CHAPTER V.

“I have heard,” said the Squire, “that from hell there is no

_retention_.”

CERVANTES.

For some hours after this exclamation, Melmoth lay silent, his memory

returning,--his senses gradually defecated,--the intellectual lord

slowly returning to his abdicated throne.--

“I remember all now,” he cried, starting up in his bed with a sudden

vehemence, that terrified his old nurse with the apprehension of

returning insanity; but when she approached the bed, candle in hand,

cautiously veiling her eyes with the other, while she threw the full

glare of the light on the face of the patient, she saw in a moment the

light of sanity in his eyes, and the strength of health in his

movements. To his eager inquiries of how he had been saved, how the

storm had terminated, and whether any but himself had survived the

wreck, she could not deny herself the gratification of answering, though

conscious of his weakness, and solemnly charged neither to let him speak

or hear, as she valued the recovery of his reason. She had faithfully

observed the charge for several days,--a dreadful trial!--and now she

felt like Fatima in Cymon, who, when threatened by the magician with the

loss of speech, exclaims, “Barbarian, will not my death then satisfy

you?”

She began her narrative, the effect of which was, to lull Melmoth into a

profound repose before half of it was concluded; he felt the full

benefit of the invalids mentioned in Spenser, who used to hire Irish

story-tellers, and found those indefatigable persons still pursuing the

tale when they awoke. At first Melmoth listened with eager attention;

soon he was in the situation of him described by Miss Baillie,

“Who, half asleep, but faintly hears,

The gossip’s tale hum in his ears.”

Soon after his lengthened respiration gave token that she was only

“vexing the dull ear of a drowsy man;” while, as she closed the curtain,

and shaded the light, the images of her story were faintly painted on

his dream, that still seemed half a waking one.

In the morning Melmoth sat up, gazed round, remembered every thing in a

moment, though nothing distinctly, but felt the most intense anxiety to

see the stranger saved from the shipwreck, who, he remembered the

gouvernante had told him, (while her words seemed to falter on the

threshold of his closing senses), was still alive, and an inmate in his

house, but weak and ill from the bruises he had received, and the

exhaustion and terror he had undergone. The opinions of the household on

the subject of this stranger were various. The knowledge of his being a

Catholic had conciliated their hearts, for the first act of his

recovered reason was to request that a Catholic priest might be sent

for, and the first use of his speech was to express his satisfaction

that he was in a country where he might enjoy the benefits of the rites

of his own church. So far all was well; but there was a mysterious

haughtiness and reserve about him, that somewhat repelled the officious

curiosity of his attendants. He spoke often to himself in a language

they did not understand; they hoped relief from the priest on this

point, but the priest, after listening long at the invalid’s door,

pronounced the language in which he was soliloquizing _not to be Latin_,

and, after a conversation of some hours with him, refused to tell what

language the stranger spoke to himself in, and forbid all inquiry on the

subject. This was bad enough; but, still worse, the stranger spoke

English with ease and fluency, and therefore could have no right, as all

the household argued, to torment them with those unknown sounds, that,

sonorous and powerful as they were, seemed to their ears like an

evocation of some invisible being.

“He asks for what he wants in English,” said the harassed housekeeper,

“and he can call for candle in English, and he can say he’ll go to bed

in English; and why the devil can’t he do every thing in English?--He

can say his prayers too in English to that picture he’s always pulling

out of his breast and talking to, though it’s no saint, I am sure, he

prays to, (from the glimpse I got of it), but more like the

devil,--Christ save us!” All these strange rumours, and ten thousand

more, were poured into Melmoth’s ears, fast and faster than he could

receive them. “Is Father Fay in the house,” said he at last,

understanding that the priest visited the stranger every day; “if he be,

let me see him.” Father Fay attended him as soon as he quitted the

stranger’s apartment.

He was a grave and decent priest, well “spoken of by those that were

without” the pale of his own communion; and as he entered the room,

Melmoth smiled at the idle tattle of his domestics. “I thank you for

your attention to this unfortunate gentleman, who, I understand, is in

my house.”--“It was my duty.”--“I am told he sometimes speaks in a

foreign tongue.” The priest assented. “Do you know what countryman he

is?” “He is a Spaniard,” said the priest. This plain, direct answer, had

the proper effect on Melmoth, of convincing him of its veracity, and of

there being no mystery in the business, but what the folly of his

servants had made.

The priest proceeded to tell him the particulars of the loss of the

vessel. She was an English trader bound for Wexford or Waterford, with

many passengers on board; she had been driven up the Wicklow coast by

stress of weather, had struck on the night of the 19th October, during

the intense darkness that accompanied the storm, on a hidden reef of

rocks, and gone to pieces. Crew, passengers, all had perished, except

this Spaniard. It was singular, too, that this man had saved the life of

Melmoth. While swimming for his own, he had seen him fall from the rock

he was climbing, and, though his strength was almost exhausted, had

collected its last remains to preserve the life of a being who, as he

conceived, had been betrayed into danger by his humanity. His efforts

were successful, though Melmoth was unconscious of them; and in the

morning they were found on the strand, locked in each other’s hold, but

stiff and senseless. They shewed some signs of life when an attempt was

made to remove them, and the stranger was conveyed to Melmoth’s house.

“You owe your life to him,” said the priest, when he had ended. “I shall

go and thank him for it this moment,” said Melmoth; but as he was

assisted to rise, the old woman whispered to him with visible terror,

“Jasus’ sake, dear, don’t tell him ye’re a Melmoth, for the dear life!

He has been as mad as any thing out of Bedlam, since some jist mintioned

the name before him the ither night.” A sickening recollection of some

parts of the manuscript came over Melmoth at these words, but he

struggled with himself, and proceeded to the apartment of the stranger.

The Spaniard was a man about thirty, of a noble form and prepossessing

manners. To the gravity of his nation was superadded a deeper tint of

peculiar melancholy. He spoke English fluently; and when questioned on

it by Melmoth, he remarked with a sigh, that he had learnt it in a

painful school. Melmoth then changed the subject, to thank him with

earnest gratitude for the preservation of his life. “Senhor,” said the

Spaniard, “spare me; if your life was no dearer to you than mine, it

would not be worth thanks.” “Yet you made the most strenuous exertions

to save it,” said Melmoth. “That was instinct,” said the Spaniard. “But

you also struggled to save mine,” said Melmoth. “That was instinct too

at the moment,” said the Spaniard; then resuming his stately politeness,

“or I should say, the influence of my better genius. I am wholly a

stranger in this country, and must have fared miserably but for the

shelter of your roof.”

Melmoth observed that he spoke with evident pain, and he confessed a few

moments afterwards, that though he had escaped without any serious

injury, he had been so bruised and lacerated, that he still breathed

with difficulty, and hardly possessed the use of his limbs. As he

concluded the account of his sufferings during the storm, the wreck, and

the subsequent struggle for life, he exclaimed in Spanish, “God! why did

the Jonah survive, and the mariners perish?” Melmoth, imagining he was

engaged in some devotional ejaculation, was going to retire, when the

Spaniard detained him. “Senhor, I understand your name is----” He

paused, shuddered, and with an effort that seemed like convulsion,

disgorged the name of Melmoth. “My name is Melmoth.” “Had you an

ancestor, a very remote one, who was--at a period perhaps beyond

family-tradition----It is useless to inquire,” said the Spaniard,

covering his face with both his hands, and groaning aloud. Melmoth

listened in mingled excitement and terror. “Perhaps, if you would

proceed, I could answer you--go on, Senhor.” “Had you,” said the

Spaniard, forcing himself to speak, abruptly and rapidly, “had you,

then, a relative who was, about one hundred and forty years ago, said to

be in Spain.” “I believe--yes, I fear--I had.” “It is enough,

Senhor--leave me--to-morrow perhaps--leave me now.” “It is impossible to

leave you now,” said Melmoth, catching him in his arms before he sunk on

the floor. He was not senseless, for his eyes were rolling with terrible

expression, and he attempted to articulate. They were alone. Melmoth,

unable to quit him, called aloud for water; and while attempting to open

his vest, and give him air, his hand encountered a miniature portrait

close to the heart of the stranger. As he touched it, his touch operated

on the patient with all the force of the most powerful restorative. He

grasped it with his own cold hand with a force like that of death, and

muttered in a hollow but thrilling voice, “What have you done?” He felt

eagerly the ribbon by which it was suspended, and, satisfied that his

terrible treasure was safe, turned his eyes with a fearful calmness of

expression on Melmoth, “You know all, then?”--“I know nothing,” said

Melmoth faultering. The Spaniard rose from the ground, to which he had

almost fallen, disengaged himself from the arms that supported him, and

eagerly, but staggeringly, hurrying towards the candles, (it was night),

held up the portrait full before Melmoth’s eye. It was a miniature

likeness of that extraordinary being. It was painted in a coarse and

unartist-like style, but so faithfully, that the pencil appeared rather

held by the mind than by the fingers.

