We were brought up together; there was not quite a year difference in
our ages. I need not say that we were strangers to any species of
disunion or dispute. Harmony was the soul of our companionship, and the
diversity and contrast that subsisted in our characters drew us nearer
together. Elizabeth was of a calmer and more concentrated disposition;
but, with all my ardour, I was capable of a more intense application,
and was more deeply smitten with the thirst for knowledge. She busied
herself with following the aerial creations of the poets; and in the
majestic and wondrous scenes which surrounded our Swiss home--the
sublime shapes of the mountains; the changes of the seasons; tempest and
calm; the silence of winter, and the life and turbulence of our Alpine
summers,--she found ample scope for admiration and delight. While my
companion contemplated with a serious and satisfied spirit the
magnificent appearances of things, I delighted in investigating their
causes. The world was to me a secret which I desired to divine.
Curiosity, earnest research to learn the hidden laws of nature, gladness
akin to rapture, as they were unfolded to me, are among the earliest
sensations I can remember.
On the birth of a second son, my junior by seven years, my parents gave
up entirely their wandering life, and fixed themselves in their native
country. We possessed a house in Geneva, and a _campagne_ on Belrive,
the eastern shore of the lake, at the distance of rather more than a
league from the city. We resided principally in the latter, and the
lives of my parents were passed in considerable seclusion. It was my
temper to avoid a crowd, and to attach myself fervently to a few. I was
indifferent, therefore, to my schoolfellows in general; but I united
myself in the bonds of the closest friendship to one among them. Henry
Clerval was the son of a merchant of Geneva. He was a boy of singular
talent and fancy. He loved enterprise, hardship, and even danger, for
its own sake. He was deeply read in books of chivalry and romance. He
composed heroic songs, and began to write many a tale of enchantment and
knightly adventure. He tried to make us act plays, and to enter into
masquerades, in which the characters were drawn from the heroes of
Roncesvalles, of the Round Table of King Arthur, and the chivalrous
train who shed their blood to redeem the holy sepulchre from the hands
of the infidels.
No human being could have passed a happier childhood than myself. My
parents were possessed by the very spirit of kindness and indulgence. We
felt that they were not the tyrants to rule our lot according to their
caprice, but the agents and creators of all the many delights which we
enjoyed. When I mingled with other families, I distinctly discerned how
peculiarly fortunate my lot was, and gratitude assisted the developement
of filial love.
My temper was sometimes violent, and my passions vehement; but by some
law in my temperature they were turned, not towards childish pursuits,
but to an eager desire to learn, and not to learn all things
indiscriminately. I confess that neither the structure of languages, nor
the code of governments, nor the politics of various states, possessed
attractions for me. It was the secrets of heaven and earth that I
desired to learn; and whether it was the outward substance of things, or
the inner spirit of nature and the mysterious soul of man that occupied
me, still my enquiries were directed to the metaphysical, or, in its
highest sense, the physical secrets of the world.
Meanwhile Clerval occupied himself, so to speak, with the moral
relations of things. The busy stage of life, the virtues of heroes, and
the actions of men, were his theme; and his hope and his dream was to
become one among those whose names are recorded in story, as the
gallant and adventurous benefactors of our species. The saintly soul of
Elizabeth shone like a shrine-dedicated lamp in our peaceful home. Her
sympathy was ours; her smile, her soft voice, the sweet glance of her
celestial eyes, were ever there to bless and animate us. She was the
living spirit of love to soften and attract: I might have become sullen
in my study, rough through the ardour of my nature, but that she was
there to subdue me to a semblance of her own gentleness. And
Clerval--could aught ill entrench on the noble spirit of Clerval?--yet
he might not have been so perfectly humane, so thoughtful in his
generosity--so full of kindness and tenderness amidst his passion for
adventurous exploit, had she not unfolded to him the real loveliness of
beneficence, and made the doing good the end and aim of his soaring
ambition.
I feel exquisite pleasure in dwelling on the recollections of childhood,
before misfortune had tainted my mind, and changed its bright visions of
extensive usefulness into gloomy and narrow reflections upon self.
Besides, in drawing the picture of my early days, I also record those
events which led, by insensible steps, to my after tale of misery: for
when I would account to myself for the birth of that passion, which
afterwards ruled my destiny, I find it arise, like a mountain river,
from ignoble and almost forgotten sources; but, swelling as it
proceeded, it became the torrent which, in its course, has swept away
all my hopes and joys.
Natural philosophy is the genius that has regulated my fate; I desire,
therefore, in this narration, to state those facts which led to my
predilection for that science. When I was thirteen years of age, we all
went on a party of pleasure to the baths near Thonon: the inclemency of
the weather obliged us to remain a day confined to the inn. In this
house I chanced to find a volume of the works of Cornelius Agrippa. I
opened it with apathy; the theory which he attempts to demonstrate, and
the wonderful facts which he relates, soon changed this feeling into
enthusiasm. A new light seemed to dawn upon my mind; and, bounding with
joy, I communicated my discovery to my father. My father looked
carelessly at the titlepage of my book, and said, "Ah! Cornelius
Agrippa! My dear Victor, do not waste your time upon this; it is sad
trash."
