saying:
"O Lord! Thy loving-kindness is infinite toward me, and Thy favour
manifest, seeing Thou hast so willed I should lie on a dunghill, like
Job and Lazarus, whom Thou didst love so well. And Thou hast given me to
know how filthy straw is a soft and sweet pillow to the just man. And
Thou, dear Son of God, who didst descend into Hell, bless Thou the sleep
of Thy servant where he lies in the gloomy prison-house. Forasmuch as
men have robbed me of air and light, because I was steadfast to confess
the truth, deign to enlighten me with the glory of the everlasting
dayspring and feed me on the flames of Thy love, O living Truth, O Lord
my God!"
Thus prayed the holy man Giovanni with his lips. But in his heart he
remembered the sayings of the Adversary. He was troubled to the bottom
of his spirit, and in much trouble and anguish of mind he fell asleep.
And seeing the thought of the Adversary weighed heavy on his slumbers,
his sleep was not like the little child's lying on its mother's breast,
a gentle sleep of smiles and milk. And in his dreams he beheld a vast
wheel that shone with colours of living fire.
It was like those rose windows of flower-like brilliancy that glow over
the doors of Churches, the masterpieces of Gothic craftsmen, and display
in the translucent glass the history of the Virgin Mary and the glory of
the Prophets. But the secret of these rose windows is unknown to the
Tuscan artificer.
And this wheel was great and dazzling and brighter a thousandfold than
the best wrought of all the rose windows that ever were divided by
compass and painted with brush in the lands of the North. The Emperor
Charlemagne saw not the like the day he was crowned.
The only man who ever beheld a wheel more splendid was the poet who, a
lady leading him, entered clothed in flesh into Holy Paradise. The rose
was of living light, and seemed alive itself, every age and every
condition, in an eager crowd, formed the nave and spokes and felloe.
They were clad each according to his estate, and it was easy to
recognize Pope and Emperor, Kings and Queens, Bishops, Barons, Knights,
ladies, esquires, clerks, burghers, merchants, attorneys, apothecaries,
labourers, ruffians, Moors and Jews. Moreover, seeing all that live on
this earth were shown on the wheel, Satyrs and Cyclopes were there, and
Pygmies and Centaurs such as Africa nurses in her burning deserts, and
the men Marco Polo the traveller found, who are born without heads and
with a face below their navel.
And from betwixt the lips of each there issued a scroll, bearing a
device. Now each device was of a hue which did not appear in any other,
and in all the incalculable multitude of devices, no two could have been
discovered of the same appearance. Some were dyed purple, others painted
with the bright colours of the sky and sea, or the shining of the stars,
yet others green as grass. Many were exceeding pale, many again
exceeding dark and sombre, the whole so ordered that the eye found in
these devices every one of the colours that paint the universe.
The holy man Giovanni began to decipher them, by this means making
himself acquainted with the divers thoughts of divers men. And after
reading on a good while, he perceived that these devices were as much
diversified in the sense of the words as in the hues of the letters, and
that the sentences differed one from the other in such sort that there
was never a single one did not flatly contradict every other.
But at the same time he noted that this contradiction which existed in
the head and body of the maxims did not continue in their tail, but that
they all agreed together very accurately in their lower extremity, all
ending in the same fashion, seeing each and all terminated in these
words, _Such is Truth_.
And he said in his heart:
"These mottoes are like the flowers young men and maidens pluck in the
water-meadows by the Arno, to make them into posies. For these flowers
are readily gathered together by the tails, while the heads keep
separate and fight amongst themselves in hue and brilliancy. And it is
the same with the opinions of human beings."
And the holy man found in the devices a host of contradictions regarding
the origin of sovereignty, the fountains of knowledge, pleasure and
pain, things lawful and things unlawful. And he discovered likewise
mighty difficulties in connection with the shape of the Earth and the
Divinity of Our Lord Jesus Christ, by reason of the Heretics and Arabs
and Jews, the monsters of the African desert and the Epicureans, who all
had their place, a scroll in their lips, on the wheel of fire.
And each sentence ended in this way, _Such is Truth_. And the holy man
Giovanni marvelled to see so many truths all diversely coloured. He saw
red, and blue, and green, and yellow, but he saw no white--not even the
one the Pope made proclamation of, to wit, "On this rock have I built my
Church and committed thereto the crowns of all the world." Indeed this
device was all red and as if blood-stained.
