in fact shy; and her intellect suggested that she act upon what she
had just heard Paul say about people who undervalued themselves. Of
course, Adele suspected at once what Paul hoped would happen; but she
took her own way to make him ask for it.
“What’s going to happen?” said Adele, leading him on. “I mean what do
you hope for?”
“It’s just this way; let me tell you.”
“I’m listening.”
“You call this a Cathedral, don’t you? I think it a first-rate place,
myself.”
“Admirable for a short sojourn.”
“And more, it’s very suitable for something special--something for us
two.”
“Not to live in; it’s too breezy.”
“I don’t mind a breeze, if it don’t result in something worse--a
squall.”
“Squalls! I don’t permit squalls,” said Adele.
“No, nor I, either; especially when another fellow tells you squarely
to ‘forever after hold your peace.’”
Adele did not quite enjoy this turn in the conversation, so changed
it a little.
“But you missed seeing the Lepcha ritual; you should see how the
natives make their sacrifices.”
“Sacrifices? God forbid, my dear. No! it’s all gain for us here;
please don’t even think of sacrificing anything.”
“Then we can attend some other ritual,” said Adele; which remark was
so very much of an acknowledgment on her part that Paul imagined she
would consent at once.
“All right!” said he. “There is a Church of England curate in the
village--I’m not particular.”
“Also Taoist monks with masks and wheels. I’m not so very particular
myself about the form,” quizzed Adele.
“Don’t keep me on the rack, my dear; just tell me which you prefer.”
“Well, the Taoist ritual is the most spectacular, the Lepcha the most
thrilling, and the Church of England the most serious--probably, but
I have my doubts.”
“I never was more serious in my life,” said Paul. “The English will
do; that is, if it suits you?”
“Me! suits me!” she exclaimed, but her expression told him well
enough his allusions were clearly understood.
“Yes, of course, you have the final say.”
“To decide what? It was you who spoke about something you hoped would
happen before we left. You haven’t told me what it is, have you?”
“But you guessed it at once, Adele, I’m sure; and better than I can
tell you. Would not this be an ideal place for our marriage? Just
arrange it to suit yourself.”
Adele turned her face away--a little embarrassed, rather confused.
“Oh, don’t be in such a hurry, Paul. I really must think.”
“I am not, my dear. I’ve thought of it for a week,” said the ardent
lover.
“A week! you don’t call that much time to decide for life!” Adele was
now as serious as her lover was ardent.
“I decided at Olympus--oh, months ago,” said Paul, a little nervous.
“Didn’t you?”
“Yes, but this is like a surprise, after all, when it comes to the
actual. I must have some time. Oh, Paul, you’re so--impatient; just
like a boy.”
“Why shouldn’t I be? I feel as if we were really married that evening
when under the brow of Olympus”--and in one sense this was true; Paul
had felt so, conscientiously, as to the bond between them.
“Do you? I don’t,” said Adele.
“Why you must have thought so,” said Paul, very inconsiderate in his
ardor.
Adele thought him too harsh to her, at such a time; and her manner
showed how uncomfortable he had made her feel.
It took Paul some little time to quiet his own ardor, and appreciate
things from her point of view; finally he succeeded.
“Adele, I suppose it is sudden; I had a wrong notion, an idea that
the suddenness was only read about in novels of impulse, written to
pass the time quickly. I know differently now; you see I never did it
before. Forgive me now, Adele; I never dreamed of hurting you in any
way--it is too serious.” Paul’s ardor had only taken another form.
“Yes, this is real life; sudden and serious,” said Adele, “more
serious than when we were at Olympus.”
“Tell me why you think so?”
“A betrothal is truth in words; marriage is truth in deeds.”
Paul put his arm around her and told her again how he felt and
thought and wished to act for the very best, for both of them. His
manner changed, however. It was less ardent and more devout. He
held her hand as if it were very precious to him, that to touch
her was a sacred privilege. Never before had she a realizing sense
so intense, of that manly virtue, which she then recognized in her
future husband; and for the first time she noticed he used a new
expression. His words were forcible, indeed.
“Adele, I love you with all my soul and strength.” Then he bowed his
head as if overcome.
