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+The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Exiles, by Honore de Balzac
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+Title: The Exiles
+
+Author: Honore de Balzac
+
+Translator: Clara Bell and James Waring
+
+Release Date: September, 1999  [Etext #1884]
+Posting Date: March 5, 2010
+Last Updated: November 22, 2016
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: UTF-8
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE EXILES ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by John Bickers, and Dagny
+
+
+
+
+
+The Exiles
+
+
+By Honore de Balzac
+
+
+
+Translated by Clara Bell and James Waring
+
+
+
+
+
+ALMAE SORORI
+
+
+In the year 1308 few houses were yet standing on the Island formed by
+the alluvium and sand deposited by the Seine above the Cite, behind the
+Church of Notre-Dame. The first man who was so bold as to build on this
+strand, then liable to frequent floods, was a constable of the watch
+of the City of Paris, who had been able to do some service to their
+Reverences the Chapter of the Cathedral; and in return the Bishop leased
+him twenty-five perches of land, with exemptions from all feudal dues or
+taxes on the buildings he might erect.
+
+Seven years before the beginning of this narrative, Joseph Tirechair,
+one of the sternest of Paris constables, as his name (Tear Flesh) would
+indicate, had, thanks to his share of the fines collected by him for
+delinquencies committed within the precincts of the Cite, had been able
+to build a house on the bank of the Seine just at the end of the Rue du
+Port-Saint-Landry. To protect the merchandise landed on the strand, the
+municipality had constructed a sort of break-water of masonry, which may
+still be seen on some old plans of Paris, and which preserved the piles
+of the landing-place by meeting the rush of water and ice at the upper
+end of the Island. The constable had taken advantage of this for the
+foundation of his house, so that there were several steps up to his
+door.
+
+Like all the houses of that date, this cottage was crowned by a peaked
+roof, forming a gable-end to the front, or half a diamond. To the great
+regret of historians, but two or three examples of such roofs survive in
+Paris. A round opening gave light to a loft, where the constable’s wife
+dried the linen of the Chapter, for she had the honor of washing for the
+Cathedral--which was certainly not a bad customer. On the first floor
+were two rooms, let to lodgers at a rent, one year with another, of
+forty sous _Parisis_ each, an exorbitant sum, that was however justified
+by the luxury Tirechair had lavished on their adornment. Flanders
+tapestry hung on the walls, and a large bed with a top valance of green
+serge, like a peasant’s bed, was amply furnished with mattresses, and
+covered with good sheets of fine linen. Each room had a stove called
+a _chauffe-doux_; the floor, carefully polished by Dame Tirechair’s
+apprentices, shone like the woodwork of a shrine. Instead of stools, the
+lodgers had deep chairs of carved walnut, the spoils probably of some
+raided castle. Two chests with pewter mouldings, and tables on
+twisted legs, completed the fittings, worthy of the most fastidious
+knights-banneret whom business might bring to Paris.
+
+The windows of those two rooms looked out on the river. From one you
+could only see the shores of the Seine, and the three barren islands, of
+which two were subsequently joined together to form the Ile Saint-Louis;
+the third was the Ile de Louviers. From the other could be seen, down a
+vista of the Port-Saint-Landry, the buildings on the Greve, the Bridge
+of Notre-Dame, with its houses, and the tall towers of the Louvre, but
+lately built by Philippe-Auguste to overlook the then poor and squalid
+town of Paris, which suggests so many imaginary marvels to the fancy of
+modern romancers.
+
+The ground floor of Tirechair’s house consisted of a large hall, where
+his wife’s business was carried on, through which the lodgers were
+obliged to pass on their way to their own rooms up a stairway like a
+mill-ladder. Behind this were a kitchen and a bedroom, with a view over
+the Seine. A tiny garden, reclaimed from the waters, displayed at the
+foot of this modest dwelling its beds of cabbages and onions, and a few
+rose-bushes, sheltered by palings, forming a sort of hedge. A little
+structure of lath and mud served as a kennel for a big dog, the
+indispensable guardian of so lonely a dwelling. Beyond this kennel was a
+little plot, where the hens cackled whose eggs were sold to the Canons.
+Here and there on this patch of earth, muddy or dry according to the
+whimsical Parisian weather, a few trees grew, constantly lashed by the
+wind, and teased and broken by the passer-by--willows, reeds, and tall
+grasses.
+
+The Eyot, the Seine, the landing-place, the house, were all overshadowed
+on the west by the huge basilica of Notre-Dame casting its cold gloom
+over the whole plot as the sun moved. Then, as now, there was not in all
+Paris a more deserted spot, a more solemn or more melancholy prospect.
+The noise of waters, the chanting of priests, or the piping of the wind,
+were the only sounds that disturbed this wilderness, where lovers would
+sometimes meet to discuss their secrets when the church-folds and clergy
+were safe in church at the services.
+
+
+
+One evening in April in the year 1308, Tirechair came home in a
+remarkably bad temper. For three days past everything had been in good
+order on the King’s highway. Now, as an officer of the peace, nothing
+annoyed him so much as to feel himself useless. He flung down his
+halbert in a rage, muttered inarticulate words as he pulled off his
+doublet, half red and half blue, and slipped on a shabby camlet jerkin.
+After helping himself from the bread-box to a hunch of bread, and
+spreading it with butter, he seated himself on a bench, looked round
+at his four whitewashed walls, counted the beams of the ceiling, made a
+mental inventory of the household goods hanging from the nails, scowled
+at the neatness which left him nothing to complain of, and looked at his
+wife, who said not a word as she ironed the albs and surplices from the
+sacristy.
+
+“By my halidom,” he said, to open the conversation, “I cannot think,
+Jacqueline, where you go to catch your apprenticed maids. Now, here is
+one,” he went on, pointing to a girl who was folding an altar-cloth,
+clumsily enough, it must be owned, “who looks to me more like a damsel
+rather free of her person than a sturdy country wench. Her hands are as
+white as a fine lady’s! By the Mass! and her hair smells of essences, I
+verily believe, and her hose are as find as a queen’s. By the two horns
+of Old Nick, matters please me but ill as I find them here.”
+
+The girl colored, and stole a look at Jacqueline, full of alarm not
+unmixed with pride. The mistress answered her glance with a smile, laid
+down her work, and turned to her husband.
+
+“Come now,” said she, in a sharp tone, “you need not harry me. Are you
+going to accuse me next of some underhand tricks? Patrol your roads
+as much as you please, but do not meddle here with anything but what
+concerns your sleeping in peace, drinking your wine, and eating what
+I set before you, or else, I warn you, I will have no more to do with
+keeping you healthy and happy. Let any one find me a happier man in all
+the town,” she went on, with a scolding grimace. “He has silver in his
+purse, a gable over the Seine, a stout halbert on one hand, an honest
+wife on the other, a house as clean and smart as a new pin! And he
+growls like a pilgrim smarting from Saint Anthony’s fire!”
+
+“Hey day!” exclaimed the sergeant of the watch, “do you fancy,
+Jacqueline, that I have any wish to see my house razed down, my halbert
+given to another, and my wife standing in the pillory?”
+
+Jacqueline and the dainty journeywoman turned pale.
+
+“Just tell me what you are driving at,” said the washerwoman sharply,
+“and make a clean breast of it. For some days, my man, I have observed
+that you have some maggot twisting in your poor brain. Come up, then,
+and have it all out. You must be a pretty coward indeed if you fear any
+harm when you have only to guard the common council and live under the
+protection of the Chapter! Their Reverences the Canons would lay the
+whole bishopric under an interdict if Jacqueline brought a complaint of
+the smallest damage.”
+
+As she spoke, she went straight up to her husband and took him by the
+arm.
+
+“Come with me,” she added, pulling him up and out on to the steps.
+
+When they were down by the water in their little garden, Jacqueline
+looked saucily in her husband’s face.
+
+“I would have you to know, you old gaby, that when my lady fair goes
+out, a piece of gold comes into our savings-box.”
+
+“Oh, ho!” said the constable, who stood silent and meditative before his
+wife. But he presently said, “Any way, we are done for.--What brings the
+dame to our house?”
+
+“She comes to see the well-favored young clerk who lives overhead,”
+ replied Jacqueline, looking up at the window that opened on to the vast
+landscape of the Seine valley.
+
+“The Devil’s in it!” cried the man. “For a few base crowns you have
+ruined me, Jacqueline. Is that an honest trade for a sergeant’s decent
+wife to ply? And, be she Countess or Baroness, the lady will not be able
+to get us out of the trap in which we shall find ourselves caught sooner
+or later. Shall we not have to square accounts with some puissant and
+offended husband? for, by the Mass, she is fair to look upon!”
+
+“But she is a widow, I tell you, gray gander! How dare you accuse your
+wife of foul play and folly? And the lady has never spoken a word to yon
+gentle clerk, she is content to look on him and think of him. Poor lad!
+he would be dead of starvation by now but for her, for she is as good as
+a mother to him. And he, the sweet cherub! it is as easy to cheat him as
+to rock a new-born babe. He believes his pence will last for ever, and
+he has eaten them through twice over in the past six months.”
+
+“Woman,” said the sergeant, solemnly pointing to the Place de Greve, “do
+you remember seeing, even from this spot, the fire in which they burnt
+the Danish woman the other day?”
+
+“What then?” said Jacqueline, in a fright.
+
+“What then?” echoed Tirechair. “Why, the two men who lodge with us smell
+of scorching. Neither Chapter nor Countess or Protector can serve them.
+Here is Easter come round; the year is ending; we must turn our company
+out of doors, and that at once. Do you think you can teach an old
+constable how to know a gallows-bird? Our two lodgers were on terms with
+la Porette, that heretic jade from Denmark or Norway, whose last cries
+you heard from here. She was a brave witch; she never blenched at the
+stake, which was proof enough of her compact with the Devil. I saw her
+as plain as I see you; she preached to the throng, and declared she was
+in heaven and could see God.
+
+“And since that, I tell you, I have never slept quietly in my bed.
+My lord, who lodges over us, is of a surety more of a wizard than a
+Christian. On my word as an officer, I shiver when that old man passes
+near me; he never sleeps of nights; if I wake, his voice is ringing
+like a bourdon of bells, and I hear him muttering incantations in the
+language of hell. Have you ever seen him eat an honest crust of bread
+or a hearth-cake made by a good Catholic baker? His brown skin has been
+scorched and tanned by hell-fires. Marry, and I tell you his eyes hold
+a spell like that of serpents. Jacqueline, I will have none of those two
+men under my roof. I see too much of the law not to know that it is well
+to have nothing to do with it.--You must get rid of our two lodgers; the
+elder because I suspect him; the youngster, because he is too pretty.
+They neither of them seem to me to keep Christian company. The boy
+is ever staring at the moon, the stars, and the clouds, like a wizard
+watching for the hour when he shall mount his broomstick; the other old
+rogue certainly makes some use of the poor boy for his black art. My
+house stands too close to the river as it is, and that risk of ruin is
+bad enough without bringing down fire from heaven, or the love affairs
+of a countess. I have spoken. Do not rebel.”
+
+In spite of her sway in the house, Jacqueline stood stupefied as she
+listened to the edict fulminated against his lodgers by the sergeant
+of the watch. She mechanically looked up at the window of the room
+inhabited by the old man, and shivered with horror as she suddenly
+caught sight of the gloomy, melancholy face, and the piercing eye that
+so affected her husband, accustomed as he was to dealing with criminals.
+
+At that period, great and small, priests and laymen, all trembled before
+the idea of any supernatural power. The word “magic” was as powerful as
+leprosy to root up feelings, break social ties, and freeze piety in the
+most generous soul. It suddenly struck the constable’s wife that she
+had never, in fact, seen either of her lodgers exercising any human
+function. Though the younger man’s voice was as sweet and melodious as
+the tones of a flute, she so rarely heard it that she was tempted to
+think his silence the result of a spell. As she recalled the strange
+beauty of that pink-and-white face, and saw in memory the fine hair and
+moist brilliancy of those eyes, she believed that they were indeed the
+artifices of the Devil. She remembered that for days at a time she
+had never heard the slightest sound from either room. Where were the
+strangers during all those hours?
+
+Suddenly the most singular circumstances recurred to her mind. She was
+completely overmastered by fear, and could even discern witchcraft in
+the rich lady’s interest in the young Godefroid, a poor orphan who had
+come from Flanders to study at the University of Paris. She hastily put
+her hand into one of her pockets, pulled out four livres of Tournay in
+large silver coinage, and looked at the pieces with an expression of
+avarice mingled with terror.
+
+“That, at any rate, is not false coin,” said she, showing the silver
+to her husband. “Besides,” she went on, “how can I turn them out after
+taking next year’s rent paid in advance?”
+
+“You had better inquire of the Dean of the Chapter,” replied Tirechair.
+“Is not it his business to tell us how we should deal with these
+extraordinary persons?”
+
+“Ay, truly extraordinary,” cried Jacqueline. “To think of their cunning;
+coming here under the very shadow of Notre-Dame! Still,” she went on,
+“or ever I ask the Dean, why not warn that fair and noble lady of the
+risk she runs?”
+
+As she spoke, Jacqueline went into the house with her husband, who had
+not missed a mouthful. Tirechair, as a man grown old in the tricks
+of his trade, affected to believe that the strange lady was in fact a
+work-girl; still, this assumed indifference could not altogether cloak
+the timidity of a courtier who respects a royal incognity. At this
+moment six was striking by the clock of Saint-Denis du Pas, a small
+church that stood between Notre-Dame and the Port-Saint-Landry--the
+first church erected in Paris, on the very spot where Saint-Denis was
+laid on the gridiron, as chronicles tell. The hour flew from steeple to
+tower all over the city. Then suddenly confused shouts were heard on
+the left bank of the Seine, behind Notre-Dame, in the quarter where the
+schools of the University harbored their swarms.
+
+At this signal, Jacqueline’s elder lodger began to move about his room.
+The sergeant, his wife, and the strange lady listened while he opened
+and shut his door, and the old man’s heavy step was heard on the steep
+stair. The constable’s suspicions gave such interest to the advent of
+this personage, that the lady was startled as she observed the strange
+expression of the two countenances before her. Referring the terrors
+of this couple to the youth she was protecting--as was natural in a
+lover--the young lady awaited, with some uneasiness, the event thus
+heralded by the fears of her so-called master and mistress.
+
+The old man paused for a moment on the threshold to scrutinize the three
+persons in the room, and seemed to be looking for his young companion.
+This glance of inquiry, unsuspicious as it was, agitated the three.
+Indeed, nobody, not even the stoutest man, could deny that Nature
+had bestowed exceptional powers on this being, who seemed almost
+supernatural. Though his eyes were somewhat deeply shaded by the wide
+sockets fringed with long eyebrows, they were set, like a kite’s eyes,
+in eyelids so broad, and bordered by so dark a circle sharply defined on
+his cheek, that they seemed rather prominent. These singular eyes had
+in them something indescribably domineering and piercing, which took
+possession of the soul by a grave and thoughtful look, a look as bright
+and lucid as that of a serpent or a bird, but which held one fascinated
+and crushed by the swift communication of some tremendous sorrow, or of
+some super-human power.
+
+Every feature was in harmony with this eye of lead and of fire, at once
+rigid and flashing, stern and calm. While in this eagle eye earthly
+emotions seemed in some sort extinct, the lean, parched face also bore
+traces of unhappy passions and great deeds done. The nose, which was
+narrow and aquiline, was so long that it seemed to hang on by the
+nostrils. The bones of the face were strongly marked by the long,
+straight wrinkles that furrowed the hollow cheeks. Every line in the
+countenance looked dark. It would suggest the bed of a torrent where
+the violence of former floods was recorded in the depth of the
+water-courses, which testified to some terrible, unceasing turmoil.
+Like the ripples left by the oars of a boat on the waters, deep lines,
+starting from each side of his nose, marked his face strongly, and
+gave an expression of bitter sadness to his mouth, which was firm and
+straight-lipped. Above the storm thus stamped on his countenance, his
+calm brow rose with what may be called boldness, and crowned it as with
+a marble dome.
+
+The stranger preserved that intrepid and dignified manner that is
+frequently habitual with men inured to disaster, and fitted by nature to
+stand unmoved before a furious mob and to face the greatest dangers. He
+seemed to move in a sphere apart, where he poised above humanity. His
+gestures, no less than his look, were full of irresistible power; his
+lean hands were those of a soldier; and if your own eyes were forced to
+fall before his piercing gaze, you were no less sure to tremble when by
+word or action he spoke to your soul. He moved in silent majesty that
+made him seem a king without his guard, a god without his rays.
+
+His dress emphasized the ideas suggested by the peculiarities of his
+mien and face. Soul, body, and garb were in harmony, and calculated to
+impress the coldest imagination. He wore a sort of sleeveless gown of
+black cloth, fastened in front, and falling to the calf, leaving the
+neck bare with no collar. His doublet and boots were likewise black.
+On his head was a black velvet cap like a priest’s, sitting in a close
+circle above his forehead, and not showing a single hair. It was the
+strictest mourning, the gloomiest habit a man could wear. But for a
+long sword that hung by his side from a leather belt which could be
+seen where his surcoat hung open, a priest would have hailed him as a
+brother. Though of no more than middle height, he appeared tall; and,
+looking him in the face he seemed a giant.
+
+“The clock has struck, the boat is waiting; will you not come?”
+
+At these words, spoken in bad French, but distinctly audible in the
+silence, a little noise was heard in the other top room, and the young
+man came down as lightly as a bird.
+
+When Godefroid appeared, the lady’s face turned crimson; she trembled,
+started, and covered her face with her white hands.
+
+Any woman might have shared her agitation at the sight of this youth of
+about twenty, of a form and stature so slender that at a first glance he
+might have been taken for a mere boy, or a young girl in disguise. His
+black cap--like the _beret_ worn by the Basque people--showed a brow
+as white as snow, where grace and innocence shone with an expression
+of divine sweetness--the light of a soul full of faith. A poet’s
+fancy would have seen there the star which, in some old tale, a mother
+entreats the fairy godmother to set on the forehead of an infant
+abandoned, like Moses, to the waves. Love lurked in the thousand fair
+curls that fell over his shoulders. His throat, truly a swan’s throat,
+was white and exquisitely round. His blue eyes, bright and liquid,
+mirrored the sky. His features and the mould of his brow were refined
+and delicate enough to enchant a painter. The bloom of beauty, which
+in a woman’s face causes men such indescribable delight, the exquisite
+purity of outline, the halo of light that bathes the features we love,
+were here combined with a masculine complexion, and with strength as
+yet but half developed, in the most enchanting contrast. His was one of
+those melodious countenances which even when silent speak and attract
+us. And yet, on marking it attentively, the incipient blight might have
+been detected which comes of a great thought or a passion, the faint
+yellow tinge that made him seem like a young leaf opening to the sun.
+
+No contrast could be greater or more startling than that seen in the
+companionship of these two men. It was like seeing a frail and graceful
+shrub that has grown from the hollow trunk of some gnarled willow,
+withered by age, blasted by lightning, standing decrepit; one of those
+majestic trees that painters love; the trembling sapling takes shelter
+there from storms. One was a god, the other was an angel; one the poet
+that feels, the other the poet that expresses--a prophet in sorrow, a
+levite in prayer.
+
+They went out together without speaking.
+
+“Did you mark how he called him to him?” cried the sergeant of the watch
+when the footsteps of the couple were no longer audible on the strand.
+“Are not they a demon and his familiar?”
+
+“Phooh!” puffed Jacqueline. “I felt smothered! I never marked our two
+lodgers so carefully. ‘Tis a bad thing for us women that the Devil can
+wear so fair a mien!”
+
+“Ay, cast some holy water on him,” said Tirechair, “and you will see him
+turn into a toad.--I am off to tell the office all about them.”
+
+On hearing this speech, the lady roused herself from the reverie into
+which she had sunk, and looked at the constable, who was donning his
+red-and-blue jacket.
+
+“Whither are you off to?” she asked.
+
+“To tell the justices that wizards are lodging in our house very much
+against our will.”
+
+The lady smiled.
+
+“I,” said she, “am the Comtesse de Mahaut,” and she rose with a dignity
+that took the man’s breath away. “Beware of bringing the smallest
+trouble on your guests. Above all, respect the old man; I have seen him
+in the company of your Lord the King, who entreated him courteously;
+you will be ill advised to trouble him in any way. As to my having been
+here--never breathe a word of it, as you value your life.”
+
+She said no more, but relapsed into thought.
+
+Presently she looked up, signed to Jacqueline, and together they went up
+into Godefroid’s room. The fair Countess looked at the bed, the carved
+chairs, the chest, the tapestry, the table, with a joy like that of
+the exile who sees on his return the crowded roofs of his native town
+nestling at the foot of a hill.
+
+“If you have not deceived me,” she said to Jacqueline, “I promise you a
+hundred crowns in gold.”
+
+“Behold, madame,” said the woman, “the poor angel is confiding--here is
+all his treasure.”
+
+As she spoke, Jacqueline opened a drawer in the table and showed some
+parchments.
+
+“God of mercy!” cried the Countess, snatching up a document that caught
+her eye, on which she read, _Gothofredus Comes Gantiacus_ (Godefroid,
+Count of Ghent).
+
+She dropped the parchment, and passed her hand over her brow; then,
+feeling, no doubt, that she had compromised herself by showing so much
+emotion, she recovered her cold demeanor.
+
+“I am satisfied,” said she.
+
+She went downstairs and out of the house. The constable and his wife
+stood in their doorway, and saw her take the path to the landing-place.
+
+A boat was moored hard by. When the rustle of the Countess’ approach was
+audible, a boatman suddenly stood up, helped the fair laundress to take
+her seat in it, and rowed with such strength as to make the boat fly
+like a swallow down the stream.
+
+“You are a sorry fellow,” said Jacqueline, giving the officer’s shoulder
+a familiar slap. “We have earned a hundred gold crowns this morning.”
+
+“I like harboring lords no better than harboring wizards. And I know
+not, of the two, which is the more like to bring us to the gallows,”
+ replied Tirechair, taking up his halbert. “I will go my rounds over by
+Champfleuri; God protect us, and send me to meet some pert jade out in
+her bravery of gold rings to glitter in the shade like a glow-worm!”
+
+Jacqueline, alone in the house, hastily went up to the unknown lord’s
+room to discover, if she could, some clue to this mysterious business.
+Like some learned men who give themselves infinite pains to complicate
+the clear and simple laws of nature, she had already invented a chaotic
+romance to account for the meeting of these three persons under her
+humble roof. She hunted through the chest, examined everything, but
+could find nothing extraordinary. She saw nothing on the table but a
+writing-case and some sheets of parchment; and as she could not read,
+this discovery told her nothing. A woman’s instinct then took her into
+the young man’s room, and from thence she descried her two lodgers
+crossing the river in the ferry boat.
+
+“They stand like two statues,” said she to herself. “Ah, ha! They are
+landing at the Rue du Fouarre. How nimble he is, the sweet youth! He
+jumped out like a bird. By him the old man looks like some stone saint
+in the Cathedral.--They are going to the old School of the Four Nations.
+Presto! they are out of sight.--And this is where he lives, poor
+cherub!” she went on, looking about the room. “How smart and winning he
+is! Ah! your fine gentry are made of other stuff than we are.”
+
+And Jacqueline went down again after smoothing down the bed-coverlet,
+dusting the chest, and wondering for the hundredth time in six months:
+
+“What in the world does he do all the blessed day? He cannot always be
+staring at the blue sky and the stars that God has hung up there like
+lanterns. That dear boy has known trouble. But why do he and the old man
+hardly ever speak to each other?”
+
+Then she lost herself in wonderment and in thoughts which, in her
+woman’s brain, were tangled like a skein of thread.
+
+The old man and his young companion had gone into one of the schools for
+which the Rue du Fouarre was at that time famous throughout Europe. At
+the moment when Jacqueline’s two lodgers arrived at the old School des
+Quatre Nations, the celebrated Sigier, the most noted Doctor of Mystical
+Theology of the University of Paris, was mounting his pulpit in a
+spacious low room on a level with the street. The cold stones were
+strewn with clean straw, on which several of his disciples knelt on
+one knee, writing on the other, to enable them to take notes from the
+Master’s improvised discourse, in the shorthand abbreviations which are
+the despair of modern decipherers.
+
+The hall was full, not of students only, but of the most distinguished
+men belonging to the clergy, the court, and the legal faculty. There
+were some learned foreigners, too--soldiers and rich citizens. The broad
+faces were there, with prominent brows and venerable beards, which fill
+us with a sort of pious respect for our ancestors when we see their
+portraits from the Middle Ages. Lean faces, too, with burning, sunken
+eyes, under bald heads yellow from the labors of futile scholasticism,
+contrasted with young and eager countenances, grave faces, warlike
+faces, and the ruddy cheeks of the financial class.
+
+These lectures, dissertations, theses, sustained by the brightest
+geniuses of the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries, roused our
+forefathers to enthusiasm. They were to them their bull-fights, their
+Italian opera, their tragedy, their dancers; in short, all their drama.
+The performance of Mysteries was a later thing than these spiritual
+disputations, to which, perhaps, we owe the French stage. Inspired
+eloquence, combining the attractions of the human voice skilfully used,
+with daring inquisition into the secrets of God, sufficed to satisfy
+every form of curiosity, appealed to the soul, and constituted the
+fashionable entertainment of the time. Not only did Theology include
+the other sciences, it was science itself, as grammar was science to the
+Ancient Greeks; and those who distinguished themselves in these duels,
+in which the orators, like Jacob, wrestled with the Spirit of God, had
+a promising future before them. Embassies, arbitrations between
+sovereigns, chancellorships, and ecclesiastical dignities were the meed
+of men whose rhetoric had been schooled in theological controversy. The
+professor’s chair was the tribune of the period.
+
+This system lasted till the day when Rabelais gibbeted dialectics by
+his merciless satire, as Cervantes demolished chivalry by a narrative
+comedy.
+
+To understand this amazing period and the spirit which dictated its
+voluminous, though now forgotten, masterpieces, to analyze it, even to
+its barbarisms, we need only examine the Constitutions of the University
+of Paris and the extraordinary scheme of instruction that then obtained.
+Theology was taught under two faculties--that of Theology properly so
+called, and that of Canon Law. The faculty of Theology, again, had three
+sections--Scholastic, Canonical, and Mystic. It would be wearisome to
+give an account of the attributes of each section of the science, since
+one only, namely, Mystic, is the subject of this _Etude_.
+
+Mystical Theology included the whole of Divine Revelation and the
+elucidation of the Mysteries. And this branch of ancient theology has
+been secretly preserved with reverence even to our own day; Jacob Boehm,
+Swendenborg, Martinez Pasqualis, Saint-Martin, Molinos, Madame Guyon,
+Madame Bourignon, and Madame Krudener, the extensive sect of the
+Ecstatics, and that of the Illuminati, have at different periods duly
+treasured the doctrines of this science, of which the aim is indeed
+truly startling and portentous. In Doctor Sigier’s day, as in our own,
+man has striven to gain wings to fly into the sanctuary where God hides
+from our gaze.
+
+This digression was necessary to give a clue to the scene at which the
+old man and the youth from the island under Notre-Dame had come to be
+audience; it will also protect this narrative from all blame on the
+score of falsehood and hyperbole, of which certain persons of hasty
+judgment might perhaps suspect me.
+
+Doctor Sigier was a tall man in the prime of life. His face, rescued
+from oblivion by the archives of the University, had singular analogies
+with that of Mirabeau. It was stamped with the seal of fierce, swift,
+and terrible eloquence. But the Doctor bore on his brow the expression
+of religious faith that his modern double had not. His voice, too, was
+of persuasive sweetness, with a clear and pleasing ring in it.
+
+At this moment the daylight, that was stintingly diffused through the
+small, heavily-leaded window-panes, tinted the assembly with capricious
+tones and powerful contrasts from the chequered light and shade. Here,
+in a dark corner, eyes shone brightly, their dark heads under the
+sunbeams gleamed light above faces in shadow, and various bald heads,
+with only a circlet of white hair, were distinguished among the crowd
+like battlements silvered by moonlight. Every face was turned towards
+the Doctor, mute but impatient. The drowsy voices of other lecturers
+in the adjoining schools were audible in the silent street like the
+murmuring of the sea; and the steps of the two strangers, as they now
+came in, attracted general attention. Doctor Sigier, ready to begin, saw
+the stately senior standing, looked round for a seat for him, and then
+finding none, as the place was full, came down from his place, went to
+the newcomer, and with great respect, led him to the platform of
+his professor’s chair, and there gave him his stool to sit upon. The
+assembly hailed this mark of deference with a murmur of approval,
+recognizing the old man as the orator of a fine thesis admirably argued
+not long since at the Sorbonne.
+
+The stranger looked down from his raised position on the crowd below
+with that deep glance that held a whole poem of sorrow, and those who
+met his eye felt an indescribable thrill. The lad, following the old
+man, sat down on one of the steps, leaning against the pulpit in a
+graceful and melancholy attitude. The silence was now profound, and the
+doorway and even the street were blocked by scholars who had deserted
+the other classes.
+
+Doctor Sigier was to-day to recapitulate, in the last of a series of
+discourses, the views he had set forth in the former lectures on the
+Resurrection, Heaven, and Hell. His strange doctrine responded to
+the sympathies of the time, and gratified the immoderate love of the
+marvelous, which haunts the mind of man in every age. This effort of
+man to clutch the infinite, which for ever slips through his ineffectual
+grasp, this last tourney of thought against thought, was a task worthy
+of an assembly where the most stupendous human imagination ever known,
+perhaps, at that moment shone.
+
+The Doctor began by summing up in a mild and even tone the principal
+points he had so far established:
+
+“No intellect was the exact counterpart of another. Had man any right to
+require an account of his Creator for the inequality of powers bestowed
+on each? Without attempting to penetrate rashly into the designs of
+God, ought we not to recognize the fact that by reason of their general
+diversity intelligences could be classed in spheres? From the sphere
+where the least degree of intelligence gleamed, to the most translucent
+souls who could see the road by which to ascend to God, was there not
+an ascending scale of spiritual gift? And did not spirits of the same
+sphere understand each other like brothers in soul, in flesh, in mind,
+and in feeling?”
+
+From this the Doctor went on to unfold the most wonderful theories of
+sympathy. He set forth in Biblical language the phenomena of love, of
+instinctive repulsion, of strong affinities which transcend the laws
+of space, of the sudden mingling of souls which seem to recognize each
+other. With regard to the different degrees of strength of which our
+affections are capable, he accounted for them by the place, more or less
+near the centre, occupied by beings in their respective circles.
+
+He gave mathematical expression to God’s grand idea in the co-ordination
+of the various human spheres. “Through man,” he said, “these spheres
+constituted a world intermediate between the intelligence of the brute
+and the intelligence of the angels.” As he stated it, the divine Word
+nourishes the spiritual Word, the spiritual Word nourishes the living
+Word, the living Word nourishes the animal Word, the animal Word
+nourishes the vegetable Word, and the vegetable Word is the expression
+of the life of the barren Word. These successive evolutions, as of a
+chrysalis, which God thus wrought in our souls, this infusorial life,
+so to speak, communicated from each zone to the next, more vivid, more
+spiritual, more perceptive in its ascent, represented, rather dimly no
+doubt, but marvelously enough to his inexperienced hearers, the impulse
+given to Nature by the Almighty. Supported by many texts from the Sacred
+Scriptures, which he used as a commentary on his own statements to
+express by concrete images the abstract arguments he felt to be wanting,
+he flourished the Spirit of God like a torch over the deep secrets of
+creation, with an eloquence peculiar to himself, and accents that urged
+conviction on his audience. As he unfolded his mysterious system and
+all its consequences, he gave a key to every symbol and justified the
+vocation, the special gifts, the genius, the talent of each human being.
+
+Then, instinctively becoming physiological, he remarked on the
+resemblance to certain animals stamped on some human faces, accounting
+for them by primordial analogies and the upward tendency of all
+creation. He showed his audience the workings of Nature, and assigned
+a mission and a future to minerals, plants, and animals. Bible in
+hand, after thus spiritualizing Matter and materializing Spirit, after
+pointing to the Will of God in all things, and enjoining respect for
+His smallest works, he suggested the possibility of rising by faith from
+sphere to sphere.
+
+This was the first portion of his discourse, and by adroit
+digressions he applied the doctrine of his system to feudalism. The
+poetry--religious and profane--and the abrupt eloquence of that
+period had a grand opening in this vast theory, wherein the Doctor had
+amalgamated all the philosophical systems of the ancients, and from
+which he brought them out again classified, transfigured, purified. The
+false dogmas of two adverse principles and of Pantheism were demolished
+at his word, which proclaimed the Divine Unity, while ascribing to
+God and His angels the knowledge, the ends to which the means shone
+resplendent to the eyes of man. Fortified by the demonstrations that
+proved the existence of the world of Matter, Doctor Sigier constructed
+the scheme of a spiritual world dividing us from God by an ascending
+scale of spheres, just as the plant is divided from man by an infinite
+number of grades. He peopled the heavens, the stars, the planets, the
+sun.
+
+Quoting Saint Paul, he invested man with a new power; he might rise,
+from globe to globe, to the very Fount of eternal life. Jacob’s mystical
+ladder was both the religious formula and the traditional proof of the
+fact. He soared through space, carrying with him the passionate souls of
+his hearers on the wings of his word, making them feel the infinite, and
+bathing them in the heavenly sea. Then the Doctor accounted logically
+for hell by circles placed in inverse order to the shining spheres that
+lead to God, in which torments and darkness take the place of the
+Spirit and of light. Pain was as intelligible as rapture. The terms of
+comparison were present in the conditions of human life and its various
+atmospheres of suffering and of intellect. Thus the most extraordinary
+traditions of hell and purgatory were quite naturally conceivable.
+
+He gave the fundamental _rationale_ of virtue with admirable clearness.
+A pious man, toiling onward in poverty, proud of his good conscience,
+at peace with himself, and steadfastly true to himself in his heart
+in spite of the spectacle of exultant vice, was a fallen angel doing
+penance, who remembered his origin, foresaw his guerdon, accomplished
+his task, and obeyed his glorious mission. The sublime resignation of
+Christians was then seen in all its glory. He depicted martyrs at the
+burning stake, and almost stripped them of their merit by stripping
+them of their sufferings. He showed their inner angel as dwelling in the
+heavens, while the outer man was tortured by the executioner’s sword.
+He described angels dwelling among men, and gave tokens by which to
+recognize them.
+
+He next strove to drag from the very depths of man’s understanding the
+real sense of the word fall, which occurs in every language. He appealed
+to the most widely-spread traditions in evidence of this one true
+origin, explaining, with much lucidity, the passion all men have for
+rising, mounting--an instinctive ambition, the perennial revelations of
+our destiny.
+
+He displayed the whole universe at a glance, and described the nature
+of God Himself circulating in a full tide from the centre to the
+extremities, and from the extremities to the centre again. Nature was
+one and homogeneous. In the most seemingly trivial, as in the most
+stupendous work, everything obeyed that law; each created object
+reproduced in little an exact image of that nature--the sap in the
+plant, the blood in man, the orbits of the planets. He piled proof on
+proof, always completing his idea by a picture musical with poetry.
+
+And he boldly anticipated every objection. He thundered forth an
+eloquent challenge to the monumental works of science and human
+excrescences of knowledge, such as those which societies use the
+elements of the earthly globe to produce. He asked whether our wars, our
+disasters, our depravity could hinder the great movement given by God to
+all the globes; and he laughed human impotence to scorn by pointing
+to their efforts everywhere in ruins. He cried upon the manes of Tyre,
+Carthage, and Babylon; he called upon Babel and Jerusalem to appear;
+and sought, without finding them, the transient furrows made by the
+ploughshare of civilization. Humanity floated on the surface of the
+earth as a ship whose wake is lost in the calm level of ocean.
+
+These were the fundamental notions set forth in Doctor Sigier’s address,
+all wrapped in the mystical language and strange school Latin of the
+time. He had made a special study of the Scriptures, and they supplied
+him with the weapons with which he came before his contemporaries to
+hasten their progress. He hid his boldness under his immense learning,
+as with a cloak, and his philosophical bent under a saintly life. At
+this moment, after bringing his hearers face to face with God, after
+packing the universe into an idea, and almost unveiling the idea of the
+world, he gazed down on the silent, throbbing mass, and scrutinized the
+stranger with a look. Then, spurred on, no doubt, by the presence of
+this remarkable personage, he added these words, from which I have
+eliminated the corrupt Latinity of the Middle Ages:--
+
+“Where, think you, may a man find these fruitful truths if not in the
+heart of God Himself?--What am I?--The humble interpreter of a single
+line left to us by the greatest of the Apostles--a single line out of
+thousands all equally full of light. Before us, Saint Paul said, ‘_In
+Deo vivimus movemur et sumus_.’ In our day, less believing and more
+learned, or better instructed and more sceptical, we should ask the
+Apostle, ‘To what end this perpetual motion? Whither leads this life
+divided into zones? Wherefore an intelligence that begins with the
+obscure perfection of marble and proceeds from sphere to sphere up to
+man, up to the angel, up to God? Where is the Fount, where is the ocean,
+if life, attaining to God across worlds and stars, through Matter and
+Spirit, has to come down again to some other goal?’
+
+“You desire to see both aspects of the universe at once. You would adore
+the Sovereign on condition of being suffered to sit for an instant
+on His throne. Mad fools that we are! We will not admit that the most
+intelligent animals are able to understand our ideas and the object of
+our actions; we are merciless to the creatures of the inferior spheres,
+and exile them from our own; we deny them the faculty of divining human
+thoughts, and yet we ourselves would fain master the highest of all
+ideas--the Idea of the Idea!