And the holy man sighed:
"Then I am never to find on the wheel of the universe the pure, white
Truth, the immaculate and candid Truth, I would find."
And he called upon Truth, crying with tears in his eyes:
"Truth! Truth! for whose sake I am to die, show yourself before your
martyr's eyes."
And lo! as he was wailing out the words, the living wheel began to
revolve, and the devices, running one into the other, no longer kept
distinct, while on the great disk came circles of every hue, circles
wider and wider the further they were from the centre.
Then as the motion grew faster, these circles disappeared one by one;
the widest vanished first, because the speed was swiftest near the
felloe of the wheel. But directly the wheel began to spin so fast the
eye could not see it move and it seemed to stand motionless, the
smallest circles too disappeared, like the morning-star when the sun
pales the hills of Assisi.
Then at the last the wheel looked all white; and it overpassed in
brilliance the translucent orb where the Florentine poet saw Beatrice in
the dewdrop. It seemed as though an Angel, wiping the eternal pearl to
cleanse it of all stains, had set it on the Earth, so like was the wheel
to the Moon, when she shines high in the heavens lightly veiled under
the gauze of filmy clouds. For at these times no shadow of a man
carrying sticks, no mark at all, shows on her opalescent surface. Even
so never a stain was visible on the wheel of light.
And the holy man Giovanni heard a voice which said to him:
"Behold that same white Truth you were fain to contemplate. And know it
is built up of the divers contradictory truths, in the same fashion as
all colours go to make up white. The little children of Viterbo know
this, for having spun their tops striped with many colours on the flags
on the Great Market. But the doctors of Bologna never guessed the
reasons for this appearance. Now in every one of the devices was a
portion of the Truth, and all together make up the true and veritable
device."
"Alas! and alas!" replied the holy man, "how am I to read it? For my
eyes are dazzled."
And the voice answered:
"Very true, there is naught to be seen there but flashing fire. No Latin
letters, nor Arabic, nor Greek, no cabalistic signs, can ever express
this device; and no hand is there may trace it in characters of flame on
palace walls.
"Friend, never set your heart on reading what is not written. Only know
this, that whatsoever a man has thought or believed in his brief
lifetime is a parcel of this infinite Truth; and that, even as much dirt
and disorder enter into what we call the order of nature, that is the
clean and proper ordering of the universe, so the maxims of knaves and
fools, who make the mass of mankind, participate in some sort in that
general and universal Truth-which is absolute, everlasting and divine.
Which makes me sore afraid, by the by, it may very like not exist at
all."
And with a great burst of mocking laughter, the voice fell silent.
Then the holy man saw a long leg stretched out, in red hose, and inside
the shoe the foot seemed cloven and like a goat's, only much larger. And
it gave the wheel of light so shrewd a kick on the rim of its felloe,
that sparks flew out as they do when the blacksmith smites the iron with
his hammer, and the great wheel leapt into the air to fall far away,
broken into fragments. Meantime the air was filled with such piercing
laughter that the holy man awoke.
And in the livid gloom of the dungeon, he thought sadly:
"I have no hope or wish left to know Truth, if, as has just been
manifested to me, she only shows herself in contradictions and
inconsistencies. How shall I dare by my death to be witness and martyr
of what men must believe, now the vision of the wheel of the universe
has made me see how every particular falsehood is a parcel of general
Truth, absolute and unknowable? Why, O my God, have you suffered me to
behold these things, and let it be revealed to me before my last sleep,
that Truth is everywhere and that she is nowhere?"
And the holy man laid his head in his hands and wept.
XV
THE JUDGMENT
Fra Giovanni was led before the Magistrates of the Republic to be judged
according to the laws of Viterbo. And one of the Magistrates said to the
guards:
"Take his chains off him. For every person accused should appear freely
before us."
And Giovanni thought:
"Why does the Judge pronounce words that are not straight?"
And the first of the Magistrates began to question the holy man, and
said to him:
"Giovanni, bad man that you are, being thrown in prison by the august
clemency of the laws, you have spoken against those laws. You have
contrived with wicked men, chained in the same dungeon as yourself, a
plot to overthrow the order stablished in this city."
