To know how a bad man will act when in power, reverse all the
doctrines he preaches when obscure.--S. Montague.
Antipathies also form a part of magic (falsely) so-called. Man
naturally has the same instinct as the animals, which warns them
involuntarily against the creatures that are hostile or fatal to
their existence. But HE so often neglects it, that it becomes
dormant. Not so the true cultivator of the Great Science, etc.
--Trismegistus the Fourth (a Rosicrucian).
When he again saw the old man the next day, the stranger found him calm,
and surprisingly recovered from the scene and sufferings of the night.
He expressed his gratitude to his preserver with tearful fervour,
and stated that he had already sent for a relation who would make
arrangements for his future safety and mode of life. “For I have money
yet left,” said the old man; “and henceforth have no motive to be a
miser.” He proceeded then briefly to relate the origin and circumstances
of his connection with his intended murderer.
It seems that in earlier life he had quarrelled with his
relations,--from a difference in opinions of belief. Rejecting all
religion as a fable, he yet cultivated feelings that inclined him--for
though his intellect was weak, his dispositions were good--to that
false and exaggerated sensibility which its dupes so often mistake
for benevolence. He had no children; he resolved to adopt an enfant
du peuple. He resolved to educate this boy according to “reason.” He
selected an orphan of the lowest extraction, whose defects of person and
constitution only yet the more moved his pity, and finally engrossed his
affection. In this outcast he not only loved a son, he loved a theory!
He brought him up most philosophically. Helvetius had proved to him
that education can do all; and before he was eight years old, the little
Jean’s favourite expressions were, “La lumiere et la vertu.” (Light and
virtue.) The boy showed talents, especially in art.
The protector sought for a master who was as free from “superstition” as
himself, and selected the painter David. That person, as hideous as
his pupil, and whose dispositions were as vicious as his professional
abilities were undeniable, was certainly as free from “superstition” as
the protector could desire. It was reserved for Robespierre hereafter
to make the sanguinary painter believe in the Etre Supreme. The boy
was early sensible of his ugliness, which was almost preternatural. His
benefactor found it in vain to reconcile him to the malice of Nature by
his philosophical aphorisms; but when he pointed out to him that in
this world money, like charity, covers a multitude of defects, the boy
listened eagerly and was consoled. To save money for his protege,--for
the only thing in the world he loved,--this became the patron’s passion.
Verily, he had met with his reward.
“But I am thankful he has escaped,” said the old man, wiping his eyes.
“Had he left me a beggar, I could never have accused him.”
“No, for you are the author of his crimes.”
“How! I, who never ceased to inculcate the beauty of virtue? Explain
yourself.”
“Alas! if thy pupil did not make this clear to thee last night from his
own lips, an angel might come from heaven to preach to thee in vain.”
The old man moved uneasily, and was about to reply, when the relative he
had sent for--and who, a native of Nancy, happened to be at Paris at the
time--entered the room. He was a man somewhat past thirty, and of a dry,
saturnine, meagre countenance, restless eyes, and compressed lips. He
listened, with many ejaculations of horror, to his relation’s recital,
and sought earnestly, but in vain, to induce him to give information
against his protege.
“Tush, tush, Rene Dumas!” said the old man, “you are a lawyer. You are
bred to regard human life with contempt. Let any man break a law, and
you shout, ‘Execute him!’”
“I!” cried Dumas, lifting up his hands and eyes: “venerable sage, how
you misjudge me! I lament more than any one the severity of our code. I
think the state never should take away life,--no, not even the life of
a murderer. I agree with that young statesman,--Maximilien
Robespierre,--that the executioner is the invention of the tyrant. My
very attachment to our advancing revolution is, that it must sweep away
this legal butchery.”
The lawyer paused, out of breath. The stranger regarded him fixedly and
turned pale.
“You change countenance, sir,” said Dumas; “you do not agree with me.”
“Pardon me, I was at that moment repressing a vague fear which seemed
prophetic.”
“And that--”
“Was that we should meet again, when your opinions on Death and the
philosophy of Revolutions might be different.”
“Never!”
“You enchant me, Cousin Rene,” said the old man, who had listened to his
relation with delight. “Ah, I see you have proper sentiments of justice
and philanthropy. Why did I not seek to know you before? You admire the
Revolution;--you, equally with me, detest the barbarity of kings and the
fraud of priests?”
“Detest! How could I love mankind if I did not?”
“And,” said the old man, hesitatingly, “you do not think, with this
noble gentleman, that I erred in the precepts I instilled into that
wretched man?”
“Erred! Was Socrates to blame if Alcibiades was an adulterer and a
traitor?”
“You hear him, you hear him! But Socrates had also a Plato; henceforth
you shall be a Plato to me. You hear him?” exclaimed the old man,
turning to the stranger.
But the latter was at the threshold. Who shall argue with the most
stubborn of all bigotries,--the fanaticism of unbelief?
“Are you going?” exclaimed Dumas, “and before I have thanked you,
blessed you, for the life of this dear and venerable man? Oh, if ever I
can repay you,--if ever you want the heart’s blood of Rene Dumas!” Thus
volubly delivering himself, he followed the stranger to the threshold of
the second chamber, and there, gently detaining him, and after looking
over his shoulder, to be sure that he was not heard by the owner,
he whispered, “I ought to return to Nancy. One would not lose one’s
time,--you don’t think, sir, that that scoundrel took away ALL the old
fool’s money?”
“Was it thus Plato spoke of Socrates, Monsieur Dumas?”
“Ha, ha!--you are caustic. Well, you have a right. Sir, we shall meet
again.”
“AGAIN!” muttered the stranger, and his brow darkened. He hastened to
his chamber; he passed the day and the night alone, and in studies, no
matter of what nature,--they served to increase his gloom.
What could ever connect his fate with Rene Dumas, or the fugitive
assassin? Why did the buoyant air of Paris seem to him heavy with
the steams of blood; why did an instinct urge him to fly from those
sparkling circles, from that focus of the world’s awakened hopes,
warning him from return?--he, whose lofty existence defied--but away
these dreams and omens! He leaves France behind. Back, O Italy, to thy
majestic wrecks! On the Alps his soul breathes the free air once more.
Free air! Alas! let the world-healers exhaust their chemistry; man never
shall be as free in the marketplace as on the mountain. But we, reader,
we too escape from these scenes of false wisdom clothing godless crime.
Away, once more
“In den heitern Regionen Wo die reinen Formen wohnen.”
Away, to the loftier realm where the pure dwellers are. Unpolluted by
the Actual, the Ideal lives only with Art and Beauty. Sweet Viola, by
the shores of the blue Parthenope, by Virgil’s tomb, and the Cimmerian
cavern, we return to thee once more.