+
+“Well, go then, start! Fly by faith up from globe to globe, soar through
+space! Thought, love, and faith are its mystical keys. Traverse the
+circles, reach the throne! God is more merciful than you are; He opens
+His temple to all His creatures. Only, do not forget the pattern of
+Moses; put your shoes from off your feet, cast off all filth, leave
+your body far behind; otherwise you shall be consumed; for God--God is
+Light!”
+
+Just as Doctor Sigier spoke these grand words, his face radiant, his
+hand uplifted, a sunbeam pierced through an open window, like a magic
+jet from a fount of splendor, a long triangular shaft of gold that lay
+like a scarf over the whole assembly. They all clapped their hands, for
+the audience accepted this effect of the sinking sun as a miracle. There
+was a universal cry of:
+
+“_Vivant_! _Vivant_!”
+
+The very sky seemed to shed approval. Godefroid, struck with reverence,
+looked from the old man to Doctor Sigier; they were talking together in
+an undertone.
+
+“All honor to the Master!” said the stranger.
+
+“What is such transient honor?” replied Sigier.
+
+“I would I could perpetuate my gratitude,” said the older man.
+
+“A line written by you is enough!” said the Doctor. “It would give me
+immortality, humanly speaking.”
+
+“Can I give what I have not?” cried the elder.
+
+Escorted by the crowd, which followed in their footsteps, like courtiers
+round a king, at a respectful distance, Godefroid, with the old man and
+the Doctor, made their way to the oozy shore, where as yet there were no
+houses, and where the ferryman was waiting for them. The Doctor and the
+stranger were talking together, not in Latin nor in any Gallic tongue,
+but in an unknown language, and very gravely. They pointed with their
+hands now to heaven and now to the earth. Sigier, to whom the paths by
+the river were familiar, guided the venerable stranger with particular
+care to the narrow planks which here and there bridged the mud; the
+following watched them inquisitively; and some of the students envied
+the privileged boy who might walk with these two great masters of
+speech. Finally, the Doctor took leave of the stranger, and the
+ferry-boat pushed off.
+
+At the moment when the boat was afloat on the wide river, communicating
+its motion to the soul, the sun pierced the clouds like a conflagration
+blazing up on the horizon, and poured forth a flood of light, coloring
+slate roof-tops and humbler thatch with a ruddy glow and tawny
+reflections, fringed Philippe Auguste’s towers with fire, flooded the
+sky, dyed the waters, gilded the plants, and aroused the half-sleeping
+insects. The immense shaft of light set the clouds on fire. It was like
+the last verse of the daily hymn. Every heart was thrilled; nature in
+such a moment is sublime.
+
+As he gazed at the spectacle, the stranger’s eyes moistened with the
+tenderest of human tears: Godefroid too was weeping; his trembling
+hand touched that of the elder man, who, looking round, confessed his
+emotion. But thinking his dignity as a man compromised, no doubt, to
+redeem it, he said in a deep voice:
+
+“I weep for my native land. I am an exile! Young man, in such an hour as
+this I left my home. There, at this hour, the fireflies are coming
+out of their fragile dwellings and clinging like diamond sparks to the
+leaves of the iris. At this hour the breeze, as sweet as the sweetest
+poetry, rises up from a valley bathed in light, bearing on its wings
+the richest fragrance. On the horizon I could see a golden city like
+the Heavenly Jerusalem--a city whose name I may not speak. There, too,
+a river winds. But that city and its buildings, that river of which
+the lovely vistas, and the pools of blue water, mingled, crossed,
+and embraced each other, which gladdened my sight and filled me with
+love--where are they?
+
+“At that hour the waters assumed fantastic hues under the sunset sky,
+and seemed to be painted pictures; the stars dropped tender streaks of
+light, the moon spread its pleasing snares; it gave another life to
+the trees, to the color and form of things, and a new aspect to the
+sparkling water, the silent hills, the eloquent buildings. The city
+spoke, it glittered, it called to me to return!
+
+“Columns of smoke rose up by the side of the ancient pillars, whose
+marble sheen gleamed white through the night; the lines of the horizon
+were still visible through the mists of evening; all was harmony and
+mystery. Nature would not say farewell; she desired to keep me there.
+Ah! It was all in all to me; my mother and my child, my wife and my
+glory! The very bells bewailed my condemnation. Oh, land of marvels!
+It is as beautiful as heaven. From that hour the wide world has been my
+dungeon. Beloved land, why hast thou rejected me?
+
+“But I shall triumph there yet!” he cried, speaking with an accent
+of such intense conviction and such a ringing tone, that the boatman
+started as at a trumpet call.
+
+The stranger was standing in a prophetic attitude and gazing southwards
+into the blue, pointing to his native home across the skyey regions.
+The ascetic pallor of his face had given place to a glow of triumph, his
+eyes flashed, he was as grand as a lion shaking his mane.
+
+“But you, poor child,” he went on, looking at Godefroid, whose cheeks
+were beaded with glittering tears, “have you, like me, studied life from
+blood-stained pages? What can you have to weep for, at your age?”
+
+“Alas!” said Godefroid, “I regret a land more beautiful than any land
+on earth--a land I never saw and yet remember. Oh, if I could but cleave
+the air on beating wings, I would fly----”
+
+“Whither?” asked the exile.
+
+“Up there,” replied the boy.
+
+On hearing this answer, the stranger seemed surprised; he looked darkly
+at the youth, who remained silent. They seemed to communicate by an
+unspeakable effusion of the spirit, hearing each other’s yearnings
+in the teeming silence, and going forth side by side, like two doves
+sweeping the air on equal wing, till the boat, touching the strand of
+the island, roused them from their deep reverie.
+
+Then, each lost in thought, they went together to the sergeant’s house.
+
+“And so the boy believes that he is an angel exiled from heaven!”
+ thought the tall stranger. “Which of us all has a right to undeceive
+him? Not I--I, who am so often lifted by some magic spell so far above
+the earth; I who am dedicate to God; I who am a mystery to myself. Have
+I not already seen the fairest of the angels dwelling in this mire? Is
+this child more or less crazed than I am? Has he taken a bolder step
+in the way of faith? He believes, and his belief no doubt will lead him
+into some path of light like that in which I walk. But though he is
+as beautiful as an angel, is he not too feeble to stand fast in such a
+struggle?”
+
+Abashed by the presence of his companion, whose voice of thunder
+expressed to him his own thoughts, as lightning expresses the will of
+Heaven, the boy was satisfied to gaze at the stars with a lover’s eyes.
+Overwhelmed by a luxury of sentiment, which weighed on his heart, he
+stood there timid and weak--a midge in the sunbeams. Sigier’s discourse
+had proved to them the mysteries of the spiritual world; the tall, old
+man was to invest them with glory; the lad felt them in himself,
+though he could in no way express them. The three represented in living
+embodiment Science, Poetry, and Feeling.
+
+
+
+On going into the house, the Exile shut himself into his room, lighted
+the inspiring lamp, and gave himself over to the ruthless demon of Work,
+seeking words of the silence and ideas of the night. Godefroid sat down
+in his window sill, by turns gazing at the moon reflected in the water,
+and studying the mysteries of the sky. Lost in one of the trances that
+were frequent to him, he traveled from sphere to sphere, from vision to
+vision, listening for obscure rustlings and the voices of angels, and
+believing that he heard them; seeing, or fancying that he saw, a divine
+radiance in which he lost himself; striving to attain the far-away goal,
+the source of all light, the fount of all harmony.
+
+Presently the vast clamor of Paris, brought down on the current, was
+hushed; lights were extinguished one by one in the houses; silence
+spread over all; and the huge city slept like a tired giant.
+
+Midnight struck. The least noise, the fall of a leaf, or the flight of
+a jackdaw changing its perching-place among the pinnacles of Notre-Dame,
+would have been enough to bring the stranger’s mind to earth again, to
+have made the youth drop from the celestial heights to which his soul
+had soared on the wings of rapture.
+
+And then the old man heard with dismay a groan mingling with the sound
+of a heavy fall--the fall, as his experienced ear assured him, of a dead
+body. He hastened into Godefroid’s room, and saw him lying in a heap
+with a long rope tight round his neck, the end meandering over the
+floor.
+
+When he had untied it, the poor lad opened his eyes.
+
+“Where am I?” he asked, with a hopeful gleam.
+
+“In your own room,” said the elder man, looking with surprise at
+Godefroid’s neck, and at the nail to which the cord had been tied, and
+which was still in the knot.
+
+“In heaven?” said the boy, in a voice of music.
+
+“No; on earth!”
+
+Godefroid rose and walked along the path of light traced on the floor
+by the moon through the window, which stood open; he saw the rippling
+Seine, the willows and plants on the island. A misty atmosphere hung
+over the waters like a smokey floor.
+
+On seeing the view, to him so heartbreaking, he folded his hands over
+his bosom, and stood in an attitude of despair; the Exile came up to him
+with astonishment on his face.
+
+“You meant to kill yourself?” he asked.
+
+“Yes,” replied Godefroid, while the stranger passed his hand about his
+neck again and again to feel the place where the rope had tightened on
+it.
+
+But for some slight bruises, the young man had been but little hurt. His
+friend supposed that the nail had given way at once under the weight of
+the body, and the terrible attempt had ended in a fall without injury.
+
+“And why, dear lad, did you try to kill yourself?”
+
+“Alas!” said Godefroid, no longer restraining the tears that rolled down
+his cheeks, “I heard the Voice from on high; it called me by name! It
+had never named me before, but this time it bade me to Heaven! Oh, how
+sweet is that voice!--As I could not fly to Heaven,” he added artlessly,
+“I took the only way we know of going to God.”
+
+“My child! oh, sublime boy!” cried the old man, throwing his arms round
+Godefroid, and clasping him to his heart. “You are a poet; you can
+boldly ride the whirlwind! Your poetry does not proceed from your heart;
+your living, burning thoughts, your creations, move and grow in your
+soul.--Go, never reveal your ideas to the vulgar! Be at once the altar,
+the priest, and the victim!
+
+“You know Heaven, do you not? You have seen those myriads of angels,
+white-winged, and holding golden sistrums, all soaring with equal flight
+towards the Throne, and you have often seen their pinions moving at the
+breath of God as the trees of the forest bow with one consent before the
+storm. Ah, how glorious is unlimited space! Tell me.”
+
+The stranger clasped Godefroid’s hand convulsively, and they both gazed
+at the firmament, whence the stars seemed to shed gentle poetry which
+they could bear.
+
+“Oh, to see God!” murmured Godefroid.
+
+“Child!” said the old man suddenly, in a sterner voice, “have you so
+soon forgotten the holy teaching of our good master, Doctor Sigier? In
+order to return, you to your heavenly home, and I to my native land on
+earth, must we not obey the voice of God? We must walk on resignedly
+in the stony paths where His almighty finger points the way. Do not
+you quail at the thought of the danger to which you exposed yourself?
+Arriving there without being bidden, and saying, ‘Here I am!’ before
+your time, would you not have been cast back into a world beneath that
+where your soul now hovers? Poor outcast cherub! Should you not rather
+bless God for having suffered you to live in a sphere where you may hear
+none but heavenly harmonies? Are you not as pure as a diamond, as lovely
+as a flower?
+
+“Think what it is to know, like me, only the City of Sorrows!--Dwelling
+there I have worn out my heart.--To search the tombs for their horrible
+secrets; to wipe hands steeped in blood, counting them over night after
+night, seeing them rise up before me imploring forgiveness which I may
+not grant; to mark the writhing of the assassin and the last shriek
+of his victim; to listen to appalling noises and fearful silence, the
+silence of a father devouring his dead sons; to wonder at the laughter
+of the damned; to look for some human form among the livid heaps wrung
+and trampled by crime; to learn words such as living men may not hear
+without dying; to call perpetually on the dead, and always to accuse and
+condemn!--Is that living?”
+
+“Cease!” cried Godefroid; “I cannot see you or hear you any further!
+My reason wanders, my eyes are dim. You light a fire within me which
+consumes me.”
+
+“And yet I must go on!” said the senior, waving his hand with a strange
+gesture that worked on the youth like a spell.
+
+For a moment the old man fixed Godefroid with his large, weary,
+lightless eyes; then he pointed with one finger to the ground. A gulf
+seemed to open at his bidding. He remained standing in the doubtful
+light of the moon; it lent a glory to his brow which reflected an almost
+solar gleam. Though at first a somewhat disdainful expression lurked in
+the wrinkles of his face, his look presently assumed the fixity which
+seems to gaze on an object invisible to the ordinary organs of sight.
+His eyes, no doubt, were seeing then the remoter images which the grave
+has in store for us.
+
+Never, perhaps, had this man presented so grand an aspect. A terrible
+struggle was going on in his soul, and reacted on his outer frame;
+strong man as he seemed to be, he bent as a reed bows under the breeze
+that comes before a storm. Godefroid stood motionless, speechless,
+spellbound; some inexplicable force nailed him to the floor; and, as
+happens when our attention takes us out of ourselves while watching a
+fire or a battle, he was wholly unconscious of his body.
+
+“Shall I tell you the fate to which you were hastening, poor angel
+of love? Listen! It has been given to me to see immeasurable space,
+bottomless gulfs in which all human creations are swallowed up, the
+shoreless sea whither flows the vast stream of men and of angels. As I
+made my way through the realms of eternal torment, I was sheltered under
+the cloak of an immortal--the robe of glory due to genius, and which the
+ages hand on--I, a frail mortal! When I wandered through the fields of
+light where the happy souls play, I was borne up by the love of a woman,
+the wings of an angel; resting on her heart, I could taste the ineffable
+pleasures whose touch is more perilous to us mortals than are the
+torments of the worser world.
+
+“As I achieved my pilgrimage through the dark regions below I had
+mounted from torture to torture, from crime to crime, from punishment to
+punishment, from awful silence to heartrending cries, till I reached the
+uppermost circle of Hell. Already, from afar, I could see the glory of
+Paradise shining at a vast distance; I was still in darkness, but on the
+borders of day. I flew, upheld by my Guide, borne along by a power akin
+to that which, during our dreams, wafts us to spheres invisible to the
+eye of the body. The halo that crowned our heads seared away the shades
+as we passed, like impalpable dust. Far above us the suns of all the
+worlds shone with scarce so much light as the twinkling fireflies of my
+native land. I was soaring towards the fields of air where, round about
+Paradise, the bodies of light are in closer array, where the azure is
+easy to pass through, where worlds innumerable spring like flowers in a
+meadow.
+
+“There, on the last level of the circles where those phantoms dwell that
+I had left behind me, like sorrows one would fain forget, I saw a vast
+shade. Standing in an attitude of aspiration, that soul looked eagerly
+into space; his feet were riveted by the will of God to the topmost
+point of the margin, and he remained for ever in the painful strain by
+which we project our purpose when we long to soar, as birds about to
+take wing. I saw the man; he neither looked at us nor heard us; every
+muscle quivered and throbbed; at each separate instant he seemed to
+feel, though he did not move, all the fatigue of traversing the infinite
+that divided him from Paradise where, as he gazed steadfastly, he
+believed he had glimpses of a beloved image. At this last gate of Hell,
+as at the first, I saw the stamp of despair even in hope. The hapless
+creature was so fearfully held by some unseen force, that his anguish
+entered into my bones and froze my blood. I shrank closer to my Guide,
+whose protection restored me to peace and silence.
+
+“Suddenly the Shade gave a cry of joy--a cry as shrill as that of the
+mother bird that sees a hawk in the air, or suspects its presence. We
+looked where he was looking, and saw, as it were, a sapphire, floating
+high up in the abysses of light. The glowing star fell with the
+swiftness of a sunbeam when it flashes over the horizon in the morning
+and its first rays shoot across the world. The Splendor became clearer
+and grew larger; presently I beheld the cloud of glory in which the
+angels move--a shining vapor that emanates from their divine substance,
+and that glitters here and there like tongues of flame. A noble face,
+whose glory none may endure that have not won the mantle, the laurel,
+and the palm--the attribute of the Powers--rose above this cloud as
+white and pure as snow. It was Light within light. His wings as they
+waved shed dazzling ripples in the spheres through which he descended,
+as the glance of God pierces through the universe. At last I saw the
+archangel in all his glory. The flower of eternal beauty that belongs to
+the angels of the Spirit shone in him. In one hand he held a green
+palm branch, in the other a sword of flame: the palm to bestow on the
+pardoned soul, the sword to drive back all the hosts of Hell with one
+sweep. As he approached, the perfumes of Heaven fell upon us as dew. In
+the region where the archangel paused, the air took the hues of opal,
+and moved in eddies of which he was the centre. He paused, looked at the
+Shade, and said:
+
+“‘To-morrow.’
+
+“Then he turned heavenwards once more, spread his wings, and clove
+through space as a vessel cuts through the waves, hardly showing her
+white sails to the exiles left on some deserted shore.
+
+“The Shade uttered appalling cries, to which the damned responded from
+the lowest circle, the deepest in the immensity of suffering, to the
+more peaceful zone near the surface on which we were standing. This
+worst torment of all had appealed to all the rest. The turmoil was
+swelled by the roar of a sea of fire which formed a bass to the terrific
+harmony of endless millions of suffering souls.
+
+“Then suddenly the Shade took flight through the doleful city, and down
+to its place at the very bottom of Hell; but as suddenly it came up
+again, turned, soared through the endless circles in every direction,
+as a vulture, confined for the first time in a cage, exhausts itself in
+vain efforts. The Shade was free to do this; he could wander through the
+zones of Hell icy, fetid, or scorching without enduring their pangs; he
+glided into that vastness as a sunbeam makes its way into the deepest
+dark.
+
+“‘God has not condemned him to any torment,’ said the Master; ‘but not
+one of the souls you have seen suffering their various punishments would
+exchange his anguish for the hope that is consuming this soul.’
+
+“And just then the Shade came back to us, brought thither by an
+irresistible force which condemned him to perch on the verge of Hell. My
+divine Guide, guessing my curiosity, touched the unhappy Shade with his
+palm-branch. He, who was perhaps trying to measure the age of sorrow
+that divided him from that ever-vanishing ‘To-morrow,’ started and gave
+a look full of all the tears he had already shed.
+
+“‘You would know my woe?’ said he sadly. ‘Oh, I love to tell it. I am
+here, Teresa is above; that is all. On earth we were happy, we were
+always together. When I saw my loved Teresa Donati for the first time,
+she was ten years old. We loved each other even then, not knowing what
+love meant. Our lives were one; I turned pale if she were pale, I was
+happy in her joy; we gave ourselves up to the pleasure of thinking and
+feeling together; and we learned what love was, each through the other.
+We were wedded at Cremona; we never saw each other’s lips but decked
+with pearls of a smile; our eyes always shone; our hair, like our
+desires, flowed together; our heads were always bent over one book when
+we read, our feet walked in equal step. Life was one long kiss, our home
+was a nest.
+
+“‘One day, for the first time, Teresa turned pale and said, “I am in
+pain!”--And I was not in pain!
+
+“‘She never rose again. I saw her sweet face change, her golden hair
+fade--and I did not die! She smiled to hide her sufferings, but I could
+read them in her blue eyes, of which I could interpret the slightest
+trembling. “Honorino, I love you!” said she, at the very moment when her
+lips turned white, and she was clasping my hand still in hers when death
+chilled them. So I killed myself that she might not lie alone in her
+sepulchral bed, under her marble sheet. Teresa is above and I am here.
+I could not bear to leave her, but God has divided us. Why, then, did
+He unite us on earth? He is jealous! Paradise was no doubt so much the
+fairer on the day when Teresa entered in.
+
+“‘Do you see her? She is sad in her bliss; she is parted from me!
+Paradise must be a desert to her.’
+
+“‘Master,’ said I with tears, for I thought of my love, ‘when this one
+shall desire Paradise for God’s sake alone, shall he not be delivered?’
+And the Father of Poets mildly bowed his head in sign of assent.
+
+“We departed, cleaving the air, and making no more noise than the birds
+that pass overhead sometimes when we lie in the shade of a tree. It
+would have been vain to try to check the hapless shade in his blasphemy.
+It is one of the griefs of the angels of darkness that they can never
+see the light even when they are surrounded by it. He would not have
+understood us.”
+
+
+
+At this moment the swift approach of many horses rang through the
+stillness, the dog barked, the constable’s deep growl replied; the
+horsemen dismounted, knocked at the door; the noise was so unexpected
+that it seemed like some sudden explosion.
+
+The two exiles, the two poets, fell to earth through all the space that
+divides us from the skies. The painful shock of this fall rushed through
+their veins like strange blood, hissing as it seemed, and full of
+scorching sparks. Their pain was like an electric discharge. The loud,
+heavy step of a man-at-arms sounded on the stairs with the iron clank of
+his sword, his cuirass, and spurs; a soldier presently stood before the
+astonished stranger.
+
+“We can return to Florence,” said the man, whose bass voice sounded soft
+as he spoke in Italian.
+
+“What is that you say?” asked the old man.
+
+“The _Bianchi_ are triumphant.”
+
+“Are you not mistaken?” asked the poet.
+
+“No, dear Dante!” replied the soldier, whose warlike tones rang with the
+thrill of battle and the exultation of victory.
+
+“To Florence! To Florence! Ah, my Florence!” cried Dante Alighieri,
+drawing himself up, and gazing into the distance. In fancy he saw Italy;
+he was gigantic.
+
+“But I--when shall I be in Heaven?” said Godefroid, kneeling on one knee
+before the immortal poet, like an angel before the sanctuary.
+
+“Come to Florence,” said Dante in compassionate tones. “Come! when you
+see its lovely landscape from the heights of Fiesole you will fancy
+yourself in Paradise.”
+
+The soldier smiled. For the first time, perhaps for the only time in his
+life, Dante’s gloomy and solemn features wore a look of joy; his eyes
+and brows expressed the happiness he has depicted so lavishly in his
+vision of Paradise. He thought perhaps that he heard the voice of
+Beatrice.
+
+A light step, and the rustle of a woman’s gown, were audible in the
+silence. Dawn was now showing its first streaks of light. The fair
+Comtesse de Mahaut came in and flew to Godefroid.
+
+“Come, my child, my son! I may at last acknowledge you. Your birth is
+recognized, your rights are under the protection of the King of France,
+and you will find Paradise in your mother’s heart.”
+
+“I hear, I know, the voice of Heaven!” cried the youth in rapture.
+
+The exclamation roused Dante, who saw the young man folded in the
+Countess’ arms. He took leave of them with a look, and left his young
+companion on his mother’s bosom.
+
+“Come away!” he cried in a voice of thunder. “Death to the Guelphs!”
+
+
+PARIS, October 1831.
+
+
+
+
+
+
+End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of The Exiles, by Honore de Balzac
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+  <head>
+    <title>
+      The Exiles, by Honore de Balzac
+    </title>
+    <style type="text/css" xml:space="preserve">
+
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+    .toc       { margin-left: 10%; margin-bottom: .75em;}
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+               margin: 0; padding: 0; position: absolute; right: 1%;
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+<pre xml:space="preserve">
+
+The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Exiles, by Honore de Balzac
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+Title: The Exiles
+
+Author: Honore de Balzac
+
+Translator: Clara Bell and James Waring
+
+Release Date: March 5, 2010 [EBook #1884]
+Last Updated: November 22, 2016
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: UTF-8
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE EXILES ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by John Bickers, and Dagny, and David Widger
+
+
+
+
+
+
+</pre>
+    <p>
+      <br /><br />
+    </p>
+    <h1>
+      THE EXILES
+    </h1>
+    <p>
+      <br /><br />
+    </p>
+    <h2>
+      By Honore de Balzac
+    </h2>
+    <p>
+      <br /><br />
+    </p>
+    <h3>
+      Translated by Clara Bell and James Waring
+    </h3>
+    <p>
+      <br /> <br />
+    </p>
+    <hr />
+    <p>
+      <br /> <br />
+    </p>
+    <h1>
+      ALMAE SORORI
+    </h1>
+    <p>
+      <br />
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      In the year 1308 few houses were yet standing on the Island formed by the
+      alluvium and sand deposited by the Seine above the Cite, behind the Church
+      of Notre-Dame. The first man who was so bold as to build on this strand,
+      then liable to frequent floods, was a constable of the watch of the City
+      of Paris, who had been able to do some service to their Reverences the
+      Chapter of the Cathedral; and in return the Bishop leased him twenty-five
+      perches of land, with exemptions from all feudal dues or taxes on the
+      buildings he might erect.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Seven years before the beginning of this narrative, Joseph Tirechair, one
+      of the sternest of Paris constables, as his name (Tear Flesh) would
+      indicate, had, thanks to his share of the fines collected by him for
+      delinquencies committed within the precincts of the Cite, had been able to
+      build a house on the bank of the Seine just at the end of the Rue du
+      Port-Saint-Landry. To protect the merchandise landed on the strand, the
+      municipality had constructed a sort of break-water of masonry, which may
+      still be seen on some old plans of Paris, and which preserved the piles of
+      the landing-place by meeting the rush of water and ice at the upper end of
+      the Island. The constable had taken advantage of this for the foundation
+      of his house, so that there were several steps up to his door.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Like all the houses of that date, this cottage was crowned by a peaked
+      roof, forming a gable-end to the front, or half a diamond. To the great
+      regret of historians, but two or three examples of such roofs survive in
+      Paris. A round opening gave light to a loft, where the constable&rsquo;s wife
+      dried the linen of the Chapter, for she had the honor of washing for the
+      Cathedral&mdash;which was certainly not a bad customer. On the first floor
+      were two rooms, let to lodgers at a rent, one year with another, of forty
+      sous <i>Parisis</i> each, an exorbitant sum, that was however justified by
+      the luxury Tirechair had lavished on their adornment. Flanders tapestry
+      hung on the walls, and a large bed with a top valance of green serge, like
+      a peasant&rsquo;s bed, was amply furnished with mattresses, and covered with
+      good sheets of fine linen. Each room had a stove called a <i>chauffe-doux</i>;
+      the floor, carefully polished by Dame Tirechair&rsquo;s apprentices, shone like
+      the woodwork of a shrine. Instead of stools, the lodgers had deep chairs
+      of carved walnut, the spoils probably of some raided castle. Two chests
+      with pewter mouldings, and tables on twisted legs, completed the fittings,
+      worthy of the most fastidious knights-banneret whom business might bring
+      to Paris.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The windows of those two rooms looked out on the river. From one you could
+      only see the shores of the Seine, and the three barren islands, of which
+      two were subsequently joined together to form the Ile Saint-Louis; the
+      third was the Ile de Louviers. From the other could be seen, down a vista
+      of the Port-Saint-Landry, the buildings on the Greve, the Bridge of
+      Notre-Dame, with its houses, and the tall towers of the Louvre, but lately
+      built by Philippe-Auguste to overlook the then poor and squalid town of
+      Paris, which suggests so many imaginary marvels to the fancy of modern
+      romancers.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The ground floor of Tirechair&rsquo;s house consisted of a large hall, where his
+      wife&rsquo;s business was carried on, through which the lodgers were obliged to
+      pass on their way to their own rooms up a stairway like a mill-ladder.
+      Behind this were a kitchen and a bedroom, with a view over the Seine. A
+      tiny garden, reclaimed from the waters, displayed at the foot of this
+      modest dwelling its beds of cabbages and onions, and a few rose-bushes,
+      sheltered by palings, forming a sort of hedge. A little structure of lath
+      and mud served as a kennel for a big dog, the indispensable guardian of so
+      lonely a dwelling. Beyond this kennel was a little plot, where the hens
+      cackled whose eggs were sold to the Canons. Here and there on this patch
+      of earth, muddy or dry according to the whimsical Parisian weather, a few
+      trees grew, constantly lashed by the wind, and teased and broken by the
+      passer-by&mdash;willows, reeds, and tall grasses.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The Eyot, the Seine, the landing-place, the house, were all overshadowed
+      on the west by the huge basilica of Notre-Dame casting its cold gloom over
+      the whole plot as the sun moved. Then, as now, there was not in all Paris
+      a more deserted spot, a more solemn or more melancholy prospect. The noise
+      of waters, the chanting of priests, or the piping of the wind, were the
+      only sounds that disturbed this wilderness, where lovers would sometimes
+      meet to discuss their secrets when the church-folds and clergy were safe
+      in church at the services.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      One evening in April in the year 1308, Tirechair came home in a remarkably
+      bad temper. For three days past everything had been in good order on the
+      King&rsquo;s highway. Now, as an officer of the peace, nothing annoyed him so
+      much as to feel himself useless. He flung down his halbert in a rage,
+      muttered inarticulate words as he pulled off his doublet, half red and
+      half blue, and slipped on a shabby camlet jerkin. After helping himself
+      from the bread-box to a hunch of bread, and spreading it with butter, he
+      seated himself on a bench, looked round at his four whitewashed walls,
+      counted the beams of the ceiling, made a mental inventory of the household
+      goods hanging from the nails, scowled at the neatness which left him
+      nothing to complain of, and looked at his wife, who said not a word as she
+      ironed the albs and surplices from the sacristy.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;By my halidom,&rdquo; he said, to open the conversation, &ldquo;I cannot think,
+      Jacqueline, where you go to catch your apprenticed maids. Now, here is
+      one,&rdquo; he went on, pointing to a girl who was folding an altar-cloth,
+      clumsily enough, it must be owned, &ldquo;who looks to me more like a damsel
+      rather free of her person than a sturdy country wench. Her hands are as
+      white as a fine lady&rsquo;s! By the Mass! and her hair smells of essences, I
+      verily believe, and her hose are as find as a queen&rsquo;s. By the two horns of
+      Old Nick, matters please me but ill as I find them here.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The girl colored, and stole a look at Jacqueline, full of alarm not
+      unmixed with pride. The mistress answered her glance with a smile, laid
+      down her work, and turned to her husband.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Come now,&rdquo; said she, in a sharp tone, &ldquo;you need not harry me. Are you
+      going to accuse me next of some underhand tricks? Patrol your roads as
+      much as you please, but do not meddle here with anything but what concerns
+      your sleeping in peace, drinking your wine, and eating what I set before
+      you, or else, I warn you, I will have no more to do with keeping you
+      healthy and happy. Let any one find me a happier man in all the town,&rdquo; she
+      went on, with a scolding grimace. &ldquo;He has silver in his purse, a gable
+      over the Seine, a stout halbert on one hand, an honest wife on the other,
+      a house as clean and smart as a new pin! And he growls like a pilgrim
+      smarting from Saint Anthony&rsquo;s fire!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Hey day!&rdquo; exclaimed the sergeant of the watch, &ldquo;do you fancy, Jacqueline,
+      that I have any wish to see my house razed down, my halbert given to
+      another, and my wife standing in the pillory?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Jacqueline and the dainty journeywoman turned pale.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Just tell me what you are driving at,&rdquo; said the washerwoman sharply, &ldquo;and
+      make a clean breast of it. For some days, my man, I have observed that you
+      have some maggot twisting in your poor brain. Come up, then, and have it
+      all out. You must be a pretty coward indeed if you fear any harm when you
+      have only to guard the common council and live under the protection of the
+      Chapter! Their Reverences the Canons would lay the whole bishopric under
+      an interdict if Jacqueline brought a complaint of the smallest damage.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      As she spoke, she went straight up to her husband and took him by the arm.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Come with me,&rdquo; she added, pulling him up and out on to the steps.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      When they were down by the water in their little garden, Jacqueline looked
+      saucily in her husband&rsquo;s face.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I would have you to know, you old gaby, that when my lady fair goes out,
+      a piece of gold comes into our savings-box.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Oh, ho!&rdquo; said the constable, who stood silent and meditative before his
+      wife. But he presently said, &ldquo;Any way, we are done for.&mdash;What brings
+      the dame to our house?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;She comes to see the well-favored young clerk who lives overhead,&rdquo;
+       replied Jacqueline, looking up at the window that opened on to the vast
+      landscape of the Seine valley.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;The Devil&rsquo;s in it!&rdquo; cried the man. &ldquo;For a few base crowns you have ruined
+      me, Jacqueline. Is that an honest trade for a sergeant&rsquo;s decent wife to
+      ply? And, be she Countess or Baroness, the lady will not be able to get us
+      out of the trap in which we shall find ourselves caught sooner or later.
+      Shall we not have to square accounts with some puissant and offended
+      husband? for, by the Mass, she is fair to look upon!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;But she is a widow, I tell you, gray gander! How dare you accuse your
+      wife of foul play and folly? And the lady has never spoken a word to yon
+      gentle clerk, she is content to look on him and think of him. Poor lad! he
+      would be dead of starvation by now but for her, for she is as good as a
+      mother to him. And he, the sweet cherub! it is as easy to cheat him as to
+      rock a new-born babe. He believes his pence will last for ever, and he has
+      eaten them through twice over in the past six months.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Woman,&rdquo; said the sergeant, solemnly pointing to the Place de Greve, &ldquo;do
+      you remember seeing, even from this spot, the fire in which they burnt the
+      Danish woman the other day?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What then?&rdquo; said Jacqueline, in a fright.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What then?&rdquo; echoed Tirechair. &ldquo;Why, the two men who lodge with us smell
+      of scorching. Neither Chapter nor Countess or Protector can serve them.
+      Here is Easter come round; the year is ending; we must turn our company
+      out of doors, and that at once. Do you think you can teach an old
+      constable how to know a gallows-bird? Our two lodgers were on terms with
+      la Porette, that heretic jade from Denmark or Norway, whose last cries you
+      heard from here. She was a brave witch; she never blenched at the stake,
+      which was proof enough of her compact with the Devil. I saw her as plain
+      as I see you; she preached to the throng, and declared she was in heaven
+      and could see God.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And since that, I tell you, I have never slept quietly in my bed. My
+      lord, who lodges over us, is of a surety more of a wizard than a
+      Christian. On my word as an officer, I shiver when that old man passes
+      near me; he never sleeps of nights; if I wake, his voice is ringing like a
+      bourdon of bells, and I hear him muttering incantations in the language of
+      hell. Have you ever seen him eat an honest crust of bread or a hearth-cake
+      made by a good Catholic baker? His brown skin has been scorched and tanned
+      by hell-fires. Marry, and I tell you his eyes hold a spell like that of
+      serpents. Jacqueline, I will have none of those two men under my roof. I
+      see too much of the law not to know that it is well to have nothing to do
+      with it.&mdash;You must get rid of our two lodgers; the elder because I
+      suspect him; the youngster, because he is too pretty. They neither of them
+      seem to me to keep Christian company. The boy is ever staring at the moon,
+      the stars, and the clouds, like a wizard watching for the hour when he
+      shall mount his broomstick; the other old rogue certainly makes some use
+      of the poor boy for his black art. My house stands too close to the river
+      as it is, and that risk of ruin is bad enough without bringing down fire
+      from heaven, or the love affairs of a countess. I have spoken. Do not
+      rebel.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      In spite of her sway in the house, Jacqueline stood stupefied as she
+      listened to the edict fulminated against his lodgers by the sergeant of
+      the watch. She mechanically looked up at the window of the room inhabited
+      by the old man, and shivered with horror as she suddenly caught sight of
+      the gloomy, melancholy face, and the piercing eye that so affected her
+      husband, accustomed as he was to dealing with criminals.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      At that period, great and small, priests and laymen, all trembled before
+      the idea of any supernatural power. The word &ldquo;magic&rdquo; was as powerful as
+      leprosy to root up feelings, break social ties, and freeze piety in the
+      most generous soul. It suddenly struck the constable&rsquo;s wife that she had
+      never, in fact, seen either of her lodgers exercising any human function.
+      Though the younger man&rsquo;s voice was as sweet and melodious as the tones of
+      a flute, she so rarely heard it that she was tempted to think his silence
+      the result of a spell. As she recalled the strange beauty of that
+      pink-and-white face, and saw in memory the fine hair and moist brilliancy
+      of those eyes, she believed that they were indeed the artifices of the
+      Devil. She remembered that for days at a time she had never heard the
+      slightest sound from either room. Where were the strangers during all
+      those hours?
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Suddenly the most singular circumstances recurred to her mind. She was
+      completely overmastered by fear, and could even discern witchcraft in the
+      rich lady&rsquo;s interest in the young Godefroid, a poor orphan who had come
+      from Flanders to study at the University of Paris. She hastily put her
+      hand into one of her pockets, pulled out four livres of Tournay in large
+      silver coinage, and looked at the pieces with an expression of avarice
+      mingled with terror.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;That, at any rate, is not false coin,&rdquo; said she, showing the silver to
+      her husband. &ldquo;Besides,&rdquo; she went on, &ldquo;how can I turn them out after taking
+      next year&rsquo;s rent paid in advance?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You had better inquire of the Dean of the Chapter,&rdquo; replied Tirechair.
+      &ldquo;Is not it his business to tell us how we should deal with these
+      extraordinary persons?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ay, truly extraordinary,&rdquo; cried Jacqueline. &ldquo;To think of their cunning;
+      coming here under the very shadow of Notre-Dame! Still,&rdquo; she went on, &ldquo;or
+      ever I ask the Dean, why not warn that fair and noble lady of the risk she
+      runs?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      As she spoke, Jacqueline went into the house with her husband, who had not
+      missed a mouthful. Tirechair, as a man grown old in the tricks of his
+      trade, affected to believe that the strange lady was in fact a work-girl;
+      still, this assumed indifference could not altogether cloak the timidity
+      of a courtier who respects a royal incognity. At this moment six was
+      striking by the clock of Saint-Denis du Pas, a small church that stood
+      between Notre-Dame and the Port-Saint-Landry&mdash;the first church
+      erected in Paris, on the very spot where Saint-Denis was laid on the
+      gridiron, as chronicles tell. The hour flew from steeple to tower all over
+      the city. Then suddenly confused shouts were heard on the left bank of the
+      Seine, behind Notre-Dame, in the quarter where the schools of the
+      University harbored their swarms.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      At this signal, Jacqueline&rsquo;s elder lodger began to move about his room.
+      The sergeant, his wife, and the strange lady listened while he opened and
+      shut his door, and the old man&rsquo;s heavy step was heard on the steep stair.
+      The constable&rsquo;s suspicions gave such interest to the advent of this
+      personage, that the lady was startled as she observed the strange
+      expression of the two countenances before her. Referring the terrors of
+      this couple to the youth she was protecting&mdash;as was natural in a
+      lover&mdash;the young lady awaited, with some uneasiness, the event thus
+      heralded by the fears of her so-called master and mistress.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The old man paused for a moment on the threshold to scrutinize the three
+      persons in the room, and seemed to be looking for his young companion.
+      This glance of inquiry, unsuspicious as it was, agitated the three.
+      Indeed, nobody, not even the stoutest man, could deny that Nature had
+      bestowed exceptional powers on this being, who seemed almost supernatural.
+      Though his eyes were somewhat deeply shaded by the wide sockets fringed
+      with long eyebrows, they were set, like a kite&rsquo;s eyes, in eyelids so
+      broad, and bordered by so dark a circle sharply defined on his cheek, that
+      they seemed rather prominent. These singular eyes had in them something
+      indescribably domineering and piercing, which took possession of the soul
+      by a grave and thoughtful look, a look as bright and lucid as that of a
+      serpent or a bird, but which held one fascinated and crushed by the swift
+      communication of some tremendous sorrow, or of some super-human power.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Every feature was in harmony with this eye of lead and of fire, at once
+      rigid and flashing, stern and calm. While in this eagle eye earthly
+      emotions seemed in some sort extinct, the lean, parched face also bore
+      traces of unhappy passions and great deeds done. The nose, which was
+      narrow and aquiline, was so long that it seemed to hang on by the
+      nostrils. The bones of the face were strongly marked by the long, straight
+      wrinkles that furrowed the hollow cheeks. Every line in the countenance
+      looked dark. It would suggest the bed of a torrent where the violence of
+      former floods was recorded in the depth of the water-courses, which
+      testified to some terrible, unceasing turmoil. Like the ripples left by
+      the oars of a boat on the waters, deep lines, starting from each side of
+      his nose, marked his face strongly, and gave an expression of bitter
+      sadness to his mouth, which was firm and straight-lipped. Above the storm
+      thus stamped on his countenance, his calm brow rose with what may be
+      called boldness, and crowned it as with a marble dome.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The stranger preserved that intrepid and dignified manner that is
+      frequently habitual with men inured to disaster, and fitted by nature to
+      stand unmoved before a furious mob and to face the greatest dangers. He
+      seemed to move in a sphere apart, where he poised above humanity. His
+      gestures, no less than his look, were full of irresistible power; his lean
+      hands were those of a soldier; and if your own eyes were forced to fall
+      before his piercing gaze, you were no less sure to tremble when by word or
+      action he spoke to your soul. He moved in silent majesty that made him
+      seem a king without his guard, a god without his rays.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      His dress emphasized the ideas suggested by the peculiarities of his mien
+      and face. Soul, body, and garb were in harmony, and calculated to impress
+      the coldest imagination. He wore a sort of sleeveless gown of black cloth,
+      fastened in front, and falling to the calf, leaving the neck bare with no
+      collar. His doublet and boots were likewise black. On his head was a black
+      velvet cap like a priest&rsquo;s, sitting in a close circle above his forehead,
+      and not showing a single hair. It was the strictest mourning, the
+      gloomiest habit a man could wear. But for a long sword that hung by his
+      side from a leather belt which could be seen where his surcoat hung open,
+      a priest would have hailed him as a brother. Though of no more than middle
+      height, he appeared tall; and, looking him in the face he seemed a giant.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;The clock has struck, the boat is waiting; will you not come?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      At these words, spoken in bad French, but distinctly audible in the
+      silence, a little noise was heard in the other top room, and the young man
+      came down as lightly as a bird.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      When Godefroid appeared, the lady&rsquo;s face turned crimson; she trembled,
+      started, and covered her face with her white hands.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Any woman might have shared her agitation at the sight of this youth of
+      about twenty, of a form and stature so slender that at a first glance he
+      might have been taken for a mere boy, or a young girl in disguise. His
+      black cap&mdash;like the <i>beret</i> worn by the Basque people&mdash;showed
+      a brow as white as snow, where grace and innocence shone with an
+      expression of divine sweetness&mdash;the light of a soul full of faith. A
+      poet&rsquo;s fancy would have seen there the star which, in some old tale, a
+      mother entreats the fairy godmother to set on the forehead of an infant
+      abandoned, like Moses, to the waves. Love lurked in the thousand fair
+      curls that fell over his shoulders. His throat, truly a swan&rsquo;s throat, was
+      white and exquisitely round. His blue eyes, bright and liquid, mirrored
+      the sky. His features and the mould of his brow were refined and delicate
+      enough to enchant a painter. The bloom of beauty, which in a woman&rsquo;s face
+      causes men such indescribable delight, the exquisite purity of outline,
+      the halo of light that bathes the features we love, were here combined
+      with a masculine complexion, and with strength as yet but half developed,
+      in the most enchanting contrast. His was one of those melodious
+      countenances which even when silent speak and attract us. And yet, on
+      marking it attentively, the incipient blight might have been detected
+      which comes of a great thought or a passion, the faint yellow tinge that
+      made him seem like a young leaf opening to the sun.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      No contrast could be greater or more startling than that seen in the
+      companionship of these two men. It was like seeing a frail and graceful
+      shrub that has grown from the hollow trunk of some gnarled willow,
+      withered by age, blasted by lightning, standing decrepit; one of those
+      majestic trees that painters love; the trembling sapling takes shelter
+      there from storms. One was a god, the other was an angel; one the poet
+      that feels, the other the poet that expresses&mdash;a prophet in sorrow, a
+      levite in prayer.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      They went out together without speaking.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Did you mark how he called him to him?&rdquo; cried the sergeant of the watch
+      when the footsteps of the couple were no longer audible on the strand.
+      &ldquo;Are not they a demon and his familiar?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Phooh!&rdquo; puffed Jacqueline. &ldquo;I felt smothered! I never marked our two
+      lodgers so carefully. &lsquo;Tis a bad thing for us women that the Devil can
+      wear so fair a mien!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ay, cast some holy water on him,&rdquo; said Tirechair, &ldquo;and you will see him
+      turn into a toad.&mdash;I am off to tell the office all about them.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      On hearing this speech, the lady roused herself from the reverie into
+      which she had sunk, and looked at the constable, who was donning his
+      red-and-blue jacket.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Whither are you off to?&rdquo; she asked.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;To tell the justices that wizards are lodging in our house very much
+      against our will.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The lady smiled.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I,&rdquo; said she, &ldquo;am the Comtesse de Mahaut,&rdquo; and she rose with a dignity
+      that took the man&rsquo;s breath away. &ldquo;Beware of bringing the smallest trouble
+      on your guests. Above all, respect the old man; I have seen him in the
+      company of your Lord the King, who entreated him courteously; you will be
+      ill advised to trouble him in any way. As to my having been here&mdash;never
+      breathe a word of it, as you value your life.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She said no more, but relapsed into thought.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Presently she looked up, signed to Jacqueline, and together they went up
+      into Godefroid&rsquo;s room. The fair Countess looked at the bed, the carved
+      chairs, the chest, the tapestry, the table, with a joy like that of the
+      exile who sees on his return the crowded roofs of his native town nestling
+      at the foot of a hill.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;If you have not deceived me,&rdquo; she said to Jacqueline, &ldquo;I promise you a
+      hundred crowns in gold.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Behold, madame,&rdquo; said the woman, &ldquo;the poor angel is confiding&mdash;here
+      is all his treasure.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      As she spoke, Jacqueline opened a drawer in the table and showed some
+      parchments.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;God of mercy!&rdquo; cried the Countess, snatching up a document that caught
+      her eye, on which she read, <i>Gothofredus Comes Gantiacus</i> (Godefroid,
+      Count of Ghent).
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      She dropped the parchment, and passed her hand over her brow; then,
+      feeling, no doubt, that she had compromised herself by showing so much
+      emotion, she recovered her cold demeanor.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I am satisfied,&rdquo; said she.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      She went downstairs and out of the house. The constable and his wife stood
+      in their doorway, and saw her take the path to the landing-place.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      A boat was moored hard by. When the rustle of the Countess&rsquo; approach was
+      audible, a boatman suddenly stood up, helped the fair laundress to take
+      her seat in it, and rowed with such strength as to make the boat fly like
+      a swallow down the stream.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You are a sorry fellow,&rdquo; said Jacqueline, giving the officer&rsquo;s shoulder a
+      familiar slap. &ldquo;We have earned a hundred gold crowns this morning.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I like harboring lords no better than harboring wizards. And I know not,
+      of the two, which is the more like to bring us to the gallows,&rdquo; replied
+      Tirechair, taking up his halbert. &ldquo;I will go my rounds over by
+      Champfleuri; God protect us, and send me to meet some pert jade out in her
+      bravery of gold rings to glitter in the shade like a glow-worm!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Jacqueline, alone in the house, hastily went up to the unknown lord&rsquo;s room
+      to discover, if she could, some clue to this mysterious business. Like
+      some learned men who give themselves infinite pains to complicate the
+      clear and simple laws of nature, she had already invented a chaotic
+      romance to account for the meeting of these three persons under her humble
+      roof. She hunted through the chest, examined everything, but could find
+      nothing extraordinary. She saw nothing on the table but a writing-case and
+      some sheets of parchment; and as she could not read, this discovery told
+      her nothing. A woman&rsquo;s instinct then took her into the young man&rsquo;s room,
+      and from thence she descried her two lodgers crossing the river in the
+      ferry boat.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;They stand like two statues,&rdquo; said she to herself. &ldquo;Ah, ha! They are
+      landing at the Rue du Fouarre. How nimble he is, the sweet youth! He
+      jumped out like a bird. By him the old man looks like some stone saint in
+      the Cathedral.&mdash;They are going to the old School of the Four Nations.
+      Presto! they are out of sight.&mdash;And this is where he lives, poor
+      cherub!&rdquo; she went on, looking about the room. &ldquo;How smart and winning he
+      is! Ah! your fine gentry are made of other stuff than we are.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      And Jacqueline went down again after smoothing down the bed-coverlet,
+      dusting the chest, and wondering for the hundredth time in six months:
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What in the world does he do all the blessed day? He cannot always be
+      staring at the blue sky and the stars that God has hung up there like
+      lanterns. That dear boy has known trouble. But why do he and the old man
+      hardly ever speak to each other?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Then she lost herself in wonderment and in thoughts which, in her woman&rsquo;s
+      brain, were tangled like a skein of thread.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The old man and his young companion had gone into one of the schools for
+      which the Rue du Fouarre was at that time famous throughout Europe. At the
+      moment when Jacqueline&rsquo;s two lodgers arrived at the old School des Quatre
+      Nations, the celebrated Sigier, the most noted Doctor of Mystical Theology
+      of the University of Paris, was mounting his pulpit in a spacious low room
+      on a level with the street. The cold stones were strewn with clean straw,
+      on which several of his disciples knelt on one knee, writing on the other,
+      to enable them to take notes from the Master&rsquo;s improvised discourse, in
+      the shorthand abbreviations which are the despair of modern decipherers.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The hall was full, not of students only, but of the most distinguished men
+      belonging to the clergy, the court, and the legal faculty. There were some
+      learned foreigners, too&mdash;soldiers and rich citizens. The broad faces
+      were there, with prominent brows and venerable beards, which fill us with
+      a sort of pious respect for our ancestors when we see their portraits from
+      the Middle Ages. Lean faces, too, with burning, sunken eyes, under bald
+      heads yellow from the labors of futile scholasticism, contrasted with
+      young and eager countenances, grave faces, warlike faces, and the ruddy
+      cheeks of the financial class.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      These lectures, dissertations, theses, sustained by the brightest geniuses
+      of the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries, roused our forefathers to
+      enthusiasm. They were to them their bull-fights, their Italian opera,
+      their tragedy, their dancers; in short, all their drama. The performance
+      of Mysteries was a later thing than these spiritual disputations, to
+      which, perhaps, we owe the French stage. Inspired eloquence, combining the
+      attractions of the human voice skilfully used, with daring inquisition
+      into the secrets of God, sufficed to satisfy every form of curiosity,
+      appealed to the soul, and constituted the fashionable entertainment of the
+      time. Not only did Theology include the other sciences, it was science
+      itself, as grammar was science to the Ancient Greeks; and those who
+      distinguished themselves in these duels, in which the orators, like Jacob,
+      wrestled with the Spirit of God, had a promising future before them.
+      Embassies, arbitrations between sovereigns, chancellorships, and
+      ecclesiastical dignities were the meed of men whose rhetoric had been
+      schooled in theological controversy. The professor&rsquo;s chair was the tribune
+      of the period.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      This system lasted till the day when Rabelais gibbeted dialectics by his
+      merciless satire, as Cervantes demolished chivalry by a narrative comedy.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      To understand this amazing period and the spirit which dictated its
+      voluminous, though now forgotten, masterpieces, to analyze it, even to its
+      barbarisms, we need only examine the Constitutions of the University of
+      Paris and the extraordinary scheme of instruction that then obtained.
+      Theology was taught under two faculties&mdash;that of Theology properly so
+      called, and that of Canon Law. The faculty of Theology, again, had three
+      sections&mdash;Scholastic, Canonical, and Mystic. It would be wearisome to
+      give an account of the attributes of each section of the science, since
+      one only, namely, Mystic, is the subject of this <i>Etude</i>.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Mystical Theology included the whole of Divine Revelation and the
+      elucidation of the Mysteries. And this branch of ancient theology has been
+      secretly preserved with reverence even to our own day; Jacob Boehm,
+      Swendenborg, Martinez Pasqualis, Saint-Martin, Molinos, Madame Guyon,
+      Madame Bourignon, and Madame Krudener, the extensive sect of the
+      Ecstatics, and that of the Illuminati, have at different periods duly
+      treasured the doctrines of this science, of which the aim is indeed truly
+      startling and portentous. In Doctor Sigier&rsquo;s day, as in our own, man has
+      striven to gain wings to fly into the sanctuary where God hides from our
+      gaze.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      This digression was necessary to give a clue to the scene at which the old
+      man and the youth from the island under Notre-Dame had come to be
+      audience; it will also protect this narrative from all blame on the score
+      of falsehood and hyperbole, of which certain persons of hasty judgment
+      might perhaps suspect me.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Doctor Sigier was a tall man in the prime of life. His face, rescued from
+      oblivion by the archives of the University, had singular analogies with
+      that of Mirabeau. It was stamped with the seal of fierce, swift, and
+      terrible eloquence. But the Doctor bore on his brow the expression of
+      religious faith that his modern double had not. His voice, too, was of
+      persuasive sweetness, with a clear and pleasing ring in it.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      At this moment the daylight, that was stintingly diffused through the
+      small, heavily-leaded window-panes, tinted the assembly with capricious
+      tones and powerful contrasts from the chequered light and shade. Here, in
+      a dark corner, eyes shone brightly, their dark heads under the sunbeams
+      gleamed light above faces in shadow, and various bald heads, with only a
+      circlet of white hair, were distinguished among the crowd like battlements
+      silvered by moonlight. Every face was turned towards the Doctor, mute but
+      impatient. The drowsy voices of other lecturers in the adjoining schools
+      were audible in the silent street like the murmuring of the sea; and the
+      steps of the two strangers, as they now came in, attracted general
+      attention. Doctor Sigier, ready to begin, saw the stately senior standing,
+      looked round for a seat for him, and then finding none, as the place was
+      full, came down from his place, went to the newcomer, and with great
+      respect, led him to the platform of his professor&rsquo;s chair, and there gave
+      him his stool to sit upon. The assembly hailed this mark of deference with
+      a murmur of approval, recognizing the old man as the orator of a fine
+      thesis admirably argued not long since at the Sorbonne.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The stranger looked down from his raised position on the crowd below with
+      that deep glance that held a whole poem of sorrow, and those who met his
+      eye felt an indescribable thrill. The lad, following the old man, sat down
+      on one of the steps, leaning against the pulpit in a graceful and
+      melancholy attitude. The silence was now profound, and the doorway and
+      even the street were blocked by scholars who had deserted the other
+      classes.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Doctor Sigier was to-day to recapitulate, in the last of a series of
+      discourses, the views he had set forth in the former lectures on the
+      Resurrection, Heaven, and Hell. His strange doctrine responded to the
+      sympathies of the time, and gratified the immoderate love of the
+      marvelous, which haunts the mind of man in every age. This effort of man
+      to clutch the infinite, which for ever slips through his ineffectual
+      grasp, this last tourney of thought against thought, was a task worthy of
+      an assembly where the most stupendous human imagination ever known,
+      perhaps, at that moment shone.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The Doctor began by summing up in a mild and even tone the principal
+      points he had so far established:
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No intellect was the exact counterpart of another. Had man any right to
+      require an account of his Creator for the inequality of powers bestowed on
+      each? Without attempting to penetrate rashly into the designs of God,
+      ought we not to recognize the fact that by reason of their general
+      diversity intelligences could be classed in spheres? From the sphere where
+      the least degree of intelligence gleamed, to the most translucent souls
+      who could see the road by which to ascend to God, was there not an
+      ascending scale of spiritual gift? And did not spirits of the same sphere
+      understand each other like brothers in soul, in flesh, in mind, and in
+      feeling?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      From this the Doctor went on to unfold the most wonderful theories of
+      sympathy. He set forth in Biblical language the phenomena of love, of
+      instinctive repulsion, of strong affinities which transcend the laws of
+      space, of the sudden mingling of souls which seem to recognize each other.
+      With regard to the different degrees of strength of which our affections
+      are capable, he accounted for them by the place, more or less near the
+      centre, occupied by beings in their respective circles.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      He gave mathematical expression to God&rsquo;s grand idea in the co-ordination
+      of the various human spheres. &ldquo;Through man,&rdquo; he said, &ldquo;these spheres
+      constituted a world intermediate between the intelligence of the brute and
+      the intelligence of the angels.&rdquo; As he stated it, the divine Word
+      nourishes the spiritual Word, the spiritual Word nourishes the living
+      Word, the living Word nourishes the animal Word, the animal Word nourishes
+      the vegetable Word, and the vegetable Word is the expression of the life
+      of the barren Word. These successive evolutions, as of a chrysalis, which
+      God thus wrought in our souls, this infusorial life, so to speak,
+      communicated from each zone to the next, more vivid, more spiritual, more
+      perceptive in its ascent, represented, rather dimly no doubt, but
+      marvelously enough to his inexperienced hearers, the impulse given to
+      Nature by the Almighty. Supported by many texts from the Sacred
+      Scriptures, which he used as a commentary on his own statements to express
+      by concrete images the abstract arguments he felt to be wanting, he
+      flourished the Spirit of God like a torch over the deep secrets of
+      creation, with an eloquence peculiar to himself, and accents that urged
+      conviction on his audience. As he unfolded his mysterious system and all
+      its consequences, he gave a key to every symbol and justified the
+      vocation, the special gifts, the genius, the talent of each human being.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Then, instinctively becoming physiological, he remarked on the resemblance
+      to certain animals stamped on some human faces, accounting for them by
+      primordial analogies and the upward tendency of all creation. He showed
+      his audience the workings of Nature, and assigned a mission and a future
+      to minerals, plants, and animals. Bible in hand, after thus spiritualizing
+      Matter and materializing Spirit, after pointing to the Will of God in all
+      things, and enjoining respect for His smallest works, he suggested the
+      possibility of rising by faith from sphere to sphere.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      This was the first portion of his discourse, and by adroit digressions he
+      applied the doctrine of his system to feudalism. The poetry&mdash;religious
+      and profane&mdash;and the abrupt eloquence of that period had a grand
+      opening in this vast theory, wherein the Doctor had amalgamated all the
+      philosophical systems of the ancients, and from which he brought them out
+      again classified, transfigured, purified. The false dogmas of two adverse
+      principles and of Pantheism were demolished at his word, which proclaimed
+      the Divine Unity, while ascribing to God and His angels the knowledge, the
+      ends to which the means shone resplendent to the eyes of man. Fortified by
+      the demonstrations that proved the existence of the world of Matter,
+      Doctor Sigier constructed the scheme of a spiritual world dividing us from
+      God by an ascending scale of spheres, just as the plant is divided from
+      man by an infinite number of grades. He peopled the heavens, the stars,
+      the planets, the sun.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Quoting Saint Paul, he invested man with a new power; he might rise, from
+      globe to globe, to the very Fount of eternal life. Jacob&rsquo;s mystical ladder
+      was both the religious formula and the traditional proof of the fact. He
+      soared through space, carrying with him the passionate souls of his
+      hearers on the wings of his word, making them feel the infinite, and
+      bathing them in the heavenly sea. Then the Doctor accounted logically for
+      hell by circles placed in inverse order to the shining spheres that lead
+      to God, in which torments and darkness take the place of the Spirit and of
+      light. Pain was as intelligible as rapture. The terms of comparison were
+      present in the conditions of human life and its various atmospheres of
+      suffering and of intellect. Thus the most extraordinary traditions of hell
+      and purgatory were quite naturally conceivable.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      He gave the fundamental <i>rationale</i> of virtue with admirable
+      clearness. A pious man, toiling onward in poverty, proud of his good
+      conscience, at peace with himself, and steadfastly true to himself in his
+      heart in spite of the spectacle of exultant vice, was a fallen angel doing
+      penance, who remembered his origin, foresaw his guerdon, accomplished his
+      task, and obeyed his glorious mission. The sublime resignation of
+      Christians was then seen in all its glory. He depicted martyrs at the
+      burning stake, and almost stripped them of their merit by stripping them
+      of their sufferings. He showed their inner angel as dwelling in the
+      heavens, while the outer man was tortured by the executioner&rsquo;s sword. He
+      described angels dwelling among men, and gave tokens by which to recognize
+      them.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      He next strove to drag from the very depths of man&rsquo;s understanding the
+      real sense of the word fall, which occurs in every language. He appealed
+      to the most widely-spread traditions in evidence of this one true origin,
+      explaining, with much lucidity, the passion all men have for rising,
+      mounting&mdash;an instinctive ambition, the perennial revelations of our
+      destiny.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      He displayed the whole universe at a glance, and described the nature of
+      God Himself circulating in a full tide from the centre to the extremities,
+      and from the extremities to the centre again. Nature was one and
+      homogeneous. In the most seemingly trivial, as in the most stupendous
+      work, everything obeyed that law; each created object reproduced in little
+      an exact image of that nature&mdash;the sap in the plant, the blood in
+      man, the orbits of the planets. He piled proof on proof, always completing
+      his idea by a picture musical with poetry.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      And he boldly anticipated every objection. He thundered forth an eloquent
+      challenge to the monumental works of science and human excrescences of
+      knowledge, such as those which societies use the elements of the earthly
+      globe to produce. He asked whether our wars, our disasters, our depravity
+      could hinder the great movement given by God to all the globes; and he
+      laughed human impotence to scorn by pointing to their efforts everywhere
+      in ruins. He cried upon the manes of Tyre, Carthage, and Babylon; he
+      called upon Babel and Jerusalem to appear; and sought, without finding
+      them, the transient furrows made by the ploughshare of civilization.
+      Humanity floated on the surface of the earth as a ship whose wake is lost
+      in the calm level of ocean.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      These were the fundamental notions set forth in Doctor Sigier&rsquo;s address,
+      all wrapped in the mystical language and strange school Latin of the time.
+      He had made a special study of the Scriptures, and they supplied him with
+      the weapons with which he came before his contemporaries to hasten their
+      progress. He hid his boldness under his immense learning, as with a cloak,
+      and his philosophical bent under a saintly life. At this moment, after
+      bringing his hearers face to face with God, after packing the universe
+      into an idea, and almost unveiling the idea of the world, he gazed down on
+      the silent, throbbing mass, and scrutinized the stranger with a look.
+      Then, spurred on, no doubt, by the presence of this remarkable personage,
+      he added these words, from which I have eliminated the corrupt Latinity of
+      the Middle Ages:&mdash;
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Where, think you, may a man find these fruitful truths if not in the
+      heart of God Himself?&mdash;What am I?&mdash;The humble interpreter of a
+      single line left to us by the greatest of the Apostles&mdash;a single line
+      out of thousands all equally full of light. Before us, Saint Paul said, &lsquo;<i>In
+      Deo vivimus movemur et sumus</i>.&rsquo; In our day, less believing and more
+      learned, or better instructed and more sceptical, we should ask the
+      Apostle, &lsquo;To what end this perpetual motion? Whither leads this life
+      divided into zones? Wherefore an intelligence that begins with the obscure
+      perfection of marble and proceeds from sphere to sphere up to man, up to
+      the angel, up to God? Where is the Fount, where is the ocean, if life,
+      attaining to God across worlds and stars, through Matter and Spirit, has
+      to come down again to some other goal?&rsquo; 
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You desire to see both aspects of the universe at once. You would adore
+      the Sovereign on condition of being suffered to sit for an instant on His
+      throne. Mad fools that we are! We will not admit that the most intelligent
+      animals are able to understand our ideas and the object of our actions; we
+      are merciless to the creatures of the inferior spheres, and exile them
+      from our own; we deny them the faculty of divining human thoughts, and yet
+      we ourselves would fain master the highest of all ideas&mdash;the Idea of
+      the Idea!
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Well, go then, start! Fly by faith up from globe to globe, soar through
+      space! Thought, love, and faith are its mystical keys. Traverse the
+      circles, reach the throne! God is more merciful than you are; He opens His
+      temple to all His creatures. Only, do not forget the pattern of Moses; put
+      your shoes from off your feet, cast off all filth, leave your body far
+      behind; otherwise you shall be consumed; for God&mdash;God is Light!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Just as Doctor Sigier spoke these grand words, his face radiant, his hand
+      uplifted, a sunbeam pierced through an open window, like a magic jet from
+      a fount of splendor, a long triangular shaft of gold that lay like a scarf
+      over the whole assembly. They all clapped their hands, for the audience
+      accepted this effect of the sinking sun as a miracle. There was a
+      universal cry of:
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;<i>Vivant</i>! <i>Vivant</i>!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The very sky seemed to shed approval. Godefroid, struck with reverence,
+      looked from the old man to Doctor Sigier; they were talking together in an
+      undertone.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;All honor to the Master!&rdquo; said the stranger.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What is such transient honor?&rdquo; replied Sigier.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I would I could perpetuate my gratitude,&rdquo; said the older man.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;A line written by you is enough!&rdquo; said the Doctor. &ldquo;It would give me
+      immortality, humanly speaking.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Can I give what I have not?&rdquo; cried the elder.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Escorted by the crowd, which followed in their footsteps, like courtiers
+      round a king, at a respectful distance, Godefroid, with the old man and
+      the Doctor, made their way to the oozy shore, where as yet there were no
+      houses, and where the ferryman was waiting for them. The Doctor and the
+      stranger were talking together, not in Latin nor in any Gallic tongue, but
+      in an unknown language, and very gravely. They pointed with their hands
+      now to heaven and now to the earth. Sigier, to whom the paths by the river
+      were familiar, guided the venerable stranger with particular care to the
+      narrow planks which here and there bridged the mud; the following watched
+      them inquisitively; and some of the students envied the privileged boy who
+      might walk with these two great masters of speech. Finally, the Doctor
+      took leave of the stranger, and the ferry-boat pushed off.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      At the moment when the boat was afloat on the wide river, communicating
+      its motion to the soul, the sun pierced the clouds like a conflagration
+      blazing up on the horizon, and poured forth a flood of light, coloring
+      slate roof-tops and humbler thatch with a ruddy glow and tawny
+      reflections, fringed Philippe Auguste&rsquo;s towers with fire, flooded the sky,
+      dyed the waters, gilded the plants, and aroused the half-sleeping insects.
+      The immense shaft of light set the clouds on fire. It was like the last
+      verse of the daily hymn. Every heart was thrilled; nature in such a moment
+      is sublime.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      As he gazed at the spectacle, the stranger&rsquo;s eyes moistened with the
+      tenderest of human tears: Godefroid too was weeping; his trembling hand
+      touched that of the elder man, who, looking round, confessed his emotion.
+      But thinking his dignity as a man compromised, no doubt, to redeem it, he
+      said in a deep voice:
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I weep for my native land. I am an exile! Young man, in such an hour as
+      this I left my home. There, at this hour, the fireflies are coming out of
+      their fragile dwellings and clinging like diamond sparks to the leaves of
+      the iris. At this hour the breeze, as sweet as the sweetest poetry, rises
+      up from a valley bathed in light, bearing on its wings the richest
+      fragrance. On the horizon I could see a golden city like the Heavenly
+      Jerusalem&mdash;a city whose name I may not speak. There, too, a river
+      winds. But that city and its buildings, that river of which the lovely
+      vistas, and the pools of blue water, mingled, crossed, and embraced each
+      other, which gladdened my sight and filled me with love&mdash;where are
+      they?
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;At that hour the waters assumed fantastic hues under the sunset sky, and
+      seemed to be painted pictures; the stars dropped tender streaks of light,
+      the moon spread its pleasing snares; it gave another life to the trees, to
+      the color and form of things, and a new aspect to the sparkling water, the
+      silent hills, the eloquent buildings. The city spoke, it glittered, it
+      called to me to return!
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Columns of smoke rose up by the side of the ancient pillars, whose marble
+      sheen gleamed white through the night; the lines of the horizon were still
+      visible through the mists of evening; all was harmony and mystery. Nature
+      would not say farewell; she desired to keep me there. Ah! It was all in
+      all to me; my mother and my child, my wife and my glory! The very bells
+      bewailed my condemnation. Oh, land of marvels! It is as beautiful as
+      heaven. From that hour the wide world has been my dungeon. Beloved land,
+      why hast thou rejected me?
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;But I shall triumph there yet!&rdquo; he cried, speaking with an accent of such
+      intense conviction and such a ringing tone, that the boatman started as at
+      a trumpet call.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The stranger was standing in a prophetic attitude and gazing southwards
+      into the blue, pointing to his native home across the skyey regions. The
+      ascetic pallor of his face had given place to a glow of triumph, his eyes
+      flashed, he was as grand as a lion shaking his mane.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;But you, poor child,&rdquo; he went on, looking at Godefroid, whose cheeks were
+      beaded with glittering tears, &ldquo;have you, like me, studied life from
+      blood-stained pages? What can you have to weep for, at your age?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Alas!&rdquo; said Godefroid, &ldquo;I regret a land more beautiful than any land on
+      earth&mdash;a land I never saw and yet remember. Oh, if I could but cleave
+      the air on beating wings, I would fly&mdash;&mdash;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Whither?&rdquo; asked the exile.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Up there,&rdquo; replied the boy.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      On hearing this answer, the stranger seemed surprised; he looked darkly at
+      the youth, who remained silent. They seemed to communicate by an
+      unspeakable effusion of the spirit, hearing each other&rsquo;s yearnings in the
+      teeming silence, and going forth side by side, like two doves sweeping the
+      air on equal wing, till the boat, touching the strand of the island,
+      roused them from their deep reverie.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Then, each lost in thought, they went together to the sergeant&rsquo;s house.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And so the boy believes that he is an angel exiled from heaven!&rdquo; thought
+      the tall stranger. &ldquo;Which of us all has a right to undeceive him? Not I&mdash;I,
+      who am so often lifted by some magic spell so far above the earth; I who
+      am dedicate to God; I who am a mystery to myself. Have I not already seen
+      the fairest of the angels dwelling in this mire? Is this child more or
+      less crazed than I am? Has he taken a bolder step in the way of faith? He
+      believes, and his belief no doubt will lead him into some path of light
+      like that in which I walk. But though he is as beautiful as an angel, is
+      he not too feeble to stand fast in such a struggle?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Abashed by the presence of his companion, whose voice of thunder expressed
+      to him his own thoughts, as lightning expresses the will of Heaven, the
+      boy was satisfied to gaze at the stars with a lover&rsquo;s eyes. Overwhelmed by
+      a luxury of sentiment, which weighed on his heart, he stood there timid
+      and weak&mdash;a midge in the sunbeams. Sigier&rsquo;s discourse had proved to
+      them the mysteries of the spiritual world; the tall, old man was to invest
+      them with glory; the lad felt them in himself, though he could in no way
+      express them. The three represented in living embodiment Science, Poetry,
+      and Feeling.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      On going into the house, the Exile shut himself into his room, lighted the
+      inspiring lamp, and gave himself over to the ruthless demon of Work,
+      seeking words of the silence and ideas of the night. Godefroid sat down in
+      his window sill, by turns gazing at the moon reflected in the water, and
+      studying the mysteries of the sky. Lost in one of the trances that were
+      frequent to him, he traveled from sphere to sphere, from vision to vision,
+      listening for obscure rustlings and the voices of angels, and believing
+      that he heard them; seeing, or fancying that he saw, a divine radiance in
+      which he lost himself; striving to attain the far-away goal, the source of
+      all light, the fount of all harmony.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Presently the vast clamor of Paris, brought down on the current, was
+      hushed; lights were extinguished one by one in the houses; silence spread
+      over all; and the huge city slept like a tired giant.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Midnight struck. The least noise, the fall of a leaf, or the flight of a
+      jackdaw changing its perching-place among the pinnacles of Notre-Dame,
+      would have been enough to bring the stranger&rsquo;s mind to earth again, to
+      have made the youth drop from the celestial heights to which his soul had
+      soared on the wings of rapture.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      And then the old man heard with dismay a groan mingling with the sound of
+      a heavy fall&mdash;the fall, as his experienced ear assured him, of a dead
+      body. He hastened into Godefroid&rsquo;s room, and saw him lying in a heap with
+      a long rope tight round his neck, the end meandering over the floor.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      When he had untied it, the poor lad opened his eyes.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Where am I?&rdquo; he asked, with a hopeful gleam.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;In your own room,&rdquo; said the elder man, looking with surprise at
+      Godefroid&rsquo;s neck, and at the nail to which the cord had been tied, and
+      which was still in the knot.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;In heaven?&rdquo; said the boy, in a voice of music.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No; on earth!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Godefroid rose and walked along the path of light traced on the floor by
+      the moon through the window, which stood open; he saw the rippling Seine,
+      the willows and plants on the island. A misty atmosphere hung over the
+      waters like a smokey floor.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      On seeing the view, to him so heartbreaking, he folded his hands over his
+      bosom, and stood in an attitude of despair; the Exile came up to him with
+      astonishment on his face.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You meant to kill yourself?&rdquo; he asked.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Yes,&rdquo; replied Godefroid, while the stranger passed his hand about his
+      neck again and again to feel the place where the rope had tightened on it.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      But for some slight bruises, the young man had been but little hurt. His
+      friend supposed that the nail had given way at once under the weight of
+      the body, and the terrible attempt had ended in a fall without injury.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And why, dear lad, did you try to kill yourself?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Alas!&rdquo; said Godefroid, no longer restraining the tears that rolled down
+      his cheeks, &ldquo;I heard the Voice from on high; it called me by name! It had
+      never named me before, but this time it bade me to Heaven! Oh, how sweet
+      is that voice!&mdash;As I could not fly to Heaven,&rdquo; he added artlessly, &ldquo;I
+      took the only way we know of going to God.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;My child! oh, sublime boy!&rdquo; cried the old man, throwing his arms round
+      Godefroid, and clasping him to his heart. &ldquo;You are a poet; you can boldly
+      ride the whirlwind! Your poetry does not proceed from your heart; your
+      living, burning thoughts, your creations, move and grow in your soul.&mdash;Go,
+      never reveal your ideas to the vulgar! Be at once the altar, the priest,
+      and the victim!
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You know Heaven, do you not? You have seen those myriads of angels,
+      white-winged, and holding golden sistrums, all soaring with equal flight
+      towards the Throne, and you have often seen their pinions moving at the
+      breath of God as the trees of the forest bow with one consent before the
+      storm. Ah, how glorious is unlimited space! Tell me.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The stranger clasped Godefroid&rsquo;s hand convulsively, and they both gazed at
+      the firmament, whence the stars seemed to shed gentle poetry which they
+      could bear.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Oh, to see God!&rdquo; murmured Godefroid.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Child!&rdquo; said the old man suddenly, in a sterner voice, &ldquo;have you so soon
+      forgotten the holy teaching of our good master, Doctor Sigier? In order to
+      return, you to your heavenly home, and I to my native land on earth, must
+      we not obey the voice of God? We must walk on resignedly in the stony
+      paths where His almighty finger points the way. Do not you quail at the
+      thought of the danger to which you exposed yourself? Arriving there
+      without being bidden, and saying, &lsquo;Here I am!&rsquo; before your time, would you
+      not have been cast back into a world beneath that where your soul now
+      hovers? Poor outcast cherub! Should you not rather bless God for having
+      suffered you to live in a sphere where you may hear none but heavenly
+      harmonies? Are you not as pure as a diamond, as lovely as a flower?
