him, Christianity was the love of God and its morality was the love of the
neighbor. Judged by occasional expressions, his piety might seem too
ascetic and mystical--too urgent of penance and self-crucifixion--too
enthusiastic in emotion, perilling the sobriety of reason in the
impassioned fervors of devotion--sometimes bordering upon that
overstrained spiritualism, which, in its impulsive flights, is so apt to
lose its just balance and sink to the earth and the empire of the senses.
He has written some things that prudence, nay, wisdom, might wish to
erase. But, qualified by other statements, and above all, interpreted by
his own life, his religion appears in its true proportion--without gloom,
without extravagance. To his honor be it spoken, that in an age when
priests and prelates eminent for saintly piety sanctioned the scourging
and death of heretics, and enforced the Gospel chiefly by the fears of
perdition, Fenelon was censured for dwelling too much on the power of
love, that perfect charity that casteth out fear. It may, perhaps, be a
failing with him that he had too little sympathy with the fears and
passions of men, and appreciated too little the more sublime and terrible
aspects of Divine Providence. His mind was tuned too gently to answer to
all of the grandest music of our humanity, and we must abate something of
our admiration of him for his want of loyalty to the new ages of Christian
thought and heroism. He evidently loved Virgil more than Dante, Cicero
more than Chrysostom, and thought the Greek Parthenon, in its horizontal
lines and sensuous beauty, a grander and more perfect structure, alike in
plan and execution, than Notre Dame or Strasbourg Cathedral, with its
uplifting points and spiritual sublimity. He was a Christianized Greek,
who had exchanged the philosopher's robe for the archbishop's surplice.
Viewing him now on the whole, considering at once his gifts and graces of
mind, and heart, and will; his offerings upon the altar of learning,
humanity and religion, we sum up our judgment in a single saying. He
worshipped God in the _beauty_ of holiness. His whole being, with all its
graces and powers so harmoniously combined, was an offering to God that
men cannot but admire and the Most High will not despise.
We may not take leave of Fenelon without applying to our times the
teachings of his spirit, the lesson of his life. However rich the topic in
occasion for controversial argument, we defer all strife to the
inspiration of his gentle and loving wisdom. Let an incident connected
with the tomb of Fenelon furnish us an emblem of the spirit in which we
shall look upon his name. His remains were deposited in the vault beneath
the main altar at which he had so often ministered. It would seem as if
some guardian-angel shielded them from desecration. Eighty years passed
and the Reign of Terror came upon France in retribution for her falsity to
her best advisers. The allied armies were marshalling their hosts against
the new republic. Every means must be used to add to the public resources,
and the decree went forth that even the tombs should be robbed of their
coffins. The republican administrator of the District of Cambray, Bernard
Cannonne, in company with a butcher and two artillery-men, entered the
cathedral and went down into the vault which held the ashes of so many
prelates. The leaden coffins with their contents were carried away and
placed upon the cars; but when they came to the inclosure whose tablet
bore the name of Fenelon, and lifted it from its bed, it appeared that the
lead had become unsoldered and they could take away the coffin and leave
the sacred dust it had contained. Years passed, and the reign of Napoleon
bringing a better day, rebuked the Vandalism that would dishonor all
greatness and spoil even its grave. The facts regarding the acts of
desecration were legally ascertained and the bones of the good archbishop
triumphantly reserved for a nobler than the ancient sepulchre. There was a
poetical justice in the preservation of them from violence. It was well
that the bloody revolutionists who went to the tombs for metal to furnish
their arsenals, were made, in spite of themselves, to respect the ashes of
one whose counsels of duty heeded would have averted that revolution by a
system of timely concessions and benignant legislation.
Now that we virtually draw near the resting-place of this good man, let it
not be to furnish material for bullets of lead or paper to hurl against
theological antagonists. Appreciating the beauty of his spirit, let us
learn and apply the rebuke and encouragement it affords. A genius so rare
we may not hope to approach or imitate. Graces still more precious and
imitable are associated with that genius and create its highest charm. Our
time has been worse than thrown away, and our study of his works and his
biographies has been in vain, if we are not better, more wise, and
earnest, and gentle for the page of history, the illustration of divine
providence that has now come before us. Placed in the most perplexing
relations, he never lost hold of the calm wisdom that was his chosen
guide. Exposed to the most irritating provocations, he never gave up the
gentle peacefulness of his spirit.
