"I think that men are befooled with these new explanations of sin and
its bitter fruits because the pulpit has done talking of the abiding
sinfulness of our inherited nature. When I was a boy, the minister
offered us the good old remedies of Baptismal Regeneration or Prevenient
Grace, instead of bidding us drench our flesh with water or crack our
bones with gymnastics."
At that moment Mr. Clifton turned towards me a half-startled,
half-triumphant look. I felt that the idea had been working in his mind,
but that he had used another's lips for its utterance. Under
undetermined conditions certain minds are capable of employing a
physical organization alien to themselves. If I had doubted this before,
a foreign influence in my own person would have made it clear at that
moment. For I felt a reply uttered from my lips which came not from my
consciousness.
"The moral, perhaps, is, that the pendulum has reached the other
extremity of the arc of oscillation, and that neither spiritual nor
physical regeneration can walk in the fetters of a system."
Some one called out that the procession was passing. All crowded to the
windows.
A few musical instruments. Plenty of ribbons and rosettes; also, emblems
of mysterious device. Banners inscribed with moral texts. Miss
Hurribattle. The school-children in white. Members of the
School-Committee in demi-toilet. More banners. Mr. Stellato, as chief of
the Gladiators, covered with a pasteboard helmet, and bearing a shield
inscribed "TRUTH." (N.B. The inscription in German text by the
school-children.) The Progressive Guard with javelins,--_papier-maché_
tips gummed over with shiny paper. A Transparency,--at least it could be
used as such in lecturing emergencies,--representing the interesting
medical illustration to which Mrs. Romulus had alluded in the morning.
The choir singing a progressive anthem, accompanied by extravagant
gestures. Other banners waved in cadence with progressive stanzas. Mrs.
Romulus and the Lilac-Hill Water-Cure Establishment. Progressive
citizens generally; these in various stages of exaltation, and cheering
fervently.
"The old infectious hysteria of religious revivals, limited by fresh air
and gentle exercise, is it not, Dr. Dastick?"
The Doctor answered my inquiry with a non-committal "humph" of the most
professional sort.
"Plato tells us that the Greek Rhapsodists could not recite Homer
without falling into convulsions," said Professor Owlsdarck.
"That is very remarkable," said Colonel Prowley, deeply impressed.
"I had no idea that these youths and maidens could justify their
eccentric proceedings by so high an authority," observed his sister.
The brother objected. He thought that the same effects could not rightly
be attributed to a modern song-writer and the Blind Old Poet.
"Blind Old Poet!" exclaimed one of the undergraduates, very
thoughtlessly. "Why, my dear Colonel Prowley, you are blinder than ever
he was! Don't you know that recent scholarship has demonstrated Homer to
be nobody in particular? The 'Iliad' and 'Odyssey' are mere
agglomerations of the poetical effusions of a variety of persons; and
doubtless all of them could see as well as you and I can."
It was distressing to mark the grief and indignation which suddenly
clouded the countenance of my old friend. Was not the last noticeable
publication in post-classical literature the "Rasselas" of Dr. Johnson?
Had not all those well-disposed people who hailed it as the brightest
combination of literary and moral excellence which a mere modern could
produce,--had they not lived and died in respectable allegiance to the
Homeric personality? To say nothing of a mystical admiration of the
Greek hexameters which he could not construe, Colonel Prowley was a
diligent reader of Pope's sonorous travesty. He felt like some simple
believer in the divine right of kings, when the mob have broken into the
palace, and stand in no awe of the stucco and red velvet. Yes, of course
I admire original minds,--but then I love those which are not original.
And truly there was a stately echo about the old gentleman which always
went to my heart.
"Our friend spoke incautiously," I said. "I make no doubt that Professor
Owlsdarck will tell us that the preponderant evidence is in favor of
Homer the individual, notwithstanding a few troublesome objections."
"He was buried," replied the Professor, "perhaps at Smyrna, perhaps at
Cos, perhaps at neither. It is not easy to decide what ancient city may
rightly claim his bones."
"He should have shown a sense of their value by writing some verses
about them," urged Dr. Dastick. "There was Shakspeare, whose genius
culminated in those important osteological observations inscribed upon
his tombstone!"