“Was he--was the original of this--your ancestor?--Are you his

descendant?--Are you the depository of that terrible secret which----”

He again fell to the ground convulsed, and Melmoth, for whose

debilitated state this scene was too much, was removed to his own

apartment.

It was several days before he again saw his visitor; his manner was then

calm and collected, till he appeared to recollect the necessity of

making an apology for his agitation at their last meeting. He

began--hesitated--stopped; tried in vain to arrange his ideas, or rather

his language; but the effort so obviously renewed his agitation, that

Melmoth felt an exertion on his part necessary to avert its

consequences, and began most inauspiciously to inquire into the motive

of his voyage to Ireland. After a long pause, the Spaniard said, “That

motive, Senhor, a few days past I believed it was not in mortal power to

compel me to disclose. I deemed it incommunicable as it was incredible.

I conceived myself to be alone on the earth, without sympathy and beyond

relief. It is singular that accident should have placed me within the

reach of the only being from whom I could expect either, and perhaps a

developement of those circumstances which have placed me in a situation

so extraordinary.” This exordium, delivered with a composed but

thrilling gravity, had an effect on Melmoth. He sat down and prepared to

listen, and the Spaniard began to speak; but after some hesitation, he

snatched the picture from his neck, and trampling on it with true

continental action, exclaimed, “Devil! devil! thou choakest me!” and

crushing the portrait, glass and all, under his feet, exclaimed, “Now I

am easier.”

The room in which they sat was a low, mean, wretchedly furnished

apartment; the evening was tempestuous, and as the windows and doors

rattled in the blast, Melmoth felt as if he listened to some herald of

“fate and fear.” A deep and sickening agitation shook his frame; and in

the long pause that preceded the narrative of the Spaniard, the beating

of his heart was audible to him. He rose, and attempted to arrest the

narration by a motion of his hand; but the Spaniard mistook this for the

anxiety of his impatience, and commenced his narrative, which, in mercy

to the reader, we shall give without the endless interruptions, and

queries, and anticipations of curiosity, and starts of terror, with

which it was broken by Melmoth.

Tale of the Spaniard.

“I am, Senhor, as you know, a native of Spain, but you are yet to learn

I am a descendant of one of its noblest houses,--a house of which she

might have been proud in her proudest day,--the house of Monçada. Of

this I was not myself conscious during the first years of my life; but

during those years, I remember experiencing the singular contrast of

being treated with the utmost tenderness, and kept in the most sordid

privacy. I lived in a wretched house in the suburbs of Madrid with an

old woman, whose affection for me appeared prompted as much by interest

as inclination. I was visited every week by a young cavalier and a

beautiful female; they caressed me, called me their beloved child, and

I, attached by the grace with which my young father’s _capa_ was folded,

and my mother’s veil adjusted, and by a certain air of indescribable

superiority over those by whom I was surrounded, eagerly returned their

caresses, and petitioned them to take me _home_ with them; at these

words they always wept, gave a valuable present to the woman I lived

with, whose attention was always redoubled by this expected stimulant,

and departed.

“I observed their visits were always short, and paid late in the

evening; thus a shadow of mystery enveloped my infant days, and perhaps

gave its lasting and ineffaceable tinge to the pursuits, the character,

and the feelings of my present existence. A sudden change took

place;--one day I was visited, splendidly dressed, and carried in a

superb vehicle, whose motion made me giddy with novelty and surprise, to

a palace whose front appeared to me to reach the heavens. I was hurried

through several apartments, whose splendour made my eyes ache, amid an

army of bowing domestics, to a cabinet where sat an old nobleman, whom,

from the tranquil majesty of his posture, and the silent magnificence

that surrounded him, I felt disposed to fall down and worship as we do

those saints, whom, after traversing the aisles of an immense church, we

find niched in some remote and solitary shrine. My father and mother

were there, and both seemed awed by the presence of that aged vision,

pale and august; their awe increased mine, and as they led me to his

feet, I felt as if about to be sacrificed. He embraced me, however, with

some reluctance and more austerity; and when this ceremony was

performed, during which I trembled, I was removed by a domestic, and

conducted to an apartment where I was treated like the son of a grandee;

in the evening I was visited by my father and mother; they shed tears

over me as they embraced me, but I thought I could perceive they mingled

the tears of grief with those of fondness. Every thing around appeared

so strange, that perhaps I felt something appropriate in this change. I

was so much altered myself, that I expected an alteration in others, and

the reverse would have struck me as a phenomenon.

“Change followed change with such rapidity, that it produced on me an

effect like that of intoxication. I was now twelve years old, and the

contracted habits of my early life had had their usual effect, of

exalting my imagination, while they impaired every other faculty. I

expected an adventure whenever the door opened, and that was but seldom,

to announce the hours of devotion, food, and exercise. On the third day

after I was received into the palace of Monçada, the door was opened at

an unusual hour, (a circumstance that made me tremble with

anticipation), and my father and mother, attended by a number of

domestics, entered, accompanied by a youth whose superior height and

already distinguished figure, made him appear my senior, though he was

in fact a year younger.

“Alonzo,” said my father to me, “embrace your brother.” I advanced with

all the eagerness of youthful affection, that feels delight from new

claims on its store, and half wishes those new claims were endless; but

the slow step of my brother, the measured air with which he extended his

arms, and declined his head on my left shoulder for a moment, and then

raising it, viewed me with eyes in whose piercing and haughty lustre

there was not one beam of fraternity, repelled and disconcerted me. We

had obeyed our father, however, and embraced. “Let me see you hand in

hand together,” said my father, as if he would have enjoyed the sight. I

held out my hand to my brother, and we stood thus linked for a few

moments, my father and mother remaining at some distance to gaze on us;

during these _few_ moments, I had leisure to glance from my parents to

my brother, and judge of the comparative effect our appearance thus

contrasted might produce on them. The contrast was by no means

favourable to me. I was tall, but my brother was much taller; he had an

air of confidence, of conquest I might say; the brilliancy of his

complexion could be equalled only by that of his dark eyes, which turned

from me to our parents, and seemed to say, “Chuse between us, and reject

me if you dare.”

“My father and mother advanced and embraced us both. I clung round their

necks; my brother submitted to their caresses with a kind of proud

impatience, that seemed to demand a more marked recognition.

“I saw no more of them,--that evening the whole household, which perhaps

contain two hundred domestics, were in despair. The Duke de Monçada,

that awful vision of anticipated mortality whom I had seen but once, was

dead. The tapestry was torn from the walls; every room was filled with

ecclesiastics; I was neglected by my attendants, and wandered through

the spacious rooms, till I by chance lifted up a curtain of black

velvet, and saw a sight which, young as I was, paralyzed me. My father

and mother, dressed in black, sat beside a figure which I believed to be

my grandfather asleep, but his sleep was very profound; my brother was

there too, in a mourning dress, but its strange and grotesque

disfigurement could not conceal the impatience with which he wore it,

and the flashing eagerness of his expression, and the haughty brilliancy

of his eye, shewed a kind of impatience of the part he was compelled to

act.--I rushed forward;--I was withheld by the domestics;--I asked, “Why

am I not permitted to be here, where my younger brother is?” An

ecclesiastic drew me from the apartment. I struggled with him, and

demanded, with an arrogance which suited my pretensions better than my

prospects, “Who I was?” “The grandson of the late Duke of Monçada,” was

the answer. “And why am I thus treated?” To this no answer. I was

conveyed to my apartment, and closely watched during the interment of

the Duke of Monçada. I was not permitted to attend his funeral. I saw

the splendid and melancholy cavalcade depart from the palace. I ran from

window to window to witness the funeral pomp, but was not allowed to

accompany it. Two days after I was told a carriage waited for me at the

gate. I entered it, and was conveyed to a convent of Ex-Jesuits, (as

they were well known to be, though no one in Madrid dared to say so),

where an agreement had been made for my board and education, and where I

became an inmate that very day. I applied myself to my studies, my

teachers were pleased, my parents visited me frequently, and gave the

usual marks of affection, and all was well; till one day as they were

retiring, I heard an old domestic in their suite remark, how singular it

was, that the eldest son of the (now) Duke de Monçada should be educated

in a convent, and brought up to a monastic life, while the younger,

living in a superb palace, was surrounded by teachers suited to his

rank. The word “monastic life” thrilled in my ears; it furnished me with

an interpretation not only of the indulgence I had experienced in the

convent, (an indulgence quite inconsistent with the usual severity of

their discipline), but of the peculiar language in which I had been

always addressed by the Superior, the brethren, and the boarders. The

former, whom I saw once a week, bestowed the most flattering praises on

the progress I had made in my studies, (praises that covered me with

blushes, for I well knew it was very moderate compared with that of the

other boarders), and then gave me his benediction, but never without

adding, “My God! thou wilt not suffer this lamb to wander from thy

fold.”

“The brethren always assumed before me an air of tranquillity, that

eulogized their situation more powerfully than the most exaggerated

eloquence. The petty squabbles and intrigues of the convent, the bitter

and incessant conflict of habits, tempers, and interests, the efforts of

incarcerated minds for objects of excitement, the struggles to diversify

endless monotony, and elevate hopeless mediocrity;--all that makes

monastic life like the wrong side of tapestry, where we see only uncouth

threads, and the harsh outlines, without the glow of the colours, the

richness of the tissue, or the splendour of the embroidery, that renders

the external surface so rich and dazzling; all this was carefully

concealed. I heard something of it, however, and, young as I was, could

not help wondering how men who carried the worst passions of life into

their retreat, could imagine _that_ retreat was a refuge from the

erosions of their evil tempers, the monitions of conscience, and the

accusations of God. The same dissimulation was practised by the

boarders; the whole house was in masquerade from the moment I entered

it. If I joined the latter at the time of recreation, they went through

the few amusements allowed them with a kind of languid impatience, as if

it was an interruption of better pursuits to which they were devoted.

One of them, coming up to me, would say, “What a pity that these

exercises are necessary for the support of our frail nature! what a pity

we cannot devote its whole powers to the service of God!” Another would

say, “I never am so happy as in the choir! What a delightful eulogy was

that pronounced by the Superior on the departed Fre Jose! How thrilling

was that requiem! I imagined the heavens opened, and angels descending

to receive his soul, as I listened to it!”

“All this, and much more, I had been accustomed to hear every day. I now

began to understand it. I suppose they thought they had a very weak

person to deal with; but the bare-faced coarseness of their manœuvres

only quickened my penetration, which began to be fearfully awake. I said

to them, “Are you, then, intended for the monastic life?” “We hope so.”

“Yet I have heard you, Oliva, _once_ (it was when you did not think I

overheard you) I heard you complain of the length and tediousness of the

homilies delivered on the eves of the saints.”--“I was then under the

influence of the evil spirit doubtless,” said Oliva, who was a boy not

older than myself; “Satan is sometimes permitted to buffet those whose

vocation is but commencing, and whom he is therefore more afraid to

lose.” “And I have heard you, Balcastro, say you had not taste for

music; and to me, I confess, that of the choir appears least likely to

inspire a taste for it.” “God has touched my heart since,” replied the

young hypocrite, crossing himself; “and you know, friend of my soul,

there is a promise, that the ears of the deaf shall be opened.” “Where

are those words?” “In the Bible.” “The Bible?--But we are not permitted

to read it.” “True, dear Monçada, but we have the word of our Superior

and the brethren for it, and that is enough.” “Certainly; our spiritual

guides must take on themselves the whole responsibility of that state,

whose enjoyments and punishments they reserve in their own hands; but,

Balcastro, are you willing to take this life on their word, as well as

the next, and resign it before you have tried it?” “My dear friend, you

only speak to tempt me.” “_I do not speak to tempt_,” said I, and was

turning indignantly away, when the bell ringing, produced its usual

effect on us all. My companions assumed a more sanctified air, and I

struggled for a more composed one.

“As we went to the church, they conversed in whispers, but those

whispers were intended to reach my ear. I could hear them say, “It is in

vain that he struggles with grace; there never was a more decided

vocation; God never obtained a more glorious victory. Already he has the

look of a child of heaven;--the monastic gait,--the downcast look;--the

motion of his arms naturally imitates the sign of the cross, and the

very folds of his mantle arrange themselves, by a divine instinct, into

those of a Monk’s habit.” And all this while my gait was disturbed, my

countenance flushed, and often lifted to heaven, and my arms employed in

hastily adjusting my cloak, that had fallen off my shoulder from my

agitation, and whose disordered folds resembled any thing but those of a

Monk’s habit. From that evening I began to perceive my danger, and to

meditate how to avert it. I had no inclination for the monastic life;

but after vespers, and the evening exercise in my own cell, I began to

doubt if this very repugnance was not itself a sin. Silence and night

deepened the impression, and I lay awake for many hours, supplicating

God to enlighten me, to enable me not to oppose his will, but clearly to

reveal that will to me; and if he was not pleased to call me to a

monastic life, to support my resolution in undergoing every thing that

might be inflicted on me, sooner than profane that state by extorted

vows and an alienated mind. That my prayers might be more effectual, I

offered them up first in the name of the Virgin, then in that of the

Patron-saint of the family, and then of the Saint on whose eve I was

born. I lay in great agitation till morning, and went to matins without

having closed my eyes, I had, however, I felt, acquired

_resolution_,--at least I thought so. Alas! I knew not what I had to

encounter. I was like a man going to sea with a day’s provision, and

imagining he is victualled for a voyage to the poles. I went through my

exercises (as they were called) with uncommon assiduity that day;

already I felt the necessity of imposition,--fatal lesson of monastic

institutions. We dined at noon; and soon after my father’s carriage

arrived, and I was permitted to go for an hour on the banks of the

Manzanares. To my surprise my father was in the carriage, and though he

welcomed me with a kind of embarrassment, I was delighted to meet him.

He was a layman at least,--_he might have a heart_.

“I was disappointed at the measured phrase he addressed me in, and this

froze me at once into a rigid determination, to be as much _on my guard

with him_, as I must be within the walls of the convent. The

conversation began, “You like your convent, my son?” “Very much,” (there

was not a word of truth in my answer, but the fear of circumvention

always teaches falsehood, and we have only to thank our instructors).

“The Superior is very fond of you.” “He seems so.” “The brethren are

attentive to your studies, and capable of directing them, and

appreciating your progress.” “They seem so.” “And the boarders--they are

sons of the first families in Spain, they appear all satisfied with

their situation, and eager to embrace its advantages.” “They seem so.”

“My dear son, why have you thrice answered me in the same monotonous,

unmeaning phrase?” “Because I thought it all _seeming_.” “How, then,

would you say that the devotion of those holy men, and the profound

attention of their pupils, whose studies are alike beneficial to man,

and redounding to the glory of the church to which they are dedicated--”

“My dearest father,--I say nothing of them,--but _I dare_ to speak of

myself,--I can never be a monk,--if that is your object--spurn

me,--order your lacqueys to drag me from this carriage,--leave me a

beggar in the streets to cry (13)“_fire and water_,”--but do not make me

a monk.” My father appeared stunned by this apostrophe. He did not utter

a word. He had not expected such a premature developement of the secret

which he imagined _he_ had to disclose, not to hear disclosed. At this

moment the carriage turned into the _Prado_; a thousand magnificent

equipages, with plumed horses, superb caparisons, and beautiful women

bowing to the cavaliers, who stood for a moment on the foot-board, and

then bowed their adieus to the “ladies of their love,” passed before our

eyes. I saw my father, at this moment, arrange his superb mantle, and

the silk net in which his long black hair was bound, and give the signal

to his lacqueys to stop, that he might mingle among the crowd. I caught

this moment,--I grasped his mantle.--“Father, you find this world

delightful then,--would you ask me to resign it,--me,--who am your

child.”--“But you are too young for it, my son.” “Oh, then, my father, I

am surely much _too young for another world_, to which you would force

me.” “Force you, my child, my first-born!” And these words he uttered

with such tenderness, that I involuntarily kissed his hands, while his

lips eagerly pressed my forehead. It was at this moment that I studied,

with all the eagerness of hope, my father’s physiognomy, or what artists

would call his _physique_.

(13) “Fire for the cigars, and iced-water for drink.”--A cry often

heard in Madrid.

“He had been my parent before he was sixteen; his features were

beautiful, his figure the most graceful and lover-like I ever beheld,

and his early marriage had preserved him from all the evils of youthful

excess, and spared the glow of feature, and elasticity of muscle, and

grace of juvenility, so often withered by vice, almost before they have

bloomed. He was now but twenty-eight, and looked ten years younger. He

was evidently conscious of this, and as much alive to the enjoyments of

youth, as if he were still in its spring. He was at the same moment

rushing into all the luxuries of youthful enjoyment and voluptuous

splendour, and dooming one, who was at least young enough to be his son,

to the frozen and hopeless monotony of a cloister. I laid hold of this

with the grasp of a drowning man. But a drowning man never grasped a

straw so weak as he who depends on the worldly feeling of another for

the support of his own.

