IN THE EARLY MORNING.
"Rise Mary! Night is darkening and the wintry storms are raging--but be
comforted, in the early morning, in the Spring garden, you will see me
again."
The countess woke from a short slumber as if some one had uttered the
words aloud. She glanced around the dusky room, it was still early,
scarcely a glimmer of light pierced through the chinks of the shutters.
She tried to sleep again, but in vain. The words constantly rang in her
ears: "In the early morning you will see me again." Now the chinks in
the shutters grew brighter, and one golden arrow after another darted
through. The countess threw aside the coverlet and started up. Why
should she torment herself with trying to court sleep? Outside a dewy
garden offered its temptations.
True, it was an autumn, not a spring garden. Yet for her it was
Spring--it had dawned in her heart--the first springtime of her life.
Up and away! Should she wake Josepha, who slept above her? Nay, no
sound, no word must disturb this sacred morning stillness.
She dressed and, half an hour later, glided lightly, unseen, into the
garden.
The clock in the church steeple was striking six. A fresh autumn breeze
swept like a band of jubilant sprites through the tops of the ancient
trees, then rushing downward, tossed her silken hair as though it would
fain bear away the filmy strands to some envious wood-nymph to weave
nets from it for the poor mortals who might lose themselves in her
domain.
On the ground at her feet, too, the grasses and shrubs swayed and
rustled as if little gnomes were holding high revel there. A strange
mood pervaded all nature.
Madeleine von Wildenau looked upward; there were huge cloud-shapes in
the sky, but the sun was shining brightly in a broad expanse of blue.
The bells were ringing for early mass. The countess clasped her hands.
Everything was silent and lonely, no eye beheld, no ear heard her, save
the golden orb above. The birds carolling their matin songs, the
flowers whose cups were filled with morning dew, the buzzing, humming
bees--all were celebrating the great matins of awakening nature--and
she, whose heart was full of the morning dew of the first genuine
feeling of her life, was she alone not to join in the chorus of
gratitude of refreshed creation?
There is a language whose key we do not possess. It is the Sanscrit of
Nature and of the human soul when it communes with the deity. The
countess sank silently down on the dewy grass. She did not pray in set
words--there was an interchange of thought, her heart spoke to God, and
reason knew not what it confided to Him.
In the early morning in the spring garden "thou wilt see me again!"
There again spoke the voice which had roused her so early! The countess
raised her head--but still remained kneeling as if spell-bound. Before
her stood the Promised One.
She could say nothing save the word uttered by Mary Magdalene:
"Master!"
A loving soul can never be surprised by the object of its love because
it expects him always and everywhere, yet it appears a miracle when its
expectation becomes fulfilment.
"Have I interrupted your prater? I did not see you because you were
kneeling"--he said, gently.
"You interrupt my prayer--you who first taught me to pray?" she asked,
holding out her hand that he might help her rise. "Tell me, how did you
come here?"
"I could not sleep--some yearning urged me to your presence--to your
garden."
He gently raised her, while she gazed into his eyes as if enraptured.
"Master!" she repeated. "Oh, my friend, I was like Mary Magdalene, my
Lord had been taken away and I knew not where they had laid Him. Now I
know. He was buried in my own heart and the world had rolled the stone
before it, but yesterday--yesterday He rose and the stone was cast
aside. So some impulse urged me into the garden early this morning to
seek Him and lo--He stands before me as He promised."
"Do not speak so!--I am well aware that the words are not meant for me,
but if you associate Christ so closely with my personality, I fear that
you will confound Him with me, and that His image will be dimmed, if
anything should ever shadow mine! I beseech you, Countess, by all that
is sacred--learn to separate Him from me--or you have not grasped the
true nature of Christ, and my work will be evil!" He stood before her
with hand uplifted in prophecy, the outlines of his powerful form were
sharply relieved against the dewy, shining morning air. Purity,
chastity, the loftiest, most inspired earnestness were expressed in his
whole bearing, all the dignity of the soul and of primeval, divinely
created human nature.
Must not she have that feeling of adoration which always seizes upon us
whenever, no matter where it may be, the deity is revealed in His
creations? No, she did not understand what he meant, she only
understood that there was something divine in him, and that the
perception of this nearness to God filled her with a happiness never
known before. Joseph Freyer was the guarantee of the existence of a God
in whom she had lost faith--why should she imagine Him in any other
form than the one which she had found Him again? "Thou shalt make
thyself no graven image!" Must this Puritanically misunderstood literal
statement destroy man's dearest possession, the _symbol of the
reality_? Then the works of Raphael, Titian, and Rubens must be
effaced, and the unions of miracles of faith, wrought in the souls of
the human race by the representations of the divine nature.