From that moment Adele knew he was her husband both in spirit and
in truth. It was a complete answer to her prayers for Paul’s good,
when she had prayed in spirit and in truth for him; the natural
consequence of her prayers, her belief in Paul, and her sincerity
towards him. She might have reasonably called him her husband
in her own mind, in the presence of the Holy Spirit of truth in
nature and in religion; but she did not. If Paul had died suddenly,
however, before their marriage, she no doubt would have done so--in
spirit--and it would have been the truth.
* * * * *
A pause, yet not a rest. Thoughts active, although neither could
speak. There was nothing more Paul could say. He had spoken the whole
truth, in love--an ineffable divine experience. Youth’s foretaste of
“Love divine, all love excelling.”
Adele was meditating as never before. Her thoughts flew as a bird
flies hither and thither, from possibilities to other probabilities,
future plans, future joys; flew outwards, then inwards, as a bird
among the branches of the Tree of Life; seeking to know the good
from the evil, the best from the better; wishing to pluck fruit
from the Tree of Life, and yet preserve the integrity of her own
conscious-self, her conscientious-self, as to what she ought to do.
Conscience flew to her mother to throw her arms around her mother’s
neck and find sympathy, while mother’s love told the truth in
maternal affection into her daughter’s ear; conscience flew to her
father for consent and advice, to sit on his knee once more, and
look in his face, and press his cheek, and run her fingers through
his hair, and be caressed as “father’s little girl.” The thought of
separation from loved ones, in any degree, what might it mean?--a
leap in the dark?
No, not into the dark. She could see that, positively, in Paul’s
character: then what?--a rising upwards, an ascension into the
brighter light of a new life.
Nature indeed took its course, and with the experience came the
comforting voice speaking in nature where the Tree of Life grows.
She looked towards the chancel of her Cathedral; and how exquisitely
beautiful was the scene! The place was decorated as for a wedding;
and she saw spiritually, “as in a dream,” Paul standing at the
chancel rail, waiting for her to come to him.
That was enough--the dream became real.
She looked up, to speak to Paul; putting her arm on his shoulder
their faces met. Like as a bird, which had flown from branch to
branch in the springtime of existence, returns to build a nest of its
own among the beautiful foliage of life, so she returned in spirit
and in truth to him who loved her and was willing to give himself for
her.
Only a word was uttered:
“I am ready; I will go with you, Paul;” and in her own thoughts, “I
am yours.”
XLV
RITUAL OF THE HUMAN RACE
Thus it came to pass that Adele and Paul were to be married in the
most majestic and impressive Cathedral upon earth. Under the canopy
of heaven, in a domicile as well as edifice, constructed by the
forces of nature from designs by the Supreme Architect, their own
Father-Creator; married in a sacred place, purposed expressly for
the Creator’s own service, and their own use; where all the rituals
testified in ways practical yet mysterious to the Way of Truth in
Life.
If they had chosen the ritual of the nature-worshipers they would
have found themselves in harmony with the most ancient of all, from
the beginning; and the most widespread upon the surface of the earth
as historically known.
If they had chosen that of the Taoists considered as a peculiar phase
of Buddhism, they would have found themselves in harmony with the
most numerous, including both gnostic and agnostic, and the most
devoted to expediency as the goal of existence, where the knowledge
of human nature took the most practical forms of application to be
found upon the globe to-day. They would have had the majority with
them.
They chose neither; for truth progressive had taught them to ignore
naught in their own past experience, nor in the experience of others;
and to seek “the greater things than these” which enlightenment is
ever revealing through religion, philosophy and science.
The Christian ritual of the marriage ceremony as it was then
performed in the open air, differed greatly from that of the
Lepchas, in that it was not held in a thicket partly screened, as
if it were a quasi-secret to be seen darkly by both natural eye and
spiritual sense: nor like the Taoist, in which are prayers in endless
repetition, perfunctory effort as if by machinery, prayer wheels and
decorations of the curio order. The Christian ritual as given in this
Cathedral under the auspices of the Creator himself, ignored none of
these; but showed that the truth had made men free, freedom in the
individual, freedom by co-operation--for in union there is strength
and propagation, proselyting truth.