The holy man Giovanni made answer:
"Nay! I but spoke for Justice and Truth. If the laws of the city are
agreeable to Justice and Truth, I have not spoken against them. I have
only spoken words of loving-kindness. I said:
"'Strive not to destroy force by force. Be peaceable in the midst of
wars, to the end the spirit of God may rest on you like a little bird on
the top of a poplar in the valley that is flooded by the torrent.' I
said, 'Be gentle toward the men of violence.'"
Then the Judge cried out in anger:
"Speak! tell us who are the men of violence."
But the holy man said:
"You are for milking the cow that has given all her milk, and would
learn of me more than I know."
However the Judge imposed silence on the holy man, and he said:
"Your tongue has discharged the arrow of your discourse, and its shot
was aimed at the Republic. Only it has lighted lower, and turned back
upon yourself."
And the holy man said:
"You judge me, not by my acts and my words, which are manifest, but by
my motives, which are visible only to God's eye."
And the Judge replied:
"Nay! if we could not see the invisible and were not gods upon earth,
how would it be possible for us to judge folk? Do you not know a law
has just been passed in Viterbo, which punishes even men's secret
thoughts? For the police of cities is for ever being perfected, and the
wise Ulpian, who held the rule and the square in the days of Caesar,
would be astonished himself, if he could see our rules and squares,
improved as they are."
And the Judge said again:
"Giovanni, you have been conspiring in your prison against the common
weal."
But the holy man denied having ever conspired against the weal of
Viterbo. Then the Judge said:
"The gaoler has given testimony against you."
And the holy man asked the Judge:
"What weight will my testimony have in one scale, when that of the
gaoler is in the other?"
The Judge answered:
"Why! yours will kick the beam."
Wherefore the holy man held his peace henceforth.
Then the Judge declared:
"Anon you were talking, and the words you said proved your perfidy. Now
you say nothing, and your silence is the avowal of your crime. So you
have confessed your guilt twice over."
And the Magistrate they entitled the Accuser rose and said:
"The illustrious city of Viterbo speaks by my voice, and my voice shall
be grave and calm, because it is the public voice. And you will think
you are listening to a bronze statue speaking, for I make accusation not
with my heart and bowels, but with the tables of bronze whereon the Law
is inscribed."
And straightway he began to gesticulate furiously and utter a raging
torrent of words. And he declaimed the argument of a play, in imitation
of Seneca the Tragedian: and this drama was filled full of crimes
committed by the holy man Giovanni. And the Accuser represented in
succession all the characters of the tragedy. He mimicked the groans of
the victims and the voice of Giovanni, the better to strike awe into his
audience, who seemed to hear and see Giovanni himself, intoxicated with
hate and evildoing. And the Accuser tore his hair and rent his gown and
fell back exhausted on his august seat of office.
And the Judge who had questioned the accused before took up the word
again and said:
"It is meet a citizen defend this man. For none, so says the law of
Viterbo, may be condemned without having been first defended."
Thereupon an Advocate of Viterbo got up on a stool and spoke in these
terms:
"If this monk has said and done what is laid to his charge, he is very
wicked. But we have no proof that he has spoken and acted in the manner
supposed. Moreover, good sirs, had we this proof, it would behove us to
consider further the extreme simplicity of the man and the feebleness of
his understanding. He was the laughing-stock of the children in the
Public Square. He is ignorant; he has done a thousand extravagances. For
my own part I believe he is beside himself. What he says is worthless
nonsense, and there is nothing sensible he can do. I think he has been
frequenting seditious societies; and goes about repeating what he heard
there, without understanding a word of it. He is too dull-witted to be
punished. Look out for his instructors; it is they are to blame. There
are many difficulties in the matter, and the wise man has told us, 'In
doubt, refrain from action.'"
Having so said, the Advocate stepped down from his stool. And Brother
Giovanni received his death sentence. And he was informed he was to be
hanged in the Square where the peasant women come to sell fruit and
vegetables and the children to play knucklebones.
Next a very illustrious Doctor of Law, who was one of the Judges, got up
and said:
"Giovanni, it behoves you to subscribe consent to the sentence
condemning you, for being pronounced in the name of the city, it is
pronounced by yourself, inasmuch as you are part and parcel of the
city. You have an honourable part in it, as citizen, and I will convince
you that you ought to be well content to be strangled by the city's
judgment.