Our age is not peculiarly ecclesiastical, yet we have not done with the
church and its teachers. Many a time of late we have had cause to think
with regret of the persuasive eloquence of the Archbishop of Cambray, of
the sacred Art that could make truth lovely to wayward youth, and religion
beautiful to hard and skeptical manhood. Has it not sometimes seemed as if
ambitious prelacy had forgotten the purer example for the baser, and
copied Bossuet's pride instead of Fenelon's charity? Nay, has not priestly
assumption coveted the talons and forgotten the wings of the Eagle of
Meaux and lost sight wholly of the Dove of Cambray? What government or
ruler in Christendom would not be the better for a counsellor as eloquent
and fearless as he who dared rebuke without reserve the great Louis of
France in words like these:
"You do not love God; you do not even fear him but with a slave's fear; it
is hell and not God whom you fear. Your religion consists but in
superstitions, in petty superficialities. You are like the Jews, of whom
God said: _'Whilst they honor me with their lips, their hearts are far
from me.'_ You are scrupulous upon trifles and hardened upon terrible
evils. You love only your own glory and comfort. You refer everything to
yourself as if you were the God of the earth, and everything else here
created only to be sacrificed to you. It is you, on the contrary, whom God
has put into the world only for your people."
POEMS.
BY MRS. GEORGE P. MARSH.
I.
EXCELSIOR.
The earnest traveller, who would feed his eye
To fullness of content on Nature's charms,
Must not forever pace the easy plain.
No! he must climb the rugged mountain's side,
Scale its steep rocks, cling to its crumbling crags,
Nor fear to plunge in it's eternal snows.
And yet, if he be wise, he will not choose
To find the doubtful way alone, lest night
O'ertake him wandering, and her icy breath
Chill him to marble; not alone will risk
His foot unwonted on the glassy bed
Of rifted glacier, lest a step amiss
Should hurl him headlong down some fissure dark,
That yawns unseen--thence to arise no more.
But, furnished with a trusty guide, he mounts
From peak to peak in safety, though with toil.
Once on the lofty summit, he beholds
A glory in earth's kingdom all undreamed
Till now. The heavy curtains are withdrawn,
That shut the old horizon down so close;
And, lo! a world is lying at his feet!
A world without a flaw! What late he held
But as discordant fragments, now show forth,
From this high vantage ground, the perfect parts
Of a harmonious whole! He would not dare
To change one line in all that picture marvellous
Of hill and vale, bright stream and rolling sea,
O'erhung by the great sun that gildeth all.
And thou! If thou would'st truly feast thy soul
Upon the things invisible of Him
Who made the visible, fear not to tread
The awful heights of Thought! not to thyself
Sole trusting, lest thou perish in thy pride;
But following where Faith enlightened leads,
Thou shalt not miss or fall. The way is rough,
But never toil did win reward so rich
As that she findeth here. At every step
New prospects open, and new wonders shine!
Mount higher still, and whatsoe'er thy pains,
Thou'lt envy not the sleeper at thy feet!
Visions of truth and beauty shall arise
So multiplied, so glorified, so vast,
That thy enraptured soul amazed shall cry,
"No longer Earth, but the new Heavens I see
Lighted forever by the throne of God."
II.
FABLE.
A widow, feeble, old and lonely,
Whose flock once numbered many a score,
Had now remaining to her only
One little lamb, and nothing more.
And every morning forced to send it
To scanty pastures far away,
With prayers and tears did she commend it
To the good saint that named the day.
Nor so in vain; each kindly patron,
George, Agnes, Nicolas, Genevieve,
Still mindful of the helpless matron,
Brought home her lambkin safe at eve.
All-Saints' day dawned; with faith yet stronger,
On the whole hallowed choir the dame
Doth call--to one she prays no longer,--
That day the wolf devoured the lamb!
A STORY OF VENICE.
BY GEORGE WILLIAM CURTIS.
I.
When I was in Venice I knew the Marchesa Negropontini. Many strangers knew
her twenty and thirty years ago. In my time she was old and somewhat
withdrawn from society; but as I had been a fellow-student and friend of
her grand-nephew in Vienna, I was admitted into her house familiarly,
until the old lady felt as kindly toward me, as if I, too, had been a
nephew.
Italian life and character are different enough from ours. They are
traditionally romantic. But we are apt to disbelieve in the romance which
we hear from those concerned. I cannot disbelieve, since I knew this sad,
stern Italian woman. Can you disbelieve, who have seen Titian's, and
Tintoretto's, and Paolo Veronese's portraits of Venetian women? You, who
have floated about the canals of Venice?
I was an American boy; and my very utter strangeness probably made it
easier for the Marchesa Negropontini to tell me the story, which I now
relate. She told it to me as we sat one evening in the balcony of her
house, the palazzo Orfeo, on the Grand Canal.