“Pleasure is very selfish; and when selfishness pleads to selfishness

for relief, it is like a bankrupt asking his fellow-prisoner to go bail

for him. This was my conviction at the moment, yet still I reflected,

(for suffering supplies the place of experience in youth, and they are

most expert casuists who have graduated only in the school of

misfortune), I reflected, that a taste for pleasure, while it renders a

man selfish in one sense, renders him generous in another. The real

voluptuary, though he would not part with his slightest indulgence to

save the world from destruction, would yet wish all the world to be

enjoying itself, (provided it was not at his expence), because his own

would be increased by it. To this I clung, and intreated my father to

indulge me with another view of the brilliant scene before us. He

complied, and his feelings, softened by this compliance, and exhilarated

by the spectacle, (which interested _him_ more than me, who observed it

only for its effect on him), became more favourable than ever. I availed

myself of this, and, while returning to the convent, threw the whole

power of my nature and intellect into one (almost) shrieking appeal to

his heart. I compared myself to the unhappy Esau, deprived of his

birthright by a younger brother, and I exclaimed in his language, “Hast

thou no blessing for me! Bless me, even me also, Oh my father!” My

father was affected; he promised my intreaty every consideration; but he

hinted some difficulty to be encountered on my mother’s part, much on

that of her Director, who (I afterwards found) governed the whole

family, and still more remotely hinted at something insurmountable and

inexplicable. He suffered me, however, to kiss his hand at parting, and

vainly struggled with his emotions when he felt it damp with my tears.

“It was not till two days after, that I was summoned to attend my

mother’s Director, who was waiting for me in the parlour. I deemed this

delay the result of a long family debate, or (as it seemed to me)

conspiracy; and I tried to prepare myself for the multifarious warfare

in which I had now to engage with parents, directors, superiors, and

monks, and boarders, all sworn to win the day, and not caring whether

they carried their point by storm, sap, mine, or blockade. I began to

measure the power of the assailants, and to try to furnish myself with

weapons suited to their various modes of attack. My father was gentle,

flexible, and vacillating. I had _softened_ him in my favour, and I felt

that was all that could be done with him. But the Director was to be

encountered with different arms. As I went down to the parlour, I

composed my looks, my gait, I modulated my voice, I adjusted my dress. I

was on my guard, body, mind, mien, clothes, every thing. He was a grave,

but mild-looking ecclesiastic; one must have had the treachery of Judas

to suspect him of treachery. I felt disarmed, I even experienced some

compunction. “Perhaps,” said I, “I have all this while armed myself

against a message of reconciliation.” The Director began with some

trifling inquiries about my health, and my progress in study, but he

asked them in a tone of interest. I said to myself, it would not be

decorous for him to enter on the subject of his visit too soon;--I

answered him calmly, but my heart palpitated with violence. A silence

ensued, and then suddenly turning towards me, he said, “My dear child, I

understand your objections to a monastic life are insurmountable. I do

not wonder at it; its habits must appear very unconciliating to youth,

and, in fact, I know not to what period of life abstinence, privation,

and solitude, are particularly agreeable; it was the wish of your

parents doubtless; but”--This address, so full of candour, almost

overpowered me; caution and every thing else forsook me as I exclaimed,

“But what then, my father?” “But, I was going to observe, how rarely our

own views coincide with those which others entertain for us, and how

difficult it is to decide which are the least erroneous.” “Was that

all?” said I, shrinking with disappointment. “That was all; for

instance, some people, (of whom I once happened to be one), might be

fanciful enough to imagine, that the superior experience and proved

affection of parents should qualify them to decide on this point better

than their children; nay, I have heard some carry their absurdity so

far, as to talk of the rights of nature, the obligations of duty, and

the useful coercion of restraint; but since I had the pleasure of

becoming acquainted with your resolution, I am beginning to be of

opinion, that a youth, not thirteen years of age, may be an incomparable

judge in the last resort, particularly when the question bears a

trifling relation to his eternal as well as temporal interest; in such a

case, he has doubtless the double advantage of dictating both to his

spiritual and natural parents.” “My father, I beg you to speak without

irony or ridicule; you may be very clever, but I merely wish you to be

intelligible and serious.” “Do you wish me, then, to speak seriously?”

and he appeared to _collect_ himself as he asked this question.

“Certainly.” “Seriously, then, my dear child, do you not believe that

your parents love you? Have you not received from your infancy every

mark of affection from them? Have you not been pressed to their bosoms

from your very cradle?” At these words I struggled vainly with my

feelings, and wept, while I answered, “Yes.” “I am sorry, my dear child,

to see you thus overpowered; my object was to appeal to your reason,

(for you have no common share of reasoning power),--and to your reason I

appeal;--can you suppose that parents, who have treated you with such

tenderness, who love you as they do their own souls, could act (as your

conduct charges them) with causeless and capricious cruelty towards you?

Must you not be aware there is a reason, and that it must be a profound

one? Would it not be more worthy of your duty, as well as your superior

sense, to inquire into, than contend with it?” “Is it founded upon any

thing in my conduct, then?--I am willing to do every thing,--to

sacrifice every thing.”--“I understand,--you are willing to do every

thing but what is required of you,--and to sacrifice every thing but

your own inclination.” “But you have hinted at a reason.” The Director

was silent. “You urged me to inquire into it.” The Director was silent

still. “My father, I adjure you, by the habit you wear, unmuffle this

terrible phantom to me; there is nothing I cannot encounter”--“Except

the commands of your parents. But am I at liberty to discover this

secret to you?” said the Director, in a tone of internal debate. “Can I

imagine that you, who have in the very outset outraged parental

authority, will revere parental feelings?” “My father, I do not

understand you.” “My dear child, I am compelled to act with a caution

and reserve unsuited to my character, which is naturally as open as

yours. I dread the disclosure of a secret; it is repugnant to my habits

of profound confidence; and I dread disclosing any thing to a character

impetuous like yours. I feel myself reduced to a most painful

situation.” “My father, act and speak with candour, my situation

requires it, and your own profession demands it from you. My father,

remember the inscription over the confessional which thrilled my very

blood to read, “God hears thee.” Remember God hears you always, and will

you not deal sincerely with one whom God has placed at your mercy?” I

spoke with much agitation, and the Director appeared affected for a

moment; that is, he passed his hand over his eyes, which were as dry

as--his heart. He paused for several minutes, and then said, “My dear

child, dare I trust you? I confess I came prepared to treat you like a

boy, but I feel I am disposed to consider you as a man. You have the

intelligence, the penetration, the decision of a man. Have you the

feelings of one?” “Try me, my father.” I did not perceive that his

irony, his _secret_, and his parade of feeling, were all alike

theatrical, and substitutionary for real interest and sincerity. “If I

should be inclined to trust you, my dear child,”--“I shall be grateful.”

“And secret.” “And secret, my father.” “Then imagine yourself”--“Oh! my

father, let me not have to _imagine_ any thing--tell me the truth.”

“Foolish boy,--am I then so bad a painter, that I must write the name

under the figure.” “I understand you, my father, and shall not interrupt

you again.” “Then imagine to yourself the honour of one of the first

houses in Spain; the peace of a whole family,--the feelings of a

father,--the honour of a mother,--the interests of religion,--the

eternal salvation of an individual, all suspended in one scale. What do

you think could outweigh them?” “Nothing,” I replied ardently. “Yet, in

the opposite scale you throw _nothing_,--the caprice of a boy not

thirteen years old;--this is all you have to oppose to the claims of

nature, of society, and of God.” “My father, I am penetrated with horror

at what you have said,--does all this depend on me?” “It does,--it does

all depend on you.” “But how, then,--I am bewildered,--I am willing to

make a sacrifice,--tell me what I am to do.” “Embrace, my dear child,

the monastic life; this will accomplish the views of all who love you,

ensure your own salvation, and fulfil the will of God, who is calling

you at this moment by the voices of your affectionate parents, and the

supplications of the minister of heaven, who is now kneeling before

you.” And he sunk on his knees before me.

“This prostration, so unexpected, so revolting, and so like the monastic

habit of artificial humiliation, completely annihilated the effect of

his language. I retreated from his arms, which were extended towards me.