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Think what it is to know, like me, only the City of Sorrows!&mdash;Dwelling
+      there I have worn out my heart.&mdash;To search the tombs for their
+      horrible secrets; to wipe hands steeped in blood, counting them over night
+      after night, seeing them rise up before me imploring forgiveness which I
+      may not grant; to mark the writhing of the assassin and the last shriek of
+      his victim; to listen to appalling noises and fearful silence, the silence
+      of a father devouring his dead sons; to wonder at the laughter of the
+      damned; to look for some human form among the livid heaps wrung and
+      trampled by crime; to learn words such as living men may not hear without
+      dying; to call perpetually on the dead, and always to accuse and condemn!&mdash;Is
+      that living?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Cease!&rdquo; cried Godefroid; &ldquo;I cannot see you or hear you any further! My
+      reason wanders, my eyes are dim. You light a fire within me which consumes
+      me.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And yet I must go on!&rdquo; said the senior, waving his hand with a strange
+      gesture that worked on the youth like a spell.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      For a moment the old man fixed Godefroid with his large, weary, lightless
+      eyes; then he pointed with one finger to the ground. A gulf seemed to open
+      at his bidding. He remained standing in the doubtful light of the moon; it
+      lent a glory to his brow which reflected an almost solar gleam. Though at
+      first a somewhat disdainful expression lurked in the wrinkles of his face,
+      his look presently assumed the fixity which seems to gaze on an object
+      invisible to the ordinary organs of sight. His eyes, no doubt, were seeing
+      then the remoter images which the grave has in store for us.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Never, perhaps, had this man presented so grand an aspect. A terrible
+      struggle was going on in his soul, and reacted on his outer frame; strong
+      man as he seemed to be, he bent as a reed bows under the breeze that comes
+      before a storm. Godefroid stood motionless, speechless, spellbound; some
+      inexplicable force nailed him to the floor; and, as happens when our
+      attention takes us out of ourselves while watching a fire or a battle, he
+      was wholly unconscious of his body.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Shall I tell you the fate to which you were hastening, poor angel of
+      love? Listen! It has been given to me to see immeasurable space,
+      bottomless gulfs in which all human creations are swallowed up, the
+      shoreless sea whither flows the vast stream of men and of angels. As I
+      made my way through the realms of eternal torment, I was sheltered under
+      the cloak of an immortal&mdash;the robe of glory due to genius, and which
+      the ages hand on&mdash;I, a frail mortal! When I wandered through the
+      fields of light where the happy souls play, I was borne up by the love of
+      a woman, the wings of an angel; resting on her heart, I could taste the
+      ineffable pleasures whose touch is more perilous to us mortals than are
+      the torments of the worser world.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;As I achieved my pilgrimage through the dark regions below I had mounted
+      from torture to torture, from crime to crime, from punishment to
+      punishment, from awful silence to heartrending cries, till I reached the
+      uppermost circle of Hell. Already, from afar, I could see the glory of
+      Paradise shining at a vast distance; I was still in darkness, but on the
+      borders of day. I flew, upheld by my Guide, borne along by a power akin to
+      that which, during our dreams, wafts us to spheres invisible to the eye of
+      the body. The halo that crowned our heads seared away the shades as we
+      passed, like impalpable dust. Far above us the suns of all the worlds
+      shone with scarce so much light as the twinkling fireflies of my native
+      land. I was soaring towards the fields of air where, round about Paradise,
+      the bodies of light are in closer array, where the azure is easy to pass
+      through, where worlds innumerable spring like flowers in a meadow.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;There, on the last level of the circles where those phantoms dwell that I
+      had left behind me, like sorrows one would fain forget, I saw a vast
+      shade. Standing in an attitude of aspiration, that soul looked eagerly
+      into space; his feet were riveted by the will of God to the topmost point
+      of the margin, and he remained for ever in the painful strain by which we
+      project our purpose when we long to soar, as birds about to take wing. I
+      saw the man; he neither looked at us nor heard us; every muscle quivered
+      and throbbed; at each separate instant he seemed to feel, though he did
+      not move, all the fatigue of traversing the infinite that divided him from
+      Paradise where, as he gazed steadfastly, he believed he had glimpses of a
+      beloved image. At this last gate of Hell, as at the first, I saw the stamp
+      of despair even in hope. The hapless creature was so fearfully held by
+      some unseen force, that his anguish entered into my bones and froze my
+      blood. I shrank closer to my Guide, whose protection restored me to peace
+      and silence.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Suddenly the Shade gave a cry of joy&mdash;a cry as shrill as that of the
+      mother bird that sees a hawk in the air, or suspects its presence. We
+      looked where he was looking, and saw, as it were, a sapphire, floating
+      high up in the abysses of light. The glowing star fell with the swiftness
+      of a sunbeam when it flashes over the horizon in the morning and its first
+      rays shoot across the world. The Splendor became clearer and grew larger;
+      presently I beheld the cloud of glory in which the angels move&mdash;a
+      shining vapor that emanates from their divine substance, and that glitters
+      here and there like tongues of flame. A noble face, whose glory none may
+      endure that have not won the mantle, the laurel, and the palm&mdash;the
+      attribute of the Powers&mdash;rose above this cloud as white and pure as
+      snow. It was Light within light. His wings as they waved shed dazzling
+      ripples in the spheres through which he descended, as the glance of God
+      pierces through the universe. At last I saw the archangel in all his
+      glory. The flower of eternal beauty that belongs to the angels of the
+      Spirit shone in him. In one hand he held a green palm branch, in the other
+      a sword of flame: the palm to bestow on the pardoned soul, the sword to
+      drive back all the hosts of Hell with one sweep. As he approached, the
+      perfumes of Heaven fell upon us as dew. In the region where the archangel
+      paused, the air took the hues of opal, and moved in eddies of which he was
+      the centre. He paused, looked at the Shade, and said:
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;&lsquo;To-morrow.&rsquo; 
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Then he turned heavenwards once more, spread his wings, and clove through
+      space as a vessel cuts through the waves, hardly showing her white sails
+      to the exiles left on some deserted shore.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;The Shade uttered appalling cries, to which the damned responded from the
+      lowest circle, the deepest in the immensity of suffering, to the more
+      peaceful zone near the surface on which we were standing. This worst
+      torment of all had appealed to all the rest. The turmoil was swelled by
+      the roar of a sea of fire which formed a bass to the terrific harmony of
+      endless millions of suffering souls.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Then suddenly the Shade took flight through the doleful city, and down to
+      its place at the very bottom of Hell; but as suddenly it came up again,
+      turned, soared through the endless circles in every direction, as a
+      vulture, confined for the first time in a cage, exhausts itself in vain
+      efforts. The Shade was free to do this; he could wander through the zones
+      of Hell icy, fetid, or scorching without enduring their pangs; he glided
+      into that vastness as a sunbeam makes its way into the deepest dark.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;&lsquo;God has not condemned him to any torment,&rsquo; said the Master; &lsquo;but not one
+      of the souls you have seen suffering their various punishments would
+      exchange his anguish for the hope that is consuming this soul.&rsquo; 
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And just then the Shade came back to us, brought thither by an
+      irresistible force which condemned him to perch on the verge of Hell. My
+      divine Guide, guessing my curiosity, touched the unhappy Shade with his
+      palm-branch. He, who was perhaps trying to measure the age of sorrow that
+      divided him from that ever-vanishing &lsquo;To-morrow,&rsquo; started and gave a look
+      full of all the tears he had already shed.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;&lsquo;You would know my woe?&rsquo; said he sadly. &lsquo;Oh, I love to tell it. I am
+      here, Teresa is above; that is all. On earth we were happy, we were always
+      together. When I saw my loved Teresa Donati for the first time, she was
+      ten years old. We loved each other even then, not knowing what love meant.
+      Our lives were one; I turned pale if she were pale, I was happy in her
+      joy; we gave ourselves up to the pleasure of thinking and feeling
+      together; and we learned what love was, each through the other. We were
+      wedded at Cremona; we never saw each other&rsquo;s lips but decked with pearls
+      of a smile; our eyes always shone; our hair, like our desires, flowed
+      together; our heads were always bent over one book when we read, our feet
+      walked in equal step. Life was one long kiss, our home was a nest.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;&lsquo;One day, for the first time, Teresa turned pale and said, &ldquo;I am in
+      pain!&rdquo;&mdash;And I was not in pain!
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;&lsquo;She never rose again. I saw her sweet face change, her golden hair fade&mdash;and
+      I did not die! She smiled to hide her sufferings, but I could read them in
+      her blue eyes, of which I could interpret the slightest trembling.
+      &ldquo;Honorino, I love you!&rdquo; said she, at the very moment when her lips turned
+      white, and she was clasping my hand still in hers when death chilled them.
+      So I killed myself that she might not lie alone in her sepulchral bed,
+      under her marble sheet. Teresa is above and I am here. I could not bear to
+      leave her, but God has divided us. Why, then, did He unite us on earth? He
+      is jealous! Paradise was no doubt so much the fairer on the day when
+      Teresa entered in.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;&lsquo;Do you see her? She is sad in her bliss; she is parted from me! Paradise
+      must be a desert to her.&rsquo; 
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;&lsquo;Master,&rsquo; said I with tears, for I thought of my love, &lsquo;when this one
+      shall desire Paradise for God&rsquo;s sake alone, shall he not be delivered?&rsquo; 
+      And the Father of Poets mildly bowed his head in sign of assent.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;We departed, cleaving the air, and making no more noise than the birds
+      that pass overhead sometimes when we lie in the shade of a tree. It would
+      have been vain to try to check the hapless shade in his blasphemy. It is
+      one of the griefs of the angels of darkness that they can never see the
+      light even when they are surrounded by it. He would not have understood
+      us.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      At this moment the swift approach of many horses rang through the
+      stillness, the dog barked, the constable&rsquo;s deep growl replied; the
+      horsemen dismounted, knocked at the door; the noise was so unexpected that
+      it seemed like some sudden explosion.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The two exiles, the two poets, fell to earth through all the space that
+      divides us from the skies. The painful shock of this fall rushed through
+      their veins like strange blood, hissing as it seemed, and full of
+      scorching sparks. Their pain was like an electric discharge. The loud,
+      heavy step of a man-at-arms sounded on the stairs with the iron clank of
+      his sword, his cuirass, and spurs; a soldier presently stood before the
+      astonished stranger.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;We can return to Florence,&rdquo; said the man, whose bass voice sounded soft
+      as he spoke in Italian.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What is that you say?&rdquo; asked the old man.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;The <i>Bianchi</i> are triumphant.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Are you not mistaken?&rdquo; asked the poet.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No, dear Dante!&rdquo; replied the soldier, whose warlike tones rang with the
+      thrill of battle and the exultation of victory.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;To Florence! To Florence! Ah, my Florence!&rdquo; cried Dante Alighieri,
+      drawing himself up, and gazing into the distance. In fancy he saw Italy;
+      he was gigantic.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;But I&mdash;when shall I be in Heaven?&rdquo; said Godefroid, kneeling on one
+      knee before the immortal poet, like an angel before the sanctuary.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Come to Florence,&rdquo; said Dante in compassionate tones. &ldquo;Come! when you see
+      its lovely landscape from the heights of Fiesole you will fancy yourself
+      in Paradise.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The soldier smiled. For the first time, perhaps for the only time in his
+      life, Dante&rsquo;s gloomy and solemn features wore a look of joy; his eyes and
+      brows expressed the happiness he has depicted so lavishly in his vision of
+      Paradise. He thought perhaps that he heard the voice of Beatrice.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      A light step, and the rustle of a woman&rsquo;s gown, were audible in the
+      silence. Dawn was now showing its first streaks of light. The fair
+      Comtesse de Mahaut came in and flew to Godefroid.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Come, my child, my son! I may at last acknowledge you. Your birth is
+      recognized, your rights are under the protection of the King of France,
+      and you will find Paradise in your mother&rsquo;s heart.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I hear, I know, the voice of Heaven!&rdquo; cried the youth in rapture.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The exclamation roused Dante, who saw the young man folded in the
+      Countess&rsquo; arms. He took leave of them with a look, and left his young
+      companion on his mother&rsquo;s bosom.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Come away!&rdquo; he cried in a voice of thunder. &ldquo;Death to the Guelphs!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      PARIS, October 1831.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      <br /> <br />
+    </p>
+    <hr />
+    <p>
+      <br /> <br />
+    </p>
+<pre xml:space="preserve">
+
+
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+</html>
diff --git a/1884.txt b/1884.txt
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..0fbb984
--- /dev/null
+++ b/1884.txt
@@ -0,0 +1,1634 @@
+The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Exiles, by Honore de Balzac
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+Title: The Exiles
+
+Author: Honore de Balzac
+
+Translator: Clara Bell and James Waring
+
+Release Date: September, 1999  [Etext #1884]
+Posting Date: March 5, 2010
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ASCII
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE EXILES ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by John Bickers, and Dagny
+
+
+
+
+
+The Exiles
+
+
+By Honore de Balzac
+
+
+
+Translated by Clara Bell and James Waring
+
+
+
+
+
+ALMAE SORORI
+
+
+In the year 1308 few houses were yet standing on the Island formed by
+the alluvium and sand deposited by the Seine above the Cite, behind the
+Church of Notre-Dame. The first man who was so bold as to build on this
+strand, then liable to frequent floods, was a constable of the watch
+of the City of Paris, who had been able to do some service to their
+Reverences the Chapter of the Cathedral; and in return the Bishop leased
+him twenty-five perches of land, with exemptions from all feudal dues or
+taxes on the buildings he might erect.
+
+Seven years before the beginning of this narrative, Joseph Tirechair,
+one of the sternest of Paris constables, as his name (Tear Flesh) would
+indicate, had, thanks to his share of the fines collected by him for
+delinquencies committed within the precincts of the Cite, had been able
+to build a house on the bank of the Seine just at the end of the Rue du
+Port-Saint-Landry. To protect the merchandise landed on the strand, the
+municipality had constructed a sort of break-water of masonry, which may
+still be seen on some old plans of Paris, and which preserved the piles
+of the landing-place by meeting the rush of water and ice at the upper
+end of the Island. The constable had taken advantage of this for the
+foundation of his house, so that there were several steps up to his
+door.
+
+Like all the houses of that date, this cottage was crowned by a peaked
+roof, forming a gable-end to the front, or half a diamond. To the great
+regret of historians, but two or three examples of such roofs survive in
+Paris. A round opening gave light to a loft, where the constable's wife
+dried the linen of the Chapter, for she had the honor of washing for the
+Cathedral--which was certainly not a bad customer. On the first floor
+were two rooms, let to lodgers at a rent, one year with another, of
+forty sous _Parisis_ each, an exorbitant sum, that was however justified
+by the luxury Tirechair had lavished on their adornment. Flanders
+tapestry hung on the walls, and a large bed with a top valance of green
+serge, like a peasant's bed, was amply furnished with mattresses, and
+covered with good sheets of fine linen. Each room had a stove called
+a _chauffe-doux_; the floor, carefully polished by Dame Tirechair's
+apprentices, shone like the woodwork of a shrine. Instead of stools, the
+lodgers had deep chairs of carved walnut, the spoils probably of some
+raided castle. Two chests with pewter mouldings, and tables on
+twisted legs, completed the fittings, worthy of the most fastidious
+knights-banneret whom business might bring to Paris.
+
+The windows of those two rooms looked out on the river. From one you
+could only see the shores of the Seine, and the three barren islands, of
+which two were subsequently joined together to form the Ile Saint-Louis;
+the third was the Ile de Louviers. From the other could be seen, down a
+vista of the Port-Saint-Landry, the buildings on the Greve, the Bridge
+of Notre-Dame, with its houses, and the tall towers of the Louvre, but
+lately built by Philippe-Auguste to overlook the then poor and squalid
+town of Paris, which suggests so many imaginary marvels to the fancy of
+modern romancers.
+
+The ground floor of Tirechair's house consisted of a large hall, where
+his wife's business was carried on, through which the lodgers were
+obliged to pass on their way to their own rooms up a stairway like a
+mill-ladder. Behind this were a kitchen and a bedroom, with a view over
+the Seine. A tiny garden, reclaimed from the waters, displayed at the
+foot of this modest dwelling its beds of cabbages and onions, and a few
+rose-bushes, sheltered by palings, forming a sort of hedge. A little
+structure of lath and mud served as a kennel for a big dog, the
+indispensable guardian of so lonely a dwelling. Beyond this kennel was a
+little plot, where the hens cackled whose eggs were sold to the Canons.
+Here and there on this patch of earth, muddy or dry according to the
+whimsical Parisian weather, a few trees grew, constantly lashed by the
+wind, and teased and broken by the passer-by--willows, reeds, and tall
+grasses.
+
+The Eyot, the Seine, the landing-place, the house, were all overshadowed
+on the west by the huge basilica of Notre-Dame casting its cold gloom
+over the whole plot as the sun moved. Then, as now, there was not in all
+Paris a more deserted spot, a more solemn or more melancholy prospect.
+The noise of waters, the chanting of priests, or the piping of the wind,
+were the only sounds that disturbed this wilderness, where lovers would
+sometimes meet to discuss their secrets when the church-folds and clergy
+were safe in church at the services.
+
+
+
+One evening in April in the year 1308, Tirechair came home in a
+remarkably bad temper. For three days past everything had been in good
+order on the King's highway. Now, as an officer of the peace, nothing
+annoyed him so much as to feel himself useless. He flung down his
+halbert in a rage, muttered inarticulate words as he pulled off his
+doublet, half red and half blue, and slipped on a shabby camlet jerkin.
+After helping himself from the bread-box to a hunch of bread, and
+spreading it with butter, he seated himself on a bench, looked round
+at his four whitewashed walls, counted the beams of the ceiling, made a
+mental inventory of the household goods hanging from the nails, scowled
+at the neatness which left him nothing to complain of, and looked at his
+wife, who said not a word as she ironed the albs and surplices from the
+sacristy.
+
+"By my halidom," he said, to open the conversation, "I cannot think,
+Jacqueline, where you go to catch your apprenticed maids. Now, here is
+one," he went on, pointing to a girl who was folding an altar-cloth,
+clumsily enough, it must be owned, "who looks to me more like a damsel
+rather free of her person than a sturdy country wench. Her hands are as
+white as a fine lady's! By the Mass! and her hair smells of essences, I
+verily believe, and her hose are as find as a queen's. By the two horns
+of Old Nick, matters please me but ill as I find them here."
+
+The girl colored, and stole a look at Jacqueline, full of alarm not
+unmixed with pride. The mistress answered her glance with a smile, laid
+down her work, and turned to her husband.
+
+"Come now," said she, in a sharp tone, "you need not harry me. Are you
+going to accuse me next of some underhand tricks? Patrol your roads
+as much as you please, but do not meddle here with anything but what
+concerns your sleeping in peace, drinking your wine, and eating what
+I set before you, or else, I warn you, I will have no more to do with
+keeping you healthy and happy. Let any one find me a happier man in all
+the town," she went on, with a scolding grimace. "He has silver in his
+purse, a gable over the Seine, a stout halbert on one hand, an honest
+wife on the other, a house as clean and smart as a new pin! And he
+growls like a pilgrim smarting from Saint Anthony's fire!"
+
+"Hey day!" exclaimed the sergeant of the watch, "do you fancy,
+Jacqueline, that I have any wish to see my house razed down, my halbert
+given to another, and my wife standing in the pillory?"
+
+Jacqueline and the dainty journeywoman turned pale.
+
+"Just tell me what you are driving at," said the washerwoman sharply,
+"and make a clean breast of it. For some days, my man, I have observed
+that you have some maggot twisting in your poor brain. Come up, then,
+and have it all out. You must be a pretty coward indeed if you fear any
+harm when you have only to guard the common council and live under the
+protection of the Chapter! Their Reverences the Canons would lay the
+whole bishopric under an interdict if Jacqueline brought a complaint of
+the smallest damage."
+
+As she spoke, she went straight up to her husband and took him by the
+arm.
+
+"Come with me," she added, pulling him up and out on to the steps.
+
+When they were down by the water in their little garden, Jacqueline
+looked saucily in her husband's face.
+
+"I would have you to know, you old gaby, that when my lady fair goes
+out, a piece of gold comes into our savings-box."
+
+"Oh, ho!" said the constable, who stood silent and meditative before his
+wife. But he presently said, "Any way, we are done for.--What brings the
+dame to our house?"
+
+"She comes to see the well-favored young clerk who lives overhead,"
+replied Jacqueline, looking up at the window that opened on to the vast
+landscape of the Seine valley.
+
+"The Devil's in it!" cried the man. "For a few base crowns you have
+ruined me, Jacqueline. Is that an honest trade for a sergeant's decent
+wife to ply? And, be she Countess or Baroness, the lady will not be able
+to get us out of the trap in which we shall find ourselves caught sooner
+or later. Shall we not have to square accounts with some puissant and
+offended husband? for, by the Mass, she is fair to look upon!"
+
+"But she is a widow, I tell you, gray gander! How dare you accuse your
+wife of foul play and folly? And the lady has never spoken a word to yon
+gentle clerk, she is content to look on him and think of him. Poor lad!
+he would be dead of starvation by now but for her, for she is as good as
+a mother to him. And he, the sweet cherub! it is as easy to cheat him as
+to rock a new-born babe. He believes his pence will last for ever, and
+he has eaten them through twice over in the past six months."
+
+"Woman," said the sergeant, solemnly pointing to the Place de Greve, "do
+you remember seeing, even from this spot, the fire in which they burnt
+the Danish woman the other day?"
+
+"What then?" said Jacqueline, in a fright.
+
+"What then?" echoed Tirechair. "Why, the two men who lodge with us smell
+of scorching. Neither Chapter nor Countess or Protector can serve them.
+Here is Easter come round; the year is ending; we must turn our company
+out of doors, and that at once. Do you think you can teach an old
+constable how to know a gallows-bird? Our two lodgers were on terms with
+la Porette, that heretic jade from Denmark or Norway, whose last cries
+you heard from here. She was a brave witch; she never blenched at the
+stake, which was proof enough of her compact with the Devil. I saw her
+as plain as I see you; she preached to the throng, and declared she was
+in heaven and could see God.
+
+"And since that, I tell you, I have never slept quietly in my bed.
+My lord, who lodges over us, is of a surety more of a wizard than a
+Christian. On my word as an officer, I shiver when that old man passes
+near me; he never sleeps of nights; if I wake, his voice is ringing
+like a bourdon of bells, and I hear him muttering incantations in the
+language of hell. Have you ever seen him eat an honest crust of bread
+or a hearth-cake made by a good Catholic baker? His brown skin has been
+scorched and tanned by hell-fires. Marry, and I tell you his eyes hold
+a spell like that of serpents. Jacqueline, I will have none of those two
+men under my roof. I see too much of the law not to know that it is well
+to have nothing to do with it.--You must get rid of our two lodgers; the
+elder because I suspect him; the youngster, because he is too pretty.
+They neither of them seem to me to keep Christian company. The boy
+is ever staring at the moon, the stars, and the clouds, like a wizard
+watching for the hour when he shall mount his broomstick; the other old
+rogue certainly makes some use of the poor boy for his black art. My
+house stands too close to the river as it is, and that risk of ruin is
+bad enough without bringing down fire from heaven, or the love affairs
+of a countess. I have spoken. Do not rebel."
+
+In spite of her sway in the house, Jacqueline stood stupefied as she
+listened to the edict fulminated against his lodgers by the sergeant
+of the watch. She mechanically looked up at the window of the room
+inhabited by the old man, and shivered with horror as she suddenly
+caught sight of the gloomy, melancholy face, and the piercing eye that
+so affected her husband, accustomed as he was to dealing with criminals.
+
+At that period, great and small, priests and laymen, all trembled before
+the idea of any supernatural power. The word "magic" was as powerful as
+leprosy to root up feelings, break social ties, and freeze piety in the
+most generous soul. It suddenly struck the constable's wife that she
+had never, in fact, seen either of her lodgers exercising any human
+function. Though the younger man's voice was as sweet and melodious as
+the tones of a flute, she so rarely heard it that she was tempted to
+think his silence the result of a spell. As she recalled the strange
+beauty of that pink-and-white face, and saw in memory the fine hair and
+moist brilliancy of those eyes, she believed that they were indeed the
+artifices of the Devil. She remembered that for days at a time she
+had never heard the slightest sound from either room. Where were the
+strangers during all those hours?
+
+Suddenly the most singular circumstances recurred to her mind. She was
+completely overmastered by fear, and could even discern witchcraft in
+the rich lady's interest in the young Godefroid, a poor orphan who had
+come from Flanders to study at the University of Paris. She hastily put
+her hand into one of her pockets, pulled out four livres of Tournay in
+large silver coinage, and looked at the pieces with an expression of
+avarice mingled with terror.
+
+"That, at any rate, is not false coin," said she, showing the silver
+to her husband. "Besides," she went on, "how can I turn them out after
+taking next year's rent paid in advance?"
+
+"You had better inquire of the Dean of the Chapter," replied Tirechair.
+"Is not it his business to tell us how we should deal with these
+extraordinary persons?"
+
+"Ay, truly extraordinary," cried Jacqueline. "To think of their cunning;
+coming here under the very shadow of Notre-Dame! Still," she went on,
+"or ever I ask the Dean, why not warn that fair and noble lady of the
+risk she runs?"
+
+As she spoke, Jacqueline went into the house with her husband, who had
+not missed a mouthful. Tirechair, as a man grown old in the tricks
+of his trade, affected to believe that the strange lady was in fact a
+work-girl; still, this assumed indifference could not altogether cloak
+the timidity of a courtier who respects a royal incognity. At this
+moment six was striking by the clock of Saint-Denis du Pas, a small
+church that stood between Notre-Dame and the Port-Saint-Landry--the
+first church erected in Paris, on the very spot where Saint-Denis was
+laid on the gridiron, as chronicles tell. The hour flew from steeple to
+tower all over the city. Then suddenly confused shouts were heard on
+the left bank of the Seine, behind Notre-Dame, in the quarter where the
+schools of the University harbored their swarms.
+
+At this signal, Jacqueline's elder lodger began to move about his room.
+The sergeant, his wife, and the strange lady listened while he opened
+and shut his door, and the old man's heavy step was heard on the steep
+stair. The constable's suspicions gave such interest to the advent of
+this personage, that the lady was startled as she observed the strange
+expression of the two countenances before her. Referring the terrors
+of this couple to the youth she was protecting--as was natural in a
+lover--the young lady awaited, with some uneasiness, the event thus
+heralded by the fears of her so-called master and mistress.
+
+The old man paused for a moment on the threshold to scrutinize the three
+persons in the room, and seemed to be looking for his young companion.
+This glance of inquiry, unsuspicious as it was, agitated the three.
+Indeed, nobody, not even the stoutest man, could deny that Nature
+had bestowed exceptional powers on this being, who seemed almost
+supernatural. Though his eyes were somewhat deeply shaded by the wide
+sockets fringed with long eyebrows, they were set, like a kite's eyes,
+in eyelids so broad, and bordered by so dark a circle sharply defined on
+his cheek, that they seemed rather prominent. These singular eyes had
+in them something indescribably domineering and piercing, which took
+possession of the soul by a grave and thoughtful look, a look as bright
+and lucid as that of a serpent or a bird, but which held one fascinated
+and crushed by the swift communication of some tremendous sorrow, or of
+some super-human power.
+
+Every feature was in harmony with this eye of lead and of fire, at once
+rigid and flashing, stern and calm. While in this eagle eye earthly
+emotions seemed in some sort extinct, the lean, parched face also bore
+traces of unhappy passions and great deeds done. The nose, which was
+narrow and aquiline, was so long that it seemed to hang on by the
+nostrils. The bones of the face were strongly marked by the long,
+straight wrinkles that furrowed the hollow cheeks. Every line in the
+countenance looked dark. It would suggest the bed of a torrent where
+the violence of former floods was recorded in the depth of the
+water-courses, which testified to some terrible, unceasing turmoil.
+Like the ripples left by the oars of a boat on the waters, deep lines,
+starting from each side of his nose, marked his face strongly, and
+gave an expression of bitter sadness to his mouth, which was firm and
+straight-lipped. Above the storm thus stamped on his countenance, his
+calm brow rose with what may be called boldness, and crowned it as with
+a marble dome.
+
+The stranger preserved that intrepid and dignified manner that is
+frequently habitual with men inured to disaster, and fitted by nature to
+stand unmoved before a furious mob and to face the greatest dangers. He
+seemed to move in a sphere apart, where he poised above humanity. His
+gestures, no less than his look, were full of irresistible power; his
+lean hands were those of a soldier; and if your own eyes were forced to
+fall before his piercing gaze, you were no less sure to tremble when by
+word or action he spoke to your soul. He moved in silent majesty that
+made him seem a king without his guard, a god without his rays.
+
+His dress emphasized the ideas suggested by the peculiarities of his
+mien and face. Soul, body, and garb were in harmony, and calculated to
+impress the coldest imagination. He wore a sort of sleeveless gown of
+black cloth, fastened in front, and falling to the calf, leaving the
+neck bare with no collar. His doublet and boots were likewise black.
+On his head was a black velvet cap like a priest's, sitting in a close
+circle above his forehead, and not showing a single hair. It was the
+strictest mourning, the gloomiest habit a man could wear. But for a
+long sword that hung by his side from a leather belt which could be
+seen where his surcoat hung open, a priest would have hailed him as a
+brother. Though of no more than middle height, he appeared tall; and,
+looking him in the face he seemed a giant.
+
+"The clock has struck, the boat is waiting; will you not come?"
+
+At these words, spoken in bad French, but distinctly audible in the
+silence, a little noise was heard in the other top room, and the young
+man came down as lightly as a bird.
+
+When Godefroid appeared, the lady's face turned crimson; she trembled,
+started, and covered her face with her white hands.
+
+Any woman might have shared her agitation at the sight of this youth of
+about twenty, of a form and stature so slender that at a first glance he
+might have been taken for a mere boy, or a young girl in disguise. His
+black cap--like the _beret_ worn by the Basque people--showed a brow
+as white as snow, where grace and innocence shone with an expression
+of divine sweetness--the light of a soul full of faith. A poet's
+fancy would have seen there the star which, in some old tale, a mother
+entreats the fairy godmother to set on the forehead of an infant
+abandoned, like Moses, to the waves. Love lurked in the thousand fair
+curls that fell over his shoulders. His throat, truly a swan's throat,
+was white and exquisitely round. His blue eyes, bright and liquid,
+mirrored the sky. His features and the mould of his brow were refined
+and delicate enough to enchant a painter. The bloom of beauty, which
+in a woman's face causes men such indescribable delight, the exquisite
+purity of outline, the halo of light that bathes the features we love,
+were here combined with a masculine complexion, and with strength as
+yet but half developed, in the most enchanting contrast. His was one of
+those melodious countenances which even when silent speak and attract
+us. And yet, on marking it attentively, the incipient blight might have
+been detected which comes of a great thought or a passion, the faint
+yellow tinge that made him seem like a young leaf opening to the sun.
+
+No contrast could be greater or more startling than that seen in the
+companionship of these two men. It was like seeing a frail and graceful
+shrub that has grown from the hollow trunk of some gnarled willow,
+withered by age, blasted by lightning, standing decrepit; one of those
+majestic trees that painters love; the trembling sapling takes shelter
+there from storms. One was a god, the other was an angel; one the poet
+that feels, the other the poet that expresses--a prophet in sorrow, a
+levite in prayer.
+
+They went out together without speaking.
+
+"Did you mark how he called him to him?" cried the sergeant of the watch
+when the footsteps of the couple were no longer audible on the strand.
+"Are not they a demon and his familiar?"
+
+"Phooh!" puffed Jacqueline. "I felt smothered! I never marked our two
+lodgers so carefully. 'Tis a bad thing for us women that the Devil can
+wear so fair a mien!"
+
+"Ay, cast some holy water on him," said Tirechair, "and you will see him
+turn into a toad.--I am off to tell the office all about them."
+
+On hearing this speech, the lady roused herself from the reverie into
+which she had sunk, and looked at the constable, who was donning his
+red-and-blue jacket.
+
+"Whither are you off to?" she asked.
+
+"To tell the justices that wizards are lodging in our house very much
+against our will."
+
+The lady smiled.
+
+"I," said she, "am the Comtesse de Mahaut," and she rose with a dignity
+that took the man's breath away. "Beware of bringing the smallest
+trouble on your guests. Above all, respect the old man; I have seen him
+in the company of your Lord the King, who entreated him courteously;
+you will be ill advised to trouble him in any way. As to my having been
+here--never breathe a word of it, as you value your life."
+
+She said no more, but relapsed into thought.
+
+Presently she looked up, signed to Jacqueline, and together they went up
+into Godefroid's room. The fair Countess looked at the bed, the carved
+chairs, the chest, the tapestry, the table, with a joy like that of
+the exile who sees on his return the crowded roofs of his native town
+nestling at the foot of a hill.
+
+"If you have not deceived me," she said to Jacqueline, "I promise you a
+hundred crowns in gold."
+
+"Behold, madame," said the woman, "the poor angel is confiding--here is
+all his treasure."
+
+As she spoke, Jacqueline opened a drawer in the table and showed some
+parchments.
+
+"God of mercy!" cried the Countess, snatching up a document that caught
+her eye, on which she read, _Gothofredus Comes Gantiacus_ (Godefroid,
+Count of Ghent).
+
+She dropped the parchment, and passed her hand over her brow; then,
+feeling, no doubt, that she had compromised herself by showing so much
+emotion, she recovered her cold demeanor.
+
+"I am satisfied," said she.
+
+She went downstairs and out of the house. The constable and his wife
+stood in their doorway, and saw her take the path to the landing-place.
+
+A boat was moored hard by. When the rustle of the Countess' approach was
+audible, a boatman suddenly stood up, helped the fair laundress to take
+her seat in it, and rowed with such strength as to make the boat fly
+like a swallow down the stream.
+
+"You are a sorry fellow," said Jacqueline, giving the officer's shoulder
+a familiar slap. "We have earned a hundred gold crowns this morning."
+
+"I like harboring lords no better than harboring wizards. And I know
+not, of the two, which is the more like to bring us to the gallows,"
+replied Tirechair, taking up his halbert. "I will go my rounds over by
+Champfleuri; God protect us, and send me to meet some pert jade out in
+her bravery of gold rings to glitter in the shade like a glow-worm!"
+
+Jacqueline, alone in the house, hastily went up to the unknown lord's
+room to discover, if she could, some clue to this mysterious business.
+Like some learned men who give themselves infinite pains to complicate
+the clear and simple laws of nature, she had already invented a chaotic
+romance to account for the meeting of these three persons under her
+humble roof. She hunted through the chest, examined everything, but
+could find nothing extraordinary. She saw nothing on the table but a
+writing-case and some sheets of parchment; and as she could not read,
+this discovery told her nothing. A woman's instinct then took her into
+the young man's room, and from thence she descried her two lodgers
+crossing the river in the ferry boat.
+
+"They stand like two statues," said she to herself. "Ah, ha! They are
+landing at the Rue du Fouarre. How nimble he is, the sweet youth! He
+jumped out like a bird. By him the old man looks like some stone saint
+in the Cathedral.--They are going to the old School of the Four Nations.
+Presto! they are out of sight.--And this is where he lives, poor
+cherub!" she went on, looking about the room. "How smart and winning he
+is! Ah! your fine gentry are made of other stuff than we are."
+
+And Jacqueline went down again after smoothing down the bed-coverlet,
+dusting the chest, and wondering for the hundredth time in six months:
+
+"What in the world does he do all the blessed day? He cannot always be
+staring at the blue sky and the stars that God has hung up there like
+lanterns. That dear boy has known trouble. But why do he and the old man
+hardly ever speak to each other?"
+
+Then she lost herself in wonderment and in thoughts which, in her
+woman's brain, were tangled like a skein of thread.
+
+The old man and his young companion had gone into one of the schools for
+which the Rue du Fouarre was at that time famous throughout Europe. At
+the moment when Jacqueline's two lodgers arrived at the old School des
+Quatre Nations, the celebrated Sigier, the most noted Doctor of Mystical
+Theology of the University of Paris, was mounting his pulpit in a
+spacious low room on a level with the street. The cold stones were
+strewn with clean straw, on which several of his disciples knelt on
+one knee, writing on the other, to enable them to take notes from the
+Master's improvised discourse, in the shorthand abbreviations which are
+the despair of modern decipherers.
+
+The hall was full, not of students only, but of the most distinguished
+men belonging to the clergy, the court, and the legal faculty. There
+were some learned foreigners, too--soldiers and rich citizens. The broad
+faces were there, with prominent brows and venerable beards, which fill
+us with a sort of pious respect for our ancestors when we see their
+portraits from the Middle Ages. Lean faces, too, with burning, sunken
+eyes, under bald heads yellow from the labors of futile scholasticism,
+contrasted with young and eager countenances, grave faces, warlike
+faces, and the ruddy cheeks of the financial class.
+
+These lectures, dissertations, theses, sustained by the brightest
+geniuses of the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries, roused our
+forefathers to enthusiasm. They were to them their bull-fights, their
+Italian opera, their tragedy, their dancers; in short, all their drama.
+The performance of Mysteries was a later thing than these spiritual
+disputations, to which, perhaps, we owe the French stage. Inspired
+eloquence, combining the attractions of the human voice skilfully used,
+with daring inquisition into the secrets of God, sufficed to satisfy
+every form of curiosity, appealed to the soul, and constituted the
+fashionable entertainment of the time. Not only did Theology include
+the other sciences, it was science itself, as grammar was science to the
+Ancient Greeks; and those who distinguished themselves in these duels,
+in which the orators, like Jacob, wrestled with the Spirit of God, had
+a promising future before them. Embassies, arbitrations between
+sovereigns, chancellorships, and ecclesiastical dignities were the meed
+of men whose rhetoric had been schooled in theological controversy. The
+professor's chair was the tribune of the period.
+
+This system lasted till the day when Rabelais gibbeted dialectics by
+his merciless satire, as Cervantes demolished chivalry by a narrative
+comedy.