"Oh blessed image-worship, now I understand your meaning!" she joyously
exclaimed. "Whoever reviles you has never felt the ardent desire of the
weak human heart, the captive of the senses, for contact with the
unapproachable, the sight of the face of the ever concealed yet ever
felt divinity. Here, here stands the most perfect image Heaven and
earth ever created, and must I not kneel before it, clasp it with all
the tendrils of my aspiring soul? No! No one ought, no one can prevent
me."
Half defiantly, half imploringly, the words poured from her inmost soul
like molten lava. "Let all misunderstand me--save _you_, Freyer! You,
by whom God wrought the miracle, ought not to be narrow-minded! _You_
ought not to destroy it for me, you least of all!" Then she pleaded,
appealed to him: "Let saints, let glorified spirits grasp _only_ the
essence and dispense with the earthly pledge--I cannot! I am a type of
the millions who live snared by the weaknesses, the ideas, the
pleasures of the world of sense; do you suddenly require of me the
abstract purity and spiritualization of religious thought, to which
only the highest innate or required perfection leads? Be forbearing to
me--God has various ways of drawing the rebellious to Him! To the soul
which is capable of material ideas only. He gives revelations by the
senses until, through pain and sorrow, it has worked its way upward to
intellectual ones. And until I can behold the _real_ God in His shadowy
sphere, I shall cling lovingly and devoutly to His _image_."
She sank on her knees before him in passionate entreaty. "Do not
destroy it for me, rather aid the pious delusion which is to save me!
Bear patiently with the woe of a soul seeking its salvation, and leave
the rest to God!" She leaned her brow against the hand which hung by
his side and was silent from excess of emotion.
The tall, stalwart man stood trembling as Abraham may have stood before
the thicket when God stayed his uplifted arm and cried in tender love:
"I will not accept thy sacrifice."
He had a presentiment that the victim would be snatched from him also,
if he was too stern, and all the floods of his heart burst forth, all
the flood gates of love and pity opened. Bending down, he held her head
in a close, warm clasp between both hands, and touched her forehead
with quivering lips.
A low cry of unutterable bliss, and she sank upon his breast; the next
instant she lifted her warm rosy lips to his.
But he drew back a step in agonizing conflict; "No, Countess, for
Heavens's sake no, it must not be."
"Why not?" she asked, her face blanching.
"Let me remain worthy of the miracle God has wrought upon you through
me. If I am to represent Christ to you, I must at least feel and think
as He did, so far as my human weakness will permit, or everything will
be a deception."
The countess covered her face with her hands. "Ah, no one can utter
such words who knows aught of love and longing!" she moaned between her
set teeth in bitter scorn.
"Do you think so?" exclaimed Freyer, and the tone in which he spoke
pierced her heart like a cry of pain. Drawing her hands from her face,
he forced her to meet his glowing eyes: "Look at me and see whether the
tears which now course down my cheeks express no love and longing. Look
at yourself, your sweet, pouting lips, your sparkling eyes, all your
radiant charms, and ask yourself whether a man into whose arms such a
woman falls _can_ remain unmoved? When you have answered these
questions, say to yourself: 'How that man must love his Saviour, if he
buys with such sacrifices the right to wear His crown of thorns!'
Perhaps you will then better understand what I said just now of the
spirit and nature of Christ."
Countess Madeleine made no reply, but wringing her hands, bent her eyes
on the ground.
"Have I wounded you, Countess?"
"Yes, unto death. But it is best so. I understand you. If I am to love
you as Christ, you must _be_ Christ. And the more severe you are, the
higher you raise me! Alas--the pain is keen!" She pressed her hand upon
her heart as though to close a wound, a pathetic expression of
resignation rested on her pallid face.
"Oh, Countess, do not make my task too hard for me. I am but mortal!
Oh, how can I see you suffer? _I_ can renounce everything, but to hurt
_you_ in doing so--is beyond my power."
"Do not say _you_ in this solemn hour! Call me by my name, I would fain
hear it once from your lips!"
"And what _is_ your name?"
"Maria Magdalena."
"No. You call yourself so under the impression of the Passion Play."
"I was christened Maria Magdalena von Prankenberg."
"Maria Magdalena," he repeated, his eyes resting upon her with deep
emotion as she stood before him, she whose bearing was usually so
haughty, now humble, silent, submissive, like the Penitent before the
Master. Suddenly, overpowered by his feelings, he extended his arms:
"_My_ Magdalena."
"My Master, my salvation," she sobbed, throwing herself upon his
breast. He clasped her with a divine gesture of love in his embrace.
"Oh, God she has flown hither like a frightened dove and nestled in my
breast. Poor dove, I will conceal and protect you from every rude
breeze, from every base touch of the world! Build your nest in my
heart--here you shall rest in the peace of God!" He pressed her head
close to his heart.
