"It occasionally leads to complications," Jurgen admitted, "through
a choice of the wrong example. But the axiom is no less true."
"Come, then, and sit next to me on this couch if you can find it in
the dark; and do you explain to me what you mean."
"Why, madame, by a concrete example I mean one that is perceptible
to any of the senses--as to sight or hearing, or touch--"
"Oh, oh!" said the Queen, "now I perceive what you mean by a
concrete example. And grasping this, I can understand that
complications must of course arise from a choice of the wrong
example."
"Well, then, madame, it is first necessary to implant in you, by the
force of example, a lively sense of the peculiar character, and
virtues and properties, of each of the numbers upon which is based
the whole science of Praxagorean mathematics. For in order to
convince you thoroughly, we must start far down, at the beginning of
all things."
"I see," said the Queen, "or rather, in this darkness I cannot see
at all, but I perceive your point. Your opening interests me: and
you may go on."
"Now ONE, or the monad," says Jurgen, "is the principle and the end
of all: it reveals the sublime knot which binds together the chain
of causes: it is the symbol of identity, of equality, of existence,
of conservation, and of general harmony." And Jurgen emphasized
these characteristics vigorously. "In brief, ONE is a symbol of the
union of things: it introduces that generating virtue which is the
cause of all combinations: and consequently ONE is a good
principle."
"Ah, ah!" said Queen Dolores, "I heartily admire a good principle.
But what has become of your concrete example?"
"It is ready for you, madame: there is but ONE Jurgen."
"Oh, I assure you, I am not yet convinced of that. Still, the
audacity of your example will help me to remember ONE, whether or
not you prove to be really unique."
"Now, TWO, or the dyad, the origin of contrasts--"
Jurgen went on penetratingly to demonstrate that TWO was a symbol of
diversity and of restlessness and of disorder, ending in collapse
and separation: and was accordingly an evil principle. Thus was the
life of every man made wretched by the struggle between his TWO
components, his soul and his body; and thus was the rapture of
expectant parents considerably abated by the advent of TWINS.
THREE, or the triad, however, since everything was composed of three
substances, contained the most sublime mysteries, which Jurgen duly
communicated. We must remember, he pointed out, that Zeus carried a
TRIPLE thunderbolt, and Poseidon a TRIDENT, whereas Adês was guarded
by a dog with THREE heads: this in addition to the omnipotent
brothers themselves being a TRIO.
Thus Jurgen continued to impart the Praxagorean significance of each
digit separately: and by and by the Queen was declaring his flow of
wisdom was superhuman.
"Ah, but, madame, not even the wisdom of a king is without limit.
EIGHT, I repeat, then, is appropriately the number of the
Beatitudes. And NINE, or the ennead, also, being the multiple of
THREE, should be regarded as sacred--"
The Queen attended docilely to his demonstration of the peculiar
properties of NINE. And when he had ended she confessed that beyond
doubt NINE should be regarded as miraculous. But she repudiated his
analogues as to the muses, the lives of a cat, and how many tailors
made a man.
"Rather, I shall remember always," she declared, "that King Jurgen
of Eubonia is a NINE days' wonder."
"Well, madame," said Jurgen, with a sigh, "now that we have reached
NINE, I regret to say we have exhausted the digits."
"Oh, what a pity!" cried Queen Dolores. "Nevertheless, I will
concede the only illustration I disputed; there is but ONE Jurgen:
and certainly this Praxagorean system of mathematics is a
fascinating study." And promptly she commenced to plan Jurgen's
return with her into Philistia, so that she might perfect herself in
the higher branches of mathematics. "For you must teach me calculus
and geometry and all other sciences in which these digits are
employed. We can arrange some compromise with the priests. That is
always possible with the priests of Philistia, and indeed the
priests of Sesphra can be made to help anybody in anything. And as
for your Hamadryad, I will attend to her myself."
"But, no," says Jurgen, "I am ready enough in all conscience to
compromise elsewhere: but to compound with the forces of Philistia
is the one thing I cannot do."
"Do you mean that, King Jurgen?" The Queen was astounded.
"I mean it, my dear, as I mean nothing else. You are in many ways an
admirable people, and you are in all ways a formidable people. So I
admire, I dread, I avoid, and at the very last pinch I defy. For you
are not my people, and willy-nilly my gorge rises against your laws,
as equally insane and abhorrent. Mind you, though, I assert nothing.
You may be right in attributing wisdom to these laws; and certainly
I cannot go so far as to say you are wrong: but still, at the same
time--! That is the way I feel about it. So I, who compromise with
everything else, can make no compromise with Philistia. No, my
adored Dolores, it is not a virtue, rather it is an instinct with
me, and I have no choice."
Even Dolores, who was Queen of all the Philistines, could perceive
that this man spoke truthfully. "I am sorry," says she, with real
regret, "for you could be much run after in Philistia."
"Yes," said Jurgen, "as an instructor in mathematics."
"But, no, King Jurgen, not only in mathematics," said Dolores,
reasonably. "There is poetry, for instance! For they tell me you are
a poet, and a great many of my people take poetry quite seriously, I
believe. Of course, I do not have much time for reading, myself. So
you can be the Poet Laureate of Philistia, on any salary you like.
And you can teach us all your ideas by writing beautiful poems about
them. And you and I can be very happy together."
"Teach, teach! there speaks Philistia, and very temptingly, too,
through an adorable mouth, that would bribe me with praise and fine
food and soft days forever. It is a thing that happens rather often,
though. And I can but repeat that art is not a branch of pedagogy!"