+
+To understand this amazing period and the spirit which dictated its
+voluminous, though now forgotten, masterpieces, to analyze it, even to
+its barbarisms, we need only examine the Constitutions of the University
+of Paris and the extraordinary scheme of instruction that then obtained.
+Theology was taught under two faculties--that of Theology properly so
+called, and that of Canon Law. The faculty of Theology, again, had three
+sections--Scholastic, Canonical, and Mystic. It would be wearisome to
+give an account of the attributes of each section of the science, since
+one only, namely, Mystic, is the subject of this _Etude_.
+
+Mystical Theology included the whole of Divine Revelation and the
+elucidation of the Mysteries. And this branch of ancient theology has
+been secretly preserved with reverence even to our own day; Jacob Boehm,
+Swendenborg, Martinez Pasqualis, Saint-Martin, Molinos, Madame Guyon,
+Madame Bourignon, and Madame Krudener, the extensive sect of the
+Ecstatics, and that of the Illuminati, have at different periods duly
+treasured the doctrines of this science, of which the aim is indeed
+truly startling and portentous. In Doctor Sigier's day, as in our own,
+man has striven to gain wings to fly into the sanctuary where God hides
+from our gaze.
+
+This digression was necessary to give a clue to the scene at which the
+old man and the youth from the island under Notre-Dame had come to be
+audience; it will also protect this narrative from all blame on the
+score of falsehood and hyperbole, of which certain persons of hasty
+judgment might perhaps suspect me.
+
+Doctor Sigier was a tall man in the prime of life. His face, rescued
+from oblivion by the archives of the University, had singular analogies
+with that of Mirabeau. It was stamped with the seal of fierce, swift,
+and terrible eloquence. But the Doctor bore on his brow the expression
+of religious faith that his modern double had not. His voice, too, was
+of persuasive sweetness, with a clear and pleasing ring in it.
+
+At this moment the daylight, that was stintingly diffused through the
+small, heavily-leaded window-panes, tinted the assembly with capricious
+tones and powerful contrasts from the chequered light and shade. Here,
+in a dark corner, eyes shone brightly, their dark heads under the
+sunbeams gleamed light above faces in shadow, and various bald heads,
+with only a circlet of white hair, were distinguished among the crowd
+like battlements silvered by moonlight. Every face was turned towards
+the Doctor, mute but impatient. The drowsy voices of other lecturers
+in the adjoining schools were audible in the silent street like the
+murmuring of the sea; and the steps of the two strangers, as they now
+came in, attracted general attention. Doctor Sigier, ready to begin, saw
+the stately senior standing, looked round for a seat for him, and then
+finding none, as the place was full, came down from his place, went to
+the newcomer, and with great respect, led him to the platform of
+his professor's chair, and there gave him his stool to sit upon. The
+assembly hailed this mark of deference with a murmur of approval,
+recognizing the old man as the orator of a fine thesis admirably argued
+not long since at the Sorbonne.
+
+The stranger looked down from his raised position on the crowd below
+with that deep glance that held a whole poem of sorrow, and those who
+met his eye felt an indescribable thrill. The lad, following the old
+man, sat down on one of the steps, leaning against the pulpit in a
+graceful and melancholy attitude. The silence was now profound, and the
+doorway and even the street were blocked by scholars who had deserted
+the other classes.
+
+Doctor Sigier was to-day to recapitulate, in the last of a series of
+discourses, the views he had set forth in the former lectures on the
+Resurrection, Heaven, and Hell. His strange doctrine responded to
+the sympathies of the time, and gratified the immoderate love of the
+marvelous, which haunts the mind of man in every age. This effort of
+man to clutch the infinite, which for ever slips through his ineffectual
+grasp, this last tourney of thought against thought, was a task worthy
+of an assembly where the most stupendous human imagination ever known,
+perhaps, at that moment shone.
+
+The Doctor began by summing up in a mild and even tone the principal
+points he had so far established:
+
+"No intellect was the exact counterpart of another. Had man any right to
+require an account of his Creator for the inequality of powers bestowed
+on each? Without attempting to penetrate rashly into the designs of
+God, ought we not to recognize the fact that by reason of their general
+diversity intelligences could be classed in spheres? From the sphere
+where the least degree of intelligence gleamed, to the most translucent
+souls who could see the road by which to ascend to God, was there not
+an ascending scale of spiritual gift? And did not spirits of the same
+sphere understand each other like brothers in soul, in flesh, in mind,
+and in feeling?"
+
+From this the Doctor went on to unfold the most wonderful theories of
+sympathy. He set forth in Biblical language the phenomena of love, of
+instinctive repulsion, of strong affinities which transcend the laws
+of space, of the sudden mingling of souls which seem to recognize each
+other. With regard to the different degrees of strength of which our
+affections are capable, he accounted for them by the place, more or less
+near the centre, occupied by beings in their respective circles.
+
+He gave mathematical expression to God's grand idea in the co-ordination
+of the various human spheres. "Through man," he said, "these spheres
+constituted a world intermediate between the intelligence of the brute
+and the intelligence of the angels." As he stated it, the divine Word
+nourishes the spiritual Word, the spiritual Word nourishes the living
+Word, the living Word nourishes the animal Word, the animal Word
+nourishes the vegetable Word, and the vegetable Word is the expression
+of the life of the barren Word. These successive evolutions, as of a
+chrysalis, which God thus wrought in our souls, this infusorial life,
+so to speak, communicated from each zone to the next, more vivid, more
+spiritual, more perceptive in its ascent, represented, rather dimly no
+doubt, but marvelously enough to his inexperienced hearers, the impulse
+given to Nature by the Almighty. Supported by many texts from the Sacred
+Scriptures, which he used as a commentary on his own statements to
+express by concrete images the abstract arguments he felt to be wanting,
+he flourished the Spirit of God like a torch over the deep secrets of
+creation, with an eloquence peculiar to himself, and accents that urged
+conviction on his audience. As he unfolded his mysterious system and
+all its consequences, he gave a key to every symbol and justified the
+vocation, the special gifts, the genius, the talent of each human being.
+
+Then, instinctively becoming physiological, he remarked on the
+resemblance to certain animals stamped on some human faces, accounting
+for them by primordial analogies and the upward tendency of all
+creation. He showed his audience the workings of Nature, and assigned
+a mission and a future to minerals, plants, and animals. Bible in
+hand, after thus spiritualizing Matter and materializing Spirit, after
+pointing to the Will of God in all things, and enjoining respect for
+His smallest works, he suggested the possibility of rising by faith from
+sphere to sphere.
+
+This was the first portion of his discourse, and by adroit
+digressions he applied the doctrine of his system to feudalism. The
+poetry--religious and profane--and the abrupt eloquence of that
+period had a grand opening in this vast theory, wherein the Doctor had
+amalgamated all the philosophical systems of the ancients, and from
+which he brought them out again classified, transfigured, purified. The
+false dogmas of two adverse principles and of Pantheism were demolished
+at his word, which proclaimed the Divine Unity, while ascribing to
+God and His angels the knowledge, the ends to which the means shone
+resplendent to the eyes of man. Fortified by the demonstrations that
+proved the existence of the world of Matter, Doctor Sigier constructed
+the scheme of a spiritual world dividing us from God by an ascending
+scale of spheres, just as the plant is divided from man by an infinite
+number of grades. He peopled the heavens, the stars, the planets, the
+sun.
+
+Quoting Saint Paul, he invested man with a new power; he might rise,
+from globe to globe, to the very Fount of eternal life. Jacob's mystical
+ladder was both the religious formula and the traditional proof of the
+fact. He soared through space, carrying with him the passionate souls of
+his hearers on the wings of his word, making them feel the infinite, and
+bathing them in the heavenly sea. Then the Doctor accounted logically
+for hell by circles placed in inverse order to the shining spheres that
+lead to God, in which torments and darkness take the place of the
+Spirit and of light. Pain was as intelligible as rapture. The terms of
+comparison were present in the conditions of human life and its various
+atmospheres of suffering and of intellect. Thus the most extraordinary
+traditions of hell and purgatory were quite naturally conceivable.
+
+He gave the fundamental _rationale_ of virtue with admirable clearness.
+A pious man, toiling onward in poverty, proud of his good conscience,
+at peace with himself, and steadfastly true to himself in his heart
+in spite of the spectacle of exultant vice, was a fallen angel doing
+penance, who remembered his origin, foresaw his guerdon, accomplished
+his task, and obeyed his glorious mission. The sublime resignation of
+Christians was then seen in all its glory. He depicted martyrs at the
+burning stake, and almost stripped them of their merit by stripping
+them of their sufferings. He showed their inner angel as dwelling in the
+heavens, while the outer man was tortured by the executioner's sword.
+He described angels dwelling among men, and gave tokens by which to
+recognize them.
+
+He next strove to drag from the very depths of man's understanding the
+real sense of the word fall, which occurs in every language. He appealed
+to the most widely-spread traditions in evidence of this one true
+origin, explaining, with much lucidity, the passion all men have for
+rising, mounting--an instinctive ambition, the perennial revelations of
+our destiny.
+
+He displayed the whole universe at a glance, and described the nature
+of God Himself circulating in a full tide from the centre to the
+extremities, and from the extremities to the centre again. Nature was
+one and homogeneous. In the most seemingly trivial, as in the most
+stupendous work, everything obeyed that law; each created object
+reproduced in little an exact image of that nature--the sap in the
+plant, the blood in man, the orbits of the planets. He piled proof on
+proof, always completing his idea by a picture musical with poetry.
+
+And he boldly anticipated every objection. He thundered forth an
+eloquent challenge to the monumental works of science and human
+excrescences of knowledge, such as those which societies use the
+elements of the earthly globe to produce. He asked whether our wars, our
+disasters, our depravity could hinder the great movement given by God to
+all the globes; and he laughed human impotence to scorn by pointing
+to their efforts everywhere in ruins. He cried upon the manes of Tyre,
+Carthage, and Babylon; he called upon Babel and Jerusalem to appear;
+and sought, without finding them, the transient furrows made by the
+ploughshare of civilization. Humanity floated on the surface of the
+earth as a ship whose wake is lost in the calm level of ocean.
+
+These were the fundamental notions set forth in Doctor Sigier's address,
+all wrapped in the mystical language and strange school Latin of the
+time. He had made a special study of the Scriptures, and they supplied
+him with the weapons with which he came before his contemporaries to
+hasten their progress. He hid his boldness under his immense learning,
+as with a cloak, and his philosophical bent under a saintly life. At
+this moment, after bringing his hearers face to face with God, after
+packing the universe into an idea, and almost unveiling the idea of the
+world, he gazed down on the silent, throbbing mass, and scrutinized the
+stranger with a look. Then, spurred on, no doubt, by the presence of
+this remarkable personage, he added these words, from which I have
+eliminated the corrupt Latinity of the Middle Ages:--
+
+"Where, think you, may a man find these fruitful truths if not in the
+heart of God Himself?--What am I?--The humble interpreter of a single
+line left to us by the greatest of the Apostles--a single line out of
+thousands all equally full of light. Before us, Saint Paul said, '_In
+Deo vivimus movemur et sumus_.' In our day, less believing and more
+learned, or better instructed and more sceptical, we should ask the
+Apostle, 'To what end this perpetual motion? Whither leads this life
+divided into zones? Wherefore an intelligence that begins with the
+obscure perfection of marble and proceeds from sphere to sphere up to
+man, up to the angel, up to God? Where is the Fount, where is the ocean,
+if life, attaining to God across worlds and stars, through Matter and
+Spirit, has to come down again to some other goal?'
+
+"You desire to see both aspects of the universe at once. You would adore
+the Sovereign on condition of being suffered to sit for an instant
+on His throne. Mad fools that we are! We will not admit that the most
+intelligent animals are able to understand our ideas and the object of
+our actions; we are merciless to the creatures of the inferior spheres,
+and exile them from our own; we deny them the faculty of divining human
+thoughts, and yet we ourselves would fain master the highest of all
+ideas--the Idea of the Idea!
+
+"Well, go then, start! Fly by faith up from globe to globe, soar through
+space! Thought, love, and faith are its mystical keys. Traverse the
+circles, reach the throne! God is more merciful than you are; He opens
+His temple to all His creatures. Only, do not forget the pattern of
+Moses; put your shoes from off your feet, cast off all filth, leave
+your body far behind; otherwise you shall be consumed; for God--God is
+Light!"
+
+Just as Doctor Sigier spoke these grand words, his face radiant, his
+hand uplifted, a sunbeam pierced through an open window, like a magic
+jet from a fount of splendor, a long triangular shaft of gold that lay
+like a scarf over the whole assembly. They all clapped their hands, for
+the audience accepted this effect of the sinking sun as a miracle. There
+was a universal cry of:
+
+"_Vivant_! _Vivant_!"
+
+The very sky seemed to shed approval. Godefroid, struck with reverence,
+looked from the old man to Doctor Sigier; they were talking together in
+an undertone.
+
+"All honor to the Master!" said the stranger.
+
+"What is such transient honor?" replied Sigier.
+
+"I would I could perpetuate my gratitude," said the older man.
+
+"A line written by you is enough!" said the Doctor. "It would give me
+immortality, humanly speaking."
+
+"Can I give what I have not?" cried the elder.
+
+Escorted by the crowd, which followed in their footsteps, like courtiers
+round a king, at a respectful distance, Godefroid, with the old man and
+the Doctor, made their way to the oozy shore, where as yet there were no
+houses, and where the ferryman was waiting for them. The Doctor and the
+stranger were talking together, not in Latin nor in any Gallic tongue,
+but in an unknown language, and very gravely. They pointed with their
+hands now to heaven and now to the earth. Sigier, to whom the paths by
+the river were familiar, guided the venerable stranger with particular
+care to the narrow planks which here and there bridged the mud; the
+following watched them inquisitively; and some of the students envied
+the privileged boy who might walk with these two great masters of
+speech. Finally, the Doctor took leave of the stranger, and the
+ferry-boat pushed off.
+
+At the moment when the boat was afloat on the wide river, communicating
+its motion to the soul, the sun pierced the clouds like a conflagration
+blazing up on the horizon, and poured forth a flood of light, coloring
+slate roof-tops and humbler thatch with a ruddy glow and tawny
+reflections, fringed Philippe Auguste's towers with fire, flooded the
+sky, dyed the waters, gilded the plants, and aroused the half-sleeping
+insects. The immense shaft of light set the clouds on fire. It was like
+the last verse of the daily hymn. Every heart was thrilled; nature in
+such a moment is sublime.
+
+As he gazed at the spectacle, the stranger's eyes moistened with the
+tenderest of human tears: Godefroid too was weeping; his trembling
+hand touched that of the elder man, who, looking round, confessed his
+emotion. But thinking his dignity as a man compromised, no doubt, to
+redeem it, he said in a deep voice:
+
+"I weep for my native land. I am an exile! Young man, in such an hour as
+this I left my home. There, at this hour, the fireflies are coming
+out of their fragile dwellings and clinging like diamond sparks to the
+leaves of the iris. At this hour the breeze, as sweet as the sweetest
+poetry, rises up from a valley bathed in light, bearing on its wings
+the richest fragrance. On the horizon I could see a golden city like
+the Heavenly Jerusalem--a city whose name I may not speak. There, too,
+a river winds. But that city and its buildings, that river of which
+the lovely vistas, and the pools of blue water, mingled, crossed,
+and embraced each other, which gladdened my sight and filled me with
+love--where are they?
+
+"At that hour the waters assumed fantastic hues under the sunset sky,
+and seemed to be painted pictures; the stars dropped tender streaks of
+light, the moon spread its pleasing snares; it gave another life to
+the trees, to the color and form of things, and a new aspect to the
+sparkling water, the silent hills, the eloquent buildings. The city
+spoke, it glittered, it called to me to return!
+
+"Columns of smoke rose up by the side of the ancient pillars, whose
+marble sheen gleamed white through the night; the lines of the horizon
+were still visible through the mists of evening; all was harmony and
+mystery. Nature would not say farewell; she desired to keep me there.
+Ah! It was all in all to me; my mother and my child, my wife and my
+glory! The very bells bewailed my condemnation. Oh, land of marvels!
+It is as beautiful as heaven. From that hour the wide world has been my
+dungeon. Beloved land, why hast thou rejected me?
+
+"But I shall triumph there yet!" he cried, speaking with an accent
+of such intense conviction and such a ringing tone, that the boatman
+started as at a trumpet call.
+
+The stranger was standing in a prophetic attitude and gazing southwards
+into the blue, pointing to his native home across the skyey regions.
+The ascetic pallor of his face had given place to a glow of triumph, his
+eyes flashed, he was as grand as a lion shaking his mane.
+
+"But you, poor child," he went on, looking at Godefroid, whose cheeks
+were beaded with glittering tears, "have you, like me, studied life from
+blood-stained pages? What can you have to weep for, at your age?"
+
+"Alas!" said Godefroid, "I regret a land more beautiful than any land
+on earth--a land I never saw and yet remember. Oh, if I could but cleave
+the air on beating wings, I would fly----"
+
+"Whither?" asked the exile.
+
+"Up there," replied the boy.
+
+On hearing this answer, the stranger seemed surprised; he looked darkly
+at the youth, who remained silent. They seemed to communicate by an
+unspeakable effusion of the spirit, hearing each other's yearnings
+in the teeming silence, and going forth side by side, like two doves
+sweeping the air on equal wing, till the boat, touching the strand of
+the island, roused them from their deep reverie.
+
+Then, each lost in thought, they went together to the sergeant's house.
+
+"And so the boy believes that he is an angel exiled from heaven!"
+thought the tall stranger. "Which of us all has a right to undeceive
+him? Not I--I, who am so often lifted by some magic spell so far above
+the earth; I who am dedicate to God; I who am a mystery to myself. Have
+I not already seen the fairest of the angels dwelling in this mire? Is
+this child more or less crazed than I am? Has he taken a bolder step
+in the way of faith? He believes, and his belief no doubt will lead him
+into some path of light like that in which I walk. But though he is
+as beautiful as an angel, is he not too feeble to stand fast in such a
+struggle?"
+
+Abashed by the presence of his companion, whose voice of thunder
+expressed to him his own thoughts, as lightning expresses the will of
+Heaven, the boy was satisfied to gaze at the stars with a lover's eyes.
+Overwhelmed by a luxury of sentiment, which weighed on his heart, he
+stood there timid and weak--a midge in the sunbeams. Sigier's discourse
+had proved to them the mysteries of the spiritual world; the tall, old
+man was to invest them with glory; the lad felt them in himself,
+though he could in no way express them. The three represented in living
+embodiment Science, Poetry, and Feeling.
+
+
+
+On going into the house, the Exile shut himself into his room, lighted
+the inspiring lamp, and gave himself over to the ruthless demon of Work,
+seeking words of the silence and ideas of the night. Godefroid sat down
+in his window sill, by turns gazing at the moon reflected in the water,
+and studying the mysteries of the sky. Lost in one of the trances that
+were frequent to him, he traveled from sphere to sphere, from vision to
+vision, listening for obscure rustlings and the voices of angels, and
+believing that he heard them; seeing, or fancying that he saw, a divine
+radiance in which he lost himself; striving to attain the far-away goal,
+the source of all light, the fount of all harmony.
+
+Presently the vast clamor of Paris, brought down on the current, was
+hushed; lights were extinguished one by one in the houses; silence
+spread over all; and the huge city slept like a tired giant.
+
+Midnight struck. The least noise, the fall of a leaf, or the flight of
+a jackdaw changing its perching-place among the pinnacles of Notre-Dame,
+would have been enough to bring the stranger's mind to earth again, to
+have made the youth drop from the celestial heights to which his soul
+had soared on the wings of rapture.
+
+And then the old man heard with dismay a groan mingling with the sound
+of a heavy fall--the fall, as his experienced ear assured him, of a dead
+body. He hastened into Godefroid's room, and saw him lying in a heap
+with a long rope tight round his neck, the end meandering over the
+floor.
+
+When he had untied it, the poor lad opened his eyes.
+
+"Where am I?" he asked, with a hopeful gleam.
+
+"In your own room," said the elder man, looking with surprise at
+Godefroid's neck, and at the nail to which the cord had been tied, and
+which was still in the knot.
+
+"In heaven?" said the boy, in a voice of music.
+
+"No; on earth!"
+
+Godefroid rose and walked along the path of light traced on the floor
+by the moon through the window, which stood open; he saw the rippling
+Seine, the willows and plants on the island. A misty atmosphere hung
+over the waters like a smokey floor.
+
+On seeing the view, to him so heartbreaking, he folded his hands over
+his bosom, and stood in an attitude of despair; the Exile came up to him
+with astonishment on his face.
+
+"You meant to kill yourself?" he asked.
+
+"Yes," replied Godefroid, while the stranger passed his hand about his
+neck again and again to feel the place where the rope had tightened on
+it.
+
+But for some slight bruises, the young man had been but little hurt. His
+friend supposed that the nail had given way at once under the weight of
+the body, and the terrible attempt had ended in a fall without injury.
+
+"And why, dear lad, did you try to kill yourself?"
+
+"Alas!" said Godefroid, no longer restraining the tears that rolled down
+his cheeks, "I heard the Voice from on high; it called me by name! It
+had never named me before, but this time it bade me to Heaven! Oh, how
+sweet is that voice!--As I could not fly to Heaven," he added artlessly,
+"I took the only way we know of going to God."
+
+"My child! oh, sublime boy!" cried the old man, throwing his arms round
+Godefroid, and clasping him to his heart. "You are a poet; you can
+boldly ride the whirlwind! Your poetry does not proceed from your heart;
+your living, burning thoughts, your creations, move and grow in your
+soul.--Go, never reveal your ideas to the vulgar! Be at once the altar,
+the priest, and the victim!
+
+"You know Heaven, do you not? You have seen those myriads of angels,
+white-winged, and holding golden sistrums, all soaring with equal flight
+towards the Throne, and you have often seen their pinions moving at the
+breath of God as the trees of the forest bow with one consent before the
+storm. Ah, how glorious is unlimited space! Tell me."
+
+The stranger clasped Godefroid's hand convulsively, and they both gazed
+at the firmament, whence the stars seemed to shed gentle poetry which
+they could bear.
+
+"Oh, to see God!" murmured Godefroid.
+
+"Child!" said the old man suddenly, in a sterner voice, "have you so
+soon forgotten the holy teaching of our good master, Doctor Sigier? In
+order to return, you to your heavenly home, and I to my native land on
+earth, must we not obey the voice of God? We must walk on resignedly
+in the stony paths where His almighty finger points the way. Do not
+you quail at the thought of the danger to which you exposed yourself?
+Arriving there without being bidden, and saying, 'Here I am!' before
+your time, would you not have been cast back into a world beneath that
+where your soul now hovers? Poor outcast cherub! Should you not rather
+bless God for having suffered you to live in a sphere where you may hear
+none but heavenly harmonies? Are you not as pure as a diamond, as lovely
+as a flower?
+
+"Think what it is to know, like me, only the City of Sorrows!--Dwelling
+there I have worn out my heart.--To search the tombs for their horrible
+secrets; to wipe hands steeped in blood, counting them over night after
+night, seeing them rise up before me imploring forgiveness which I may
+not grant; to mark the writhing of the assassin and the last shriek
+of his victim; to listen to appalling noises and fearful silence, the
+silence of a father devouring his dead sons; to wonder at the laughter
+of the damned; to look for some human form among the livid heaps wrung
+and trampled by crime; to learn words such as living men may not hear
+without dying; to call perpetually on the dead, and always to accuse and
+condemn!--Is that living?"
+
+"Cease!" cried Godefroid; "I cannot see you or hear you any further!
+My reason wanders, my eyes are dim. You light a fire within me which
+consumes me."
+
+"And yet I must go on!" said the senior, waving his hand with a strange
+gesture that worked on the youth like a spell.
+
+For a moment the old man fixed Godefroid with his large, weary,
+lightless eyes; then he pointed with one finger to the ground. A gulf
+seemed to open at his bidding. He remained standing in the doubtful
+light of the moon; it lent a glory to his brow which reflected an almost
+solar gleam. Though at first a somewhat disdainful expression lurked in
+the wrinkles of his face, his look presently assumed the fixity which
+seems to gaze on an object invisible to the ordinary organs of sight.
+His eyes, no doubt, were seeing then the remoter images which the grave
+has in store for us.
+
+Never, perhaps, had this man presented so grand an aspect. A terrible
+struggle was going on in his soul, and reacted on his outer frame;
+strong man as he seemed to be, he bent as a reed bows under the breeze
+that comes before a storm. Godefroid stood motionless, speechless,
+spellbound; some inexplicable force nailed him to the floor; and, as
+happens when our attention takes us out of ourselves while watching a
+fire or a battle, he was wholly unconscious of his body.
+
+"Shall I tell you the fate to which you were hastening, poor angel
+of love? Listen! It has been given to me to see immeasurable space,
+bottomless gulfs in which all human creations are swallowed up, the
+shoreless sea whither flows the vast stream of men and of angels. As I
+made my way through the realms of eternal torment, I was sheltered under
+the cloak of an immortal--the robe of glory due to genius, and which the
+ages hand on--I, a frail mortal! When I wandered through the fields of
+light where the happy souls play, I was borne up by the love of a woman,
+the wings of an angel; resting on her heart, I could taste the ineffable
+pleasures whose touch is more perilous to us mortals than are the
+torments of the worser world.
+
+"As I achieved my pilgrimage through the dark regions below I had
+mounted from torture to torture, from crime to crime, from punishment to
+punishment, from awful silence to heartrending cries, till I reached the
+uppermost circle of Hell. Already, from afar, I could see the glory of
+Paradise shining at a vast distance; I was still in darkness, but on the
+borders of day. I flew, upheld by my Guide, borne along by a power akin
+to that which, during our dreams, wafts us to spheres invisible to the
+eye of the body. The halo that crowned our heads seared away the shades
+as we passed, like impalpable dust. Far above us the suns of all the
+worlds shone with scarce so much light as the twinkling fireflies of my
+native land. I was soaring towards the fields of air where, round about
+Paradise, the bodies of light are in closer array, where the azure is
+easy to pass through, where worlds innumerable spring like flowers in a
+meadow.
+
+"There, on the last level of the circles where those phantoms dwell that
+I had left behind me, like sorrows one would fain forget, I saw a vast
+shade. Standing in an attitude of aspiration, that soul looked eagerly
+into space; his feet were riveted by the will of God to the topmost
+point of the margin, and he remained for ever in the painful strain by
+which we project our purpose when we long to soar, as birds about to
+take wing. I saw the man; he neither looked at us nor heard us; every
+muscle quivered and throbbed; at each separate instant he seemed to
+feel, though he did not move, all the fatigue of traversing the infinite
+that divided him from Paradise where, as he gazed steadfastly, he
+believed he had glimpses of a beloved image. At this last gate of Hell,
+as at the first, I saw the stamp of despair even in hope. The hapless
+creature was so fearfully held by some unseen force, that his anguish
+entered into my bones and froze my blood. I shrank closer to my Guide,
+whose protection restored me to peace and silence.
+
+"Suddenly the Shade gave a cry of joy--a cry as shrill as that of the
+mother bird that sees a hawk in the air, or suspects its presence. We
+looked where he was looking, and saw, as it were, a sapphire, floating
+high up in the abysses of light. The glowing star fell with the
+swiftness of a sunbeam when it flashes over the horizon in the morning
+and its first rays shoot across the world. The Splendor became clearer
+and grew larger; presently I beheld the cloud of glory in which the
+angels move--a shining vapor that emanates from their divine substance,
+and that glitters here and there like tongues of flame. A noble face,
+whose glory none may endure that have not won the mantle, the laurel,
+and the palm--the attribute of the Powers--rose above this cloud as
+white and pure as snow. It was Light within light. His wings as they
+waved shed dazzling ripples in the spheres through which he descended,
+as the glance of God pierces through the universe. At last I saw the
+archangel in all his glory. The flower of eternal beauty that belongs to
+the angels of the Spirit shone in him. In one hand he held a green
+palm branch, in the other a sword of flame: the palm to bestow on the
+pardoned soul, the sword to drive back all the hosts of Hell with one
+sweep. As he approached, the perfumes of Heaven fell upon us as dew. In
+the region where the archangel paused, the air took the hues of opal,
+and moved in eddies of which he was the centre. He paused, looked at the
+Shade, and said:
+
+"'To-morrow.'
+
+"Then he turned heavenwards once more, spread his wings, and clove
+through space as a vessel cuts through the waves, hardly showing her
+white sails to the exiles left on some deserted shore.
+
+"The Shade uttered appalling cries, to which the damned responded from
+the lowest circle, the deepest in the immensity of suffering, to the
+more peaceful zone near the surface on which we were standing. This
+worst torment of all had appealed to all the rest. The turmoil was
+swelled by the roar of a sea of fire which formed a bass to the terrific
+harmony of endless millions of suffering souls.
+
+"Then suddenly the Shade took flight through the doleful city, and down
+to its place at the very bottom of Hell; but as suddenly it came up
+again, turned, soared through the endless circles in every direction,
+as a vulture, confined for the first time in a cage, exhausts itself in
+vain efforts. The Shade was free to do this; he could wander through the
+zones of Hell icy, fetid, or scorching without enduring their pangs; he
+glided into that vastness as a sunbeam makes its way into the deepest
+dark.
+
+"'God has not condemned him to any torment,' said the Master; 'but not
+one of the souls you have seen suffering their various punishments would
+exchange his anguish for the hope that is consuming this soul.'
+
+"And just then the Shade came back to us, brought thither by an
+irresistible force which condemned him to perch on the verge of Hell. My
+divine Guide, guessing my curiosity, touched the unhappy Shade with his
+palm-branch. He, who was perhaps trying to measure the age of sorrow
+that divided him from that ever-vanishing 'To-morrow,' started and gave
+a look full of all the tears he had already shed.
+
+"'You would know my woe?' said he sadly. 'Oh, I love to tell it. I am
+here, Teresa is above; that is all. On earth we were happy, we were
+always together. When I saw my loved Teresa Donati for the first time,
+she was ten years old. We loved each other even then, not knowing what
+love meant. Our lives were one; I turned pale if she were pale, I was
+happy in her joy; we gave ourselves up to the pleasure of thinking and
+feeling together; and we learned what love was, each through the other.
+We were wedded at Cremona; we never saw each other's lips but decked
+with pearls of a smile; our eyes always shone; our hair, like our
+desires, flowed together; our heads were always bent over one book when
+we read, our feet walked in equal step. Life was one long kiss, our home
+was a nest.
+
+"'One day, for the first time, Teresa turned pale and said, "I am in
+pain!"--And I was not in pain!
+
+"'She never rose again. I saw her sweet face change, her golden hair
+fade--and I did not die! She smiled to hide her sufferings, but I could
+read them in her blue eyes, of which I could interpret the slightest
+trembling. "Honorino, I love you!" said she, at the very moment when her
+lips turned white, and she was clasping my hand still in hers when death
+chilled them. So I killed myself that she might not lie alone in her
+sepulchral bed, under her marble sheet. Teresa is above and I am here.
+I could not bear to leave her, but God has divided us. Why, then, did
+He unite us on earth? He is jealous! Paradise was no doubt so much the
+fairer on the day when Teresa entered in.
+
+"'Do you see her? She is sad in her bliss; she is parted from me!
+Paradise must be a desert to her.'
+
+"'Master,' said I with tears, for I thought of my love, 'when this one
+shall desire Paradise for God's sake alone, shall he not be delivered?'
+And the Father of Poets mildly bowed his head in sign of assent.
+
+"We departed, cleaving the air, and making no more noise than the birds
+that pass overhead sometimes when we lie in the shade of a tree. It
+would have been vain to try to check the hapless shade in his blasphemy.
+It is one of the griefs of the angels of darkness that they can never
+see the light even when they are surrounded by it. He would not have
+understood us."
+
+
+
+At this moment the swift approach of many horses rang through the
+stillness, the dog barked, the constable's deep growl replied; the
+horsemen dismounted, knocked at the door; the noise was so unexpected
+that it seemed like some sudden explosion.
+
+The two exiles, the two poets, fell to earth through all the space that
+divides us from the skies. The painful shock of this fall rushed through
+their veins like strange blood, hissing as it seemed, and full of
+scorching sparks. Their pain was like an electric discharge. The loud,
+heavy step of a man-at-arms sounded on the stairs with the iron clank of
+his sword, his cuirass, and spurs; a soldier presently stood before the
+astonished stranger.
+
+"We can return to Florence," said the man, whose bass voice sounded soft
+as he spoke in Italian.
+
+"What is that you say?" asked the old man.
+
+"The _Bianchi_ are triumphant."
+
+"Are you not mistaken?" asked the poet.
+
+"No, dear Dante!" replied the soldier, whose warlike tones rang with the
+thrill of battle and the exultation of victory.
+
+"To Florence! To Florence! Ah, my Florence!" cried Dante Alighieri,
+drawing himself up, and gazing into the distance. In fancy he saw Italy;
+he was gigantic.
+
+"But I--when shall I be in Heaven?" said Godefroid, kneeling on one knee
+before the immortal poet, like an angel before the sanctuary.
+
+"Come to Florence," said Dante in compassionate tones. "Come! when you
+see its lovely landscape from the heights of Fiesole you will fancy
+yourself in Paradise."
+
+The soldier smiled. For the first time, perhaps for the only time in his
+life, Dante's gloomy and solemn features wore a look of joy; his eyes
+and brows expressed the happiness he has depicted so lavishly in his
+vision of Paradise. He thought perhaps that he heard the voice of
+Beatrice.
+
+A light step, and the rustle of a woman's gown, were audible in the
+silence. Dawn was now showing its first streaks of light. The fair
+Comtesse de Mahaut came in and flew to Godefroid.
+
+"Come, my child, my son! I may at last acknowledge you. Your birth is
+recognized, your rights are under the protection of the King of France,
+and you will find Paradise in your mother's heart."
+
+"I hear, I know, the voice of Heaven!" cried the youth in rapture.
+
+The exclamation roused Dante, who saw the young man folded in the
+Countess' arms. He took leave of them with a look, and left his young
+companion on his mother's bosom.
+
+"Come away!" he cried in a voice of thunder. "Death to the Guelphs!"
+
+
+PARIS, October 1831.
+
+
+
+
+
+
+End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of The Exiles, by Honore de Balzac
+
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diff --git a/1884.zip b/1884.zip
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+Project Gutenberg (https://www.gutenberg.org) public repository for
+eBook #1884 (https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/1884)
diff --git a/old/20040922-1884.txt b/old/20040922-1884.txt
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+The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Exiles, by Honore de Balzac
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.net
+
+
+Title: The Exiles
+
+Author: Honore de Balzac
+
+Release Date: September 22, 2004 [EBook #1884]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ASCII
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE EXILES ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by Dagny, and John Bickers
+
+
+
+
+                              The Exiles
+
+                                  By
+
+                           Honore de Balzac
+
+
+              Translated by Clara Bell and James Waring
+
+
+
+                             ALMAE SORORI
+
+
+
+In the year 1308 few houses were yet standing on the Island formed by
+the alluvium and sand deposited by the Seine above the Cite, behind
+the Church of Notre-Dame. The first man who was so bold as to build on
+this strand, then liable to frequent floods, was a constable of the
+watch of the City of Paris, who had been able to do some service to
+their Reverences the Chapter of the Cathedral; and in return the
+Bishop leased him twenty-five perches of land, with exemptions from
+all feudal dues or taxes on the buildings he might erect.
+
+Seven years before the beginning of this narrative, Joseph Tirechair,
+one of the sternest of Paris constables, as his name (Tear Flesh)
+would indicate, had, thanks to his share of the fines collected by him
+for delinquencies committed within the precincts of the Cite, had been
+able to build a house on the bank of the Seine just at the end of the
+Rue du Port-Saint-Landry. To protect the merchandise landed on the
+strand, the municipality had constructed a sort of break-water of
+masonry, which may still be seen on some old plans of Paris, and which
+preserved the piles of the landing-place by meeting the rush of water
+and ice at the upper end of the Island. The constable had taken
+advantage of this for the foundation of his house, so that there were
+several steps up to his door.
+
+Like all the houses of that date, this cottage was crowned by a peaked
+roof, forming a gable-end to the front, or half a diamond. To the
+great regret of historians, but two or three examples of such roofs
+survive in Paris. A round opening gave light to a loft, where the
+constable's wife dried the linen of the Chapter, for she had the honor
+of washing for the Cathedral--which was certainly not a bad customer.
+On the first floor were two rooms, let to lodgers at a rent, one year
+with another, of forty sous _Parisis_ each, an exorbitant sum, that
+was however justified by the luxury Tirechair had lavished on their
+adornment. Flanders tapestry hung on the walls, and a large bed with a
+top valance of green serge, like a peasant's bed, was amply furnished
+with mattresses, and covered with good sheets of fine linen. Each room
+had a stove called a _chauffe-doux_; the floor, carefully polished by
+Dame Tirechair's apprentices, shone like the woodwork of a shrine.
+Instead of stools, the lodgers had deep chairs of carved walnut, the
+spoils probably of some raided castle. Two chests with pewter
+mouldings, and tables on twisted legs, completed the fittings, worthy
+of the most fastidious knights-banneret whom business might bring to
+Paris.
+
+The windows of those two rooms looked out on the river. From one you
+could only see the shores of the Seine, and the three barren islands,
+of which two were subsequently joined together to form the Ile
+Saint-Louis; the third was the Ile de Louviers. From the other could
+be seen, down a vista of the Port-Saint-Landry, the buildings on the
+Greve, the Bridge of Notre-Dame, with its houses, and the tall towers
+of the Louvre, but lately built by Philippe-Auguste to overlook the
+then poor and squalid town of Paris, which suggests so many imaginary
+marvels to the fancy of modern romancers.
+
+The ground floor of Tirechair's house consisted of a large hall, where
+his wife's business was carried on, through which the lodgers were
+obliged to pass on their way to their own rooms up a stairway like a
+mill-ladder. Behind this were a kitchen and a bedroom, with a view
+over the Seine. A tiny garden, reclaimed from the waters, displayed at
+the foot of this modest dwelling its beds of cabbages and onions, and
+a few rose-bushes, sheltered by palings, forming a sort of hedge. A
+little structure of lath and mud served as a kennel for a big dog, the
+indispensable guardian of so lonely a dwelling. Beyond this kennel was
+a little plot, where the hens cackled whose eggs were sold to the
+Canons. Here and there on this patch of earth, muddy or dry according
+to the whimsical Parisian weather, a few trees grew, constantly lashed
+by the wind, and teased and broken by the passer-by--willows, reeds,
+and tall grasses.
+
+The Eyot, the Seine, the landing-place, the house, were all
+overshadowed on the west by the huge basilica of Notre-Dame casting
+its cold gloom over the whole plot as the sun moved. Then, as now,
+there was not in all Paris a more deserted spot, a more solemn or more
+melancholy prospect. The noise of waters, the chanting of priests, or
+the piping of the wind, were the only sounds that disturbed this
+wilderness, where lovers would sometimes meet to discuss their secrets
+when the church-folds and clergy were safe in church at the services.
+
+
+
+One evening in April in the year 1308, Tirechair came home in a
+remarkably bad temper. For three days past everything had been in good
+order on the King's highway. Now, as an officer of the peace, nothing
+annoyed him so much as to feel himself useless. He flung down his
+halbert in a rage, muttered inarticulate words as he pulled off his
+doublet, half red and half blue, and slipped on a shabby camlet
+jerkin. After helping himself from the bread-box to a hunch of bread,
+and spreading it with butter, he seated himself on a bench, looked
+round at his four whitewashed walls, counted the beams of the ceiling,
+made a mental inventory of the household goods hanging from the nails,
+scowled at the neatness which left him nothing to complain of, and
+looked at his wife, who said not a word as she ironed the albs and
+surplices from the sacristy.
+
+"By my halidom," he said, to open the conversation, "I cannot think,
+Jacqueline, where you go to catch your apprenticed maids. Now, here is
+one," he went on, pointing to a girl who was folding an altar-cloth,
+clumsily enough, it must be owned, "who looks to me more like a damsel
+rather free of her person than a sturdy country wench. Her hands are
+as white as a fine lady's! By the Mass! and her hair smells of
+essences, I verily believe, and her hose are as find as a queen's. By
+the two horns of Old Nick, matters please me but ill as I find them
+here."
+
+The girl colored, and stole a look at Jacqueline, full of alarm not
+unmixed with pride. The mistress answered her glance with a smile,
+laid down her work, and turned to her husband.
+
+"Come now," said she, in a sharp tone, "you need not harry me. Are you
+going to accuse me next of some underhand tricks? Patrol your roads as
+much as you please, but do not meddle here with anything but what
+concerns your sleeping in peace, drinking your wine, and eating what I
+set before you, or else, I warn you, I will have no more to do with
+keeping you healthy and happy. Let any one find me a happier man in
+all the town," she went on, with a scolding grimace. "He has silver in
+his purse, a gable over the Seine, a stout halbert on one hand, an
+honest wife on the other, a house as clean and smart as a new pin! And
+he growls like a pilgrim smarting from Saint Anthony's fire!"
+
+"Hey day!" exclaimed the sergeant of the watch, "do you fancy,
+Jacqueline, that I have any wish to see my house razed down, my
+halbert given to another, and my wife standing in the pillory?"
+
+Jacqueline and the dainty journeywoman turned pale.
+
+"Just tell me what you are driving at," said the washerwoman sharply,
+"and make a clean breast of it. For some days, my man, I have observed
+that you have some maggot twisting in your poor brain. Come up, then,
+and have it all out. You must be a pretty coward indeed if you fear
+any harm when you have only to guard the common council and live under
+the protection of the Chapter! Their Reverences the Canons would lay
+the whole bishopric under an interdict if Jacqueline brought a
+complaint of the smallest damage."
+
+As she spoke, she went straight up to her husband and took him by the
+arm.
+
+"Come with me," she added, pulling him up and out on to the steps.
+
+When they were down by the water in their little garden, Jacqueline
+looked saucily in her husband's face.
+
+"I would have you to know, you old gaby, that when my lady fair goes
+out, a piece of gold comes into our savings-box."
+
+"Oh, ho!" said the constable, who stood silent and meditative before
+his wife. But he presently said, "Any way, we are done for.--What
+brings the dame to our house?"
+
+"She comes to see the well-favored young clerk who lives overhead,"
+replied Jacqueline, looking up at the window that opened on to the
+vast landscape of the Seine valley.
+
+"The Devil's in it!" cried the man. "For a few base crowns you have
+ruined me, Jacqueline. Is that an honest trade for a sergeant's decent
+wife to ply? And, be she Countess or Baroness, the lady will not be
+able to get us out of the trap in which we shall find ourselves caught
+sooner or later. Shall we not have to square accounts with some
+puissant and offended husband? for, by the Mass, she is fair to look
+upon!"
+
+"But she is a widow, I tell you, gray gander! How dare you accuse your
+wife of foul play and folly? And the lady has never spoken a word to
+yon gentle clerk, she is content to look on him and think of him. Poor
+lad! he would be dead of starvation by now but for her, for she is as
+good as a mother to him. And he, the sweet cherub! it is as easy to
+cheat him as to rock a new-born babe. He believes his pence will last
+for ever, and he has eaten them through twice over in the past six
+months."
+
+"Woman," said the sergeant, solemnly pointing to the Place de Greve,
+"do you remember seeing, even from this spot, the fire in which they
+burnt the Danish woman the other day?"
+
+"What then?" said Jacqueline, in a fright.
+
+"What then?" echoed Tirechair. "Why, the two men who lodge with us
+smell of scorching. Neither Chapter nor Countess or Protector can
+serve them. Here is Easter come round; the year is ending; we must
+turn our company out of doors, and that at once. Do you think you can
+teach an old constable how to know a gallows-bird? Our two lodgers
+were on terms with la Porette, that heretic jade from Denmark or
+Norway, whose last cries you heard from here. She was a brave witch;
+she never blenched at the stake, which was proof enough of her compact
+with the Devil. I saw her as plain as I see you; she preached to the
+throng, and declared she was in heaven and could see God.
+
+"And since that, I tell you, I have never slept quietly in my bed. My
+lord, who lodges over us, is of a surety more of a wizard than a
+Christian. On my word as an officer, I shiver when that old man passes
+near me; he never sleeps of nights; if I wake, his voice is ringing
+like a bourdon of bells, and I hear him muttering incantations in the
+language of hell. Have you ever seen him eat an honest crust of bread
+or a hearth-cake made by a good Catholic baker? His brown skin has
+been scorched and tanned by hell-fires. Marry, and I tell you his eyes
+hold a spell like that of serpents. Jacqueline, I will have none of
+those two men under my roof. I see too much of the law not to know
+that it is well to have nothing to do with it.--You must get rid of
+our two lodgers; the elder because I suspect him; the youngster,
+because he is too pretty. They neither of them seem to me to keep
+Christian company. The boy is ever staring at the moon, the stars, and
+the clouds, like a wizard watching for the hour when he shall mount
+his broomstick; the other old rogue certainly makes some use of the
+poor boy for his black art. My house stands too close to the river as
+it is, and that risk of ruin is bad enough without bringing down fire
+from heaven, or the love affairs of a countess. I have spoken. Do not
+rebel."
+
+In spite of her sway in the house, Jacqueline stood stupefied as she
+listened to the edict fulminated against his lodgers by the sergeant
+of the watch. She mechanically looked up at the window of the room
+inhabited by the old man, and shivered with horror as she suddenly
+caught sight of the gloomy, melancholy face, and the piercing eye that
+so affected her husband, accustomed as he was to dealing with
+criminals.
+
+At that period, great and small, priests and laymen, all trembled
+before the idea of any supernatural power. The word "magic" was as
+powerful as leprosy to root up feelings, break social ties, and freeze
+piety in the most generous soul. It suddenly struck the constable's
+wife that she had never, in fact, seen either of her lodgers
+exercising any human function. Though the younger man's voice was as
+sweet and melodious as the tones of a flute, she so rarely heard it
+that she was tempted to think his silence the result of a spell. As
+she recalled the strange beauty of that pink-and-white face, and saw
+in memory the fine hair and moist brilliancy of those eyes, she
+believed that they were indeed the artifices of the Devil. She
+remembered that for days at a time she had never heard the slightest
+sound from either room. Where were the strangers during all those
+hours?
+
+Suddenly the most singular circumstances recurred to her mind. She was
+completely overmastered by fear, and could even discern witchcraft in
+the rich lady's interest in the young Godefroid, a poor orphan who had
+come from Flanders to study at the University of Paris. She hastily
+put her hand into one of her pockets, pulled out four livres of
+Tournay in large silver coinage, and looked at the pieces with an
+expression of avarice mingled with terror.
+
+"That, at any rate, is not false coin," said she, showing the silver
+to her husband. "Besides," she went on, "how can I turn them out after
+taking next year's rent paid in advance?"
+
+"You had better inquire of the Dean of the Chapter," replied
+Tirechair. "Is not it his business to tell us how we should deal with
+these extraordinary persons?"
+
+"Ay, truly extraordinary," cried Jacqueline. "To think of their
+cunning; coming here under the very shadow of Notre-Dame! Still," she
+went on, "or ever I ask the Dean, why not warn that fair and noble
+lady of the risk she runs?"
+
+As she spoke, Jacqueline went into the house with her husband, who had
+not missed a mouthful. Tirechair, as a man grown old in the tricks of
+his trade, affected to believe that the strange lady was in fact a
+work-girl; still, this assumed indifference could not altogether cloak
+the timidity of a courtier who respects a royal incognity. At this
+moment six was striking by the clock of Saint-Denis du Pas, a small
+church that stood between Notre-Dame and the Port-Saint-Landry--the
+first church erected in Paris, on the very spot where Saint-Denis was
+laid on the gridiron, as chronicles tell. The hour flew from steeple
+to tower all over the city. Then suddenly confused shouts were heard
+on the left bank of the Seine, behind Notre-Dame, in the quarter where
+the schools of the University harbored their swarms.
+
+At this signal, Jacqueline's elder lodger began to move about his
+room. The sergeant, his wife, and the strange lady listened while he
+opened and shut his door, and the old man's heavy step was heard on
+the steep stair. The constable's suspicions gave such interest to the
+advent of this personage, that the lady was startled as she observed
+the strange expression of the two countenances before her. Referring
+the terrors of this couple to the youth she was protecting--as was
+natural in a lover--the young lady awaited, with some uneasiness, the
+event thus heralded by the fears of her so-called master and mistress.
+
+The old man paused for a moment on the threshold to scrutinize the
+three persons in the room, and seemed to be looking for his young
+companion. This glance of inquiry, unsuspicious as it was, agitated
+the three. Indeed, nobody, not even the stoutest man, could deny that
+Nature had bestowed exceptional powers on this being, who seemed
+almost supernatural. Though his eyes were somewhat deeply shaded by
+the wide sockets fringed with long eyebrows, they were set, like a
+kite's eyes, in eyelids so broad, and bordered by so dark a circle
+sharply defined on his cheek, that they seemed rather prominent. These
+singular eyes had in them something indescribably domineering and
+piercing, which took possession of the soul by a grave and thoughtful
+look, a look as bright and lucid as that of a serpent or a bird, but
+which held one fascinated and crushed by the swift communication of
+some tremendous sorrow, or of some super-human power.
+
+Every feature was in harmony with this eye of lead and of fire, at
+once rigid and flashing, stern and calm. While in this eagle eye
+earthly emotions seemed in some sort extinct, the lean, parched face
+also bore traces of unhappy passions and great deeds done. The nose,
+which was narrow and aquiline, was so long that it seemed to hang on
+by the nostrils. The bones of the face were strongly marked by the
+long, straight wrinkles that furrowed the hollow cheeks. Every line in
+the countenance looked dark. It would suggest the bed of a torrent
+where the violence of former floods was recorded in the depth of the
+water-courses, which testified to some terrible, unceasing turmoil.
+Like the ripples left by the oars of a boat on the waters, deep lines,
+starting from each side of his nose, marked his face strongly, and
+gave an expression of bitter sadness to his mouth, which was firm and
+straight-lipped. Above the storm thus stamped on his countenance, his
+calm brow rose with what may be called boldness, and crowned it as
+with a marble dome.
+
+The stranger preserved that intrepid and dignified manner that is
+frequently habitual with men inured to disaster, and fitted by nature
+to stand unmoved before a furious mob and to face the greatest
+dangers. He seemed to move in a sphere apart, where he poised above
+humanity. His gestures, no less than his look, were full of
+irresistible power; his lean hands were those of a soldier; and if
+your own eyes were forced to fall before his piercing gaze, you were
+no less sure to tremble when by word or action he spoke to your soul.
+He moved in silent majesty that made him seem a king without his
+guard, a god without his rays.
+
+His dress emphasized the ideas suggested by the peculiarities of his
+mien and face. Soul, body, and garb were in harmony, and calculated to
+impress the coldest imagination. He wore a sort of sleeveless gown of
+black cloth, fastened in front, and falling to the calf, leaving the
+neck bare with no collar. His doublet and boots were likewise black.
+On his head was a black velvet cap like a priest's, sitting in a close
+circle above his forehead, and not showing a single hair. It was the
+strictest mourning, the gloomiest habit a man could wear. But for a
+long sword that hung by his side from a leather belt which could be
+seen where his surcoat hung open, a priest would have hailed him as a
+brother. Though of no more than middle height, he appeared tall; and,
+looking him in the face he seemed a giant.
+
+"The clock has struck, the boat is waiting; will you not come?"
+
+At these words, spoken in bad French, but distinctly audible in the
+silence, a little noise was heard in the other top room, and the young
+man came down as lightly as a bird.
+
+When Godefroid appeared, the lady's face turned crimson; she trembled,
+started, and covered her face with her white hands.
+
+Any woman might have shared her agitation at the sight of this youth
+of about twenty, of a form and stature so slender that at a first
+glance he might have been taken for a mere boy, or a young girl in
+disguise. His black cap--like the _beret_ worn by the Basque people
+--showed a brow as white as snow, where grace and innocence shone with
+an expression of divine sweetness--the light of a soul full of faith.
+A poet's fancy would have seen there the star which, in some old tale,
+a mother entreats the fairy godmother to set on the forehead of an
+infant abandoned, like Moses, to the waves. Love lurked in the
+thousand fair curls that fell over his shoulders. His throat, truly a
+swan's throat, was white and exquisitely round. His blue eyes, bright
+and liquid, mirrored the sky. His features and the mould of his brow
+were refined and delicate enough to enchant a painter. The bloom of
+beauty, which in a woman's face causes men such indescribable delight,
+the exquisite purity of outline, the halo of light that bathes the
+features we love, were here combined with a masculine complexion, and
+with strength as yet but half developed, in the most enchanting
+contrast. His was one of those melodious countenances which even when
+silent speak and attract us. And yet, on marking it attentively, the
+incipient blight might have been detected which comes of a great
+thought or a passion, the faint yellow tinge that made him seem like a
+young leaf opening to the sun.
+
+No contrast could be greater or more startling than that seen in the
+companionship of these two men. It was like seeing a frail and
+graceful shrub that has grown from the hollow trunk of some gnarled
+willow, withered by age, blasted by lightning, standing decrepit; one
+of those majestic trees that painters love; the trembling sapling
+takes shelter there from storms. One was a god, the other was an
+angel; one the poet that feels, the other the poet that expresses--a
+prophet in sorrow, a levite in prayer.
+
+They went out together without speaking.
+
+"Did you mark how he called him to him?" cried the sergeant of the
+watch when the footsteps of the couple were no longer audible on the
+strand. "Are not they a demon and his familiar?"
+
+"Phooh!" puffed Jacqueline. "I felt smothered! I never marked our two
+lodgers so carefully. 'Tis a bad thing for us women that the Devil can
+wear so fair a mien!"
+
+"Ay, cast some holy water on him," said Tirechair, "and you will see
+him turn into a toad.--I am off to tell the office all about them."
+
+On hearing this speech, the lady roused herself from the reverie into
+which she had sunk, and looked at the constable, who was donning his
+red-and-blue jacket.
+
+"Whither are you off to?" she asked.
+
+"To tell the justices that wizards are lodging in our house very much
+against our will."
+
+The lady smiled.
+
+"I," said she, "am the Comtesse de Mahaut," and she rose with a
+dignity that took the man's breath away. "Beware of bringing the
+smallest trouble on your guests. Above all, respect the old man; I
+have seen him in the company of your Lord the King, who entreated him
+courteously; you will be ill advised to trouble him in any way. As to
+my having been here--never breathe a word of it, as you value your
+life."
+
+She said no more, but relapsed into thought.
+
+Presently she looked up, signed to Jacqueline, and together they went
+up into Godefroid's room. The fair Countess looked at the bed, the
+carved chairs, the chest, the tapestry, the table, with a joy like
+that of the exile who sees on his return the crowded roofs of his
+native town nestling at the foot of a hill.
+
+"If you have not deceived me," she said to Jacqueline, "I promise you
+a hundred crowns in gold."
+
+"Behold, madame," said the woman, "the poor angel is confiding--here
+is all his treasure."
+
+As she spoke, Jacqueline opened a drawer in the table and showed some
+parchments.
+
+"God of mercy!" cried the Countess, snatching up a document that
+caught her eye, on which she read, _Gothofredus Comes Gantiacus_
+(Godefroid, Count of Ghent).
+
+She dropped the parchment, and passed her hand over her brow; then,
+feeling, no doubt, that she had compromised herself by showing so much
+emotion, she recovered her cold demeanor.
+
+"I am satisfied," said she.
+
+She went downstairs and out of the house. The constable and his
+wife stood in their doorway, and saw her take the path to the
+landing-place.
+
+A boat was moored hard by. When the rustle of the Countess' approach
+was audible, a boatman suddenly stood up, helped the fair laundress to
+take her seat in it, and rowed with such strength as to make the boat
+fly like a swallow down the stream.
+
+"You are a sorry fellow," said Jacqueline, giving the officer's
+shoulder a familiar slap. "We have earned a hundred gold crowns this
+morning."
+
+"I like harboring lords no better than harboring wizards. And I know
+not, of the two, which is the more like to bring us to the gallows,"
+replied Tirechair, taking up his halbert. "I will go my rounds over by
+Champfleuri; God protect us, and send me to meet some pert jade out in
+her bravery of gold rings to glitter in the shade like a glow-worm!"
+
+Jacqueline, alone in the house, hastily went up to the unknown lord's
+room to discover, if she could, some clue to this mysterious business.
+Like some learned men who give themselves infinite pains to complicate
+the clear and simple laws of nature, she had already invented a
+chaotic romance to account for the meeting of these three persons
+under her humble roof. She hunted through the chest, examined
+everything, but could find nothing extraordinary. She saw nothing on
+the table but a writing-case and some sheets of parchment; and as she
+could not read, this discovery told her nothing. A woman's instinct
+then took her into the young man's room, and from thence she descried
+her two lodgers crossing the river in the ferry boat.
+
+"They stand like two statues," said she to herself. "Ah, ha! They are
+landing at the Rue du Fouarre. How nimble he is, the sweet youth! He
+jumped out like a bird. By him the old man looks like some stone saint
+in the Cathedral.--They are going to the old School of the Four
+Nations. Presto! they are out of sight.--And this is where he lives,
+poor cherub!" she went on, looking about the room. "How smart and
+winning he is! Ah! your fine gentry are made of other stuff than we
+are."
+
+And Jacqueline went down again after smoothing down the bed-coverlet,
+dusting the chest, and wondering for the hundredth time in six months:
+
+"What in the world does he do all the blessed day? He cannot always be
+staring at the blue sky and the stars that God has hung up there like
+lanterns. That dear boy has known trouble. But why do he and the old
+man hardly ever speak to each other?"
+
+Then she lost herself in wonderment and in thoughts which, in her
+woman's brain, were tangled like a skein of thread.
+
+The old man and his young companion had gone into one of the schools
+for which the Rue du Fouarre was at that time famous throughout
+Europe. At the moment when Jacqueline's two lodgers arrived at the old
+School des Quatre Nations, the celebrated Sigier, the most noted
+Doctor of Mystical Theology of the University of Paris, was mounting
+his pulpit in a spacious low room on a level with the street. The cold
+stones were strewn with clean straw, on which several of his disciples
+knelt on one knee, writing on the other, to enable them to take notes
+from the Master's improvised discourse, in the shorthand abbreviations
+which are the despair of modern decipherers.
+
+The hall was full, not of students only, but of the most distinguished
+men belonging to the clergy, the court, and the legal faculty. There
+were some learned foreigners, too--soldiers and rich citizens. The
+broad faces were there, with prominent brows and venerable beards,
+which fill us with a sort of pious respect for our ancestors when we
+see their portraits from the Middle Ages. Lean faces, too, with
+burning, sunken eyes, under bald heads yellow from the labors of
+futile scholasticism, contrasted with young and eager countenances,
+grave faces, warlike faces, and the ruddy cheeks of the financial
+class.
+
+These lectures, dissertations, theses, sustained by the brightest
+geniuses of the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries, roused our
+forefathers to enthusiasm. They were to them their bull-fights, their
+Italian opera, their tragedy, their dancers; in short, all their
+drama. The performance of Mysteries was a later thing than these
+spiritual disputations, to which, perhaps, we owe the French stage.
+Inspired eloquence, combining the attractions of the human voice
+skilfully used, with daring inquisition into the secrets of God,
+sufficed to satisfy every form of curiosity, appealed to the soul, and
+constituted the fashionable entertainment of the time. Not only did
+Theology include the other sciences, it was science itself, as grammar
+was science to the Ancient Greeks; and those who distinguished
+themselves in these duels, in which the orators, like Jacob, wrestled
+with the Spirit of God, had a promising future before them. Embassies,
+arbitrations between sovereigns, chancellorships, and ecclesiastical
+dignities were the meed of men whose rhetoric had been schooled in
+theological controversy. The professor's chair was the tribune of the
+period.
+
+This system lasted till the day when Rabelais gibbeted dialectics by
+his merciless satire, as Cervantes demolished chivalry by a narrative
+comedy.
+
+To understand this amazing period and the spirit which dictated its
+voluminous, though now forgotten, masterpieces, to analyze it, even to
+its barbarisms, we need only examine the Constitutions of the
+University of Paris and the extraordinary scheme of instruction that
+then obtained. Theology was taught under two faculties--that of
+Theology properly so called, and that of Canon Law. The faculty of
+Theology, again, had three sections--Scholastic, Canonical, and
+Mystic. It would be wearisome to give an account of the attributes of
+each section of the science, since one only, namely, Mystic, is the
+subject of this _Etude_.
+
+Mystical Theology included the whole of Divine Revelation and the
+elucidation of the Mysteries. And this branch of ancient theology has
+been secretly preserved with reverence even to our own day; Jacob
+Boehm, Swendenborg, Martinez Pasqualis, Saint-Martin, Molinos, Madame
+Guyon, Madame Bourignon, and Madame Krudener, the extensive sect of
+the Ecstatics, and that of the Illuminati, have at different periods
+duly treasured the doctrines of this science, of which the aim is
+indeed truly startling and portentous. In Doctor Sigier's day, as in
+our own, man has striven to gain wings to fly into the sanctuary where
+God hides from our gaze.
+
+This digression was necessary to give a clue to the scene at which the
+old man and the youth from the island under Notre-Dame had come to be
+audience; it will also protect this narrative from all blame on the
+score of falsehood and hyperbole, of which certain persons of hasty
+judgment might perhaps suspect me.
+
+Doctor Sigier was a tall man in the prime of life. His face, rescued
+from oblivion by the archives of the University, had singular
+analogies with that of Mirabeau. It was stamped with the seal of
+fierce, swift, and terrible eloquence. But the Doctor bore on his brow
+the expression of religious faith that his modern double had not. His
+voice, too, was of persuasive sweetness, with a clear and pleasing
+ring in it.
+
+At this moment the daylight, that was stintingly diffused through the
+small, heavily-leaded window-panes, tinted the assembly with
+capricious tones and powerful contrasts from the chequered light and
+shade. Here, in a dark corner, eyes shone brightly, their dark heads
+under the sunbeams gleamed light above faces in shadow, and various
+bald heads, with only a circlet of white hair, were distinguished
+among the crowd like battlements silvered by moonlight. Every face was
+turned towards the Doctor, mute but impatient. The drowsy voices of
+other lecturers in the adjoining schools were audible in the silent
+street like the murmuring of the sea; and the steps of the two
+strangers, as they now came in, attracted general attention. Doctor
+Sigier, ready to begin, saw the stately senior standing, looked round
+for a seat for him, and then finding none, as the place was full, came
+down from his place, went to the newcomer, and with great respect, led
+him to the platform of his professor's chair, and there gave him his
+stool to sit upon. The assembly hailed this mark of deference with a
+murmur of approval, recognizing the old man as the orator of a fine
+thesis admirably argued not long since at the Sorbonne.
+
+The stranger looked down from his raised position on the crowd below
+with that deep glance that held a whole poem of sorrow, and those who
+met his eye felt an indescribable thrill. The lad, following the old
+man, sat down on one of the steps, leaning against the pulpit in a
+graceful and melancholy attitude. The silence was now profound, and
+the doorway and even the street were blocked by scholars who had
+deserted the other classes.
+
+Doctor Sigier was to-day to recapitulate, in the last of a series of
+discourses, the views he had set forth in the former lectures on the
+Resurrection, Heaven, and Hell. His strange doctrine responded to the
+sympathies of the time, and gratified the immoderate love of the
+marvelous, which haunts the mind of man in every age. This effort of
+man to clutch the infinite, which for ever slips through his
+ineffectual grasp, this last tourney of thought against thought, was a
+task worthy of an assembly where the most stupendous human imagination
+ever known, perhaps, at that moment shone.
+
+The Doctor began by summing up in a mild and even tone the principal
+points he had so far established:
+
+"No intellect was the exact counterpart of another. Had man any right
+to require an account of his Creator for the inequality of powers
+bestowed on each? Without attempting to penetrate rashly into the
+designs of God, ought we not to recognize the fact that by reason of
+their general diversity intelligences could be classed in spheres?
+From the sphere where the least degree of intelligence gleamed, to the
+most translucent souls who could see the road by which to ascend to
+God, was there not an ascending scale of spiritual gift? And did not
+spirits of the same sphere understand each other like brothers in
+soul, in flesh, in mind, and in feeling?"
+
+From this the Doctor went on to unfold the most wonderful theories of
+sympathy. He set forth in Biblical language the phenomena of love, of
+instinctive repulsion, of strong affinities which transcend the laws
+of space, of the sudden mingling of souls which seem to recognize each
+other. With regard to the different degrees of strength of which our
+affections are capable, he accounted for them by the place, more or
+less near the centre, occupied by beings in their respective circles.
+
+He gave mathematical expression to God's grand idea in the
+co-ordination of the various human spheres. "Through man," he said,
+"these spheres constituted a world intermediate between the
+intelligence of the brute and the intelligence of the angels." As he
+stated it, the divine Word nourishes the spiritual Word, the spiritual
+Word nourishes the living Word, the living Word nourishes the animal
+Word, the animal Word nourishes the vegetable Word, and the vegetable
+Word is the expression of the life of the barren Word. These
+successive evolutions, as of a chrysalis, which God thus wrought in
+our souls, this infusorial life, so to speak, communicated from each
+zone to the next, more vivid, more spiritual, more perceptive in its
+ascent, represented, rather dimly no doubt, but marvelously enough to
+his inexperienced hearers, the impulse given to Nature by the
+Almighty. Supported by many texts from the Sacred Scriptures, which he
+used as a commentary on his own statements to express by concrete
+images the abstract arguments he felt to be wanting, he flourished the
+Spirit of God like a torch over the deep secrets of creation, with an
+eloquence peculiar to himself, and accents that urged conviction on
+his audience. As he unfolded his mysterious system and all its
+consequences, he gave a key to every symbol and justified the
+vocation, the special gifts, the genius, the talent of each human
+being.
+
+Then, instinctively becoming physiological, he remarked on the
+resemblance to certain animals stamped on some human faces, accounting
+for them by primordial analogies and the upward tendency of all
+creation. He showed his audience the workings of Nature, and assigned
+a mission and a future to minerals, plants, and animals. Bible in
+hand, after thus spiritualizing Matter and materializing Spirit, after
+pointing to the Will of God in all things, and enjoining respect for
+His smallest works, he suggested the possibility of rising by faith
+from sphere to sphere.
+
+This was the first portion of his discourse, and by adroit digressions
+he applied the doctrine of his system to feudalism. The poetry
+--religious and profane--and the abrupt eloquence of that period had a
+grand opening in this vast theory, wherein the Doctor had amalgamated
+all the philosophical systems of the ancients, and from which he
+brought them out again classified, transfigured, purified. The false
+dogmas of two adverse principles and of Pantheism were demolished at
+his word, which proclaimed the Divine Unity, while ascribing to God
+and His angels the knowledge, the ends to which the means shone
+resplendent to the eyes of man. Fortified by the demonstrations that
+proved the existence of the world of Matter, Doctor Sigier constructed
+the scheme of a spiritual world dividing us from God by an ascending
+scale of spheres, just as the plant is divided from man by an infinite
+number of grades. He peopled the heavens, the stars, the planets, the
+sun.
+
+Quoting Saint Paul, he invested man with a new power; he might rise,
+from globe to globe, to the very Fount of eternal life. Jacob's
+mystical ladder was both the religious formula and the traditional
+proof of the fact. He soared through space, carrying with him the
+passionate souls of his hearers on the wings of his word, making them
+feel the infinite, and bathing them in the heavenly sea. Then the
+Doctor accounted logically for hell by circles placed in inverse order
+to the shining spheres that lead to God, in which torments and
+darkness take the place of the Spirit and of light. Pain was as
+intelligible as rapture. The terms of comparison were present in the
+conditions of human life and its various atmospheres of suffering and
+of intellect. Thus the most extraordinary traditions of hell and
+purgatory were quite naturally conceivable.
+
+He gave the fundamental _rationale_ of virtue with admirable
+clearness. A pious man, toiling onward in poverty, proud of his good
+conscience, at peace with himself, and steadfastly true to himself in
+his heart in spite of the spectacle of exultant vice, was a fallen
+angel doing penance, who remembered his origin, foresaw his guerdon,
+accomplished his task, and obeyed his glorious mission. The sublime
+resignation of Christians was then seen in all its glory. He depicted
+martyrs at the burning stake, and almost stripped them of their merit
+by stripping them of their sufferings. He showed their inner angel as
+dwelling in the heavens, while the outer man was tortured by the
+executioner's sword. He described angels dwelling among men, and gave
+tokens by which to recognize them.
+
+He next strove to drag from the very depths of man's understanding the
+real sense of the word fall, which occurs in every language. He
+appealed to the most widely-spread traditions in evidence of this one
+true origin, explaining, with much lucidity, the passion all men have
+for rising, mounting--an instinctive ambition, the perennial
+revelations of our destiny.
+
+He displayed the whole universe at a glance, and described the nature
+of God Himself circulating in a full tide from the centre to the
+extremities, and from the extremities to the centre again. Nature was
+one and homogeneous. In the most seemingly trivial, as in the most
+stupendous work, everything obeyed that law; each created object
+reproduced in little an exact image of that nature--the sap in the
+plant, the blood in man, the orbits of the planets. He piled proof on
+proof, always completing his idea by a picture musical with poetry.
+
+And he boldly anticipated every objection. He thundered forth an
+eloquent challenge to the monumental works of science and human
+excrescences of knowledge, such as those which societies use the
+elements of the earthly globe to produce. He asked whether our wars,
+our disasters, our depravity could hinder the great movement given by
+God to all the globes; and he laughed human impotence to scorn by
+pointing to their efforts everywhere in ruins. He cried upon the manes
+of Tyre, Carthage, and Babylon; he called upon Babel and Jerusalem to
+appear; and sought, without finding them, the transient furrows made
+by the ploughshare of civilization. Humanity floated on the surface of
+the earth as a ship whose wake is lost in the calm level of ocean.
+
+These were the fundamental notions set forth in Doctor Sigier's
+address, all wrapped in the mystical language and strange school Latin
+of the time. He had made a special study of the Scriptures, and they
+supplied him with the weapons with which he came before his
+contemporaries to hasten their progress. He hid his boldness under his
+immense learning, as with a cloak, and his philosophical bent under a
+saintly life. At this moment, after bringing his hearers face to face
+with God, after packing the universe into an idea, and almost
+unveiling the idea of the world, he gazed down on the silent,
+throbbing mass, and scrutinized the stranger with a look. Then,
+spurred on, no doubt, by the presence of this remarkable personage, he
+added these words, from which I have eliminated the corrupt Latinity
+of the Middle Ages:--
+
+"Where, think you, may a man find these fruitful truths if not in the
+heart of God Himself?--What am I?--The humble interpreter of a single
+line left to us by the greatest of the Apostles--a single line out of
+thousands all equally full of light. Before us, Saint Paul said, '_In
+Deo vivimus movemur et sumus_.' In our day, less believing and more
+learned, or better instructed and more sceptical, we should ask the
+Apostle, 'To what end this perpetual motion? Whither leads this life
+divided into zones? Wherefore an intelligence that begins with the
+obscure perfection of marble and proceeds from sphere to sphere up to
+man, up to the angel, up to God? Where is the Fount, where is the
+ocean, if life, attaining to God across worlds and stars, through
+Matter and Spirit, has to come down again to some other goal?'
+
+"You desire to see both aspects of the universe at once. You would
+adore the Sovereign on condition of being suffered to sit for an
+instant on His throne. Mad fools that we are! We will not admit that
+the most intelligent animals are able to understand our ideas and the
+object of our actions; we are merciless to the creatures of the
+inferior spheres, and exile them from our own; we deny them the
+faculty of divining human thoughts, and yet we ourselves would fain
+master the highest of all ideas--the Idea of the Idea!
+
+"Well, go then, start! Fly by faith up from globe to globe, soar
+through space! Thought, love, and faith are its mystical keys.
+Traverse the circles, reach the throne! God is more merciful than you
+are; He opens His temple to all His creatures. Only, do not forget the
+pattern of Moses; put your shoes from off your feet, cast off all
+filth, leave your body far behind; otherwise you shall be consumed;
+for God--God is Light!"
+
+Just as Doctor Sigier spoke these grand words, his face radiant, his
+hand uplifted, a sunbeam pierced through an open window, like a magic
+jet from a fount of splendor, a long triangular shaft of gold that lay
+like a scarf over the whole assembly. They all clapped their hands,
+for the audience accepted this effect of the sinking sun as a miracle.
+There was a universal cry of:
+
+"_Vivant_! _Vivant_!"
+
+The very sky seemed to shed approval. Godefroid, struck with
+reverence, looked from the old man to Doctor Sigier; they were talking
+together in an undertone.
+
+"All honor to the Master!" said the stranger.
+
+"What is such transient honor?" replied Sigier.
+
+"I would I could perpetuate my gratitude," said the older man.
+
+"A line written by you is enough!" said the Doctor. "It would give me
+immortality, humanly speaking."
+
+"Can I give what I have not?" cried the elder.
+
+Escorted by the crowd, which followed in their footsteps, like
+courtiers round a king, at a respectful distance, Godefroid, with the
+old man and the Doctor, made their way to the oozy shore, where as yet
+there were no houses, and where the ferryman was waiting for them. The
+Doctor and the stranger were talking together, not in Latin nor in any
+Gallic tongue, but in an unknown language, and very gravely. They
+pointed with their hands now to heaven and now to the earth. Sigier,
+to whom the paths by the river were familiar, guided the venerable
+stranger with particular care to the narrow planks which here and
+there bridged the mud; the following watched them inquisitively; and
+some of the students envied the privileged boy who might walk with
+these two great masters of speech. Finally, the Doctor took leave of
+the stranger, and the ferry-boat pushed off.
+
+At the moment when the boat was afloat on the wide river,
+communicating its motion to the soul, the sun pierced the clouds like
+a conflagration blazing up on the horizon, and poured forth a flood of
+light, coloring slate roof-tops and humbler thatch with a ruddy glow
+and tawny reflections, fringed Philippe Auguste's towers with fire,
+flooded the sky, dyed the waters, gilded the plants, and aroused the
+half-sleeping insects. The immense shaft of light set the clouds on
+fire. It was like the last verse of the daily hymn. Every heart was
+thrilled; nature in such a moment is sublime.
+
+As he gazed at the spectacle, the stranger's eyes moistened with the
+tenderest of human tears: Godefroid too was weeping; his trembling
+hand touched that of the elder man, who, looking round, confessed his
+emotion. But thinking his dignity as a man compromised, no doubt, to
+redeem it, he said in a deep voice:
+
+"I weep for my native land. I am an exile! Young man, in such an hour
+as this I left my home. There, at this hour, the fireflies are coming
+out of their fragile dwellings and clinging like diamond sparks to the
+leaves of the iris. At this hour the breeze, as sweet as the sweetest
+poetry, rises up from a valley bathed in light, bearing on its wings
+the richest fragrance. On the horizon I could see a golden city like
+the Heavenly Jerusalem--a city whose name I may not speak. There, too,
+a river winds. But that city and its buildings, that river of which
+the lovely vistas, and the pools of blue water, mingled, crossed, and
+embraced each other, which gladdened my sight and filled me with love
+--where are they?