At this point the undergraduate murmured something about "Wolf's
Prolegomena," which was lost in a dull rumble of thunder,--as if some
giant outside the house had taken up the title and was gruffly repeating
it.
And now the storm was coming.
The sky darkened rapidly.
The atmosphere lay thick and yellow.
Where was the procession? Would it not be necessary to omit the
triumphal progress through the town, and come to the hill at once?
Windy whiffs--fledgling stormlets--practised in the branches of the
Twynintuft oak. The great tree lunged and croaked at them. Suddenly the
lilac-bushes were fanned into fantastic shapes. The sumach perked its
red _pompon_ like a holiday soldier, and then flung skyward its crimson
battle-flag. The wind blustered among the fallen leaves, and slammed a
loose blind or two. It grew darker,--still darker.
The procession, at last,--a straggling remnant of it,--was seen pushing
up the hill. A remnant indeed! The children, and those having charge of
them, had withdrawn. The Committee-men had sought shelter. The
Progressive Guard was decimated. Every moment men and women were falling
out of rank and hurrying away.
It was a little group that at length collected about the cider-mill.
Little at first,--less every instant. It would be necessary to abridge
the exercises. We saw Mrs. Romulus mount a barrel and harangue the
seceders with furious gesticulation. A book was passed up to her, and
she apparently gave out some hymn or ode suitable to the occasion. Alas!
there remained no choir to give it vocal expression.
A hurricane-gust struck the town, and drove clouds of dust along the
street. Perhaps it was five minutes before the hill was again visible.
Then there stood by the Deacon's cider-mill three figures. Mr. Stellato
waved a torch about his head, and flung it into the combustibles. A
sheet of flame shot madly up. Mrs. Romulus seized one of the abandoned
banners and flourished it in triumph.
Again the Twynintuft oak ground its great branches together, and threw
them heavenward for relief. The relief came. The dry agony of Nature
burst in a flood of tears.
The rain came beating down. It came with a sudden plunge upon the earth,
drenching all things. And then, the sharp, curt rattle of hail.
"Come to the middle of the room, the lightning is straight above us!"
We crouched together as the thunder crashed over the house.
Rain,--nothing but rain. No ever-varying light and shade, as in common
squalls. One great cascade poured down its awful monotony.
A bursting noise at the door. There stood before us Mrs. Romulus, Miss
Hurribattle, and Mr. Stellato. Soaked, dripping, reeking,--take your
choice of adjectives, or look into Worcester for better. The ladies
might have passed for transcendental relatives of Fouqué's Undine.
Stellato, with his hair and face bedaubed with a glutinous substance
into which his helmet had been resolved, did not strongly resemble one's
idea of a Progressive Gladiator. Truly, a deplorable contrast between
that late triumphant march before the house, and this present estate of
the leaders, so reduced, so pitiable!
"Oh, dear, dear, what can I do for you?" cried good Mrs. Widesworth,
forgetting all resentment in a gracious gush of sympathy.
"'Only wine-bibbers and flesh-eaters are affected by the weather,'"
murmured the clergyman, in bitter quotation, "'Storm and sunshine are
alike wholesome to the purified seekers for truth.'"
"Seekers for truth!" echoed Professor Owlsdarck; "one would say that our
friends must have been seeking it in its native well."
"As a medical man," said Dr. Dastick, "I shall direct Mrs. Widesworth to
provide some dry garments for her unexpected guests. Also, I think it my
duty to mention that a glass of hot brandy-and-water would be but
common prudence."
"The first part of your advice shall be complied with," assented our
hostess,--"that is, if I can find anything to put on to them. As to the
last suggestion,--I have, to be sure, a decanter of fine old Cognac in
the closet, but it would be almost an insult to offer it."
"The pledge has its important exceptions," observed Mr. Stellato,
shivering perceptibly. "'Except when prescribed by a medical
attendant,'--I believe I quote the exact language, Mrs. Romulus,--and
Dr. Dastick has a diploma."
"Come up-stairs, then," said Mrs. Widesworth, taking the decanter from
the closet; "you will all catch your deaths of cold, if you stay another
minute."