"Know this, the satisfaction of the whole comprehends and embraces the
satisfaction of the parts, and seeing you are a part--a vile and
miserable part, yet still a part--of the noble city of Viterbo, your
condemnation which satisfies the community should be no less
satisfactory to yourself.
"And I will further prove you that you should rightly consider death
doom agreeable and fitting. For there is no other thing so useful and
becoming as is the law, which is the just measure of things, and you
ought to be pleased to have received this same just and proper measure.
In accordance with the rules stablished by Caesar Justinian, you have got
your due. Your condemnation is just, and therefore a pleasant and a good
thing. But, were it unjust and tainted and contaminated with ignorance
and iniquity (which God forbid), still it would be incumbent on you to
approve the same.
"For an unjust sentence, when it is pronounced in the prescribed forms
of law, participates in the virtue of the said forms and through them
continues august, efficacious and of high merit. What it contains of
wrong is temporary and of little consequence, and concerns only the
particular instance, whereas the good in it derives from the fixity and
permanence of the organization of the laws, and therefore is it
agreeable to the general dictates of justice. Wherefore Papinian
declares it is better to give false judgment than none at all, seeing
how men without justice are no better than wild beasts in the woods,
whereas by justice is made manifest their nobleness and dignity, as is
seen by the example of the Judges of the Areopagus, who were held in
special honour among the Athenians. So, seeing it is necessary and
profitable to give judgment, and that it is not possible to do so
without fault or mistake, it follows that mistake and faultiness are
comprised in the excellence of Justice and participate in the said
excellence. Accordingly, supposing you deemed your sentence unfair, you
should find satisfaction in this unfairness, inasmuch as it is united
and amalgamated with fairness, just as tin and copper are fused together
to make bronze, which is a precious metal and employed for very noble
purposes, in the fashion Pliny describes in his Histories."
The learned Doctor then proceeded to enumerate the conveniencies and
advantages which flow from expiation and wash away sin, as the maids
every Saturday wash the courtyards of their masters' houses. And he
demonstrated to the holy man what a boon it was for him to be condemned
to death by the august good pleasure of the Commonwealth of Viterbo,
which had granted him judges and a defender. And so soon as the Doctor's
eloquence was exhausted and he fell silent, Fra Giovanni was fettered
once more and led back to prison.
XVI
THE PRINCE OF THIS WORLD
Now on the morning appointed for his hanging, the holy man Giovanni was
lying sound asleep. And the Subtle Doctor came and opened the door of
his prison cell, and pulling him by the sleeve, cried:
"Ho! there, son of woman, awake! The day is just unclosing his grey
eyes. The lark is singing, and the morning mists kissing the mountain
sides. Clouds glide along the hills, soft and sinuous, snow-white with
rosy reflexions,--which are the flanks and bosoms and loins of immortal
nymphs, divine daughters of the rivers and the sky, maidens of the morn
old Oceanus leads forth along the heights,--a flock multiform as his
waves, and who welcome to their cool, fresh arms, on a couch of
hyacinths and anemones, the gods, masters of the world, and the shepherd
swains loved of goddesses. For there are shepherds their mothers bore
beautiful and worthy the bed of the nymphs that dwell in the
water-springs and woodlands.
"And for myself, who have deeply studied the secrets of nature, seeing
but now these clouds curling wantonly round the bosom of the hill, I was
filled with mysterious longings at the sight, longings I know nothing of
but that they spring from the region of my loins, and that, like the
infant Hercules, they showed their strength from the very cradle. And
these longings were not merely after rosy mists and floating clouds;
they pictured very precisely a wench named Monna Libetta I made
acquaintance with once in travelling, at Castro, at an inn where she was
serving-maid and at the free disposal of the muleteers and soldiers
frequenting it.
"But the picture I framed in my mind of Monna Libetta, this morning, as
I fared along the slopes of the hills, was wondrously embellished by the
tenderness of recollection and the regrets of separation, and she was
tricked out with all the pretty fancies that, springing from the loins
as I said, presently send their fragrant fire coursing through all the
body's soul, transfusing it with languishing ardours and pains that are
a delicious pleasure.