Strange to say, it was only those who officiated in strait-laced
garments of the local form of ecclesiasticism who appeared awkward,
stiff and unnatural in manner, and uneasy in mind when they found
themselves administering in the open before a public which had thus
become free in spirit.
The wedding took place upon a grassy hill-side, a beautiful location
where natural flowers bloomed, and crimson rhododendrons hung in
bouquets and garlands overhead, framing in the Peaks of Eternal
Whiteness (purity); a marvelous symbolic landscape, symbolizing that
humanity must pass through and under the crimson of suffering in
order to attain the pure whiteness beyond.
The wedding took place where the Celestial scenery was ever before
them; fleecy clouds hanging like wedding draperies in the azure blue
around the Cathedral spires--the spires rising heavenwards, ever
pointing upward.
But at this particular time it was not so much these everyday
manifestations of natural facts in this Cathedral which impressed
those who officiated, as the astonishing cosmopolitan aspect of the
crowd which came to see and be seen. Representatives of all sorts and
conditions, racial and religious, which the region contained, engaged
in various occupations, yet all now actuated by the same spirit, to
share and rejoice in the happiness of others. Many among the crowd
of witnesses had gone through the marriage ceremony themselves;
others looked forward with rejoicing to the time when they would.
Some, a limited number chiefly from the Latin races, spoke of it as
of very serious “sacramental” character; but the enormous majority
did not; and very many did not know what such a word meant; yet
every individual present knew it was a “holy” condition to live in,
for mortals. To all, the tenor of it was to induce mankind to be
happier, to gain strength by co-operation in personal experience; an
experience never to be forgotten in this case, for natural methods in
religious ceremonial were about to take their course, and make it the
most interesting wedding any of the guests had ever attended.
The first impulse of those asked to officiate was to robe themselves,
each to put on his own official cassock, stole, or academical gown.
Lo! there was no robing room--positively no place suitable, not
even an enclosure to screen a change of garments; all must be done
in the open before God and man. If the officiating prelate had not
brought his vestments in a grip-sack he would have had difficulty
in assuming, as custom required, his usual official aspect. One
unfortunate who laid great stress upon his official garb, his robes
of office, found himself exposing a very soiled undergarment, much
less decent, really, than the occasion required. Never was mortal man
more ashamed of his personal underwear than this unfortunate who had
previously been covered in public by outer sacerdotal garments.
Another, profiting by his experience, sought a little briar bush he
had discovered at the last minute, behind which to robe himself; and
ere he had assumed his wedding garments, the bridegroom came.
Paul approached, and stood waiting for his bride. He was dressed
as often before when freedom of life and thought had characterized
his actions; in fact, very nearly as when he won his bride and told
her of his love. He and Adele had chosen to commence their future
life by identifying it with the very freest and happiest of past
experiences; hence Paul wore a spotless suit of white flannels, with
an inner white waistcoat for the occasion; his necktie of light
blue, which suited his complexion admirably. Verily new garments in
one sense, but such as preserved his own sense of freedom just when
he wanted it most. Some cigars had peeped out of one of his pockets
just before he came forward, but the Doctor concealed them at the
last moment. The lapels of his coat were thrown back upon his breast;
his athletic frame was vigorous and active, and his countenance was
sincere and truthful; his dark hair natural in its folds, and his
eyes more forcible, energetic, intense than ever before.
“I want you just as you are,” Adele had said to him, “without one
plea, not dressed up for an occasion;” and the healthy groom came so,
fresh, and clean, and free--a true man.
Other lovers of nature present said he was “a splendid fellow--he
looks it! Any girl ought to be proud of him”--the truth. He was
indeed much more a veritable nobleman in appearance than when clothed
in black.
He waited for Adele.
The bride, “arrayed in fine linen pure and white,” wore orange
blossoms because symbolic among her people, the emblems festooning
the bridal veil upon her shoulders. Her forehead was uncovered;
and naught in her hair but a spray of blossoms held by a diamond
cross--Paul’s gift. The cross glowed and sparkled in the sunlight,
not unlike a flame. Some of the natives called it a “tongue of fire.”
It was so, a flame of affection from Paul to herself. Her blonde hair
like her mother’s, and intellectual dark eyes from her father, gave
an alluring and mysterious beauty; a combination which appealed to
the Orientals as angelic, and to many others as fascinating; human,
yet spiritual.
Adele at first looked upwards, but not in assumption--it was her
natural attitude when moving freely without fear; then bowed her
head as in the presence of God whom she loved, and because she was
with her beloved in human experience.
Upon her father’s arm she came forward, leaning in submission to
him from whom she had received her life (_bios_); and embraced her
mother, kissing her with arms around her neck, before the Creator
and men, in token of that mother’s love she had received, namely her
creation and preservation in this life; which she considered were
divine attributes, divine gifts to be bequeathed to her own hereafter.
To Paul she seemed as one looking towards the Celestial regions from
which she must have come, and to which he felt sure she was destined
some day. And the Orientals present looked on rapturously, and some
drew in their breath between their teeth with admiration and respect;
their manner of doing this seemed to say that they wished to imbibe
some of the happiness which her presence near them suggested. Another
voiced the sentiment of all mankind: “She is too lovely to live, she
will be taken;” but on the instant a twig in the grass caught the
skirt of her gown, and as she felt inclined to pause and loosen it,
the Doctor stooped to detach it, and the bride passed on.
Her father’s dignified presence, markedly paternal, was also
suggestive--of what research after higher knowledge in systems may
accomplish when Christianity is recognized as the great incentive to
knowledge and ultimate unity. Truth was the one goal in Professor
Cultus’ scientific investigations; but he was not one to accept
mere knowledge as adequate. _He must have the truth also._ His
intellectual head stood upon his finely proportioned shoulders,
witness to the honesty and thoroughness of truth as he saw it; an
honest man--God’s noblest work.
Mrs. Cultus, Carlotta Gains Cultus, the bride’s mother, was by
heredity a positive character, practical, active and worldly-wise.
She was the embodiment of that womanly knowledge of the science
of social intercourse, the ethics of society; one, who after
encountering men and things, learns to appreciate them at their
real value--a value not set by fashion, but by the true commonsense
standards. Mrs. Cultus was one not always properly appreciated by
others, but ever active on principle whether appreciated or not; not
solely in intellectual lines of various heterogeneous clubs, but
also in the humanities when the appeal to her seemed reasonable,
and therefore natural. Mrs. Cultus had learned through severe
illness certain truths in life which appealed to her personally
with practical force and significance; an avenue to conviction very
different from that of her husband. Her presence now manifested that
other dignity of truth and worldly wisdom which did not repel, but
attracted all who really knew her, for confidence, aid and affection;
her husband and daughter most of all, for they knew her best. Being a
mother who had suffered, she had learned to feel a mother-tenderness
for all--that divine affection for humanity ever characteristic of
Him who took even little babes in His arms and blessed them. So did
Mrs. Cultus, in this way, now strive to follow Him. Devoid of either
hypocrisy or guile, she was ever “true to the life”--her natural life
as God had made her.
And the bride’s friend, the friend of her own age; Adele and “Frank”
Winchester, intimates; the one with whom her youthful thoughts and
pranks had been unrestrained and free. It was this friend who had
arrayed her in fine linen, pure and white, for her bridal, and by
working faithfully, almost without ceasing, had embellished her
wedding garment with an exquisite vine embroidered in white floss
silk, encircling her bosom, trailing down to the hem. Affection
and artistic skill guiding the willing fingers had produced this
simple vine and branches. The art of loving simply, yet constantly,
entwining truly, was in that vine, for there had been neither time
nor place for elaboration; yet the vine was finished in season, and
decked the bride at her wedding. It was a secret between these
chums, how the worker had added clandestinely a small bunch of thorns
embroidered in among the folds near the hem of her garment, where
Adele could tread upon them if she chose. “Merely to remind you, my
dear,” said Frank, laughing, “what a thorn in the flesh I’ve often
been; these are the last--all future thorns are for Paul.” Adele
cherished those precious thorns as if they were jewels; she would not
have trod on them--no! no more than she would have wished her friend
a pathway of thorns.