"How you tremble, dove! May I call you so?"
"Oh, forever!"
"Are you wearied by your long flight? Poor dove! Have you fluttered
hither to me across the wild surges of the world, to bring the olive
branch, the token of reconciliation, which makes my peace with things
temporal and eternal? And must I now thrust you from me, saying as
Christ said to Magdalene! 'Touch me not; for I am not yet ascended to
my Father?' Shall I drive you forth again into this chaos, that the
faithful wings which bore you on the right way may droop exhausted till
you perish in the billows of the world?" He clasped her still more
closely: "Oh, God! This cannot be Thy will! But I think I understand
Thee, Omnipotent One--Thou hast _entrusted_ this soul to me, and I will
guard it for Thee _loyally_!"
It was an hour of sacred happiness. Her head rested on his breast. Not
a leaf stirred on the boughs. The dense shadow of the beeches
surrounded them, separating them from the world as if the universe
contained naught save this one spot of earth, and the dream of this
moment.
"Tell me _one_ thing," she whispered, "only one, and I will suffer,
atone, and purchase this hour of Heaven by any sacrifice: Do you love
me?"
He looked at her, his whole soul in his eyes. "Must I _tell_ you so?"
he asked mournfully. "What can it serve you to put your hand into the
wound in my heart, and see how deep it is? You cannot cure it. Have you
not felt, from the first moment, that some irresistible spell drew me
to you, forcing me, the recluse, to come to you again and yet again?
What was it that drove me from my couch early this morning and sent me
hither to your closed house and deserted garden? What was it save
love?"
"Ever since four o'clock I have wandered restlessly about with my eyes
fixed on the shutters of your room, till the impetuous longing of my
soul roused you and drew you from your warm bed into the chill morning
air. Come, you are shivering, let me warm you, nestle in my arms and
feel the glow of my heart."
He sat down on the bench under the arbor, and--he knew not how it
happened--she clung to him like a child and he could not repulse her,
he _could_ not! She stroked his long black locks with her little soft
hand and rested her head against his cheek--she was the very embodiment
of innocence, simplicity, girlish artlessness. And in low murmurs she
poured out her whole heart to him as a child confides in its father.
Without reserve, she told him all the bitter sorrow of her whole
life--a life which had never known either love or happiness! Having
lost her mother when a mere child, she had been educated by a
cold-hearted governess and a pessimistic tutor. Her father, wholly
absorbed by the whirl of fashionable life, had cared nothing for her,
and when scarcely out of the school-room had compelled her to marry a
rich old man with whom for eight years existence was one long torment.
Then, in mortal fear lest her listener would not forgive her, yet
faithful to the truth, she confessed also how her eager soul, yearning
for love, had striven to find some compensation, rebelling against a
law which recognized the utmost immorality as moral, till _sin_ itself
seemed virtue compared to the wrong of such a bond. But as the
forbidden draught did not quench her thirst, a presentiment came to her
that she was longing for that spring of which Christ said: "But
whosoever drinketh of the water that I shall give him shall never
thirst!" This had brought her here, and here had been opened the
purifying, redeeming fount of life and love.
"Now you know all! My soul lies open before you! By the self denial
with which I risked my highest blessing, _yourself_, and revealed my
whole past life to you, you can judge whether I have been ennobled by
your love." Slipping from his embrace, she sank on her knees before
him: "Now judge the Penitent--I will accept from your hand whatever
fate you may impose. But one thing I beseech you to do, whatever you
may ask of me: remember _Christ_."
Freyer raised his large dark eyes. "I do remember Him." Bending toward
her with infinite gentleness, he lifted her in his strong arms: "Come,
Magdalena! I cannot condemn you," he said, and the Penitent again
rested in the embrace of compassion.
"There are drops of cold perspiration on your brow," said Madeleine
after a long silence. "Are you suffering?"
"I suffer gladly. Do not heed it!" he said with effort.
Then a glance of loving inquiry searched his inmost soul. "Do you
regret the kiss which you just denied me?" she asked, scarcely above
her breath, but the whispered question made him wince as though a probe
had entered some hidden wound. She felt it, and some irresistible
impulse urged her to again raise her pouting lips. He saw their rosy
curves close to his own, and gently covered them with his hand. "Be
true! Let us be loyal to each other. Do not make my lot harder than it
is already! You do not know what you are unchaining." Starting up, he
clasped his hands upon his breast, eagerly drinking in long draughts of
the invigorating morning air. The gloomy fire which had just glowed in
his eyes changed again to a pure, calm light. "This is so _beautiful_,
do not disturb it," he said gently, kissing her on the forehead. "My
child, my dove! Our love shall remain pure and sacred--shall it not?"