"For I would have you know, my Giovanni, that looking at her calmly and
coldly, the girl was not greatly different from all the rest of the
country wenches that, in the plains of Umbria and the Roman Marches, go
afield to milk the cattle. She had dark eyes, slow and sullen, a
sunburnt face, a big mouth, the bosom heavy, the belly tanned and the
forepart of the legs, from the knee, shaggy with hair. Her laugh was
ready and rude, in a general way; but in act with a lover, her face grew
dark and transfigured as if with wonder at the presence of a god. 'Twas
this had attached me to her, and I have many a time pondered since on
the nature of this attachment, for I am learned and curious to search
out the reasons of things.
"And I discovered the force that drew me toward this girl Monna Libetta,
maid-servant at the inn of Castro, was the same that governs the stars
in heaven and that there is one force and one only in the world, which
is Love. And it is likewise Hate, as is shown by the case of this same
Monna Libetta, who was fiercely fondled, and just as fiercely beaten.
"And I mind me how a groom in the Pope's stables, who was her chief
lover, struck her so savagely one night in the hay-loft where he was
bedding with her, that he left her lying there for dead. And he rushed
crying through the streets that the vampires had strangled the girl.
These be subjects a man must needs ponder if he would gain some notion
of true physics and natural philosophy."
Thus spoke the Subtle Doctor. And the holy man Giovanni sitting up on
his bedding of dung, answered:
"Nay! Doctor, is this language meet to address to a man that is to be
hanged in a very short while? Hearing you, I am filled with doubt
whether your words are the words of a good man and a great Theologian,
or if they do not rather come from an evil dream sent by the Angel of
Darkness."
But the Subtle Doctor made answer:
"Who talks of being hanged? I tell you, Giovanni, I am come hither, at
the earliest peep of day, to set you free and help you to fly. See! I
have donned a gaoler's habit; the prison door stands open. Quick! up and
away!"
At this the holy man rose to his feet, and answered:
"Doctor, take heed what you are saying. I have made the sacrifice of my
life, and I admit it has cost me dear to make it. If trusting to your
word that I am restored to life, I am then led to the place of
execution, I must needs make a second sacrifice more grievous than the
first, and suffer two deaths instead of out. And I confess to you my
desire of martyrdom is vanished away, and a longing come upon me to
breathe the air of day under the branches of the mountain pines."
The Subtle Doctor made reply:
"It happens that was just my intent to lead you away under the pines
rustling in the wind with the soft sighing of a flute. We will break our
fast sitting on the mossy slope overlooking the city. Come with me! Why
do you tarry?"
And the holy man said:
"Before going hence with you, I would fain know clearly who you are. I
am fallen from my first constancy; my courage is no better now than a
straw blown about on the wasted threshing-floor of my virtue. But I am
left my faith in the Son of God, and to save my body, I would ill like
to lose my soul."
"Verily," cried the Subtle Doctor, "think you verily I have any desire
of your soul! Is it then so fair a maid and sweet a lady you are afraid
I may rob you of it? Nay! keep it, friend; I could make nothing of it."
The holy man was scarce assured by what he heard, for the other's words
breathed no pious odour. But, as he was exceeding eager to be free, he
asked no more questions, but followed the Doctor and passed the wicket
of the prison by his side.
Only when he was without, he inquired:
"Who are you, you who send dreams to men and set prisoners free? You
have the beauty of a woman and the strength of a man, and I admire you,
though I cannot love you."
And the Subtle Doctor answered:
"You will love me so soon as I have made you suffer. Men cannot love but
those who make them suffer; and there is no love except in pain."
And so conversing, they left the city and began climbing the mountain
paths. And after faring far, they saw at the entering in of a wood a
red-tiled house, before which was a wide terrace overlooking the plain,
planted with fruit trees and bordered with vines.
So they sat down in the courtyard at the foot of a vine trunk; its
leaves were gilded by the Autumn and from the boughs hung clusters of
grapes. And a girl brought them milk and honey and cakes of maize.
Presently the Subtle Doctor, stretching out his arm, plucked a
scarlet-cheeked apple, bit into it and gave it to the holy man. And
Giovanni ate and drank; and his beard was all white with milk and his
eyes laughed as he gazed up at the sky, which filled them with blue
light and joy. And the girl smiled.
Then the Subtle Doctor said: