above the clouds, uttered three piercing cries, turning to the three
points of the horizon, and at once from the East, from the West, and
from the South, there came forth the gods of Rome and Greece, abandoning
their mysterious retreats. There was Neptune with his Tritons, his
Harpies, and his marine monsters; and {236}there was Pluto with his
Fates, his Furies, and his whole host from hell.
Odin struck his buckler, and from the far North came not only the gods
and the Valkyrias, with the heroes of Walhalla, but even the adversaries
of the Ases,--Hela, the wolf Fenris, the Giants of the Frost with Loki
at their head,--and all enlisted under him to take part in the immense
slaughter.
Never had the armies of a Darius, an Alexander, an Attila, or a
Charlemagne, presented a more imposing and more terrible aspect; nor has
the world ever seen the like since.
When the Sibyls and the Norns, the augurs and the witches had been
consulted, the march began.
A few miles from the other side of the river, in the direction of
Argentoratum (Strasbourg), about half way up the slope of a gentle hill,
there stood a little chapel which had not been quite finished.
The Sibyls and Druidesses had pointed out this building as the end of
the first day’s march, not doubting but that the god of the Christians
would appear at the head of his legions, to defend his temple.
The Confederates were advancing silently under cover of the night
in order to surprise the enemy, whom they thought fully prepared for
resistance. Odin was in command of the right wing of the {237}army,
Jupiter of the left. The Scythian, Sarma-tian, Borussian, and Finnish
deities under the orders of Tahiti, Perun, Percunos, Wainamoinen, and
Radgost, commanded the centre.
As soon as they came in sight of the hill, they noticed a very peculiar
twinkling light, which shone out from the deep darkness, and was
surrounded below by a circle of light.
Immediately the three light-footed messengers of the Roman, Slavonic,
and Scandinavian gods, Mercury, Algis, and Hermode, were sent out to
reconnoitre, accompanied by the Eumenides, the Valkyrias, and a small
detachment of Lapithes and Centaurs. When they returned they reported
that the light proceeded from the flaming swords of ten thousand
destroying angels. They were quite sure of it.
Some of the allies immediately rushed forth, as is the usage in all epic
battles, to challenge the chiefs of the angels to single combat. But
Jupiter and Odin, thinking that all these private contests can only
jeopardize the success of the great battle, compelled them to obey
orders.
Thor, who had been one of the first to rush forth, was so much
disappointed, that in his anger he let his heavy mace fall upon a little
town that was on their route, and that might possibly have impeded the
progress of the army. The mace {238}instantly returned to the hand of
the owner, and then fell and returned again and again.
[Illustration: 258]
The barking of Cerberus, the three-headed dog, of his brother dog Garm,
and the howlings of the Strygi, the Kikimoras, and the Polkrans.
This was by no means all of the concert.
Mars, Odin, Potrympos, and the other war-gods now drew their swords,
which produced a fearful grating sound as they came out of their
sheaths; next Jupiter sounds his thunder among the Romans, and after him
thunder Perun among the Slaves, Ukko among the Finns, and Thor among
the Scandinavians. The repeated crash of thunder. And thanks to this
incident, the plain had been cleared and levelled at the same time, and
the signal for the attack was given at once. The Corybantes beat their
drums in muffled tones; the chants of the Bards and the Skalds responded
from the right and the left wing, although their harps were soon drowned
in the bleat of the trumpets, the furious {239}lightning mingles with
the rumbling of the chariots of Tabiti, of Flintz, the skeleton god,
and of Pocu-los and Stribog, the gods of waterspouts and of Northern
tempests; the Egipans, the Cyclops, the blacksmiths of Ilmarinnen, begin
to push immense masses of rock before them, brandishing entire oak trees
as spears; while the Giants of the Frost with fearful clamor, which is
taken up by the whole army of invaders, follow them, led by the equally
gigantic Yaga-Baba, the terrible conductor of such an infernal concert,
who marks the time by beating with his iron pestle upon his wooden
mortar.
[Illustration: 259]
All these fearful noises, all these echoing explosions, seem to confound
heaven and earth; the {240}horizon trembles and shakes, the mountains
start and stagger.
But the holy hill stands unmoved.
The light which at first shone only at the base has gradually risen as
high as the summit, and the little chapel now shines brightly like a
brilliant constellation.
Surprised at seeing no enemy appear, the army of the pagan gods makes a
halt.
Suddenly, O miracle! lifted up as if by a gust of wind from on high,
the little chapel vanishes, and in its place is seen a simple altar
surmounted by a cross.
Before this altar stands a young maid, showing neither ornament nor
weapon of defense,--a Virgin barefooted, with a child in her arms.
She comes down the hill, a smile on her lips; the brilliant light still
encircles her brow and the brow of the infant; she comes straight up to
the allied gods, who begin to look at each other in utter consternation.
She draws nearer, and all of a sudden an irresistible panic seizes
Jupiter and Odin, Mars and Thor, Wainomoinen and Perun, together with
the Eumenides, the Tassanis, the Cyclops, and the Giants, and all turn
back towards the river, cross it in fearful disorder, and crush each
other in their desperate flight, while their own temples and {241}their
own statues fall to pieces in the universal destruction.
Some of these were buried in the Rhine, where we shall hereafter find
them once more; the remainder reached in sad condition their northern
homes, abandoning almost the whole of Germany to Jesus and Mary.
It is but right to notice that in all the traditions which speak of this
struggle between the gods and the rising religion of Christ, no mention
is ever made of the Teut and the Esus of the Celts, the Alfader of the
Scandinavians, the Jumala of the Finns, and the Bog of the Slaves,--nor
is the Unknown God of the Romans ever mentioned. The reason is that
each one of these grand deities, like the Indra of the Indian heaven,
contained all the others and represented to the mind the idea of the
only one eternal God.
This grand but vain effort of the pagan gods was made, according to
tradition, about the year 510 of the Christian era. In the course of the
same year King Clovis determined to erect a temple in honor of Christ
which should be worthy of Him, and laid the foundation of the Minster
at Strasbourg, perhaps with a design to replace the little chapel, which
had disappeared in so miraculous a manner.
[Illustration: 265]
X.
{245}_Marietta and the Sweet-briar.--Esus and Jesus.--A malgam--
A Neophyte.--Prohibition to eat Horse-flesh.--Bishops in
Arms.--Interruption.--Come Home, my Good Friend!--Prussia and the Myths
of the Middle Ages.--Tybilimts, the Black God.--The little Blue Flower._
All who know me and esteem me will testify to my great natural modesty.
Even when I have {246}to do with fables, I would not venture to
invent the smallest thing; I am incapable of committing such a crime.
Nevertheless, some of my incredulous readers, when they see the
marvelous nature of the poem, in which the triumph of Jesus and Mary
over the allied pagan gods was celebrated, might possibly fancy it to be
a product of my imagination. In self-defense I feel bound to quote here
one of the countless traditions which allude to this great event. I once
more borrow from the Muse of the Finns.
“There lived in those days a virgin who was so pure, so pure and chaste,
that her eyes had never seen anything but the eyes of her sisters, that
her hands had never yet touched a being in creation for the purpose of
caressing it.
“She lived alone in her chamber, in company with her distaff, and
ignorant of what happened even within the narrow circle of shadows which
the sun traced around her house, and the image of a man was as foreign
to her eyes as it was to her mind. Her thoughts and her eyes had alike
kept their chastity perfect.
“She was called Marietta.
“One day, on a fine spring morning, Marietta felt a vague and
incomprehensible desire to enjoy the beauties of Nature. Her heart rose
within her with strange emotion. {247} “Impelled rather by a desire of
her own than by a command from on high, she opened her door and hastened
to a meadow inclosed with a hedge, which was near the house.
“In this hedge a sweet-briar was in bloom. She drew near to inhale the
fragrance; she touched the flower, and that was all that was needed.
Marietta became a mother, and when her son was born she felt by the
boundless pride that filled her heart, that she had given birth to a
god.
“In the mean time the other gods of her own country and of the adjoining
countries had been warned by their prophetesses that this child, born
of a virgin and a flower, would one day drive them out of heaven; they
assembled, fully armed and determined that mother and child must both
die so as to prevent the threatened catastrophe.
“At the moment when they were holding their secret councils, Marietta
appeared in their midst holding her infant in her arms, and all these
gods, who had until now wielded such absolute power, fled in dismay to
the far North, and the icy gates of the North Pole closed behind them.”
This is the story of Marietta and her child Jesus.
It would certainly seem as if this naïve account, well known among the
ancient legends of Finland, was nothing less than a slight sketch of
that great epic poem which we have laid before our readers. {248}We have
only filled out the details by the aid of similar documents.
Henceforth Christianity enjoyed the results of that great day at
Argentoratum. At a later period the conquered gods, it is true, showed
once more signs of resistance on isolated points, but from the first,
this triumph of Mary and Jesus, and perhaps also the victories obtained
by King Clovis, changed the first dawn of Christianity in Germany into a
kind of purifying conflagration, which spread rapidly from the Rhine to
the Weser and from the Weser to the Danube.
Curious circumstances sometimes came to its assistance. Thus, many
Teutons had been taught by their Druid teachers to acknowledge but one
single God, and this primitive doctrine naturally reconciled them to
the new creed. But, more than that, the particular god whom they thus
acknowledged, was called _Esus_, almost Jesus! Others had followed the
example of the Slaves and worshipped the handle of their swords, which
bore the form of a cross; they naturally recognized in the Christian
cross a familiar emblem of protection and safety. Even baptism was in
no way distasteful to the followers of Odin. They readily adopted, it in
memory of the regular and regenerative ablutions with water which their
ancient creed prescribed. Odin had said to them in the Runic chapter of
the {248}Edda: “If I wish a man never to perish in combat, _I sprinkle
him with water soon after his birth?_”
Finally, this just man, put to death by wicked men, this risen Christ,
reminded them forcibly of their own god Balder. Evidently the predicted
time had come. Balder, the ancient prisoner of Niflheim, was about to
renew the world; in his new shape, the Bright God was no longer the son
of Frigg; he was now Mary’s son and his name was Jesus.
This disposition, however, although plainly shown in many parts of
Germany, was by no means unanimous.
At the table of King Clovis, the bishops, and Saint Reni himself, were
compelled to sit by the side of Scandinavian Druids. When they intoned
their Benedicite, the latter never failed to pour out their libations
in honor of Asa-Thor and Asa-Freyr. In spite of all the heroic and
indefatigable efforts of the priests, polytheism survived even among the
new converts, who would walk devoutly in the processions of Christian
worship, while they carried their idols and their fetishes under their
arms, and who never failed to make the sign of the cross when
they passed a tree or a spring that had been held sacred by their
forefathers. What could be done to make them sincere and orthodox
Christians? {250}Liberty, in the sense in which we understand it now,
and have good reason to understand it, would have appeared to a Teuton
or a Slave as a beautiful woman, with a wooden yoke around her neck and
all her limbs in chains. Germany had her laws, as well as every other
Northern country her written or unwritten laws, but the dignity of a
freeborn man consisted mainly in disregarding these laws. The free man
left his country, to engage in war wherever he chose, and his family,
to live in any country he might prefer. It was the same thing with
religious matters; he reserved to himself his independent judgment,
the right to worship as he chose and the privilege of combining such
articles of creed as pleased him.
This curious freedom of religion, this curious amalgamation of creeds,
produced the strange result, that the neophytes especially remained half
pagan and half Christian, and preferred generally to “ride on the fence”
between the two creeds.
In the Nibelungen Lied, which we look upon as nothing more than a great
epic poem of the Scandinavians, pagan at first but Christianized at
a later period, men are represented as going devoutly to church after
having consulted the Nix of the river as to their future fate. This is,
no doubt, a true picture of the Germany of the early Christian days.
{251}Some looked upon baptism, with its magnificent and pompous
ceremonies, as a pleasure; others submitted to it for a consideration.
Ozanam, who is exceedingly well informed about everything that refers
to this curious period of transition in point of religion, tells the
following anecdote:--
[Illustration: 271]
One day there was a crowd of candidates for baptism; each one of them
was, as usual, dressed in white, as emblematic of purity. This symbolic
dress, made of a suitable material, was a present from the Church to
the neophyte, which he had carefully to preserve as an evidence of his
conversion.
Now, on that day, all the available robes had been given away, when one
more candidate for baptism presented himself; the priest found at last a
robe of light color, but unfortunately in wretched condition.
“What do you mean?” exclaimed the neophyte, angrily drawing back; “have
I not a right to claim a white robe as well as the others, and one of
fine wool?” and looking furiously at the priest he added: “Do you think
I am a man to be taken {252}in? This is the twentieth time that I am
baptized, and I have never been offered such rags before!”
The naïve candor of this good Teuton could make me almost believe that
he misunderstood the nature of the ceremony altogether, and looked upon
it only as a gratuitous distribution of wearing apparel.
Other more painful mistakes were made when the Christian missionaries,
crossing rivers and seas at the risk of their lives, went to the
uttermost confines of Germany, and there encountered half savage nations
who were still worshipping the Scandinavian gods.
The patient zeal, the gentleness, and the eloquence of these holy men,
succeeded finally in overcoming the convictions of these barbarians, and
in introducing among them not only the Gospel, but also the worship of
saints. The people received baptism, and not only welcomed the saints
with great eagerness and enthusiasm, but in their desire to do them all
the honor in their power, they hastened to turn every one of them into
a god! They erected altars to these new gods, and on these altars they
offered them human sacrifices.
These same missionaries had been instructed to prohibit the use of
horseflesh among the new converts; but they found it very difficult
to overcome a custom which at that time was very general. {253}We can
hardly, at the present day, understand the importance which the Church
attached to this abstinence, since now-a-days the best of people are
perfectly willing to allow their horses to be taken from their stables
for the purpose of being served up at table!
[Illustration: 273]
The most serious difficulty in all such critical periods is this, that
while the true and faithful clergymen by their prodigious labors and
admirable self-devotion succeeded in converting and disciplining
great multitudes, false priests appeared among them, taking forcible
possession of parishes and bishoprics, often without waiting till they
became vacant. Pepin of Heristal and Charles Martel, his son, had just
compelled the pagan Saxons to take refuge behind the Weser. When the
war was over and they proceeded to dismiss the commanders of {254}this
numerous army till the beginning of another campaign, as was the custom
in those days, the majority among them claimed, as a reward for services
rendered, the right to exchange the sword for the crozier and the helmet
for the mitre. They evidently thought that the profession was an easy
one to practice and rich in rewards.
Pepin and Charles resisted, but they had to give way.
To the great disgust of the newly converted populations and to the great
injury of the holy cause, which they professed to have served, these
warrior-priests brought with them into the Church the manners of
the camp and the fortress. They surrounded themselves with squires,
falconers, and riding-masters, with horses and hounds; they hawked, they
hunted, they lived high, giving themselves up to all kinds of excesses,
and drawing the sword against any one who should venture to reproach
them.
When war began once more, they almost all returned to arms, without,
on that account renouncing their ecclesiastic duties. Gerold, Bishop of
Mayence, perished in a battle against the Saxons; his son succeeded
him on the episcopal throne, and had hardly been consecrated when
he proceeded to avenge his father. He rushes into battle, challenges
Gerold’s murderer, kills him, and quietly returns to {255}Mayence for
the purpose of officiating there at Mass and of returning thanks to God
for his success.
Such acts of violence and such worldly enjoyments were incomprehensible
to the faithful; gradually the Church of the Apostles began to fear
the Church of the Soldiers. The Saxons, having vastly increased their
numbers by an alliance with the Scythians and Scandinavians, appeared
once more in the field.
“But,” exclaims the reader, whom I fancy I hear at this distance, “but
this is history, church history moreover, and you told us you would tell
us all about gods!”
I confess I did, sir; and that is the reason why I have traced out, on
this historical ground, the narrowest and shortest possible path, on
which I can safely return to my own domain.
“Well, then, let us return, my good friend.”
I beg your pardon, sir, but before we return, allow me at least
to glorify three men, who were called upon at that time to save
Christianity, and with it civilization, by the pen, the word, and the
sword. These equally great and equally heroic men are now three of our
saints.
“Saints again!”
Yes, sir, the first is Pope Gregory, the second Saint Boniface the
missionary, and the third the Emperor Charlemagne. Do not be afraid; I
shall {256}do no more than mention them, for fear of going again out
of my way and of speaking of forbidden subjects, against which you have
warned me. Allow me, however, to add that if the struggle which the
great Emperor undertook, was a long and ter-tible one, it was also
glorious far beyond all. Was it not marvelous, I ask you, to see
this nation of Franks, which but just now consisted of a mixture of
barbarians, go forth under the command of their young king, to become
the protector of Rome, of civilization, and of Christianity? The mace
had become a shield, the siege-ram a wall and a rampart.
“Of course! Everybody knows that!”
But, did you know this, sir: When the Saxons, conquered for the tenth
time, had received baptism, together with their king Witikind, when the
Rhine, also baptized, had become a French river and a Christian river,
when the whole of Germany bowed low before the cross, one of the nations
of that country, the Borussians (Pruszi, or Prussians), refused to give
up their old gods, and continued to refuse for several centuries to
come? And yet it was so. The proscribed gods, finding a refuge on the
banks of the Oder and the Spree, paid frequent visits, as was quite
natural, to their former followers. It was thus that the old pagan creed
was long preserved in the remote regions of Germany. You see, sir, I
have returned to my subject. {257}Let us rapidly conclude this first
part of our task, so as to reach at last the modern gods, who were as
popular as the others, and in their way neither less strange nor less
curious.
During the time of the Middle Ages, Germany had been filling up with
towns and castles, feudal dungeons bearing aloft a helmet and a
cross. The cross arose wherever two streets met in a city and at every
cross-road in the country; the most beautiful cathedrals in the world
and the most magnificent monasteries were reflected in her broad river;
and still, in field and forest, in city and country, and along the banks
of the Rhine, the false gods were worshipped in secret.
As the church taught that they were to be looked upon as demons, the
people dared not treat them badly. Demons are not guests to be turned
out rudely.
“From the eighth century of our Christian era,” says one of our erudite
authorities, “the Saxons and Sarmatians heard the Christian missionaries
speak so continually of the formidable power of Satan, that they thought
it best to worship him secretly in order to disarm his wrath and perhaps
to win his favor. They called him the Black God or _Tybilinus_; the
Germans call him, even now, _Dibel or Teufel_.”
This Black God now became for all the German {258}nations the army
leader of their proscribed gods, an army which was presently to be
largely increased.
The princes and knights, followed by their vassals, departed in large
numbers, on the Crusades, but they brought back from the Crusades,
together with holy relics, traditions of Gnomes, Peris, and Undines.
[Illustration: 278]
The Rhine, disgusted at the loss of his royal dignity, and determined to
take his vengeance on the warrior-bishops, received these last arrivals
as he had those who came before. In his healing waters the Undines
mingled with the Tritons and the Naiads; the Gnomes found shelter under
the rocks, where they were hospitably received by the Dwarfs, and in the
evening twilight the Nymphs, the Elves, and the Dryads danced once more
merrily in company with Sylphs, Fairies, and Peris.
No doubt Christian Germany looked afterwards at all this more in the
light of food for the imagination than of trouble for the conscience,
but in that happy land, where people believe and dream {259}at the same
time, and where the words of the poet are as true as the Gospel, the
imagination easily gets the better of conscience. Thus the search after
the little blue flower led many a learned man astray, far off into half
satanic paths. Besides, it lies in the nature of the German mind, which
has always a tendency towards idealism, its magnetic pole, to oppose to
the orthodox religion another more secret and more mysterious creed.
[Illustration: 279]
This was the case already in the fourteenth and {260}fifteenth century;
it is the case still in this, the nineteenth century, especially among
the country people, who have passed through the age of witchcraft in
which the Black God ruled supreme, and, completely modifying their pagan
notions, have transferred their Olympus to the Brocken, the mountain of
the Witches’ Sabbath.
Let us now see what the dwellers on the banks of the Rhine have done
with all their old gods and demi-gods of every denomination.
[Illustration: 283]
XI.
{263}Elementary Spirits of Air, Fire, and Water.--_Sylphs,
their Amusements and Domestic Arrangements.--Little Queen Mab.
--Will-o’-the-Wisps.--White Elves and Black Elves.--True Causes of
Natural Somnambulism.--The Wind’s Betrothed.--Fire-damp.--Master
Haemmerling.--The Last of the Gnomes._