+
+"At that hour the waters assumed fantastic hues under the sunset sky,
+and seemed to be painted pictures; the stars dropped tender streaks of
+light, the moon spread its pleasing snares; it gave another life to
+the trees, to the color and form of things, and a new aspect to the
+sparkling water, the silent hills, the eloquent buildings. The city
+spoke, it glittered, it called to me to return!
+
+"Columns of smoke rose up by the side of the ancient pillars, whose
+marble sheen gleamed white through the night; the lines of the horizon
+were still visible through the mists of evening; all was harmony and
+mystery. Nature would not say farewell; she desired to keep me there.
+Ah! It was all in all to me; my mother and my child, my wife and my
+glory! The very bells bewailed my condemnation. Oh, land of marvels!
+It is as beautiful as heaven. From that hour the wide world has been
+my dungeon. Beloved land, why hast thou rejected me?
+
+"But I shall triumph there yet!" he cried, speaking with an accent of
+such intense conviction and such a ringing tone, that the boatman
+started as at a trumpet call.
+
+The stranger was standing in a prophetic attitude and gazing
+southwards into the blue, pointing to his native home across the skyey
+regions. The ascetic pallor of his face had given place to a glow of
+triumph, his eyes flashed, he was as grand as a lion shaking his mane.
+
+"But you, poor child," he went on, looking at Godefroid, whose cheeks
+were beaded with glittering tears, "have you, like me, studied life
+from blood-stained pages? What can you have to weep for, at your age?"
+
+"Alas!" said Godefroid, "I regret a land more beautiful than any land
+on earth--a land I never saw and yet remember. Oh, if I could but
+cleave the air on beating wings, I would fly----"
+
+"Whither?" asked the exile.
+
+"Up there," replied the boy.
+
+On hearing this answer, the stranger seemed surprised; he looked
+darkly at the youth, who remained silent. They seemed to communicate
+by an unspeakable effusion of the spirit, hearing each other's
+yearnings in the teeming silence, and going forth side by side, like
+two doves sweeping the air on equal wing, till the boat, touching the
+strand of the island, roused them from their deep reverie.
+
+Then, each lost in thought, they went together to the sergeant's
+house.
+
+"And so the boy believes that he is an angel exiled from heaven!"
+thought the tall stranger. "Which of us all has a right to undeceive
+him? Not I--I, who am so often lifted by some magic spell so far above
+the earth; I who am dedicate to God; I who am a mystery to myself.
+Have I not already seen the fairest of the angels dwelling in this
+mire? Is this child more or less crazed than I am? Has he taken a
+bolder step in the way of faith? He believes, and his belief no doubt
+will lead him into some path of light like that in which I walk. But
+though he is as beautiful as an angel, is he not too feeble to stand
+fast in such a struggle?"
+
+Abashed by the presence of his companion, whose voice of thunder
+expressed to him his own thoughts, as lightning expresses the will of
+Heaven, the boy was satisfied to gaze at the stars with a lover's
+eyes. Overwhelmed by a luxury of sentiment, which weighed on his
+heart, he stood there timid and weak--a midge in the sunbeams.
+Sigier's discourse had proved to them the mysteries of the spiritual
+world; the tall, old man was to invest them with glory; the lad felt
+them in himself, though he could in no way express them. The three
+represented in living embodiment Science, Poetry, and Feeling.
+
+
+
+On going into the house, the Exile shut himself into his room, lighted
+the inspiring lamp, and gave himself over to the ruthless demon of
+Work, seeking words of the silence and ideas of the night. Godefroid
+sat down in his window sill, by turns gazing at the moon reflected in
+the water, and studying the mysteries of the sky. Lost in one of the
+trances that were frequent to him, he traveled from sphere to sphere,
+from vision to vision, listening for obscure rustlings and the voices
+of angels, and believing that he heard them; seeing, or fancying that
+he saw, a divine radiance in which he lost himself; striving to attain
+the far-away goal, the source of all light, the fount of all harmony.
+
+Presently the vast clamor of Paris, brought down on the current, was
+hushed; lights were extinguished one by one in the houses; silence
+spread over all; and the huge city slept like a tired giant.
+
+Midnight struck. The least noise, the fall of a leaf, or the flight
+of a jackdaw changing its perching-place among the pinnacles of
+Notre-Dame, would have been enough to bring the stranger's mind to
+earth again, to have made the youth drop from the celestial heights
+to which his soul had soared on the wings of rapture.
+
+And then the old man heard with dismay a groan mingling with the sound
+of a heavy fall--the fall, as his experienced ear assured him, of a
+dead body. He hastened into Godefroid's room, and saw him lying in a
+heap with a long rope tight round his neck, the end meandering over
+the floor.
+
+When he had untied it, the poor lad opened his eyes.
+
+"Where am I?" he asked, with a hopeful gleam.
+
+"In your own room," said the elder man, looking with surprise at
+Godefroid's neck, and at the nail to which the cord had been tied, and
+which was still in the knot.
+
+"In heaven?" said the boy, in a voice of music.
+
+"No; on earth!"
+
+Godefroid rose and walked along the path of light traced on the floor
+by the moon through the window, which stood open; he saw the rippling
+Seine, the willows and plants on the island. A misty atmosphere hung
+over the waters like a smokey floor.
+
+On seeing the view, to him so heartbreaking, he folded his hands over
+his bosom, and stood in an attitude of despair; the Exile came up to
+him with astonishment on his face.
+
+"You meant to kill yourself?" he asked.
+
+"Yes," replied Godefroid, while the stranger passed his hand about his
+neck again and again to feel the place where the rope had tightened on
+it.
+
+But for some slight bruises, the young man had been but little hurt.
+His friend supposed that the nail had given way at once under the
+weight of the body, and the terrible attempt had ended in a fall
+without injury.
+
+"And why, dear lad, did you try to kill yourself?"
+
+"Alas!" said Godefroid, no longer restraining the tears that rolled
+down his cheeks, "I heard the Voice from on high; it called me by
+name! It had never named me before, but this time it bade me to
+Heaven! Oh, how sweet is that voice!--As I could not fly to Heaven,"
+he added artlessly, "I took the only way we know of going to God."
+
+"My child! oh, sublime boy!" cried the old man, throwing his arms
+round Godefroid, and clasping him to his heart. "You are a poet; you
+can boldly ride the whirlwind! Your poetry does not proceed from your
+heart; your living, burning thoughts, your creations, move and grow in
+your soul.--Go, never reveal your ideas to the vulgar! Be at once the
+altar, the priest, and the victim!
+
+"You know Heaven, do you not? You have seen those myriads of angels,
+white-winged, and holding golden sistrums, all soaring with equal
+flight towards the Throne, and you have often seen their pinions
+moving at the breath of God as the trees of the forest bow with one
+consent before the storm. Ah, how glorious is unlimited space! Tell
+me."
+
+The stranger clasped Godefroid's hand convulsively, and they both
+gazed at the firmament, whence the stars seemed to shed gentle poetry
+which they could bear.
+
+"Oh, to see God!" murmured Godefroid.
+
+"Child!" said the old man suddenly, in a sterner voice, "have you so
+soon forgotten the holy teaching of our good master, Doctor Sigier? In
+order to return, you to your heavenly home, and I to my native land on
+earth, must we not obey the voice of God? We must walk on resignedly
+in the stony paths where His almighty finger points the way. Do not
+you quail at the thought of the danger to which you exposed yourself?
+Arriving there without being bidden, and saying, 'Here I am!' before
+your time, would you not have been cast back into a world beneath that
+where your soul now hovers? Poor outcast cherub! Should you not rather
+bless God for having suffered you to live in a sphere where you may
+hear none but heavenly harmonies? Are you not as pure as a diamond, as
+lovely as a flower?
+
+"Think what it is to know, like me, only the City of Sorrows!
+--Dwelling there I have worn out my heart.--To search the tombs for
+their horrible secrets; to wipe hands steeped in blood, counting them
+over night after night, seeing them rise up before me imploring
+forgiveness which I may not grant; to mark the writhing of the
+assassin and the last shriek of his victim; to listen to appalling
+noises and fearful silence, the silence of a father devouring his dead
+sons; to wonder at the laughter of the damned; to look for some human
+form among the livid heaps wrung and trampled by crime; to learn words
+such as living men may not hear without dying; to call perpetually on
+the dead, and always to accuse and condemn!--Is that living?"
+
+"Cease!" cried Godefroid; "I cannot see you or hear you any further!
+My reason wanders, my eyes are dim. You light a fire within me which
+consumes me."
+
+"And yet I must go on!" said the senior, waving his hand with a
+strange gesture that worked on the youth like a spell.
+
+For a moment the old man fixed Godefroid with his large, weary,
+lightless eyes; then he pointed with one finger to the ground. A gulf
+seemed to open at his bidding. He remained standing in the doubtful
+light of the moon; it lent a glory to his brow which reflected an
+almost solar gleam. Though at first a somewhat disdainful expression
+lurked in the wrinkles of his face, his look presently assumed the
+fixity which seems to gaze on an object invisible to the ordinary
+organs of sight. His eyes, no doubt, were seeing then the remoter
+images which the grave has in store for us.
+
+Never, perhaps, had this man presented so grand an aspect. A terrible
+struggle was going on in his soul, and reacted on his outer frame;
+strong man as he seemed to be, he bent as a reed bows under the breeze
+that comes before a storm. Godefroid stood motionless, speechless,
+spellbound; some inexplicable force nailed him to the floor; and, as
+happens when our attention takes us out of ourselves while watching a
+fire or a battle, he was wholly unconscious of his body.
+
+"Shall I tell you the fate to which you were hastening, poor angel of
+love? Listen! It has been given to me to see immeasurable space,
+bottomless gulfs in which all human creations are swallowed up, the
+shoreless sea whither flows the vast stream of men and of angels. As I
+made my way through the realms of eternal torment, I was sheltered
+under the cloak of an immortal--the robe of glory due to genius, and
+which the ages hand on--I, a frail mortal! When I wandered through the
+fields of light where the happy souls play, I was borne up by the love
+of a woman, the wings of an angel; resting on her heart, I could taste
+the ineffable pleasures whose touch is more perilous to us mortals
+than are the torments of the worser world.
+
+"As I achieved my pilgrimage through the dark regions below I had
+mounted from torture to torture, from crime to crime, from punishment
+to punishment, from awful silence to heartrending cries, till I
+reached the uppermost circle of Hell. Already, from afar, I could see
+the glory of Paradise shining at a vast distance; I was still in
+darkness, but on the borders of day. I flew, upheld by my Guide, borne
+along by a power akin to that which, during our dreams, wafts us to
+spheres invisible to the eye of the body. The halo that crowned our
+heads seared away the shades as we passed, like impalpable dust. Far
+above us the suns of all the worlds shone with scarce so much light as
+the twinkling fireflies of my native land. I was soaring towards the
+fields of air where, round about Paradise, the bodies of light are in
+closer array, where the azure is easy to pass through, where worlds
+innumerable spring like flowers in a meadow.
+
+"There, on the last level of the circles where those phantoms dwell
+that I had left behind me, like sorrows one would fain forget, I saw a
+vast shade. Standing in an attitude of aspiration, that soul looked
+eagerly into space; his feet were riveted by the will of God to the
+topmost point of the margin, and he remained for ever in the painful
+strain by which we project our purpose when we long to soar, as birds
+about to take wing. I saw the man; he neither looked at us nor heard
+us; every muscle quivered and throbbed; at each separate instant he
+seemed to feel, though he did not move, all the fatigue of traversing
+the infinite that divided him from Paradise where, as he gazed
+steadfastly, he believed he had glimpses of a beloved image. At this
+last gate of Hell, as at the first, I saw the stamp of despair even in
+hope. The hapless creature was so fearfully held by some unseen force,
+that his anguish entered into my bones and froze my blood. I shrank
+closer to my Guide, whose protection restored me to peace and silence.
+
+"Suddenly the Shade gave a cry of joy--a cry as shrill as that of the
+mother bird that sees a hawk in the air, or suspects its presence. We
+looked where he was looking, and saw, as it were, a sapphire, floating
+high up in the abysses of light. The glowing star fell with the
+swiftness of a sunbeam when it flashes over the horizon in the morning
+and its first rays shoot across the world. The Splendor became clearer
+and grew larger; presently I beheld the cloud of glory in which the
+angels move--a shining vapor that emanates from their divine
+substance, and that glitters here and there like tongues of flame. A
+noble face, whose glory none may endure that have not won the mantle,
+the laurel, and the palm--the attribute of the Powers--rose above this
+cloud as white and pure as snow. It was Light within light. His wings
+as they waved shed dazzling ripples in the spheres through which he
+descended, as the glance of God pierces through the universe. At last
+I saw the archangel in all his glory. The flower of eternal beauty
+that belongs to the angels of the Spirit shone in him. In one hand he
+held a green palm branch, in the other a sword of flame: the palm to
+bestow on the pardoned soul, the sword to drive back all the hosts of
+Hell with one sweep. As he approached, the perfumes of Heaven fell
+upon us as dew. In the region where the archangel paused, the air took
+the hues of opal, and moved in eddies of which he was the centre. He
+paused, looked at the Shade, and said:
+
+"'To-morrow.'
+
+"Then he turned heavenwards once more, spread his wings, and clove
+through space as a vessel cuts through the waves, hardly showing her
+white sails to the exiles left on some deserted shore.
+
+"The Shade uttered appalling cries, to which the damned responded from
+the lowest circle, the deepest in the immensity of suffering, to the
+more peaceful zone near the surface on which we were standing. This
+worst torment of all had appealed to all the rest. The turmoil was
+swelled by the roar of a sea of fire which formed a bass to the
+terrific harmony of endless millions of suffering souls.
+
+"Then suddenly the Shade took flight through the doleful city, and
+down to its place at the very bottom of Hell; but as suddenly it came
+up again, turned, soared through the endless circles in every
+direction, as a vulture, confined for the first time in a cage,
+exhausts itself in vain efforts. The Shade was free to do this; he
+could wander through the zones of Hell icy, fetid, or scorching
+without enduring their pangs; he glided into that vastness as a
+sunbeam makes its way into the deepest dark.
+
+"'God has not condemned him to any torment,' said the Master; 'but
+not one of the souls you have seen suffering their various punishments
+would exchange his anguish for the hope that is consuming this soul.'
+
+"And just then the Shade came back to us, brought thither by an
+irresistible force which condemned him to perch on the verge of Hell.
+My divine Guide, guessing my curiosity, touched the unhappy Shade with
+his palm-branch. He, who was perhaps trying to measure the age of
+sorrow that divided him from that ever-vanishing 'To-morrow,' started
+and gave a look full of all the tears he had already shed.
+
+"'You would know my woe?' said he sadly. 'Oh, I love to tell it. I am
+here, Teresa is above; that is all. On earth we were happy, we were
+always together. When I saw my loved Teresa Donati for the first time,
+she was ten years old. We loved each other even then, not knowing what
+love meant. Our lives were one; I turned pale if she were pale, I was
+happy in her joy; we gave ourselves up to the pleasure of thinking and
+feeling together; and we learned what love was, each through the
+other. We were wedded at Cremona; we never saw each other's lips but
+decked with pearls of a smile; our eyes always shone; our hair, like
+our desires, flowed together; our heads were always bent over one book
+when we read, our feet walked in equal step. Life was one long kiss,
+our home was a nest.
+
+"'One day, for the first time, Teresa turned pale and said, "I am in
+pain!"--And I was not in pain!
+
+"'She never rose again. I saw her sweet face change, her golden hair
+fade--and I did not die! She smiled to hide her sufferings, but I
+could read them in her blue eyes, of which I could interpret the
+slightest trembling. "Honorino, I love you!" said she, at the very
+moment when her lips turned white, and she was clasping my hand still
+in hers when death chilled them. So I killed myself that she might not
+lie alone in her sepulchral bed, under her marble sheet. Teresa is
+above and I am here. I could not bear to leave her, but God has
+divided us. Why, then, did He unite us on earth? He is jealous!
+Paradise was no doubt so much the fairer on the day when Teresa
+entered in.
+
+"'Do you see her? She is sad in her bliss; she is parted from me!
+Paradise must be a desert to her.'
+
+"'Master,' said I with tears, for I thought of my love, 'when this
+one shall desire Paradise for God's sake alone, shall he not be
+delivered?' And the Father of Poets mildly bowed his head in sign of
+assent.
+
+"We departed, cleaving the air, and making no more noise than the
+birds that pass overhead sometimes when we lie in the shade of a tree.
+It would have been vain to try to check the hapless shade in his
+blasphemy. It is one of the griefs of the angels of darkness that they
+can never see the light even when they are surrounded by it. He would
+not have understood us."
+
+
+
+At this moment the swift approach of many horses rang through the
+stillness, the dog barked, the constable's deep growl replied; the
+horsemen dismounted, knocked at the door; the noise was so unexpected
+that it seemed like some sudden explosion.
+
+The two exiles, the two poets, fell to earth through all the space
+that divides us from the skies. The painful shock of this fall rushed
+through their veins like strange blood, hissing as it seemed, and full
+of scorching sparks. Their pain was like an electric discharge. The
+loud, heavy step of a man-at-arms sounded on the stairs with the iron
+clank of his sword, his cuirass, and spurs; a soldier presently stood
+before the astonished stranger.
+
+"We can return to Florence," said the man, whose bass voice sounded
+soft as he spoke in Italian.
+
+"What is that you say?" asked the old man.
+
+"The _Bianchi_ are triumphant."
+
+"Are you not mistaken?" asked the poet.
+
+"No, dear Dante!" replied the soldier, whose warlike tones rang with
+the thrill of battle and the exultation of victory.
+
+"To Florence! To Florence! Ah, my Florence!" cried Dante Alighieri,
+drawing himself up, and gazing into the distance. In fancy he saw
+Italy; he was gigantic.
+
+"But I--when shall I be in Heaven?" said Godefroid, kneeling on one
+knee before the immortal poet, like an angel before the sanctuary.
+
+"Come to Florence," said Dante in compassionate tones. "Come! when you
+see its lovely landscape from the heights of Fiesole you will fancy
+yourself in Paradise."
+
+The soldier smiled. For the first time, perhaps for the only time in
+his life, Dante's gloomy and solemn features wore a look of joy; his
+eyes and brows expressed the happiness he has depicted so lavishly in
+his vision of Paradise. He thought perhaps that he heard the voice of
+Beatrice.
+
+A light step, and the rustle of a woman's gown, were audible in the
+silence. Dawn was now showing its first streaks of light. The fair
+Comtesse de Mahaut came in and flew to Godefroid.
+
+"Come, my child, my son! I may at last acknowledge you. Your birth is
+recognized, your rights are under the protection of the King of
+France, and you will find Paradise in your mother's heart."
+
+"I hear, I know, the voice of Heaven!" cried the youth in rapture.
+
+The exclamation roused Dante, who saw the young man folded in the
+Countess' arms. He took leave of them with a look, and left his young
+companion on his mother's bosom.
+
+"Come away!" he cried in a voice of thunder. "Death to the Guelphs!"
+
+
+
+PARIS, October 1831.
+
+
+
+
+
+End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of The Exiles, by Honore de Balzac
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+*The Project Gutenberg Etext of The Exiles, by Honore de Balzac*
+#77 in our series by Honore de Balzac
+
+
+Copyright laws are changing all over the world, be sure to check
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+The Exiles
+
+by Honore de Balzac
+
+Translated by Clara Bell and James Waring
+
+September, 1999  [Etext #1884]
+
+
+*The Project Gutenberg Etext of The Exiles, by Honore de Balzac*
+******This file should be named xiles10.txt or xiles10.zip******
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+Etext prepared by Dagny, dagnyj@hotmail.com
+and John Bickers, jbickers@templar.actrix.gen.nz
+
+
+
+
+
+The Exiles
+
+by Honore de Balzac
+
+Translated by Clara Bell and James Waring
+
+
+
+
+ALMAE SORORI
+
+
+
+In the year 1308 few houses were yet standing on the Island formed by
+the alluvium and sand deposited by the Seine above the Cite, behind
+the Church of Notre-Dame. The first man who was so bold as to build on
+this strand, then liable to frequent floods, was a constable of the
+watch of the City of Paris, who had been able to do some service to
+their Reverences the Chapter of the Cathedral; and in return the
+Bishop leased him twenty-five perches of land, with exemptions from
+all feudal dues or taxes on the buildings he might erect.
+
+Seven years before the beginning of this narrative, Joseph Tirechair,
+one of the sternest of Paris constables, as his name (Tear Flesh)
+would indicate, had, thanks to his share of the fines collected by him
+for delinquencies committed within the precincts of the Cite, had been
+able to build a house on the bank of the Seine just at the end of the
+Rue du Port-Saint-Landry. To protect the merchandise landed on the
+strand, the municipality had constructed a sort of break-water of
+masonry, which may still be seen on some old plans of Paris, and which
+preserved the piles of the landing-place by meeting the rush of water
+and ice at the upper end of the Island. The constable had taken
+advantage of this for the foundation of his house, so that there were
+several steps up to his door.
+
+Like all the houses of that date, this cottage was crowned by a peaked
+roof, forming a gable-end to the front, or half a diamond. To the
+great regret of historians, but two or three examples of such roofs
+survive in Paris. A round opening gave light to a loft, where the
+constable's wife dried the linen of the Chapter, for she had the honor
+of washing for the Cathedral--which was certainly not a bad customer.
+On the first floor were two rooms, let to lodgers at a rent, one year
+with another, of forty sous /Parisis/ each, an exorbitant sum, that
+was however justified by the luxury Tirechair had lavished on their
+adornment. Flanders tapestry hung on the walls, and a large bed with a
+top valance of green serge, like a peasant's bed, was amply furnished
+with mattresses, and covered with good sheets of fine linen. Each room
+had a stove called a /chauffe-doux/; the floor, carefully polished by
+Dame Tirechair's apprentices, shone like the woodwork of a shrine.
+Instead of stools, the lodgers had deep chairs of carved walnut, the
+spoils probably of some raided castle. Two chests with pewter
+mouldings, and tables on twisted legs, completed the fittings, worthy
+of the most fastidious knights-banneret whom business might bring to
+Paris.
+
+The windows of those two rooms looked out on the river. From one you
+could only see the shores of the Seine, and the three barren islands,
+of which two were subsequently joined together to form the Ile Saint-
+Louis; the third was the Ile de Louviers. From the other could be
+seen, down a vista of the Port-Saint-Landry, the buildings on the
+Greve, the Bridge of Notre-Dame, with its houses, and the tall towers
+of the Louvre, but lately built by Philippe-Auguste to overlook the
+then poor and squalid town of Paris, which suggests so many imaginary
+marvels to the fancy of modern romancers.
+
+The ground floor of Tirechair's house consisted of a large hall, where
+his wife's business was carried on, through which the lodgers were
+obliged to pass on their way to their own rooms up a stairway like a
+mill-ladder. Behind this were a kitchen and a bedroom, with a view
+over the Seine. A tiny garden, reclaimed from the waters, displayed at
+the foot of this modest dwelling its beds of cabbages and onions, and
+a few rose-bushes, sheltered by palings, forming a sort of hedge. A
+little structure of lath and mud served as a kennel for a big dog, the
+indispensable guardian of so lonely a dwelling. Beyond this kennel was
+a little plot, where the hens cackled whose eggs were sold to the
+Canons. Here and there on this patch of earth, muddy or dry according
+to the whimsical Parisian weather, a few trees grew, constantly lashed
+by the wind, and teased and broken by the passer-by--willows, reeds,
+and tall grasses.
+
+The Eyot, the Seine, the landing-place, the house, were all
+overshadowed on the west by the huge basilica of Notre-Dame casting
+its cold gloom over the whole plot as the sun moved. Then, as now,
+there was not in all Paris a more deserted spot, a more solemn or more
+melancholy prospect. The noise of waters, the chanting of priests, or
+the piping of the wind, were the only sounds that disturbed this
+wilderness, where lovers would sometimes meet to discuss their secrets
+when the church-folds and clergy were safe in church at the services.
+
+
+
+One evening in April in the year 1308, Tirechair came home in a
+remarkably bad temper. For three days past everything had been in good
+order on the King's highway. Now, as an officer of the peace, nothing
+annoyed him so much as to feel himself useless. He flung down his
+halbert in a rage, muttered inarticulate words as he pulled off his
+doublet, half red and half blue, and slipped on a shabby camlet
+jerkin. After helping himself from the bread-box to a hunch of bread,
+and spreading it with butter, he seated himself on a bench, looked
+round at his four whitewashed walls, counted the beams of the ceiling,
+made a mental inventory of the household goods hanging from the nails,
+scowled at the neatness which left him nothing to complain of, and
+looked at his wife, who said not a word as she ironed the albs and
+surplices from the sacristy.
+
+"By my halidom," he said, to open the conversation, "I cannot think,
+Jacqueline, where you go to catch your apprenticed maids. Now, here is
+one," he went on, pointing to a girl who was folding an altar-cloth,
+clumsily enough, it must be owned, "who looks to me more like a damsel
+rather free of her person than a sturdy country wench. Her hands are
+as white as a fine lady's! By the Mass! and her hair smells of
+essences, I verily believe, and her hose are as find as a queen's. By
+the two horns of Old Nick, matters please me but ill as I find them
+here."
+
+The girl colored, and stole a look at Jacqueline, full of alarm not
+unmixed with pride. The mistress answered her glance with a smile,
+laid down her work, and turned to her husband.
+
+"Come now," said she, in a sharp tone, "you need not harry me. Are you
+going to accuse me next of some underhand tricks? Patrol your roads as
+much as you please, but do not meddle here with anything but what
+concerns your sleeping in peace, drinking your wine, and eating what I
+set before you, or else, I warn you, I will have no more to do with
+keeping you healthy and happy. Let any one find me a happier man in
+all the town," she went on, with a scolding grimace. "He has silver in
+his purse, a gable over the Seine, a stout halbert on one hand, an
+honest wife on the other, a house as clean and smart as a new pin! And
+he growls like a pilgrim smarting from Saint Anthony's fire!"
+
+"Hey day!" exclaimed the sergeant of the watch, "do you fancy,
+Jacqueline, that I have any wish to see my house razed down, my
+halbert given to another, and my wife standing in the pillory?"
+
+Jacqueline and the dainty journeywoman turned pale.
+
+"Just tell me what you are driving at," said the washerwoman sharply,
+"and make a clean breast of it. For some days, my man, I have observed
+that you have some maggot twisting in your poor brain. Come up, then,
+and have it all out. You must be a pretty coward indeed if you fear
+any harm when you have only to guard the common council and live under
+the protection of the Chapter! Their Reverences the Canons would lay
+the whole bishopric under an interdict if Jacqueline brought a
+complaint of the smallest damage."
+
+As she spoke, she went straight up to her husband and took him by the
+arm.
+
+"Come with me," she added, pulling him up and out on to the steps.
+
+When they were down by the water in their little garden, Jacqueline
+looked saucily in her husband's face.
+
+"I would have you to know, you old gaby, that when my lady fair goes
+out, a piece of gold comes into our savings-box."
+
+"Oh, ho!" said the constable, who stood silent and meditative before
+his wife. But he presently said, "Any way, we are done for.--What
+brings the dame to our house?"
+
+"She comes to see the well-favored young clerk who lives overhead,"
+replied Jacqueline, looking up at the window that opened on to the
+vast landscape of the Seine valley.
+
+"The Devil's in it!" cried the man. "For a few base crowns you have
+ruined me, Jacqueline. Is that an honest trade for a sergeant's decent
+wife to ply? And, be she Countess or Baroness, the lady will not be
+able to get us out of the trap in which we shall find ourselves caught
+sooner or later. Shall we not have to square accounts with some
+puissant and offended husband? for, by the Mass, she is fair to look
+upon!"
+
+"But she is a widow, I tell you, gray gander! How dare you accuse your
+wife of foul play and folly? And the lady has never spoken a word to
+yon gentle clerk, she is content to look on him and think of him. Poor
+lad! he would be dead of starvation by now but for her, for she is as
+good as a mother to him. And he, the sweet cherub! it is as easy to
+cheat him as to rock a new-born babe. He believes his pence will last
+for ever, and he has eaten them through twice over in the past six
+months."
+
+"Woman," said the sergeant, solemnly pointing to the Place de Greve,
+"do you remember seeing, even from this spot, the fire in which they
+burnt the Danish woman the other day?"
+
+"What then?" said Jacqueline, in a fright.
+
+"What then?" echoed Tirechair. "Why, the two men who lodge with us
+smell of scorching. Neither Chapter nor Countess or Protector can
+serve them. Here is Easter come round; the year is ending; we must
+turn our company out of doors, and that at once. Do you think you can
+teach an old constable how to know a gallows-bird? Our two lodgers
+were on terms with la Porette, that heretic jade from Denmark or
+Norway, whose last cries you heard from here. She was a brave witch;
+she never blenched at the stake, which was proof enough of her compact
+with the Devil. I saw her as plain as I see you; she preached to the
+throng, and declared she was in heaven and could see God.
+
+"And since that, I tell you, I have never slept quietly in my bed. My
+lord, who lodges over us, is of a surety more of a wizard than a
+Christian. On my word as an officer, I shiver when that old man passes
+near me; he never sleeps of nights; if I wake, his voice is ringing
+like a bourdon of bells, and I hear him muttering incantations in the
+language of hell. Have you ever seen him eat an honest crust of bread
+or a hearth-cake made by a good Catholic baker? His brown skin has
+been scorched and tanned by hell-fires. Marry, and I tell you his eyes
+hold a spell like that of serpents. Jacqueline, I will have none of
+those two men under my roof. I see too much of the law not to know
+that it is well to have nothing to do with it.--You must get rid of
+our two lodgers; the elder because I suspect him; the youngster,
+because he is too pretty. They neither of them seem to me to keep
+Christian company. The boy is ever staring at the moon, the stars, and
+the clouds, like a wizard watching for the hour when he shall mount
+his broomstick; the other old rogue certainly makes some use of the
+poor boy for his black art. My house stands too close to the river as
+it is, and that risk of ruin is bad enough without bringing down fire
+from heaven, or the love affairs of a countess. I have spoken. Do not
+rebel."
+
+In spite of her sway in the house, Jacqueline stood stupefied as she
+listened to the edict fulminated against his lodgers by the sergeant
+of the watch. She mechanically looked up at the window of the room
+inhabited by the old man, and shivered with horror as she suddenly
+caught sight of the gloomy, melancholy face, and the piercing eye that
+so affected her husband, accustomed as he was to dealing with
+criminals.
+
+At that period, great and small, priests and laymen, all trembled
+before the idea of any supernatural power. The word "magic" was as
+powerful as leprosy to root up feelings, break social ties, and freeze
+piety in the most generous soul. It suddenly struck the constable's
+wife that she had never, in fact, seen either of her lodgers
+exercising any human function. Though the younger man's voice was as
+sweet and melodious as the tones of a flute, she so rarely heard it
+that she was tempted to think his silence the result of a spell. As
+she recalled the strange beauty of that pink-and-white face, and saw
+in memory the fine hair and moist brilliancy of those eyes, she
+believed that they were indeed the artifices of the Devil. She
+remembered that for days at a time she had never heard the slightest
+sound from either room. Where were the strangers during all those
+hours?
+
+Suddenly the most singular circumstances recurred to her mind. She was
+completely overmastered by fear, and could even discern witchcraft in
+the rich lady's interest in the young Godefroid, a poor orphan who had
+come from Flanders to study at the University of Paris. She hastily
+put her hand into one of her pockets, pulled out four livres of
+Tournay in large silver coinage, and looked at the pieces with an
+expression of avarice mingled with terror.
+
+"That, at any rate, is not false coin," said she, showing the silver
+to her husband. "Besides," she went on, "how can I turn them out after
+taking next year's rent paid in advance?"
+
+"You had better inquire of the Dean of the Chapter," replied
+Tirechair. "Is not it his business to tell us how we should deal with
+these extraordinary persons?"
+
+"Ay, truly extraordinary," cried Jacqueline. "To think of their
+cunning; coming here under the very shadow of Notre-Dame! Still," she
+went on, "or ever I ask the Dean, why not warn that fair and noble
+lady of the risk she runs?"
+
+As she spoke, Jacqueline went into the house with her husband, who had
+not missed a mouthful. Tirechair, as a man grown old in the tricks of
+his trade, affected to believe that the strange lady was in fact a
+work-girl; still, this assumed indifference could not altogether cloak
+the timidity of a courtier who respects a royal incognity. At this
+moment six was striking by the clock of Saint-Denis du Pas, a small
+church that stood between Notre-Dame and the Port-Saint-Landry--the
+first church erected in Paris, on the very spot where Saint-Denis was
+laid on the gridiron, as chronicles tell. The hour flew from steeple
+to tower all over the city. Then suddenly confused shouts were heard
+on the left bank of the Seine, behind Notre-Dame, in the quarter where
+the schools of the University harbored their swarms.
+
+At this signal, Jacqueline's elder lodger began to move about his
+room. The sergeant, his wife, and the strange lady listened while he
+opened and shut his door, and the old man's heavy step was heard on
+the steep stair. The constable's suspicions gave such interest to the
+advent of this personage, that the lady was startled as she observed
+the strange expression of the two countenances before her. Referring
+the terrors of this couple to the youth she was protecting--as was
+natural in a lover--the young lady awaited, with some uneasiness, the
+event thus heralded by the fears of her so-called master and mistress.
+
+The old man paused for a moment on the threshold to scrutinize the
+three persons in the room, and seemed to be looking for his young
+companion. This glance of inquiry, unsuspicious as it was, agitated
+the three. Indeed, nobody, not even the stoutest man, could deny that
+Nature had bestowed exceptional powers on this being, who seemed
+almost supernatural. Though his eyes were somewhat deeply shaded by
+the wide sockets fringed with long eyebrows, they were set, like a
+kite's eyes, in eyelids so broad, and bordered by so dark a circle
+sharply defined on his cheek, that they seemed rather prominent. These
+singular eyes had in them something indescribably domineering and
+piercing, which took possession of the soul by a grave and thoughtful
+look, a look as bright and lucid as that of a serpent or a bird, but
+which held one fascinated and crushed by the swift communication of
+some tremendous sorrow, or of some super-human power.
+
+Every feature was in harmony with this eye of lead and of fire, at
+once rigid and flashing, stern and calm. While in this eagle eye
+earthly emotions seemed in some sort extinct, the lean, parched face
+also bore traces of unhappy passions and great deeds done. The nose,
+which was narrow and aquiline, was so long that it seemed to hang on
+by the nostrils. The bones of the face were strongly marked by the
+long, straight wrinkles that furrowed the hollow cheeks. Every line in
+the countenance looked dark. It would suggest the bed of a torrent
+where the violence of former floods was recorded in the depth of the
+water-courses, which testified to some terrible, unceasing turmoil.
+Like the ripples left by the oars of a boat on the waters, deep lines,
+starting from each side of his nose, marked his face strongly, and
+gave an expression of bitter sadness to his mouth, which was firm and
+straight-lipped. Above the storm thus stamped on his countenance, his
+calm brow rose with what may be called boldness, and crowned it as
+with a marble dome.
+
+The stranger preserved that intrepid and dignified manner that is
+frequently habitual with men inured to disaster, and fitted by nature
+to stand unmoved before a furious mob and to face the greatest
+dangers. He seemed to move in a sphere apart, where he poised above
+humanity. His gestures, no less than his look, were full of
+irresistible power; his lean hands were those of a soldier; and if
+your own eyes were forced to fall before his piercing gaze, you were
+no less sure to tremble when by word or action he spoke to your soul.
+He moved in silent majesty that made him seem a king without his
+guard, a god without his rays.
+
+His dress emphasized the ideas suggested by the peculiarities of his
+mien and face. Soul, body, and garb were in harmony, and calculated to
+impress the coldest imagination. He wore a sort of sleeveless gown of
+black cloth, fastened in front, and falling to the calf, leaving the
+neck bare with no collar. His doublet and boots were likewise black.
+On his head was a black velvet cap like a priest's, sitting in a close
+circle above his forehead, and not showing a single hair. It was the
+strictest mourning, the gloomiest habit a man could wear. But for a
+long sword that hung by his side from a leather belt which could be
+seen where his surcoat hung open, a priest would have hailed him as a
+brother. Though of no more than middle height, he appeared tall; and,
+looking him in the face he seemed a giant.
+
+"The clock has struck, the boat is waiting; will you not come?"
+
+At these words, spoken in bad French, but distinctly audible in the
+silence, a little noise was heard in the other top room, and the young
+man came down as lightly as a bird.
+
+When Godefroid appeared, the lady's face turned crimson; she trembled,
+started, and covered her face with her white hands.
+
+Any woman might have shared her agitation at the sight of this youth
+of about twenty, of a form and stature so slender that at a first
+glance he might have been taken for a mere boy, or a young girl in
+disguise. His black cap--like the /beret/ worn by the Basque people--
+showed a brow as white as snow, where grace and innocence shone with
+an expression of divine sweetness--the light of a soul full of faith.
+A poet's fancy would have seen there the star which, in some old tale,
+a mother entreats the fairy godmother to set on the forehead of an
+infant abandoned, like Moses, to the waves. Love lurked in the
+thousand fair curls that fell over his shoulders. His throat, truly a
+swan's throat, was white and exquisitely round. His blue eyes, bright
+and liquid, mirrored the sky. His features and the mould of his brow
+were refined and delicate enough to enchant a painter. The bloom of
+beauty, which in a woman's face causes men such indescribable delight,
+the exquisite purity of outline, the halo of light that bathes the
+features we love, were here combined with a masculine complexion, and
+with strength as yet but half developed, in the most enchanting
+contrast. His was one of those melodious countenances which even when
+silent speak and attract us. And yet, on marking it attentively, the
+incipient blight might have been detected which comes of a great
+thought or a passion, the faint yellow tinge that made him seem like a
+young leaf opening to the sun.