“My father, _I cannot_,--I will never become a monk.” “Wretch! and you

refuse, then, to listen to the call of your conscience, the adjuration

of your parents, and the voice of God?” The fury with which he uttered

these words,--the change from a ministering angel to an infuriated and

menacing demon, had an effect just contrary to what he expected. I said

calmly, “My conscience does not reproach me,--I have never disobeyed its

calls. My parents have adjured me only through your mouth; and I hope,

for their sakes, the organ has not been inspired by them. And the voice

of God, echoed from my own heart, bids me not to obey you, by

adulterating his service with prostituted vows.” As I spoke thus, the

Director changed the whole character of his figure, his attitude, and

his language;--from the extreme of supplication or of terror, he passed

in a moment, with the facility of an actor, to a rigid and breathless

sternness. His figure rose from the ground before me like that of the

Prophet Samuel before the astonished eyes of Saul. He dropt the

dramatist, and was the monk in a moment. “And you will not take the

vows?” “I will not, my father.” “And you will brave the resentment of

your parents, and the denunciations of the church.” “I have done nothing

to deserve either.” “But you will encounter both, to cherish your horrid

resolution of being the enemy of God.” “I am not the enemy of God for

speaking the truth.” “Liar and hypocrite, you blaspheme!” “Stop, my

father, these are words unbecoming your profession, and unsuited to this

place.” “I acknowledge the justice of the rebuke, and submit to it,

though uttered by the mouth of a child.”--And he dropped his

hypocritical eyes, folded his hands on his breast, and murmured, “Fiat

voluntas tua. My dear child, my zeal for the service of God, and the

honour of your family, to which I am attached equally by principle and

affection, have carried me too far,--I confess it; but have I to ask

pardon of you also, my child, for a redundance of that affection and

zeal for your house, which its descendant has proved himself destitute

of?” The mingled humiliation and irony of this address had no effect on

me. He saw it had not; for after slowly raising his eyes to watch that

effect, he saw me standing in silence, not trusting my voice with a

word, lest I should utter something rash and disrespectful,--not daring

to lift up my eyes, lest their expression should speak without making

language necessary.

“I believe the Director felt his situation rather critical; his interest

in the family depended on it, and he attempted to cover his retreat with

all the expertness and fertility of manœuvre which belong to an

ecclesiastical tactician. “My dear child, we have been both wrong, I

from zeal, and you from--no matter what; our business is to exchange

forgiveness with each other, and to implore it of God, whom we have both

offended. My dear child, let us prostrate ourselves before him, and even

while our hearts are glowing with human passion, God may seize that

moment to impress the seal of his grace on both, and fix it there for

ever. Often the earthquake and the whirlwind are succeeded by the still,

small voice, and God is there.--Let us pray.” I fell on my knees,

resolved to pray in my heart; but in a short time, the fervour of his

language, the eloquence and energy of his prayers, dragged me along with

him, and I felt myself compelled to pray against every dictate of my own

heart. He had reserved this display for the last, and he had judged

well. I never heard any thing so like inspiration; as I listened, and

involuntarily, to effusions that seemed to issue from no mortal lips, I

began to doubt my own motives, and search my heart. I had disdained his

taunts, I had defied and conquered his passion, but as he prayed, I

wept. This going over the same ground with the heart, is one of the most

painful and humiliating of all exercises; the virtue of yesterday

becomes the vice of to-day; we ask with the desponding and restless

scepticism of Pilate, “What is truth?” but the oracle that was so

eloquent one moment, is dumb the next, or if it answers, it is with that

ambiguity that makes us dread we have to consult again--again--and for

ever--in vain.

“I was now in a state quite fit for the Director’s purpose; but he was

fatigued with the part he had played with so little success, and took

his leave, imploring me to continue my importunities to Heaven to direct

and enlighten me, while he himself would supplicate all the saints in

heaven to touch the hearts of my parents, and reveal to them some means

of saving me from the crime and perjury of a forced vocation, without

_involving themselves in a crime, if possible, of blacker dye and

greater magnitude_. Saying so he left me, to urge my parents, with all

his influence, to pursue the most rigorous measures to enforce my

adoption of the conventual life. His motives for doing so were

sufficiently strong when he visited me, but their strength was increased

tenfold before his departure. He had reckoned confidently on the power

of his remonstrances; he had been repulsed; the disgrace of such a

defeat rankled in the core of his heart. He had been only a _partizan_

in the cause, but he was now a _party_. What was a matter of conscience

before, was now a matter of honour with him; and I rather believe that

the Director laid a greater stress on the latter, or made a great havock

of confusion between both in his mind. Be that as it may, I passed a few

days after his visit in a state of indescribable excitement. I had

something to hope, and that is often better than something to enjoy. The

cup of hope always excites thirst, that of fruition disappoints or

quenches it. I took long walks in the garden alone. I framed imaginary

conversations to myself. The boarders observed me, and said to each

other, according to their instructions, “He is meditating on his

vocation, he is supplicating for illuminating grace, let us not disturb

him.” I did not undeceive them; but I reflected with increasing horror

on a system that _forced_ hypocrisy to a precocity unparalleled, and

made the last vice of life the earliest of conventual youth. But I soon

forgot reflection, to plunge into reverie. I imagined myself at the

palace of my father; I saw him, my mother, and the Director, engaged in

debate. I spoke for each, and felt for all. I supplied the passionate

eloquence of the Director, his strong representations of my aversion to

the habit, his declaration that further importunity on their part would

be as impious as it was fruitless. I saw all the impression I once

flattered myself I had made on my father revived. I saw my mother yield.

I heard the murmur of doubtful acquiescence,--the decision, the

congratulations. I saw the carriage approaching,--I heard the convent

doors fly open. Liberty,--liberty,--I was in their arms; no, I was at

their feet. Let those who smile at me, ask themselves whether they have

been indebted most to imagination or reality for all they have enjoyed

in life, if indeed they have ever enjoyed any thing. In these internal

dramas, however, I always felt that the persons did not speak with the

interest I wished; and the speeches I put into their mouths would have

been spoken with ten thousand times more animation by myself. Still I

felt the most exquisite enjoyment in these reveries, and perhaps it was

not diminished by the thought how I was deceiving my companions the

whole time. But dissimulation always teaches dissimulation; and the only

question is, whether we shall be the masters of the art or its victims?

a question soon decided by our self-love.

“It was on the sixth day that I heard, with a beating heart, a carriage

stop. I could have sworn to the sound of its wheels. I was in the hall

before I was summoned. I felt I could not be in the wrong, nor was I. I

drove to my father’s palace in a delirium,--a vision of repulse and of

reconciliation, of gratitude and of despair. I was ushered into a room,

where were assembled my father, my mother, and the Director, all seated,

and silent as statues. I approached, I kissed their hands, and then

stood at a small distance breathless. My father was the first to break

silence, but he spoke very much with the air of a man who was repeating

a part dictated to him; and the tone of his voice contradicted every

word he _prepared_ to utter. “My son, I have sent for you, no longer to

contend with your weak and wicked obstinacy, but to announce to you my

own resolution. The will of Heaven and of your parents has devoted you

to its service, and your resistance can only make us miserable, without

in the least frustrating that resolution.” At these words, gasping for

breath, my lips involuntarily unclosed; my father imagined this was an

attempt to reply, though in fact I was not capable of uttering a

syllable, and hastened to prevent it. “My son, all opposition is

unavailing, all discussion fruitless. Your destiny is decided, and

though your struggles may render it wretched, they cannot reverse it. Be

reconciled, my child, to the will of Heaven and your parents, which you

may insult, but cannot violate. This reverend person can better explain

to you the necessity of your obedience than I can.” And my father,

evidently weary of a task which he had reluctantly undertaken, was

rising to go away, when the Director detained him. “Stay, Senhor, and

assure your son before you depart, that, since I last saw him, I have

fulfilled my promise, and urged every topic on your mind, and that of

the duchess, that I thought might operate for his _best interests_.” I

was aware of the hypocritical ambiguity of this expression; and,

collecting my breath, I said, “Reverend father, as a son I seek not to

employ an intercessor with my own parents. I stand before them, and if I

have not an intercessor in their hearts, your mediation must be

ineffectual altogether. I implored you merely to state to them my

invincible reluctance.” They all interrupted me with exclamations, as

they repeated my last words,--“Reluctance! invincible! Is it for this

you have been admitted to our presence? Is it for this we have borne so

long with your contumacy, only to hear it repeated with aggravations?”

“Yes, my father,--yes, for this or nothing. If I am not permitted to

speak, why am I suffered in your presence?” “Because we hoped to witness

your submission.” “Allow me to give the proofs of it on my knees;”--and

I fell on my knees, hoping that my posture might soften the effect of

the words I could not help uttering. I kissed my father’s hand,--he did

not withdraw it, and I felt it tremble. I kissed the skirt of my

mother’s robe,--she attempted to withdraw it with one hand, but with the

other she hid her face, and I thought I saw tears bursting through her

fingers. I knelt to the Director too, and besought his benediction, and

struggled, though with revolting lips, to kiss his hand; but he snatched

his habit from my hand, elevated his eyes, spread out his fingers, and

assumed the attitude of a man who recoils in horror from a being who

merits the extreme of malediction and reprobation. Then I felt my only

chance was with my parents. I turned to them, but they shrunk from me,

and appeared willing to devolve the remainder of the task on the

Director. He approached me. “My child, you have pronounced your

reluctance to _the life of God_ invincible, but may there not be things

more invincible even to your resolution? The curses of that God,

confirmed by those of your parents, and deepened by all the fulminations

of the church, whose embraces you have rejected, and whose holiness you

have desecrated by that rejection.” “Father, these are terrible words,

but I have no time now but for meanings.” “Besotted wretch, I do not

understand you,--you do not understand yourself.” “Oh! I do,--I do!” I

exclaimed. And turning to my father, still on my knees, I cried, “My

dear father, is life,--human life, all shut up from me?” “It is,” said

the Director, answering for my father. “Have I no resource?” “None.” “No

profession?” “_Profession!_ degenerate wretch!” “Let me embrace the

meanest, but do not make me a monk.” “Profligate as weak.” “Oh! my

father,” still calling on my father, “let not this man answer for you.