And the Doctor, the inquisitive, sincere Doctor Wise--he asked no
further questions when he stood aside as the groom’s best man; no
questions about things in the heavens above and the earth beneath,
nor even about the spirits of just men made perfect, here or anywhere
else. The Doctor would have much enjoyed wearing knickerbockers as
when he went outing with Paul, particularly so since Paul appeared
in white flannels, and if need be he could be ready for tennis or
cricket as soon as the ceremony was over; but propriety forbade.
Proprieties were apt to be a wee bit inconvenient from the Doctor’s
point of view; and just at present he was more nervous than the
groom, nervous to get the thing over and have done with it. Such was
the Doctor as he appeared on the surface; fundamentally he was the
very personification of congratulation and joy. He knew that nature
had taken the true course with these two, both so endeared to him.
He rejoiced in being able to witness and appreciate so much that was
good in nature and in co-operation. He was supremely happy too, but
from yet another cause in nature; that the Creator in kindness had
thus made him, a very ordinary man, able to see so much clearly, and
yet not himself be lost in the mysterious maelstrom of life.
The ladies gave the Doctor precious little opportunity to do anything
whatever on an occasion when bachelors-on-the-shelf do not count;
but he did search the country from Calcutta to Nepaul to obtain some
flowers which he knew were desired by Adele, the bridal bouquet.
A very simple one after all, white rose-buds amid cultivated
heliotrope. It seemed at one time as if every sort of flower and
shrub flourished in the Himalaya region except what he wanted. He
had parties hunting heliotrope as if it might grow on berry bushes;
and when from a lofty tree mistletoe was brought him by mistake,
he nearly sent the bearer to the foot of a precipice. But he got
it. It was finally obtained, near by in a private conservatory,
much to his relief and Adele’s delight. The bouquet held attached
an exquisite lace handkerchief passed through a ring; the ring was
set with a sapphire of purest quality, that peculiar shade in depth
and delicacy which in the Orient is supposed to characterize the
plumage of the Bird of Immortality. This gem, ever constant day or
night, responsive to every ray of light, symbolized the true blue
of precious worth--truth in purity and love. This was the Doctor’s
gift. Adele had heard him speak of such a stone and its significance
among sapphires of so many colors. She read his very thoughts as she
pressed his hand when accepting this significant and beautiful gift.
The fragrance of the flowers direct from nature; the handkerchief a
work of art; and the gem a true blue symbol--all brought memories of
their search after something worth knowing in many fields. Never did
Adele appear more idyllic, poetic, aye, pastoral in the higher sense,
than at this moment; and the Doctor blessed her--in spirit.
Thus, when Paul advanced to meet his bride, they stood among their
own; the bridal party among their own race and nationality, together
with cousins from their Mother Country, England--their faces radiant
with hope and pleasure. A choral of mixed voices, volunteers from the
Christian Colony, sang the processional; and the anthem was heard
upon earth as it ascended heavenward. This near a chancel rail of
natural growths, the line suggested by a carpet of wild flowers with
cultivated beauties placed at intervals. And there were tree-ferns
and palms, fountains of foliage at either end; the freshness of the
fountains springing from the centre of the plant, its life within,
not from near the exterior bark. Adele had expressed a desire for
these plants with their heart-life in the centre; also because their
significance was simple in nature, their natural beauty artistic,
and their natural meaning too exalted and widespread to be affected
seriously by passing fashions or fads. And the crimson rhododendrons
decorated the background, while before them the Delectable Mountains
and the azure blue.
The ceremony was first directed towards the world at large, for each
individual to learn, mark, and spiritually digest that which this
couple manifested of truth in humanity. It was a solemn period, while
the people gave heed, each reading his or her personal experience
into that of the new couple; to each (such was the condition in
nature), from his individual point of view. As a matter of fact Adele
felt as if the minister was speaking of some other than herself, and
Paul felt as if all eyes must be turned on Adele.
Then the Servant of God turned towards this man and woman who would
be one; a sacred moment when he pronounced them husband and wife.
They knelt together, her hand in his--their first united prayer to
“Our Father who art,” for this, from Him, unto themselves--as also
One.