When the three patrons of Progress again appeared among us, they really
seemed to have accomplished their transference to an unconventional and
pastoral era. The ladies were quite lost in the spacious habits provided
for them. Likewise, they were curiously swathed in shawls and scarfs of
various make and texture, and might be considered representatives of any
age, past, present, or future, to which the beholder might take a fancy.
Mr. Stellato had been got into the only article of male attire which the
establishment afforded. This was an ancient dressing-gown, very small in
the arms, and narrow in the back: it had belonged to Twynintuft himself,
who was six feet two, and as thin as a bean-pole. The thickly wadded
skirts swept the ground, or clung heavily about the lower limbs. The
garment combined every disadvantage of a Roman toga and a fashionable
swallow-tail.
Mrs. Romulus and Mr. Stellato, who had not scrupled to avail themselves
of the Doctor's prescription, were still noisily progressive. They at
once led a moral charge against Professor Owlsdarck and Colonel Prowley.
Miss Hurribattle, refusing such warmth as might be administered
internally, was pale and chilly. She separated herself from her
companions, and crossed the room to where I stood. Her face was radiant
with devout simplicity. To a soul so pure and brave and feminine may I
never be guilty of applying a hard and technical criticism! He is little
to be envied who reads Don Quixote's assault upon the windmills as a
chapter of mad buffoonery. An ideal knight, without fear or reproach,
subject to disaster and ridicule, august from his faith in God and the
manly consecration of his life,--is he not rather the type of a
Christian sanity? No doubt, such a character seems altogether mad to
you, my friend, who pass the window as I write these words. You have
huckstered away opportunity just upon the edge of indictable knavery;
your ambition has been to be well with the wealth and sleek
respectability of the day, to make your son begin life the sordid
worldling that you end it, to marry your daughter to the richest
fool,--and this you call sanity and common sense! Is it not some Devil's
subtlety that deludes you? If Man is an immortal soul, to be saved or
damned forever, then he only is sane who welcomes privation, toil,
contempt, for a spiritual idea. "Attacking windmills!" you say. That is,
they seem so to you. But it may be that your brother's clearer eye and
practised intelligence show them the giants which they truly are. But,
be they giants or windmills, mark you this: his life illustrates some
grade of manly worthiness which the world would be poorer without, while
to himself the gain of an unselfish activity is a certain blessedness. I
hold it, then, of small matter, that, for a time, Miss Hurribattle
mistook two charlatans, three-fifths knavery, the rest fanaticism, for
honest workers in the Lord's vineyard. Far better such over-faith than
the fatal languor which seemed to terminate Clifton's too close scrutiny
of life. A buoyant and never-failing enthusiasm is the divine requital
of faithful service. "The reward of virtue is perpetual drunkenness!"
exclaims the half mythic Musæus; "_Crucem hanc inebriari_," the Church
has responded. It has a flavor as of Paradise when a woman brims over
with some fine excitement,--and that among godless, unrepentant men.
"The storm has not prevented the accomplishment of our purpose," said
Miss Hurribattle, pleasantly; "we have this day made our protest against
the most dangerous form of evil."
"One of the most obvious forms, certainly," I replied; "we might not
quite agree about its being the most dangerous."
"I must demand all those republican virtues which should be the fruit of
our New-England liberty,--I must be strictly consistent."
I jestingly pleaded the familiar proverb about fools and dead men, and
observed that there was great obscurity surrounding the real sources of
evil in our social life.
"I once thought as you do," said the lady; "but, from my constant
association with philosophical minds like those of Mrs. Romulus and Mr.
Stellato, much has been made clear to me. They have devoted their lives
to the study of modern civilization, and are skilful in the nice
adaptation of remedies to all public disorders."
"How long have you known these two persons?" I asked.
"They came to Foxden about a month ago. I had then organized the
Temperance movement among the school-children, and devised a scheme for
furnishing employment to drunkards who would make an effort to reform.
But these more worthy guides of humanity soon reduced matters to first
principles. They showed that all Moderate Drinkers and the Church which
sustains them must be exposed and denounced. They have done a great
work, as you see. Only a few people in Foxden have dared to stand
against them. Deacon Greenlaw, one of the most obstinate cases, has just
yielded to their persevering treatment."