II.
The Marchesa sat for a long time silent, and we watched the phantom life
of the city around us. Presently she sighed deeply and said:
"Ah, me! it is the eve of the Purification. My son, seventy years ago
to-day the woman was born whose connection with the house of Negropontini
has shrouded it in gloom, like the portrait you have seen in the saloon.
Seventy years ago to-day my father's neighbor, the Count Balbo, saw for
the first time the face of the first daughter his wife had given him. The
countess lay motionless--the flame of existence flickered between life and
death.
"'Adorable Mother of God!' said the count, as he knelt by her bedside, 'if
thou restorest my wife, my daughter shall be consecrated to thy service.'
"The slow hours dragged heavily by. The mother lived.
"My brother Camillo and I were but two and four years older than our
little neighbor. We were children together, and each other's playmates.
When the little neighbor, Sulpizia Balbo, was fourteen, Camillo was
eighteen. My son, the sky of Venice never shone on a more beautiful girl,
on a youth more grave and tender. He loved her with his whole soul. Gran'
Dio! 'tis the old, old story!
"She was proud, wayward, passionate, with a splendor of wit and unusual
intelligence. He was calm, sweet, wise; with a depthless tenderness of
passion. But Sulpizia inherited her will from her father, and at fourteen
she was sacrificed to the vow he had made. She was buried alive in the
convent of our Lady of the Isle, and my brother's heart with her.
III.
"Sulpizia's powerful nature chafed in the narrow bounds of the convent
discipline. But her religious education assured her that that discipline
was so much the more necessary, and she struggled with the sirens of
worldly desire. The other sisters were shocked and surprised, at one
moment by her surpassing fervor, at another by her bold and startling
protests against their miserable bondage.
"Often, at vespers, in the dim twilight of the chapel, she flung back her
cape and hood, with the tears raining from her eyes and her voice gushing
and throbbing with the melancholy music, while the nuns paused in their
singing, appalled by the religious ecstasy of Sulpizia. She was so sweet
and gentle in her daily intercourse that all of them loved her, bending to
her caresses like grain to the breeze; but they trembled in the power of
her denunciation, which shook their faith to the centre, for it seemed to
be the voice of a faith so much profounder.
"While she was yet young she was elected abbess of the convent. It was a
day of triumph for her powerful family. Perhaps the Count Balbo may have
sometimes regretted that solemn vow, but he never betrayed repentance.
Perhaps he would have been more secretly satisfied by the triumphant
worldly career of a woman like his daughter, but he never said so.
"Sulpizia knew that my brother loved her. I think she loved him--at least
I thought so.
"The nuns were not jealous of her rule, for the superior genius which
commanded them also consoled and counselled; and her protests becoming
less frequent, her persuasive affection won all their hearts. They saw
that the first fire of youth slowly saddened in her eyes. Her mien became
even more lofty; her voice less salient; and a shadow fell gently over
her life. The sisters thought it was age; but Sulpizia was young. Others
thought it was care; but her duties could not harass such a spirit. Others
thought it was repentance; but natures like hers do not early repent.
"It was resolved that the portrait of the abbess should be painted, and
the nuns applied to her parents to select the artist. They, in turn,
consulted my brother Camillo, who was the friend of the family, and for
whom the Count Balbo would, I believe, have willingly unvowed his vow.
Camillo had left Venice as the great door of the convent closed behind his
life and love. He fled over the globe. He lost himself in new scenes, in
new employments. He took the wings of the morning, and flew to the
uttermost parts of the earth,[A] and there he found--himself. So he
returned an older and a colder man. His love, which had been a passion,
seemed to settle into a principle. His life was consecrated to one
remembrance. It did not dare to have a hope.
[Footnote A: I use, here, words corresponding to the Marchesa's.]
"He brought with him a friend whom he had met in the East. Together upon
the summit of the great pyramid they had seen the day break over Cairo,
and on the plain of Thebes had listened for Memnon to gush with music as
the sun struck him with his rod of light. Together they had travelled over
the sea-like desert, breaking the awful silence only with words that did
not profane it. My brother conversing with wise sadness--his friend Luigi
with hope and enthusiasm.
"Luigi was a poor man, and an artist. My brother was proud, but real grief
prunes the foolish side of pride, while it fosters the nobler. It was a
rare and noble friendship. Rare, because pride often interferes with
friendships among men, where all conditions are not equal. Noble, because
the two men were so, although only one had the name and the means of a
nobleman. But he shared these with his friend, as naturally as his friend
shared his thoughts with him. Neither spoke much of the past. My brother
had rolled a stone over the mouth of that tomb, and his friend was
occupied with the suggestions and the richness of the life around him. If
some stray leaf or blossom fell forward upon their path from the past, it
served to Luigi only as a stimulating mystery.