"Really I am heartily sorry. For apart from mathematics, I like you,
King Jurgen, just as a person."
"I, too, am sorry, Dolores. For I confess to a weakness for the
women of Philistia."
"Certainly you have given me no cause to suspect you of any weakness
in that quarter," observed Dolores, "in the long while you have been
alone with me, and have talked so wisely and have reasoned so
deeply. I am afraid that after to-night I shall find all other men
more or less superficial. Heigho! and I shall probably weep my eyes
out to-morrow when you are relegated to limbo. For that is what the
priests will do with you, King Jurgen, on one plea or another, if
you do not conform to the laws of Philistia."
"And that one compromise I cannot make! Ah, but even now I have a
plan wherewith to escape your priests: and failing that, I possess a
cantrap to fall back upon in my hour of direst need. My private
affairs are thus not yet in a hopeless or even in a dejected
condition. This fact now urges me to observe that TEN, or the
decade, is the measure of all, since it contains all the numeric
relations and harmonies--"
So they continued their study of mathematics until it was time for
Jurgen to appear again before his judges.
And in the morning Queen Dolores sent word to her priests that she
was too sleepy to attend their council, but that the man was
indisputably flesh and blood, amply deserved to be a king, and as a
mathematician had not his peer.
Now these points being settled, the judges conferred, and Jurgen was
decreed a backslider into the ways of undesirable error. His judges
were the priests of Vel-Tyno and Sesphra and Ageus, who are the Gods
of Philistia.
Then the priest of Ageus put on his spectacles and consulted the
canonical law, and declared that this change in the indictment
necessitated a severance of Jurgen from the others, in the
infliction of punishment.
"For each, of course, must be relegated to the limbo of his fathers,
as was foretold, in order that the prophecies may be fulfilled.
Religion languishes when prophecies are not fulfilled. Now it
appears that the forefathers of the flesh and blood prisoner were of
a different faith from the progenitors of these obsolete illusions,
and that his fathers foretold quite different things, and that their
limbo was called Hell."
"It is little you know," says Jurgen, "of the religion of Eubonia."
"We have it written down in this great book," the priest of Vel-Tyno
then told him,--"every word of it without blot or error."
"Then you will see that the King of Eubonia is the head of the
church there, and changes all the prophecies at will. Learned
Gowlais says so directly: and the judicious Stevegonius was forced
to agree with him, however unwillingly, as you will instantly
discover by consulting the third section of his widely famous
nineteenth chapter."
"Both Gowlais and Stevegonius were probably notorious heretics,"
says the priest of Ageus. "I believe that was settled once for all
at the Diet of Orthumar."
"Eh!" says Jurgen. He did not like this priest. "Now I will wager,
sirs," Jurgen continued, a trifle patronizingly, "that you gentlemen
have not read Gowlais, or even Stevegonius, in the light of
Vossler's commentaries. And that is why you underrate them."
"I at least have read every word that was ever written by any of
these three," replied the priest of Sesphra--"and with, as I need
hardly say, the liveliest abhorrence. And this Gowlais in
particular, as I hasten to agree with my learned confrère, is a most
notorious heretic--"
"Oh, sir," said Jurgen, horrified, "whatever are you telling me
about Gowlais!"
"I tell you that I have been roused to indignation by his
_Historia de Bello Veneris_--"
"You surprise me: still--"
"--Shocked by his _Pornoboscodidascolo_--"
"I can hardly believe it: even so, you must grant--"
"--And horrified by his _Liber de immortalitate Mentulæ_--"
"Well, conceding you that earlier work, sir, yet, at the same
time--"
"--And have been disgusted by his _De modo coeundi_--"
"Ah, but, none the less--"
"--And have shuddered over the unspeakable enormities of
his _Erotopægnion!_ of his _Cinædica!_ and especially of his
_Epipedesis_, that most pestilential and abominable book,
_quem sine horrore nemo potest legere_--"
"Still, you cannot deny--"
"--And have read also all the confutations of this detestable
Gowlais: as those of Zanchius, Faventinus, Lelius Vincentius,
Lagalla, Thomas Giaminus, and eight other admirable commentators--"
"You are very exact, sir: but--"
"--And that, in short, I have read every book you can imagine," says
the priest of Sesphra.
The shoulders of Jurgen rose to his ears, and Jurgen silently flung
out his hands, palms upward.
"For, I perceive," says Jurgen, to himself, "that this Realist is
too circumstantial for me. None the less, he invents his facts: it
is by citing books which never existed that he publicly confutes the
Gowlais whom I invented privately: and that is not fair. Now there
remains only one chance for Jurgen; but luckily that chance is
sure."
"Why are you fumbling in your pocket?" asks the old priest of Ageus,
fidgeting and peering.
"Aha, you may well ask!" cried Jurgen. He unfolded the cantrap which
had been given him by the Master Philologist, and which Jurgen had
treasured against the time when more was needed than a glib tongue.
"O most unrighteous judges," says Jurgen, sternly, "now hear and
tremble! 'At the death of Adrian the Fifth, Pedro Juliani, who
should be named John the Twentieth, was through an error in the
reckoning elevated to the papal chair as John the Twenty-first!'"
"Hah, and what have we to do with that?" inquired the priest of
Vel-Tyno, with raised eyebrows. "Why are you telling us of these
irrelevant matters?"
"Because I thought it would interest you," said Jurgen. "It was a
fact that appeared to me rather amusing. So I thought I would
mention it."
"Then you have very queer ideas of amusement," they told him. And
Jurgen perceived that either he had not employed his cantrap
correctly or else that its magic was unappreciated by the leaders of
Philistia.
33.