If, instead of this remark, my father had taken the pains to explain to
me, that the principles of Agrippa had been entirely exploded, and that
a modern system of science had been introduced, which possessed much
greater powers than the ancient, because the powers of the latter were
chimerical, while those of the former were real and practical; under
such circumstances, I should certainly have thrown Agrippa aside, and
have contented my imagination, warmed as it was, by returning with
greater ardour to my former studies. It is even possible, that the train
of my ideas would never have received the fatal impulse that led to my
ruin. But the cursory glance my father had taken of my volume by no
means assured me that he was acquainted with its contents; and I
continued to read with the greatest avidity.
When I returned home, my first care was to procure the whole works of
this author, and afterwards of Paracelsus and Albertus Magnus. I read
and studied the wild fancies of these writers with delight; they
appeared to me treasures known to few beside myself. I have described
myself as always having been embued with a fervent longing to penetrate
the secrets of nature. In spite of the intense labour and wonderful
discoveries of modern philosophers, I always came from my studies
discontented and unsatisfied. Sir Isaac Newton is said to have avowed
that he felt like a child picking up shells beside the great and
unexplored ocean of truth. Those of his successors in each branch of
natural philosophy with whom I was acquainted, appeared even to my boy's
apprehensions, as tyros engaged in the same pursuit.
The untaught peasant beheld the elements around him, and was acquainted
with their practical uses. The most learned philosopher knew little
more. He had partially unveiled the face of Nature, but her immortal
lineaments were still a wonder and a mystery. He might dissect,
anatomise, and give names; but, not to speak of a final cause, causes in
their secondary and tertiary grades were utterly unknown to him. I had
gazed upon the fortifications and impediments that seemed to keep human
beings from entering the citadel of nature, and rashly and ignorantly I
had repined.
But here were books, and here were men who had penetrated deeper and
knew more. I took their word for all that they averred, and I became
their disciple. It may appear strange that such should arise in the
eighteenth century; but while I followed the routine of education in the
schools of Geneva, I was, to a great degree, self taught with regard to
my favourite studies. My father was not scientific, and I was left to
struggle with a child's blindness, added to a student's thirst for
knowledge. Under the guidance of my new preceptors, I entered with the
greatest diligence into the search of the philosopher's stone and the
elixir of life; but the latter soon obtained my undivided attention.
Wealth was an inferior object; but what glory would attend the
discovery, if I could banish disease from the human frame, and render
man invulnerable to any but a violent death!
Nor were these my only visions. The raising of ghosts or devils was a
promise liberally accorded by my favourite authors, the fulfilment of
which I most eagerly sought; and if my incantations were always
unsuccessful, I attributed the failure rather to my own inexperience and
mistake, than to a want of skill or fidelity in my instructors. And thus
for a time I was occupied by exploded systems, mingling, like an
unadept, a thousand contradictory theories, and floundering desperately
in a very slough of multifarious knowledge, guided by an ardent
imagination and childish reasoning, till an accident again changed the
current of my ideas.
When I was about fifteen years old we had retired to our house near
Belrive, when we witnessed a most violent and terrible thunder-storm. It
advanced from behind the mountains of Jura; and the thunder burst at
once with frightful loudness from various quarters of the heavens. I
remained, while the storm lasted, watching its progress with curiosity
and delight. As I stood at the door, on a sudden I beheld a stream of
fire issue from an old and beautiful oak, which stood about twenty yards
from our house; and so soon as the dazzling light vanished, the oak had
disappeared, and nothing remained but a blasted stump. When we visited
it the next morning, we found the tree shattered in a singular manner.
It was not splintered by the shock, but entirely reduced to thin ribands
of wood. I never beheld any thing so utterly destroyed.
Before this I was not unacquainted with the more obvious laws of
electricity. On this occasion a man of great research in natural
philosophy was with us, and, excited by this catastrophe, he entered on
the explanation of a theory which he had formed on the subject of
electricity and galvanism, which was at once new and astonishing to me.
All that he said threw greatly into the shade Cornelius Agrippa,
Albertus Magnus, and Paracelsus, the lords of my imagination; but by
some fatality the overthrow of these men disinclined me to pursue my
accustomed studies. It seemed to me as if nothing would or could ever be
known. All that had so long engaged my attention suddenly grew
despicable. By one of those caprices of the mind, which we are perhaps
most subject to in early youth, I at once gave up my former occupations;
set down natural history and all its progeny as a deformed and abortive
creation; and entertained the greatest disdain for a would-be science,
which could never even step within the threshold of real knowledge. In
this mood of mind I betook myself to the mathematics, and the branches
of study appertaining to that science, as being built upon secure
foundations, and so worthy of my consideration.
Thus strangely are our souls constructed, and by such slight ligaments
are we bound to prosperity or ruin. When I look back, it seems to me as
if this almost miraculous change of inclination and will was the
immediate suggestion of the guardian angel of my life--the last effort
made by the spirit of preservation to avert the storm that was even then
hanging in the stars, and ready to envelope me. Her victory was
announced by an unusual tranquillity and gladness of soul, which
followed the relinquishing of my ancient and latterly tormenting
studies. It was thus that I was to be taught to associate evil with
their prosecution, happiness with their disregard.
It was a strong effort of the spirit of good; but it was ineffectual.
Destiny was too potent, and her immutable laws had decreed my utter and
terrible destruction.