"'This is my memory,' he would say, touching his portfolio, which was full
of eastern sketches. 'These are the hieroglyphics Egypt has herself
written, and we can decipher them at leisure upon your languid lagunes.'
"It was not difficult for my brother to persuade Luigi to return with him
to Venice. I shall not forget the night they came, as long as I remember
anything."
The Marchesa paused a moment, dreamily.
"It was the eve of the Purification," she said, at length, pausing again.
After a little, she resumed:
"We were ignorant of the probable time of Camillo's return; and about
sunset my mother, my younger sister Fiora, and I, were rowing along the
Guidecca, when I saw a gondola approaching, containing two persons only
beside the rowers, followed by another with trunks and servants. I have
always watched curiously new arrivals in Venice, for no other city in the
world can be entered with such peculiar emotion. I had scarcely looked at
the new comers before I recognized my brother, and was fascinated by the
appearance of his companion, who lay in a trance of delight with the
beauty of the place and the hour.
"His long hair flowed from under his slouched hat, hanging about a face
that I cannot describe; and his negligent travelling dress did not conceal
the springing grace of his figure. But to me, educated in Venice,
associated only with its silent, stately nobles; a child, early solemnized
by the society of decay and of elders whose hearts were never young, to
me the magnetic charm of the young man was his youth, and I gazed at him
with the same admiring earnestness with which he looked at the city and
the scene.
"The gondolas constantly approached. My brother lay lost in thoughts which
were visible in the shadow they cast upon his features. His head rested
upon his hand, and he looked fixedly toward the island on which the
convent stands. A light summer cloak was drawn around him, and hid his
figure entirely, except his arm and hand. His cap was drawn down over his
eyes. He was not conscious of any being in the world but Sulpizia.
"Suddenly from the convent tower the sound of the vesper bell trembled in
throbbing music over the water. It seemed to ring every soul to prayer. My
brother did not move. He still gazed intently at the island, and the tears
stole from his eyes. Luigi crossed himself. We did the same, and murmured
an Ave Maria.
"'Heavens! Camillo!' cried my mother, suddenly. He started, and was so
near that there was a mutual recognition. In a moment the gondolas were
side by side, and the greetings of a brother and sisters and mother long
parted, followed. Meanwhile, Camillo's companion remained silent, having
respectfully removed his hat, and looking as if he felt his presence to
be profane at such a moment. But my brother turned, and taking him by the
hand, said:
"'Dear mother, I might well have stayed away from you twice as long, could
I have hoped to find a friend like this.'
"His companion smiled at the generosity of his introduction. He greeted us
all cordially and cheerfully, and the light fading rapidly, we rowed on in
the early starlight. The gondolas slid side by side, and there was a
constant hum of talk.
"I alone was silent. I felt a sympathy with Camillo which I had never
known before. The tears came into my eyes as I watched him gently
conversing with my mother, turning now and then in some conversation with
Luigi and my younger sister. How I watched Luigi! How I caught the words
that were not addressed to me! How my heart throbbed at his sweet,
humorous laugh, in which my sister joined, while his eyes wandered
wonderingly toward mine, as if to ask why I was so silent. I tried to see
that they fastened upon me with special interest. I could not do it.
Gracious and gentle to all, I could not perceive that his manner toward me
was different, and I felt a new sorrow.
"So we glided over the Lagune into the canal, and beneath the balconied
palaces, until we reached our own. The gondolas stopped. Luigi leaped out
instantly upon the broad marble pavement, and assisted my mother to
alight, then my sister. Then I placed my hand in his, and my heart stood
still. It was a moment, but it was also an age. The next instant I stood
free upon the step. Free--but bound forever.
"We were passing up the staircase into the palace, Luigi plucked an orange
bud and handed it to me. I was infinitely happy!
"A few steps further, and he broke an acacia for my sister: ah! I was
miserable!
"We ascended into the great saloon, and a cheerful evening followed.
Fascinated by these first impressions of Venice, Luigi abandoned himself
to his abundant genius, and left us at midnight, mutually enchanted. Youth
and sympathy had overcome all other considerations. We had planned endless
days of enjoyment. He had promised to show us his sketches. It was not
until our mother asked of my brother who he was, that all the human facts
appeared.