Give me a sword,--send me into the armies of Spain to seek death,--death

is all I ask, in preference to that life you doom me to.” “It is

impossible,” said my father, gloomily returning from the window against

which he had been leaning; “the honour of an illustrious family,--the

dignity of a Spanish grandee--” “Oh! my father, of how little value will

that be, when I am consuming in my early grave, and you die

broken-hearted on it, over the flower your own voice has doomed to

wither there.” My father trembled. “Senhor, I entreat,--I command you to

retire; this scene will unfit you for the devotional duties you must

perform this evening.” “And you leave me then?” I cried as they

departed. “Yes,--yes,”--repeated the Director; “leave you burdened with

the curse of your father.” “Oh no!” exclaimed my father; but the

Director had hold of his hand, and pressed it strongly. “Of your

mother,” he repeated. I heard my mother weep aloud, and felt it like a

repeal of that curse; but she dared not speak, and I could not. The

Director had now two victims in his hands, and the third at his feet. He

could not avoid showing his triumph. He paused, collected the full power

of his sonorous voice, and thundered forth, “And of God!” And as he

rushed from the room, accompanied by my father and mother, whose hands

he grasped, I felt as if struck by a thunderbolt. The rushing of their

robes, as he dragged them out, seemed like the whirlwind that attends

the presence of the destroying angel. I cried out, in my hopeless agony

of destitution, “Oh! that my brother were here to intercede for

me,”--and, as I uttered these words, I fell. My head struck against a

marble table, and I sunk on the floor covered with blood.

“The domestics (of whom, according to the custom of the Spanish

nobility, there were about two hundred in the palace) found me in this

situation. They uttered outcries,--assistance was procured,--it was

believed that I had attempted to kill myself; but the surgeon who

attended me happened to be a man both of science and humanity, and

having cut away the long hair clotted with blood, and surveyed the

wound, he pronounced it trifling. My mother was of his opinion, for

within three days I was summoned to her apartment. I obeyed the summons.

A black bandage, severe head-ache, and an unnatural paleness, were the

only testimonies of my accident, as it was called; and the Director had

suggested to her that this was the time to FIX THE IMPRESSION. How well

religious persons understand the secret of making every event of the

present world operate on the future, while they pretend to make the

future predominate over the present. Were I to outlive the age of man, I

should never forget my interview with my mother. She was alone when I

entered, and seated with her back to me. I knelt and kissed her hand. My

paleness and my submission seemed to affect her,--but she struggled with

her emotions, overcame them, and said in a cold _dictated_ tone, “To

what purpose are those marks of exterior reverence, when your heart

disowns them?” “Madam, I am not conscious of that.” “Not conscious! How

then are you here? How is it that you have not, long before this, spared

your father the shame of supplicating his own child,--the shame, still

more humiliating, of supplicating him in vain; spared the Father

Director the scandal of seeing the authority of the church violated in

the person of its minister, and the remonstrances of duty as ineffectual

as the calls of nature? And me,--oh! why have you not spared me this

hour of agony and shame?” and she burst into a flood of tears, that

drowned my soul as she shed them. “Madam, what have I done that deserves

the reproach of your tears? My disinclination to a monastic life is no

crime?” “In you it is a crime.” “But how then, dear mother, were a

similar choice offered to my brother, would his rejection of it be

deemed a crime?” I said this almost involuntarily, and merely by way of

comparison. I had no ulterior meaning, nor the least idea that one could

be developed by my mother, except a reference to an unjustifiable

partiality. I was undeceived, when she added, in a voice that chilled my

blood, “There is a great difference between you.” “Yes, Madam, he is

your favourite.” “No, I take Heaven to witness,--no;” and she, who had

appeared so severe, so decisive, and so impenetrable before, uttered

these words with a sincerity that penetrated to the bottom of my

heart;--she appeared to be appealing to Heaven against the prejudices of

her child. I was affected--I said, “But, Madam, this difference of

circumstances is inexplicable.” “And would you have it explained _by

me_?” “By any one, Madam.” “_By me!_” she repeated, not hearing me; then

kissing a crucifix than hung on her bosom, “My God! the chastisement is

just, and I submit to it, though inflicted by my own child. You are

illegitimate,” she added, turning suddenly towards me; “you are

illegitimate,--your brother is not; and your intrusion into your

father’s house is not only its disgrace, but a perpetual monitor of that

crime which it aggravates without absolving.” I stood speechless. “Oh!

my child,” she continued, “have mercy on your mother. Has not this

confession, extorted from her by her own son, been sufficient to expiate

her offence?” “Go on, Madam, I can bear any thing now.” “You must bear

it, for you have forced me to this disclosure. I am of rank far inferior

to your father,--you were our first child. He loved me, and forgiving my

weakness as a proof of my devotion to him, we were married, and your

brother is our lawful child. Your father, anxious for my reputation,

since I was united to him, agreed with me, as our marriage was private,

and its date uncertain, that you should be announced as our legitimate

offspring. For years your grandfather, incensed at our marriage, refused

to see us, and we lived in retirement,--would that I had died there. A

few days before his death he relented, and sent for us; it was no time

to acknowledge the imposition practised on him, and you were introduced

as the child of his son, and the heir of his honours. But from that hour

I have never known a moment’s peace. The lie I had dared to utter before

God and the world, and to a dying parent,--the injustice done to your

brother,--the violation of natural duties and of legal claims,--the

convulsions of my conscience, that heavily upbraided me, not only with

vice and perjury, but with sacrilege.” “Sacrilege!” “Yes; every hour you

delay the assumption of the habit is a robbery of God. Before you were

born, I devoted you to him, as the only expiation of my crime. While I

yet bore you in my bosom without life, I dared to implore his

forgiveness only on the condition of your future intercession for me as

a minister of religion. _I relied on your prayers before you could

speak._ I proposed to intrust my penitence to one, who, in becoming the

child of God, had atoned for _my_ offence in making him the child of

sin. In imagination I knelt already at your confessional,--heard you, by

the authority of the church, and the commission of Heaven, pronounce me

forgiven. I saw you stand beside my dying bed,--I felt you press the

cross to my cold lips, and point to that heaven where I hoped my vow had

already secured a seat for you. Before your birth I had laboured to lift

you to heaven, and my recompence is, that your obstinacy threatens to

drag us both into the gulph of perdition. Oh! my child, if our prayers

and intercessions are available to the delivery of the souls of our

departed relatives from punishment, hear the adjuration of a living

parent, who implores you not to seal her everlasting condemnation!” I

was unable to answer, my mother saw it, and redoubled her efforts. “My

son, if I thought that my kneeling at your feet would soften your

obduracy, I would prostrate myself before them this moment.” “Oh! madam,

the sight of such unnatural humiliation ought to kill me.” “And yet you

will not yield--the agony of this confession, the interests of my

salvation and your own, nay, the preservation of my life, are of no

weight with you.” She perceived that these words made me tremble, and

repeated, “Yes, my life; beyond the day that your inflexibility exposes

me to infamy, I will not live. If you have resolution, I have resolution

too; nor do I dread the result, for God will charge on your soul, not on

mine, the crime an unnatural child has forced me to--and yet you will

not yield.--Well, then, the prostration of my body is nothing to that

prostration of soul you have already driven me to. I kneel to my own

child for life and for salvation,” and she knelt to me. I attempted to

raise her; she repelled me, and exclaimed, in a voice hoarse with

despair, “And you will not yield?” “I do not say so.” “And what, then,

do you say?--raise me not, approach me not, till you answer me.” “That I

will think.” “Think! you must decide.” “I do, then, I do.” “But how?”