The rain at length stopped.
Many persons who had appeared in the procession straggled in, looking
rather sheepish. The singing, indeed, had failed; but the supper was in
prospect.
Stellato was at high-pressure, and ready to lead his adventurous
Gladiators into the very camp of the enemy. Mrs. Romulus, wholly above
the prejudices of the toilet, would stay and bear him company.
Miss Hurribattle, not having cast out that "clothes-devil" against which
the old theologians used to warn her sex, wished to return to her
boarding-house. It being by this time dark, or nearly so, I offered to
see her home. Mr. Clifton volunteered to accompany us.
"The Deacon's cider-mill is smoking after all this drenching!" exclaimed
Mrs. Widesworth.
"The torches of the Bacchantes, when flung into the Tiber, were said
still to burn," observed Professor Owlsdarck, after rummaging about a
little for an historical parallel. "And here we seem to find a point
where the modern enthusiasm for water and the ancient fervor for wine
tend to like results."
Colonel Prowley was peculiarly interested,--so much so, indeed, that he
shook hands with us absently. Mrs. Widesworth was profuse in entreaties,
and then in hearty farewells.
We walked up the street.
A spring freshness was in that autumn evening. The air was purified by
the storm, as society is purified after a tempestuous feeling has blown
through it.
I think that both of her companions felt abased by the vivid faith which
sparkled in Miss Hurribattle's conversation. We were both rebuked by her
life-effort for what was high and positive and real. The clergyman,
examining the depths of his own sensitive spirit, felt keener contempt
for that theoretical good-will, that indefinite feeling of profound
desire, which might not be concentrated upon any reality. And it came
over me, how mean was the thirst and struggle for a merely professional
eminence which filled my common days. As in a mental _mirage_, which
loomed above the thickening twilight, I saw how our paths diverged, and
whither each must surely tend. No doubtful way was hers, the
single-hearted woman of lofty aims, of restless feminine activity, of
holy impatience with sin. She might, indeed, miss the clue which guides
through the labyrinth; but then her life would teach mankind even better
than she designed. On the other hand,--supposing the position attained
which too constantly occupied my own thoughts,--there was an admiration
of men, a market-salutation from reputable Commonplace, a seat in a
fashionable church, a final lubrication with a fat obituary,--and then?
But it was no part of my design to invite the reader into the inner
chambers of my own personality, and I forbear.
After a half-mile walk, we left Miss Hurribattle, and turned our steps
towards the parsonage.
"I sometimes feel that her instinct reasons more accurately than my poor
logic," said Clifton, bitterly; "yet it is a hard necessity to sacrifice
our individual faculties of comparison and judgment for the
working-power of a fervid organization!"
"No doubt it is a matter for serious question," I replied. "For, as soon
as we grow out of our languid and feeble maladies, we grow into the
violent inflammatory disorders which troubled our forefathers. The
doctors will tell you that this is true of our bodies; and surely the
soul's physician may pursue the analogy."
"I can no longer hope to heal any man's soul," exclaimed the clergyman;
"it is enough if my own be not wholly lost. I shall to-morrow formally
resign the sacred office of teacher in this place. With the final
renunciation of the great purpose which once swayed my life, I must
renounce every symbol less profound, less poetic. I must make my boast
of an intellect which will never let any affection pass the line of
demonstrable truth. I once knew how grand it was to stand alone in the
world of an inward faith; but now I have renounced all belief in an
ideal human being inclosed in this poor body whom it was my business to
liberate."
As we stopped at the broad path leading to the parsonage, I ventured to
say a few words which I will not set down.
More and more I was drawn towards the high and intense life of the woman
in whom all that was wrong seemed but an excess of virtue. I could have
besought some fanatical warlike spirit to take possession of Clifton and
make him capable of hate, and so, perhaps, of love. Anything to arouse
this personator of our human mutability, this vacillator between doing
and letting alone!
The wild future of the minister I did not anticipate. Hereafter it may
possibly be written, to show such lessons as it has. But on that autumn
night he walked up the gray pathway a broken man. The spiritual part was
dead; he had lost faith in the invisible. He walked as one in a funeral
procession,--ever doomed to follow a dead idea.
* * * * *