"Yes!" she murmured in reverent submission, for now he was once more
the image of Christ, and she bent silently to kiss his hand. He did not
resist, for he felt that it was a comfort to her. Then he disappeared,
calm, lofty, like one who has stripped off the fetters of this world.
Madeleine von Wildenau was left alone. Pressing her forehead against
the trunk of the tree, a rude but firm support, she had sunk back upon
the bench, closing her eyes. Her heart was almost bursting with its
seething tide of emotion. Tears coursed down her cheeks. God had given
her so much, that she almost swooned under this wealth of happiness.
Only a touch of pain could balance it, or it would be too great for
mortal strength to bear. This pain was an unsatisfied yearning, a vague
feeling that her destiny could only be fulfilled through this love, and
that she was still so far from possessing it. God has ordained that the
human heart can bear only a certain measure of happiness and, when this
limit is passed, joy becomes pain because we are not to experience here
on earth bliss which belongs to a higher stage of development. That is
why the greatest joy brings tears, that is why, amid the utmost love,
we believe that we have never loved enough, that is why, amid the
excess of enjoyment, we are consumed with the desire for a rapture of
which this is but a foretaste, that is why every pleasure teaches us to
yearn for a new and greater one, so that we may _never_ be satisfied,
but continually suffer.
There is but one power which, with strong hand, maintains the balance,
teaches us to be sparing of joy, helps us endure pain, dams all the
streams of desire and sends them back to toil and bear fruit within the
soul: asceticism! It cuts with firm touch the luxuriant shoots from the
tree of life, that its strength may concentrate within the marrow of
the trunk and urge the growth _upward_. Asceticism! The bugbear of all
the grown up children of this world. Wherever it appears human hearts
are in a tumult as if death were at hand. Like flying ants bearing away
their eggs to a place of safety, the disturbed consciences of
worldlings anxiously strive to hide their secret desires and pleasures
from the dreaded foe! But whoever dares to meet its eyes sees that it
is not the bugbear which the apostles of reason and nature would fain
represent it, no fleshless, bloodless shadow which strives to destroy
the natural bond between the Creator and creation, but a being with a
glowing heart, five wounds, and a brow bedewed with drops of sweat. Its
office is stern and gloomy, its labor severe and thankless, for it has
to struggle violently with rebellious souls and, save for the aid of
the army of priests who have consecrated themselves to its service, it
would succumb in the ceaseless struggle with materialism which is ever
developing into higher consciousness! Yet whoever has once given
himself to her service finds her a lofty, earnest, yet gracious
goddess! She is the support of the feeble, the comforter of the
unhappy and the solitary, the angel of the self-sacrificing. Whoever
feels her hand upon a wounded, quivering heart, knows that she is the
_benefactress_, not the taskmistress of humanity.
Nor does she always appear as the gloomy mourner beside the corpse of
murdered joys. Sometimes roses wreath the thorn-scarred brow, and she
becomes the priestess of love. When the world and its self-created
duties rudely sunders two hearts which God created for each other and
leaves them to waste away in mortal anguish, _she_ is the compassionate
one. With sanctifying power she raises the struggling souls above the
dividing barrier of temporal things, teaches them to trample the earth
under their feet and unites them with an eternal bond in the purer
sphere of _intellectual_ love. Thus she unites what _morality_ severs.
_Morality_ alone is harsh, not asceticism. Morality pitilessly
prescribes her laws, unheeding the weakness of poor human hearts,
asceticism helps them to submit to them. Morality _demands_ obedience,
asceticism _teaches_ it. Morality punishes, asceticism corrects. The
former judges by appearances, the latter by the reality. Morality has
only the reward of the _world_, asceticism of _Heaven_! Morality made
Mary Magdalene an outcast, asceticism led her to the Lord and obtained
His mercy for her.
And as the beautiful Magdalene of the present day sat with closed eyes,
letting her thoughts be swept along upon the wildly foaming waves of
her hot blood, she fancied that the bugbear once so dreaded because she
had known it only under the guise of the fulfilment of base, loathsome
duty was approaching. But this time the form appeared in its pure
beauty, bent tenderly over her, a pallid shape of light, and gazed at
her with the eyes of a friend! Low, mysterious words, in boding
mournful tones, were murmured in her ears. As she listened, her tears
flowed more gently, and with childlike humility she clasped the sublime
vision and hid her face on its breast. Then she felt upon her brow a
chill kiss, like a breath from the icy regions of eternal peace, and
the apparition vanished. But as the last words of something heard in a
dream often echo in the ears of the person awaking, the countess as she
raised her closed lids, remembered nothing save the three words: "On
the cross!" ...