“To be whatever you would have me.” As I uttered these words, my mother

fell in a swoon at my feet. As I attempted to lift her up, scarce

knowing if it was not a corse I held in my arms, I felt I never could

have forgiven myself if she had been reduced to that situation by my

refusing to comply with her last request. * * * * *

“I was overpowered with congratulations, blessings, and embraces. I

received them with trembling hands, cold lips, a rocking brain, and a

heart that felt turned to stone. Every thing passed before me as in a

dream. I saw the pageant move on, without a thought of who was to be the

victim. I returned to the convent--I felt my destiny was fixed--I had no

wish to avert or arrest it--I was like one who sees an enormous engine

(whose operation is to crush him to atoms) put in motion, and, stupified

with horror, gazes on it with a calmness that might be mistaken for that

of one who was coolly analysing the complication of its machinery, and

calculating the resistless crush of its blow. I have read of a wretched

Jew(14), who, by the command of a Moorish emperor, was exposed in an

area to the rage of a lion who had been purposely kept fasting for eight

and forty hours. The horrible roar of the famished and infuriated animal

made even the executioners tremble as they fastened the rope round the

body of the screaming victim. Amid hopeless struggles, supplications for

mercy, and shrieks of despair, he was bound, raised, and lowered into

the area. At the moment he touched the ground, he fell prostrate,

stupefied, annihilated. He uttered no cry--he did not draw a breath--he

did not make an effort--he fell contracting his whole body into a ball,

and lay as senseless as a lump of earth.--So it fared with me; my cries

and struggles were over,--I had been flung into the area, and I lay

there. I repeated to myself, “I am to be a monk,” and there the debate

ended. If they commended me for the performance of my exercises, or

reproved me for my deficiency, I showed neither joy nor sorrow,--I said

only, “I am to be a monk.” If they urged me to take exercise in the

garden of the convent, or reproved me for my excess in walking beyond

the allotted hours, I still answered, “I am to be a monk.” I was showed

much indulgence in these wanderings. A son--the eldest son of the Duke

de Monçada, taking the vows, was a glorious triumph for the ex-Jesuits,

and they did not fail to make the most of it. They asked what books I

would like to read,--I answered, “What they pleased.” They saw I was

fond of flowers, and vases of porcelain, filled with the most exquisite

produce of their garden, (renewed every day), embellished my apartment.

I was fond of music,--that they perceived from my involuntary joining in

the choir. My voice was good, and my profound melancholy gave an

expression to my tones, which these men, always on the watch to grasp at

any thing that may aggrandize them, or delude their victims, assured me

were like the tones of inspiration.

(14) Vide Buffa--_Anachronism prepense_.

“Amid these displays of indulgence, I exhibited an ingratitude totally

foreign from my character. I never read the books they furnished me

with,--I neglected the flowers with which they filled my room,--and the

superb organ they introduced into my apartment, I never touched, except

to elicit some deep and melancholy chords from its keys. To those who

urged me to employ my talents for painting and music, I still answered

with the same apathetic monotony, “I am to be a monk.” “But, my brother,

the love of flowers, of music, of all that can be consecrated to God, is

also worthy of the attention of man--you abuse the indulgence of the

Superior.” “Perhaps so.” “You must, in gratitude to God, thank him for

these lovely works of his creation;”--the room was at this time filled

with carnations and roses;--“you must also be grateful to him for the

powers with which he has distinguished you in hymning his praises--your

voice is the richest and most powerful in the church.” “I don’t doubt

it.” “My brother, you answer at random.” “Just as I feel--but don’t heed

that.” “Will you take a turn in the garden?” “If you please.” “Or will

you seek a moment’s consolation from the Superior?” “If you please.”

“But why do you speak with such apathy? are the odour of the flowers,

and the consolations of your Superior, to be appreciated in the same

breath?” “I believe so.” “Why?” “Because I am to be a monk.” “Nay,

brother, will you never utter any thing but that phrase, which carries

no meaning with it but that of stupefaction or delirium?” “Imagine me,

then, stupefied, delirious--what you please--you know I must be a monk.”

At these words, which I suppose I uttered in a tone unlike that of the

usual _chaunt_ of monastic conversation, another interposed, and asked

what I was uttering in so loud a key? “I am only saying,” I replied,

“that I must be a monk.” “Thank God it is no worse,” replied the

querist, “your contumacy must long ago have wearied the Superior and the

brethren--thank God it’s no worse.” At these words I felt my passions

resuscitated,--I exclaimed, “_Worse!_ what have I to dread?--am I not to

be a monk?” From that evening, (I forget when it occurred), my liberty

was abridged; I was no longer suffered to walk, to converse with the

boarders or novices,--a separate table was spread for me in the

refectory,--the seats near mine were left vacant at service,--yet still

my cell was embellished with flowers and engravings, and

exquisitely-wrought toys were left on my table. I did not perceive they

were treating me as a lunatic, yet certainly my foolishly reiterated

expressions might have justified them in doing so,--they had their own

plans in concert with the Director,--my silence went for proof. The

Director came often to visit me, and the hypocritical wretches _would_

accompany him to my cell. I was generally (for want of other occupation)

attending to my flowers, or gazing at the engravings,--and they would

say, “You see he is as happy as he wishes to be--he wants for

nothing--he is quite occupied in watching those roses.” “No, I am not

occupied,” I returned, “it is occupation I want.” Then they shrugged

their shoulders, exchanged mysterious looks with the Director, and I was

glad when they were gone, without reflecting on the mischief their

absence threatened me with. At this moment, consultation after

consultation was held at the palace de Monçada, whether I could be

induced to shew sufficient intellect to enable me to pronounce the vows.

It seems the reverend fathers were as anxious as their old enemies the

Moors, to convert an idiot into a saint. There was now a party combined

against me, that it would have required more than the might of man to

resist. All was uproar from the palace de Monçada to the convent, and

back again. I was mad, _contumacious_, heretical, idiotical,--any

thing--every thing--that could appease the jealous agony of my parents,

the cupidity of the monks, or the ambition of the ex-Jesuits, who

laughed at the terror of all the rest, and watched intently over their

own interests. Whether I was mad or not, they cared very little; to

enroll a son of the first house of Spain among their converts, or to

imprison him as a madman, or to exorcise him as a demoniac, was all the

same to them. There was a _coup de theatre_ to be exhibited, and

provided they played first parts, they cared little about the

catastrophe. Luckily, during all this uproar of imposture, fear,

falsehood, and misrepresentation, the Superior remained steady. He let

the tumult go on, to aggrandize his importance; but he was resolved all

the time that I should have sanity enough to enable me to take the vows.

I knew nothing of all this, but was astonished at being summoned to the

parlour on the last eve of my noviciate. I had performed my religious

exercises with regularity, had received no rebukes from the master of

the novices, and was totally unprepared for the scene that awaited me.

In the parlour were assembled my father, mother, the Director, and some

other persons whom I did not recognize. I advanced with a calm look, and

equal step. I believe I was as much in possession of my reason as any

one present. The Superior, taking my arm, led me round the room, saying,

“You see----” I interrupted him--“Sir, what is this intended for?” He

answered only by putting his finger on his lips, and then desired me to

exhibit my drawings. I brought them, and offered them on one knee, first

to my mother, and then to my father. They were sketches of monasteries

and prisons. My mother averted her eyes--and my father said, pushing

them away, “I have no taste in those things.” “But you are fond of music

doubtless,” said the Superior; “you must hear his performance.” There

was a small organ in the room adjacent to the parlour; my mother was not

admitted there, but my father followed to listen. Involuntarily I

selected an air from the “Sacrifice of Jephtha.” My father was affected,

and bid me cease. The Superior imagined this was not only a tribute to

my talent, but an acknowledgement of the power of his party, and he

applauded without measure or judgement. Till that moment, I had never

conceived I could be the object of a party in the convent. The Superior

was determined to make me a Jesuit, and therefore was pledged for my

_sanity_. The monks wished for an exorcism, an _auto de fe_, or some

such bagatelle, to diversify the dreariness of monasticism, and

therefore were anxious I should be, or appear, deranged or possessed.

Their pious wishes, however, failed. I had appeared when summoned,

_behaved_ with scrupulous correctness, and the next day was appointed

for my taking the vows.