"'Heavens!' shouted my younger sister, Fiora, laughing with delight,
'think of the _noble_ Marchese Cicada, who simpers, _per Bacco_, that the
day is warm, and, _per dieci_, that I am lovelier than ever. Viva Luigi!
Viva O il pittore.'
"'My daughter,' said my grave, cautious mother, 'you are very young
yet--you do not understand these things. Good night, my child!'
"Fiora kissed her on the brow, and darted out of the room as if she were
really alive.
"When she had gone, Camillo smiled in his cold, calm way, and turning to
me, asked how I liked Luigi. I answered calmly, for I was of the same
blood as my brother. I did not disguise how much superior I thought him to
the youth I knew. I was very glad he had found such a friend, and hoped
the young man would come often to see us, and be very successful in his
profession.
"Then I was silent. I did not say that I had never lived until that
evening. I did not say how my heart was chilled, because, in leaving the
room, Luigi's last glance had not been for me, but for Fiora.
"Camillo did not praise him much. It was not his way; but I felt how
deeply he honored and loved him, and was rejoiced to think that necessity
would often bring us together; only my mother seemed serious, and I knew
what her gravity meant.
"'Do not be alarmed, dear mother,' I said to her, as I was leaving the
room.
"'My daughter,' she answered, with infinite pride, 'it is not possible. I
do not understand you. And you, my daughter, you do not understand
yourself nor the world."
"She was mistaken. Myself I did understand; the world I did not."
Again the Marchesa was silent and tears stood in her eyes. She was seventy
years old. Yes, but in love's calendar there is no December.
"The days passed, and we saw Luigi constantly. He was very busy, but found
plenty of time to be with us. His paintings were full of the same kind of
power I felt in his character. He never wearied of the gorgeous
atmospheric effects of which Titian and Paul, Giorgione and Tintoretto
were the old worshippers. They touched him sometimes with a voluptuous
melancholy in which he found a deeper inspiration.
"Every day I loved him more and more, and nobody suspected it. He did not,
because he was only glad to be in my society when he wanted criticism. He
liked me as an intelligent woman. He loved Fiora as a bewitching child.
"My mother watched us all, and soon saw there was nothing to fear. I
sought to be lively--to frequent society; for I knew if my health failed I
should be sent away from Venice and Luigi. He had given me a drawing--a
scene composed from our first meeting upon the Lagune. The very soul of
evening repose brooded upon the picture. It had even an indefinable tone
of sadness, as if he had incorporated into it the sound of the vesper
bell. It had been simply a melancholy sound to him. To the rest of us, who
loved Camillo, it was something more than that. In his heart the mere
remembrance of the island rang melancholy vespers forever.
"This drawing I kept in a private drawer. At night, when I went to my
chamber, I opened the drawer and looked at it. It lay so that I did not
need to touch it; and as I gazed at it, I saw all his own character, and
all that I had felt and lived since that evening.
"At length the day came, on which the parents of Sulpizia came to my
brother to speak of her portrait. Camillo listened to them quietly, and
mentioned his friend Luigi as a man who could understand Sulpizia, and
therefore paint her portrait. The parents were satisfied. It was an
unusual thing; but at that time, as at all times, a great many unusual
things could be done in convents, especially if one had a brother, who was
Cardinal Balbo.
IV.
"It was a bright morning that Camillo carried Luigi in his gondola to the
convent. He had merely said to him that there was a beautiful abbess to
paint, an old friend of his; and Luigi replied that he would always
willingly desert beautiful waters and skies for beautiful eyes. They
reached the island"--
The Marchesa beat the floor slowly with her foot, and controlled herself,
as if a spasm of mortal agony had seized her.
"They reached the island, and stepped ashore into the convent garden. They
went into the little parlor, and presently the abbess entered veiled. My
brother, who had not seen her since she was his playmate, could not pierce
the veil; and as calmly as ever told her briefly the name of his friend,
said a few generous words of him, and, rising, promised to call at sunset
for Luigi, and departed."
The Marchesa now spoke very rapidly.
"I do not well know--nobody knows--but Sulpizia raised her veil, and Luigi
adjusted his easel. He painted--they conversed--the day fled away. Sunset
came. Camillo arrived in his gondola, and Luigi came out without smiling.
The gondoliers pulled toward the city.
"'Is she beautiful?' asked Camillo.
"'Wonderful,' responded his friend, and said no more. He trailed his hands
in the water, and then wiped them across his brow. He took off his hat and
faced the evening breeze from the sea. He cried to the gondoliers that
they were lazy--that the gondola did not move. It was darting like a wind
over the water.