Sphinx."
The Chimera gallops through the corridor of the labyrinth, flies across
the sea, and holds fast with its teeth to the sailing clouds.
The Sphinx lies motionless, tracing the alphabet in the sand with its
claws, musing and calculating; and while the sea ebbs and flows, the
grain waves to and fro, caravans pass by, and cities fall to decay, it
keeps its firm gaze bent fixedly on the horizon.
Finally it exclaims, "O phantasy! lift me up on thy pinions, out of my
deadly ennui!"
And Chimera replies, "Thou unknown one! I am enamored with thine eyes;
like an inflamed hyena I circle about thee. Oh, embrace me! Fructify
me!"
The Sphinx rises up; but Chimera flees in terror of being crushed
beneath the stony weight. "Impossible!" says the Sphinx, and sinks into
the deep sand.
I see in this scene the last confession of Flaubert, his stifled wail
over the imperfection of his entire life-work, and this master-work of
his life in especial. The Sphinx and the Chimera, science and poetry,
desire each other in him, seek each other again and again, circle
about each other with passionate yearning and ardor; but the true
impregnation of poetry through science he did not accomplish.
Not that his principle was unsound or incorrect. On the contrary,
the future of poetry is embodied in it; this I most truly believe,
for in it was its past. The greatest poets, an Æschylus, a Dante,
a Shakespeare, a Goethe, possessed all the essential knowledge of
their day, and deposited it in their poetry. True, erudition and
scientific culture, in and for themselves, have no poetic value. They
can never in the world take the place of poetic sentiment and artistic
creative power. When the poetic endowment, however, exists, the gaze
is sharpened by an acquaintance with the laws of nature and the human
soul, and expanded by the study of history. In our day, when modern
science is reconstructed in every direction, however, it is undoubtedly
far more difficult than ever to span the materials of science without
being overwhelmed, and Flaubert did not possess that native harmony of
spirit which renders difficult things easy, and reconciles the profound
antitheses of the world of ideas.
"La Tentation de St. Antoine" was disposed of in Paris with a merry
boulevard jest. Few people, indeed, had the patience to enter
thoroughly into the volume, and the public at large was soon ready
with its judgment: the book was mortally tedious. How could the author
expect that such a work would entertain the Parisians? Now "Madame
Bovary" was quite another thing. Why did not Flaubert repeat himself
(as all poor writers do)? Why did not he write ten new "Madame Bovarys"?
He retired to Croisset, shut himself up in solitude, deeply wounded
as he was, for long months, and slowly began to work anew. He grew
old. He lost by death his older friends, George Sand and Théophile
Gautier; the friends of his youth and those who were his comrades in
thought, Louis Bouilhet, Feydeau, Jules de Goncourt, and others. He
grew lonely. His health gave way; there came a time when he could not
endure walking,--indeed, could not even bear to see others walk. He
became poor. He lost his property, which from the kindness of his heart
he had intrusted to his only niece, and which her husband had foolishly
squandered, and during the latter years of his life he was tormented
with anxieties regarding means of subsistence. Toward the last he
rarely went to Paris; indeed, he did not even go into his garden. His
sole exercise consisted in an occasional walk from his bed-chamber to
his study, and down stairs to take his solitary meals.
He died in May, 1880, and was buried at Rouen. The funeral procession
was small; only a few friends from Paris followed him to his last
resting-place. From Rouen scarcely any one attended the funeral, for he
was almost entirely unknown to the majority of the inhabitants, and by
the minority who knew him, he was hated as an immoral and irreligious
writer.
[1] The titles are: Madame Bovary, Salammbô, L'éducation sentimentale,
La Tentation de Saint-Antoine, Le Candidat, Trois Contes, Bouvard et
Pécuchet.
[2] See Th. de Banville's _Odes funambulesque: Vilanelle des pauvres
housseurs,_ and two _Triolets._