“That next day--Oh! that I could describe it!--but it is impossible--the

profound stupefaction in which I was plunged prevented my noticing

things which would have inspired the most uninterested spectator. I was

so absorbed, that though I remember facts, I cannot paint the slightest

trace of the feelings which they excited. During the night I slept

profoundly, till I was awoke by a knock at my door.--“My dear child, how

are you employed?” I knew the voice of the Superior, and I replied, “My

father, I was sleeping.” “And I was macerating myself at the foot of the

altar for you, my child,--the scourge is red with my blood.” I returned

no answer, for I felt the maceration was better merited by the betrayer

than the betrayed. Yet I was mistaken; for in fact, the Superior felt

some compunction, and had undergone this penance on account of my

repugnance and alienation of mind, more than for his own offences. But

Oh! _how false is a treaty made with God, which we ratify with our own

blood_, when he has declared there is but one sacrifice he will accept,

even that of the Lamb slain from the foundation of the world! Twice in

the night, I was thus disturbed, and twice answered in the same

language. The Superior, I make no doubt, was sincere. He thought he was

doing all for God, and his bleeding shoulders testified his zeal. But I

was in such a state of mental ossification, that I neither felt, heard,

or understood; and when he knocked a second and third time at the door

of my cell to announce the severity of his macerations, and the efficacy

of his intercessions with God, I answered, “Are not criminals allowed to

sleep the night before their execution?” At hearing these words, which

must have made him shudder, the Superior fell prostrate before the door

of my cell, and I turned to sleep again. But I could hear the voices of

the monks as they raised the Superior, and bore him to his cell. They

said, “He is incorrigible--you humiliate yourself in vain--when he is

_ours_, you shall see him a different being--he shall then prostrate

himself before you.” I heard this, and slept on. The morning came--I

knew what it would bring--I dramatized the whole scene in my own mind. I

imagined I witnessed the tears of my parents, the sympathy of the

congregation. I thought I saw the hands of the priests tremble as they

tossed the incense, and even the acolytes shiver as they held their

robes. Suddenly my mind changed: I felt--what was it I felt?--a union of

malignity, despair, and power, the most formidable. Lightning seemed

flashing from my eyes as I reflected,--I might make the sacrificers and

the sacrificed change places in one moment,--I might blast my mother as

she stood, by a word,--I might break my father’s heart, by a single

sentence,--I might scatter more desolation around me, than it was

apparently possible for human vice, human power, or human malignity,

more potent than both, to cause to its most abject victim.--Yes!--on

that morning I felt within myself the struggles of nature, feeling,

compunction, pride, malevolence, and despair.--The former I had brought

with me, the latter had been all acquired in the convent. I said to

those who attended me that morning, “You are arraying me for a victim,

but I can turn the executioners into the victims if I please”--and I

laughed. The laugh terrified those who were about me--they

retreated--they represented my state to the Superior. He came to my

apartment. The whole convent was by this time alarmed--their credit was

at stake--the preparations had all been made--the whole world was

determined I was to be a monk, mad or not.

“The Superior was terrified, I saw, as he entered my apartment. “My son,

what means all this?” “Nothing, my father--nothing but a sudden thought

that has struck me.” “We will discuss it another time, my son; at

present--” “_At present_,” I repeated with a laugh that must have

lacerated the Superior’s ears--“At present I have but one alternative to

propose--let my father or my brother take my place--that is all. I will

never be a monk.” The Superior, at these words, ran in despair round the

cell. I followed him, exclaiming, in a voice that must have filled him

with horror, “I exclaim against the vows--let those who forced me to it,

take the guilt on themselves--let my father, in his own person, expiate

his guilt in bringing me into the world--let my brother sacrifice his

pride--why must I be the only victim of the crime of the one, and the

passions of the other?” “My son, all this was arranged before.” “Yes, I

know that--I know that by a decree of the Almighty I was doomed to be

cursed even in my mother’s womb, but I will never subscribe that decree

with my own hand.” “My son, what can I say to you--you have passed your

noviciate.” “Yes, in a state of stupefaction.” “All Madrid is assembled

to hear you take your vows.” “Then all Madrid shall hear me renounce

them, and disavow them.” “This is the very day fixed on. The ministers

of God are prepared to yield you to his arms. Heaven and earth,--all

that is valuable in time, or precious in eternity, are summoned, are

waiting for the irrevocable words that seal your salvation, and ensure

that of those you love. What demon has taken possession of you, my

child, and seized the moment you were coming to Christ, to cast you

down, and tear you? How shall I--how shall the fraternity, and all the

souls who are to escape from punishment by the merit of your prayers,

answer to God for your horrible apostacy?” “Let them answer for

themselves--let every one of us answer for ourselves--that is the

dictate of reason.” “Of reason, my deluded child,--when had reason any

thing to do with religion?” I had sat down, folded my arms on my breast,

and forbore to answer a word. The Superior stood with his arms crossed,

his head declined, his whole figure in an air of profound and mortified

contemplation. Any one else would have imagined him seeking God in the

abysses of meditation, but I felt he was only seeking him where he is

never to be found,--in the abyss of that heart which is “deceitful and

desperately wicked.” He approached--I exclaimed, “Come not near me!--you

will renew again the story of my submission--I tell you it was

artificial;--of my regularity in devotional exercises--it was all

mechanism or imposture;--of my conformity to discipline--it was all

practised with the hope of escaping from it ultimately. Now, I feel my

conscience discharged and my heart lightened. Do you hear, do you

understand me? These are the first words of truth I ever uttered since I

entered these walls--the only ones that will, perhaps, ever be uttered

within them--aye, treasure them up, knit your brows, and cross yourself,

and elevate your eyes as you will. Go on with your religious drama. What

is there you see before you so horrible, that you recoil, that you cross

yourself, that you lift your eyes and hands to heaven?--a creature whom

despair has driven to utter desperate truth! Truth may be horrible to

the inmates of a convent, whose whole life is artificial and

perverted,--whose very hearts are sophisticated beyond the hand even of

Heaven (which they alienate by their hypocrisy) to touch. But I feel I

am at this moment an object of less horror in the sight of the Deity,

than if I were standing at his altar, to (as you would urge me) insult

him with vows, which my heart was bursting from my bosom to contradict,

at the moment I uttered them.”

“At these words, which I must have uttered with the most indecent and

insulting violence, I almost expected the Superior would have struck me

to the earth,--would have summoned the lay-brothers to bear me to

confinement,--would have shut me up in the dungeon of the convent, for I

knew there was such a place. Perhaps I wished for all this. Driven to

extremity myself, I felt a kind of pride in driving others to it in

return. Any thing of violent excitement, of rapid and giddy vicissitude,

or even of intense suffering, I was prepared for, and equal to, at that

moment. But these paroxysms soon exhaust themselves and us by their

violence.

Astonished by the Superior’s silence, I raised my eyes to him. I said,

in a tone of moderation that seemed unnatural to my own ears, “Well, let

me hear my sentence.” He was silent still. He had _watched the crisis_,

and now skilfully seized the turn of the mental disease, to exhibit his

applications. He was standing before me meek and motionless, his arms

crossed, his eyes depressed, not the slightest indication of resentment

to be traced in his whole figure. The folds of his habit, refusing to

announce his internal agitation, seemed as they were cut out of stone.

His silence imperceptibly softened me,--I blamed myself for my violence.

Thus men of the world command us by their passions, and men of the other

world by the apparent suppression of them. At last he said, “My son, you

have revolted from God, resisted his Holy Spirit, profaned his

sanctuary, and insulted his minister,--in his name and my own I forgive

you all. Judge of the various characters of our systems, by their

different results on us two. You revile, defame, and accuse,--I bless

and forgive; which of us is then under the influence of the gospel of

Christ, and within the pale of the church’s benediction? But leaving

this question, which you are not at present in a frame to decide, I

shall urge but one topic more; if that fails, I shall no longer oppose

your wishes, or urge you to prostitute a sacrifice which man would

despise, and God must disdain. I add, I will even do my utmost to

facilitate your wishes, which are now in fact my own.” At these words,

so full of truth and benignity, I was rushing to prostrate myself at his

feet, but fear and experience checked me, and I only bowed. “Promise me

merely that you will wait with patience till this last topic is urged;

whether it succeeds or not I have now little interest, and less care.” I

promised,--he went out. A few moments after he returned. His air was a

little more disturbed, but still struggling for a calmness of

expression. There was agitation about him, but I knew not whether it was

felt on his own account or mine. He held the door half open, and his

first sentence astonished me.--“My son, you are well acquainted with the

classical histories.” “But what is that to the purpose, my father?” “You

remember a remarkable story of the Roman general, who spurned from the

steps of his tribune, people, senators, and _priests_,--trampled on all

law,--outraged all religion,--but was at last moved by nature, for, when

his mother prostrated herself before him, and exclaimed, ‘My son, before

you tread the streets of Rome, you must first tread on the body of her

who bore you!’ he relented.” “I remember all, but to what does this

tend?” “_To this_,” and he threw open the door; “now, prove yourself, if

you can, more obdurate than a heathen.” As the door opened, across the

threshold lay my mother, prostrate on her face. She said in a stifled

voice, “Advance,--break your vows,--but you must rush to perjury over

the body of your mother.” I attempted to raise her, but she clung to the

ground, repeating the same words; and her magnificent dress, that

overspread the floor of stone with gems and velvet, frightfully

contrasted her posture of humiliation, and the despair that burned in

her eyes, as she raised them to me for a moment. Convulsed with agony

and horror, I reeled into the arms of the Superior, who seized that

moment to bear me to the church. My mother followed,--the ceremony

proceeded. I vowed chastity, poverty, and obedience, and in a few

moments my destiny was decided. * * * * *