+
+No contrast could be greater or more startling than that seen in the
+companionship of these two men. It was like seeing a frail and
+graceful shrub that has grown from the hollow trunk of some gnarled
+willow, withered by age, blasted by lightning, standing decrepit; one
+of those majestic trees that painters love; the trembling sapling
+takes shelter there from storms. One was a god, the other was an
+angel; one the poet that feels, the other the poet that expresses--a
+prophet in sorrow, a levite in prayer.
+
+They went out together without speaking.
+
+"Did you mark how he called him to him?" cried the sergeant of the
+watch when the footsteps of the couple were no longer audible on the
+strand. "Are not they a demon and his familiar?"
+
+"Phooh!" puffed Jacqueline. "I felt smothered! I never marked our two
+lodgers so carefully. 'Tis a bad thing for us women that the Devil can
+wear so fair a mien!"
+
+"Ay, cast some holy water on him," said Tirechair, "and you will see
+him turn into a toad.--I am off to tell the office all about them."
+
+On hearing this speech, the lady roused herself from the reverie into
+which she had sunk, and looked at the constable, who was donning his
+red-and-blue jacket.
+
+"Whither are you off to?" she asked.
+
+"To tell the justices that wizards are lodging in our house very much
+against our will."
+
+The lady smiled.
+
+"I," said she, "am the Comtesse de Mahaut," and she rose with a
+dignity that took the man's breath away. "Beware of bringing the
+smallest trouble on your guests. Above all, respect the old man; I
+have seen him in the company of your Lord the King, who entreated him
+courteously; you will be ill advised to trouble him in any way. As to
+my having been here--never breathe a word of it, as you value your
+life."
+
+She said no more, but relapsed into thought.
+
+Presently she looked up, signed to Jacqueline, and together they went
+up into Godefroid's room. The fair Countess looked at the bed, the
+carved chairs, the chest, the tapestry, the table, with a joy like
+that of the exile who sees on his return the crowded roofs of his
+native town nestling at the foot of a hill.
+
+"If you have not deceived me," she said to Jacqueline, "I promise you
+a hundred crowns in gold."
+
+"Behold, madame," said the woman, "the poor angel is confiding--here
+is all his treasure."
+
+As she spoke, Jacqueline opened a drawer in the table and showed some
+parchments.
+
+"God of mercy!" cried the Countess, snatching up a document that
+caught her eye, on which she read, /Gothofredus Comes Gantiacus/
+(Godefroid, Count of Ghent).
+
+She dropped the parchment, and passed her hand over her brow; then,
+feeling, no doubt, that she had compromised herself by showing so much
+emotion, she recovered her cold demeanor.
+
+"I am satisfied," said she.
+
+She went downstairs and out of the house. The constable and his wife
+stood in their doorway, and saw her take the path to the landing-
+place.
+
+A boat was moored hard by. When the rustle of the Countess' approach
+was audible, a boatman suddenly stood up, helped the fair laundress to
+take her seat in it, and rowed with such strength as to make the boat
+fly like a swallow down the stream.
+
+"You are a sorry fellow," said Jacqueline, giving the officer's
+shoulder a familiar slap. "We have earned a hundred gold crowns this
+morning."
+
+"I like harboring lords no better than harboring wizards. And I know
+not, of the two, which is the more like to bring us to the gallows,"
+replied Tirechair, taking up his halbert. "I will go my rounds over by
+Champfleuri; God protect us, and send me to meet some pert jade out in
+her bravery of gold rings to glitter in the shade like a glow-worm!"
+
+Jacqueline, alone in the house, hastily went up to the unknown lord's
+room to discover, if she could, some clue to this mysterious business.
+Like some learned men who give themselves infinite pains to complicate
+the clear and simple laws of nature, she had already invented a
+chaotic romance to account for the meeting of these three persons
+under her humble roof. She hunted through the chest, examined
+everything, but could find nothing extraordinary. She saw nothing on
+the table but a writing-case and some sheets of parchment; and as she
+could not read, this discovery told her nothing. A woman's instinct
+then took her into the young man's room, and from thence she descried
+her two lodgers crossing the river in the ferry boat.
+
+"They stand like two statues," said she to herself. "Ah, ha! They are
+landing at the Rue du Fouarre. How nimble he is, the sweet youth! He
+jumped out like a bird. By him the old man looks like some stone saint
+in the Cathedral.--They are going to the old School of the Four
+Nations. Presto! they are out of sight.--And this is where he lives,
+poor cherub!" she went on, looking about the room. "How smart and
+winning he is! Ah! your fine gentry are made of other stuff than we
+are."
+
+And Jacqueline went down again after smoothing down the bed-coverlet,
+dusting the chest, and wondering for the hundredth time in six months:
+
+"What in the world does he do all the blessed day? He cannot always be
+staring at the blue sky and the stars that God has hung up there like
+lanterns. That dear boy has known trouble. But why do he and the old
+man hardly ever speak to each other?"
+
+Then she lost herself in wonderment and in thoughts which, in her
+woman's brain, were tangled like a skein of thread.
+
+The old man and his young companion had gone into one of the schools
+for which the Rue du Fouarre was at that time famous throughout
+Europe. At the moment when Jacqueline's two lodgers arrived at the old
+School des Quatre Nations, the celebrated Sigier, the most noted
+Doctor of Mystical Theology of the University of Paris, was mounting
+his pulpit in a spacious low room on a level with the street. The cold
+stones were strewn with clean straw, on which several of his disciples
+knelt on one knee, writing on the other, to enable them to take notes
+from the Master's improvised discourse, in the shorthand abbreviations
+which are the despair of modern decipherers.
+
+The hall was full, not of students only, but of the most distinguished
+men belonging to the clergy, the court, and the legal faculty. There
+were some learned foreigners, too--soldiers and rich citizens. The
+broad faces were there, with prominent brows and venerable beards,
+which fill us with a sort of pious respect for our ancestors when we
+see their portraits from the Middle Ages. Lean faces, too, with
+burning, sunken eyes, under bald heads yellow from the labors of
+futile scholasticism, contrasted with young and eager countenances,
+grave faces, warlike faces, and the ruddy cheeks of the financial
+class.
+
+These lectures, dissertations, theses, sustained by the brightest
+geniuses of the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries, roused our
+forefathers to enthusiasm. They were to them their bull-fights, their
+Italian opera, their tragedy, their dancers; in short, all their
+drama. The performance of Mysteries was a later thing than these
+spiritual disputations, to which, perhaps, we owe the French stage.
+Inspired eloquence, combining the attractions of the human voice
+skilfully used, with daring inquisition into the secrets of God,
+sufficed to satisfy every form of curiosity, appealed to the soul, and
+constituted the fashionable entertainment of the time. Not only did
+Theology include the other sciences, it was science itself, as grammar
+was science to the Ancient Greeks; and those who distinguished
+themselves in these duels, in which the orators, like Jacob, wrestled
+with the Spirit of God, had a promising future before them. Embassies,
+arbitrations between sovereigns, chancellorships, and ecclesiastical
+dignities were the meed of men whose rhetoric had been schooled in
+theological controversy. The professor's chair was the tribune of the
+period.
+
+This system lasted till the day when Rabelais gibbeted dialectics by
+his merciless satire, as Cervantes demolished chivalry by a narrative
+comedy.
+
+To understand this amazing period and the spirit which dictated its
+voluminous, though now forgotten, masterpieces, to analyze it, even to
+its barbarisms, we need only examine the Constitutions of the
+University of Paris and the extraordinary scheme of instruction that
+then obtained. Theology was taught under two faculties--that of
+Theology properly so called, and that of Canon Law. The faculty of
+Theology, again, had three sections--Scholastic, Canonical, and
+Mystic. It would be wearisome to give an account of the attributes of
+each section of the science, since one only, namely, Mystic, is the
+subject of this /Etude/.
+
+Mystical Theology included the whole of Divine Revelation and the
+elucidation of the Mysteries. And this branch of ancient theology has
+been secretly preserved with reverence even to our own day; Jacob
+Boehm, Swendenborg, Martinez Pasqualis, Saint-Martin, Molinos, Madame
+Guyon, Madame Bourignon, and Madame Krudener, the extensive sect of
+the Ecstatics, and that of the Illuminati, have at different periods
+duly treasured the doctrines of this science, of which the aim is
+indeed truly startling and portentous. In Doctor Sigier's day, as in
+our own, man has striven to gain wings to fly into the sanctuary where
+God hides from our gaze.
+
+This digression was necessary to give a clue to the scene at which the
+old man and the youth from the island under Notre-Dame had come to be
+audience; it will also protect this narrative from all blame on the
+score of falsehood and hyperbole, of which certain persons of hasty
+judgment might perhaps suspect me.
+
+Doctor Sigier was a tall man in the prime of life. His face, rescued
+from oblivion by the archives of the University, had singular
+analogies with that of Mirabeau. It was stamped with the seal of
+fierce, swift, and terrible eloquence. But the Doctor bore on his brow
+the expression of religious faith that his modern double had not. His
+voice, too, was of persuasive sweetness, with a clear and pleasing
+ring in it.
+
+At this moment the daylight, that was stintingly diffused through the
+small, heavily-leaded window-panes, tinted the assembly with
+capricious tones and powerful contrasts from the chequered light and
+shade. Here, in a dark corner, eyes shone brightly, their dark heads
+under the sunbeams gleamed light above faces in shadow, and various
+bald heads, with only a circlet of white hair, were distinguished
+among the crowd like battlements silvered by moonlight. Every face was
+turned towards the Doctor, mute but impatient. The drowsy voices of
+other lecturers in the adjoining schools were audible in the silent
+street like the murmuring of the sea; and the steps of the two
+strangers, as they now came in, attracted general attention. Doctor
+Sigier, ready to begin, saw the stately senior standing, looked round
+for a seat for him, and then finding none, as the place was full, came
+down from his place, went to the newcomer, and with great respect, led
+him to the platform of his professor's chair, and there gave him his
+stool to sit upon. The assembly hailed this mark of deference with a
+murmur of approval, recognizing the old man as the orator of a fine
+thesis admirably argued not long since at the Sorbonne.
+
+The stranger looked down from his raised position on the crowd below
+with that deep glance that held a whole poem of sorrow, and those who
+met his eye felt an indescribable thrill. The lad, following the old
+man, sat down on one of the steps, leaning against the pulpit in a
+graceful and melancholy attitude. The silence was now profound, and
+the doorway and even the street were blocked by scholars who had
+deserted the other classes.
+
+Doctor Sigier was to-day to recapitulate, in the last of a series of
+discourses, the views he had set forth in the former lectures on the
+Resurrection, Heaven, and Hell. His strange doctrine responded to the
+sympathies of the time, and gratified the immoderate love of the
+marvelous, which haunts the mind of man in every age. This effort of
+man to clutch the infinite, which for ever slips through his
+ineffectual grasp, this last tourney of thought against thought, was a
+task worthy of an assembly where the most stupendous human imagination
+ever known, perhaps, at that moment shone.
+
+The Doctor began by summing up in a mild and even tone the principal
+points he had so far established:
+
+"No intellect was the exact counterpart of another. Had man any right
+to require an account of his Creator for the inequality of powers
+bestowed on each? Without attempting to penetrate rashly into the
+designs of God, ought we not to recognize the fact that by reason of
+their general diversity intelligences could be classed in spheres?
+From the sphere where the least degree of intelligence gleamed, to the
+most translucent souls who could see the road by which to ascend to
+God, was there not an ascending scale of spiritual gift? And did not
+spirits of the same sphere understand each other like brothers in
+soul, in flesh, in mind, and in feeling?"
+
+From this the Doctor went on to unfold the most wonderful theories of
+sympathy. He set forth in Biblical language the phenomena of love, of
+instinctive repulsion, of strong affinities which transcend the laws
+of space, of the sudden mingling of souls which seem to recognize each
+other. With regard to the different degrees of strength of which our
+affections are capable, he accounted for them by the place, more or
+less near the centre, occupied by beings in their respective circles.
+
+He gave mathematical expression to God's grand idea in the
+co-ordination of the various human spheres. "Through man," he said,
+"these spheres constituted a world intermediate between the
+intelligence of the brute and the intelligence of the angels." As he
+stated it, the divine Word nourishes the spiritual Word, the spiritual
+Word nourishes the living Word, the living Word nourishes the animal
+Word, the animal Word nourishes the vegetable Word, and the vegetable
+Word is the expression of the life of the barren Word. These
+successive evolutions, as of a chrysalis, which God thus wrought in
+our souls, this infusorial life, so to speak, communicated from each
+zone to the next, more vivid, more spiritual, more perceptive in its
+ascent, represented, rather dimly no doubt, but marvelously enough to
+his inexperienced hearers, the impulse given to Nature by the
+Almighty. Supported by many texts from the Sacred Scriptures, which he
+used as a commentary on his own statements to express by concrete
+images the abstract arguments he felt to be wanting, he flourished the
+Spirit of God like a torch over the deep secrets of creation, with an
+eloquence peculiar to himself, and accents that urged conviction on
+his audience. As he unfolded his mysterious system and all its
+consequences, he gave a key to every symbol and justified the
+vocation, the special gifts, the genius, the talent of each human
+being.
+
+Then, instinctively becoming physiological, he remarked on the
+resemblance to certain animals stamped on some human faces, accounting
+for them by primordial analogies and the upward tendency of all
+creation. He showed his audience the workings of Nature, and assigned
+a mission and a future to minerals, plants, and animals. Bible in
+hand, after thus spiritualizing Matter and materializing Spirit, after
+pointing to the Will of God in all things, and enjoining respect for
+His smallest works, he suggested the possibility of rising by faith
+from sphere to sphere.
+
+This was the first portion of his discourse, and by adroit digressions
+he applied the doctrine of his system to feudalism. The poetry--
+religious and profane--and the abrupt eloquence of that period had a
+grand opening in this vast theory, wherein the Doctor had amalgamated
+all the philosophical systems of the ancients, and from which he
+brought them out again classified, transfigured, purified. The false
+dogmas of two adverse principles and of Pantheism were demolished at
+his word, which proclaimed the Divine Unity, while ascribing to God
+and His angels the knowledge, the ends to which the means shone
+resplendent to the eyes of man. Fortified by the demonstrations that
+proved the existence of the world of Matter, Doctor Sigier constructed
+the scheme of a spiritual world dividing us from God by an ascending
+scale of spheres, just as the plant is divided from man by an infinite
+number of grades. He peopled the heavens, the stars, the planets, the
+sun.
+
+Quoting Saint Paul, he invested man with a new power; he might rise,
+from globe to globe, to the very Fount of eternal life. Jacob's
+mystical ladder was both the religious formula and the traditional
+proof of the fact. He soared through space, carrying with him the
+passionate souls of his hearers on the wings of his word, making them
+feel the infinite, and bathing them in the heavenly sea. Then the
+Doctor accounted logically for hell by circles placed in inverse order
+to the shining spheres that lead to God, in which torments and
+darkness take the place of the Spirit and of light. Pain was as
+intelligible as rapture. The terms of comparison were present in the
+conditions of human life and its various atmospheres of suffering and
+of intellect. Thus the most extraordinary traditions of hell and
+purgatory were quite naturally conceivable.
+
+He gave the fundamental /rationale/ of virtue with admirable
+clearness. A pious man, toiling onward in poverty, proud of his good
+conscience, at peace with himself, and steadfastly true to himself in
+his heart in spite of the spectacle of exultant vice, was a fallen
+angel doing penance, who remembered his origin, foresaw his guerdon,
+accomplished his task, and obeyed his glorious mission. The sublime
+resignation of Christians was then seen in all its glory. He depicted
+martyrs at the burning stake, and almost stripped them of their merit
+by stripping them of their sufferings. He showed their inner angel as
+dwelling in the heavens, while the outer man was tortured by the
+executioner's sword. He described angels dwelling among men, and gave
+tokens by which to recognize them.
+
+He next strove to drag from the very depths of man's understanding the
+real sense of the word fall, which occurs in every language. He
+appealed to the most widely-spread traditions in evidence of this one
+true origin, explaining, with much lucidity, the passion all men have
+for rising, mounting--an instinctive ambition, the perennial
+revelations of our destiny.
+
+He displayed the whole universe at a glance, and described the nature
+of God Himself circulating in a full tide from the centre to the
+extremities, and from the extremities to the centre again. Nature was
+one and homogeneous. In the most seemingly trivial, as in the most
+stupendous work, everything obeyed that law; each created object
+reproduced in little an exact image of that nature--the sap in the
+plant, the blood in man, the orbits of the planets. He piled proof on
+proof, always completing his idea by a picture musical with poetry.
+
+And he boldly anticipated every objection. He thundered forth an
+eloquent challenge to the monumental works of science and human
+excrescences of knowledge, such as those which societies use the
+elements of the earthly globe to produce. He asked whether our wars,
+our disasters, our depravity could hinder the great movement given by
+God to all the globes; and he laughed human impotence to scorn by
+pointing to their efforts everywhere in ruins. He cried upon the manes
+of Tyre, Carthage, and Babylon; he called upon Babel and Jerusalem to
+appear; and sought, without finding them, the transient furrows made
+by the ploughshare of civilization. Humanity floated on the surface of
+the earth as a ship whose wake is lost in the calm level of ocean.
+
+These were the fundamental notions set forth in Doctor Sigier's
+address, all wrapped in the mystical language and strange school Latin
+of the time. He had made a special study of the Scriptures, and they
+supplied him with the weapons with which he came before his
+contemporaries to hasten their progress. He hid his boldness under his
+immense learning, as with a cloak, and his philosophical bent under a
+saintly life. At this moment, after bringing his hearers face to face
+with God, after packing the universe into an idea, and almost
+unveiling the idea of the world, he gazed down on the silent,
+throbbing mass, and scrutinized the stranger with a look. Then,
+spurred on, no doubt, by the presence of this remarkable personage, he
+added these words, from which I have eliminated the corrupt Latinity
+of the Middle Ages:--
+
+"Where, think you, may a man find these fruitful truths if not in the
+heart of God Himself?--What am I?--The humble interpreter of a single
+line left to us by the greatest of the Apostles--a single line out of
+thousands all equally full of light. Before us, Saint Paul said, '/In
+Deo vivimus movemur et sumus/.' In our day, less believing and more
+learned, or better instructed and more sceptical, we should ask the
+Apostle, 'To what end this perpetual motion? Whither leads this life
+divided into zones? Wherefore an intelligence that begins with the
+obscure perfection of marble and proceeds from sphere to sphere up to
+man, up to the angel, up to God? Where is the Fount, where is the
+ocean, if life, attaining to God across worlds and stars, through
+Matter and Spirit, has to come down again to some other goal?'
+
+"You desire to see both aspects of the universe at once. You would
+adore the Sovereign on condition of being suffered to sit for an
+instant on His throne. Mad fools that we are! We will not admit that
+the most intelligent animals are able to understand our ideas and the
+object of our actions; we are merciless to the creatures of the
+inferior spheres, and exile them from our own; we deny them the
+faculty of divining human thoughts, and yet we ourselves would fain
+master the highest of all ideas--the Idea of the Idea!
+
+"Well, go then, start! Fly by faith up from globe to globe, soar
+through space! Thought, love, and faith are its mystical keys.
+Traverse the circles, reach the throne! God is more merciful than you
+are; He opens His temple to all His creatures. Only, do not forget the
+pattern of Moses; put your shoes from off your feet, cast off all
+filth, leave your body far behind; otherwise you shall be consumed;
+for God--God is Light!"
+
+Just as Doctor Sigier spoke these grand words, his face radiant, his
+hand uplifted, a sunbeam pierced through an open window, like a magic
+jet from a fount of splendor, a long triangular shaft of gold that lay
+like a scarf over the whole assembly. They all clapped their hands,
+for the audience accepted this effect of the sinking sun as a miracle.
+There was a universal cry of:
+
+"/Vivant/! /Vivant/!"
+
+The very sky seemed to shed approval. Godefroid, struck with
+reverence, looked from the old man to Doctor Sigier; they were talking
+together in an undertone.
+
+"All honor to the Master!" said the stranger.
+
+"What is such transient honor?" replied Sigier.
+
+"I would I could perpetuate my gratitude," said the older man.
+
+"A line written by you is enough!" said the Doctor. "It would give me
+immortality, humanly speaking."
+
+"Can I give what I have not?" cried the elder.
+
+Escorted by the crowd, which followed in their footsteps, like
+courtiers round a king, at a respectful distance, Godefroid, with the
+old man and the Doctor, made their way to the oozy shore, where as yet
+there were no houses, and where the ferryman was waiting for them. The
+Doctor and the stranger were talking together, not in Latin nor in any
+Gallic tongue, but in an unknown language, and very gravely. They
+pointed with their hands now to heaven and now to the earth. Sigier,
+to whom the paths by the river were familiar, guided the venerable
+stranger with particular care to the narrow planks which here and
+there bridged the mud; the following watched them inquisitively; and
+some of the students envied the privileged boy who might walk with
+these two great masters of speech. Finally, the Doctor took leave of
+the stranger, and the ferry-boat pushed off.
+
+At the moment when the boat was afloat on the wide river,
+communicating its motion to the soul, the sun pierced the clouds like
+a conflagration blazing up on the horizon, and poured forth a flood of
+light, coloring slate roof-tops and humbler thatch with a ruddy glow
+and tawny reflections, fringed Philippe Auguste's towers with fire,
+flooded the sky, dyed the waters, gilded the plants, and aroused the
+half-sleeping insects. The immense shaft of light set the clouds on
+fire. It was like the last verse of the daily hymn. Every heart was
+thrilled; nature in such a moment is sublime.
+
+As he gazed at the spectacle, the stranger's eyes moistened with the
+tenderest of human tears: Godefroid too was weeping; his trembling
+hand touched that of the elder man, who, looking round, confessed his
+emotion. But thinking his dignity as a man compromised, no doubt, to
+redeem it, he said in a deep voice:
+
+"I weep for my native land. I am an exile! Young man, in such an hour
+as this I left my home. There, at this hour, the fireflies are coming
+out of their fragile dwellings and clinging like diamond sparks to the
+leaves of the iris. At this hour the breeze, as sweet as the sweetest
+poetry, rises up from a valley bathed in light, bearing on its wings
+the richest fragrance. On the horizon I could see a golden city like
+the Heavenly Jerusalem--a city whose name I may not speak. There, too,
+a river winds. But that city and its buildings, that river of which
+the lovely vistas, and the pools of blue water, mingled, crossed, and
+embraced each other, which gladdened my sight and filled me with love
+--where are they?
+
+"At that hour the waters assumed fantastic hues under the sunset sky,
+and seemed to be painted pictures; the stars dropped tender streaks of
+light, the moon spread its pleasing snares; it gave another life to
+the trees, to the color and form of things, and a new aspect to the
+sparkling water, the silent hills, the eloquent buildings. The city
+spoke, it glittered, it called to me to return!
+
+"Columns of smoke rose up by the side of the ancient pillars, whose
+marble sheen gleamed white through the night; the lines of the horizon
+were still visible through the mists of evening; all was harmony and
+mystery. Nature would not say farewell; she desired to keep me there.
+Ah! It was all in all to me; my mother and my child, my wife and my
+glory! The very bells bewailed my condemnation. Oh, land of marvels!
+It is as beautiful as heaven. From that hour the wide world has been
+my dungeon. Beloved land, why hast thou rejected me?
+
+"But I shall triumph there yet!" he cried, speaking with an accent of
+such intense conviction and such a ringing tone, that the boatman
+started as at a trumpet call.
+
+The stranger was standing in a prophetic attitude and gazing
+southwards into the blue, pointing to his native home across the skyey
+regions. The ascetic pallor of his face had given place to a glow of
+triumph, his eyes flashed, he was as grand as a lion shaking his mane.
+
+"But you, poor child," he went on, looking at Godefroid, whose cheeks
+were beaded with glittering tears, "have you, like me, studied life
+from blood-stained pages? What can you have to weep for, at your age?"
+
+"Alas!" said Godefroid, "I regret a land more beautiful than any land
+on earth--a land I never saw and yet remember. Oh, if I could but
+cleave the air on beating wings, I would fly----"
+
+"Whither?" asked the exile.
+
+"Up there," replied the boy.
+
+On hearing this answer, the stranger seemed surprised; he looked
+darkly at the youth, who remained silent. They seemed to communicate
+by an unspeakable effusion of the spirit, hearing each other's
+yearnings in the teeming silence, and going forth side by side, like
+two doves sweeping the air on equal wing, till the boat, touching the
+strand of the island, roused them from their deep reverie.
+
+Then, each lost in thought, they went together to the sergeant's
+house.
+
+"And so the boy believes that he is an angel exiled from heaven!"
+thought the tall stranger. "Which of us all has a right to undeceive
+him? Not I--I, who am so often lifted by some magic spell so far above
+the earth; I who am dedicate to God; I who am a mystery to myself.
+Have I not already seen the fairest of the angels dwelling in this
+mire? Is this child more or less crazed than I am? Has he taken a
+bolder step in the way of faith? He believes, and his belief no doubt
+will lead him into some path of light like that in which I walk. But
+though he is as beautiful as an angel, is he not too feeble to stand
+fast in such a struggle?"
+
+Abashed by the presence of his companion, whose voice of thunder
+expressed to him his own thoughts, as lightning expresses the will of
+Heaven, the boy was satisfied to gaze at the stars with a lover's
+eyes. Overwhelmed by a luxury of sentiment, which weighed on his
+heart, he stood there timid and weak--a midge in the sunbeams.
+Sigier's discourse had proved to them the mysteries of the spiritual
+world; the tall, old man was to invest them with glory; the lad felt
+them in himself, though he could in no way express them. The three
+represented in living embodiment Science, Poetry, and Feeling.
+
+
+
+On going into the house, the Exile shut himself into his room, lighted
+the inspiring lamp, and gave himself over to the ruthless demon of
+Work, seeking words of the silence and ideas of the night. Godefroid
+sat down in his window sill, by turns gazing at the moon reflected in
+the water, and studying the mysteries of the sky. Lost in one of the
+trances that were frequent to him, he traveled from sphere to sphere,
+from vision to vision, listening for obscure rustlings and the voices
+of angels, and believing that he heard them; seeing, or fancying that
+he saw, a divine radiance in which he lost himself; striving to attain
+the far-away goal, the source of all light, the fount of all harmony.
+
+Presently the vast clamor of Paris, brought down on the current, was
+hushed; lights were extinguished one by one in the houses; silence
+spread over all; and the huge city slept like a tired giant.
+
+Midnight struck. The least noise, the fall of a leaf, or the flight of
+a jackdaw changing its perching-place among the pinnacles of Notre-
+Dame, would have been enough to bring the stranger's mind to earth
+again, to have made the youth drop from the celestial heights to which
+his soul had soared on the wings of rapture.
+
+And then the old man heard with dismay a groan mingling with the sound
+of a heavy fall--the fall, as his experienced ear assured him, of a
+dead body. He hastened into Godefroid's room, and saw him lying in a
+heap with a long rope tight round his neck, the end meandering over
+the floor.
+
+When he had untied it, the poor lad opened his eyes.
+
+"Where am I?" he asked, with a hopeful gleam.
+
+"In your own room," said the elder man, looking with surprise at
+Godefroid's neck, and at the nail to which the cord had been tied, and
+which was still in the knot.
+
+"In heaven?" said the boy, in a voice of music.
+
+"No; on earth!"
+
+Godefroid rose and walked along the path of light traced on the floor
+by the moon through the window, which stood open; he saw the rippling
+Seine, the willows and plants on the island. A misty atmosphere hung
+over the waters like a smokey floor.
+
+On seeing the view, to him so heartbreaking, he folded his hands over
+his bosom, and stood in an attitude of despair; the Exile came up to
+him with astonishment on his face.
+
+"You meant to kill yourself?" he asked.
+
+"Yes," replied Godefroid, while the stranger passed his hand about his
+neck again and again to feel the place where the rope had tightened on
+it.
+
+But for some slight bruises, the young man had been but little hurt.
+His friend supposed that the nail had given way at once under the
+weight of the body, and the terrible attempt had ended in a fall
+without injury.
+
+"And why, dear lad, did you try to kill yourself?"
+
+"Alas!" said Godefroid, no longer restraining the tears that rolled
+down his cheeks, "I heard the Voice from on high; it called me by
+name! It had never named me before, but this time it bade me to
+Heaven! Oh, how sweet is that voice!--As I could not fly to Heaven,"
+he added artlessly, "I took the only way we know of going to God."
+
+"My child! oh, sublime boy!" cried the old man, throwing his arms
+round Godefroid, and clasping him to his heart. "You are a poet; you
+can boldly ride the whirlwind! Your poetry does not proceed from your
+heart; your living, burning thoughts, your creations, move and grow in
+your soul.--Go, never reveal your ideas to the vulgar! Be at once the
+altar, the priest, and the victim!
+
+"You know Heaven, do you not? You have seen those myriads of angels,
+white-winged, and holding golden sistrums, all soaring with equal
+flight towards the Throne, and you have often seen their pinions
+moving at the breath of God as the trees of the forest bow with one
+consent before the storm. Ah, how glorious is unlimited space! Tell
+me."
+
+The stranger clasped Godefroid's hand convulsively, and they both
+gazed at the firmament, whence the stars seemed to shed gentle poetry
+which they could bear.
+
+"Oh, to see God!" murmured Godefroid.
+
+"Child!" said the old man suddenly, in a sterner voice, "have you so
+soon forgotten the holy teaching of our good master, Doctor Sigier? In
+order to return, you to your heavenly home, and I to my native land on
+earth, must we not obey the voice of God? We must walk on resignedly
+in the stony paths where His almighty finger points the way. Do not
+you quail at the thought of the danger to which you exposed yourself?
+Arriving there without being bidden, and saying, 'Here I am!' before
+your time, would you not have been cast back into a world beneath that
+where your soul now hovers? Poor outcast cherub! Should you not rather
+bless God for having suffered you to live in a sphere where you may
+hear none but heavenly harmonies? Are you not as pure as a diamond, as
+lovely as a flower?
+
+"Think what it is to know, like me, only the City of Sorrows!--
+Dwelling there I have worn out my heart.--To search the tombs for
+their horrible secrets; to wipe hands steeped in blood, counting them
+over night after night, seeing them rise up before me imploring
+forgiveness which I may not grant; to mark the writhing of the
+assassin and the last shriek of his victim; to listen to appalling
+noises and fearful silence, the silence of a father devouring his dead
+sons; to wonder at the laughter of the damned; to look for some human
+form among the livid heaps wrung and trampled by crime; to learn words
+such as living men may not hear without dying; to call perpetually on
+the dead, and always to accuse and condemn!--Is that living?"
+
+"Cease!" cried Godefroid; "I cannot see you or hear you any further!
+My reason wanders, my eyes are dim. You light a fire within me which
+consumes me."
+
+"And yet I must go on!" said the senior, waving his hand with a
+strange gesture that worked on the youth like a spell.
+
+For a moment the old man fixed Godefroid with his large, weary,
+lightless eyes; then he pointed with one finger to the ground. A gulf
+seemed to open at his bidding. He remained standing in the doubtful
+light of the moon; it lent a glory to his brow which reflected an
+almost solar gleam. Though at first a somewhat disdainful expression
+lurked in the wrinkles of his face, his look presently assumed the
+fixity which seems to gaze on an object invisible to the ordinary
+organs of sight. His eyes, no doubt, were seeing then the remoter
+images which the grave has in store for us.
+
+Never, perhaps, had this man presented so grand an aspect. A terrible
+struggle was going on in his soul, and reacted on his outer frame;
+strong man as he seemed to be, he bent as a reed bows under the breeze
+that comes before a storm. Godefroid stood motionless, speechless,
+spellbound; some inexplicable force nailed him to the floor; and, as
+happens when our attention takes us out of ourselves while watching a
+fire or a battle, he was wholly unconscious of his body.
+
+"Shall I tell you the fate to which you were hastening, poor angel of
+love? Listen! It has been given to me to see immeasurable space,
+bottomless gulfs in which all human creations are swallowed up, the
+shoreless sea whither flows the vast stream of men and of angels. As I
+made my way through the realms of eternal torment, I was sheltered
+under the cloak of an immortal--the robe of glory due to genius, and
+which the ages hand on--I, a frail mortal! When I wandered through the
+fields of light where the happy souls play, I was borne up by the love
+of a woman, the wings of an angel; resting on her heart, I could taste
+the ineffable pleasures whose touch is more perilous to us mortals
+than are the torments of the worser world.
+
+"As I achieved my pilgrimage through the dark regions below I had
+mounted from torture to torture, from crime to crime, from punishment
+to punishment, from awful silence to heartrending cries, till I
+reached the uppermost circle of Hell. Already, from afar, I could see
+the glory of Paradise shining at a vast distance; I was still in
+darkness, but on the borders of day. I flew, upheld by my Guide, borne
+along by a power akin to that which, during our dreams, wafts us to
+spheres invisible to the eye of the body. The halo that crowned our
+heads seared away the shades as we passed, like impalpable dust. Far
+above us the suns of all the worlds shone with scarce so much light as
+the twinkling fireflies of my native land. I was soaring towards the
+fields of air where, round about Paradise, the bodies of light are in
+closer array, where the azure is easy to pass through, where worlds
+innumerable spring like flowers in a meadow.
+
+"There, on the last level of the circles where those phantoms dwell
+that I had left behind me, like sorrows one would fain forget, I saw a
+vast shade. Standing in an attitude of aspiration, that soul looked
+eagerly into space; his feet were riveted by the will of God to the
+topmost point of the margin, and he remained for ever in the painful
+strain by which we project our purpose when we long to soar, as birds
+about to take wing. I saw the man; he neither looked at us nor heard
+us; every muscle quivered and throbbed; at each separate instant he
+seemed to feel, though he did not move, all the fatigue of traversing
+the infinite that divided him from Paradise where, as he gazed
+steadfastly, he believed he had glimpses of a beloved image. At this
+last gate of Hell, as at the first, I saw the stamp of despair even in
+hope. The hapless creature was so fearfully held by some unseen force,
+that his anguish entered into my bones and froze my blood. I shrank
+closer to my Guide, whose protection restored me to peace and silence.
+
+"Suddenly the Shade gave a cry of joy--a cry as shrill as that of the
+mother bird that sees a hawk in the air, or suspects its presence. We
+looked where he was looking, and saw, as it were, a sapphire, floating
+high up in the abysses of light. The glowing star fell with the
+swiftness of a sunbeam when it flashes over the horizon in the morning
+and its first rays shoot across the world. The Splendor became clearer
+and grew larger; presently I beheld the cloud of glory in which the
+angels move--a shining vapor that emanates from their divine
+substance, and that glitters here and there like tongues of flame. A
+noble face, whose glory none may endure that have not won the mantle,
+the laurel, and the palm--the attribute of the Powers--rose above this
+cloud as white and pure as snow. It was Light within light. His wings
+as they waved shed dazzling ripples in the spheres through which he
+descended, as the glance of God pierces through the universe. At last
+I saw the archangel in all his glory. The flower of eternal beauty
+that belongs to the angels of the Spirit shone in him. In one hand he
+held a green palm branch, in the other a sword of flame: the palm to
+bestow on the pardoned soul, the sword to drive back all the hosts of
+Hell with one sweep. As he approached, the perfumes of Heaven fell
+upon us as dew. In the region where the archangel paused, the air took
+the hues of opal, and moved in eddies of which he was the centre. He
+paused, looked at the Shade, and said:
+
+" 'To-morrow.'
+
+"Then he turned heavenwards once more, spread his wings, and clove
+through space as a vessel cuts through the waves, hardly showing her
+white sails to the exiles left on some deserted shore.
+
+"The Shade uttered appalling cries, to which the damned responded from
+the lowest circle, the deepest in the immensity of suffering, to the
+more peaceful zone near the surface on which we were standing. This
+worst torment of all had appealed to all the rest. The turmoil was
+swelled by the roar of a sea of fire which formed a bass to the
+terrific harmony of endless millions of suffering souls.
+
+"Then suddenly the Shade took flight through the doleful city, and
+down to its place at the very bottom of Hell; but as suddenly it came
+up again, turned, soared through the endless circles in every
+direction, as a vulture, confined for the first time in a cage,
+exhausts itself in vain efforts. The Shade was free to do this; he
+could wander through the zones of Hell icy, fetid, or scorching
+without enduring their pangs; he glided into that vastness as a
+sunbeam makes its way into the deepest dark.
+
+" 'God has not condemned him to any torment,' said the Master; 'but
+not one of the souls you have seen suffering their various punishments
+would exchange his anguish for the hope that is consuming this soul.'
+
+"And just then the Shade came back to us, brought thither by an
+irresistible force which condemned him to perch on the verge of Hell.
+My divine Guide, guessing my curiosity, touched the unhappy Shade with
+his palm-branch. He, who was perhaps trying to measure the age of
+sorrow that divided him from that ever-vanishing 'To-morrow,' started
+and gave a look full of all the tears he had already shed.
+
+" 'You would know my woe?' said he sadly. 'Oh, I love to tell it. I am
+here, Teresa is above; that is all. On earth we were happy, we were
+always together. When I saw my loved Teresa Donati for the first time,
+she was ten years old. We loved each other even then, not knowing what
+love meant. Our lives were one; I turned pale if she were pale, I was
+happy in her joy; we gave ourselves up to the pleasure of thinking and
+feeling together; and we learned what love was, each through the
+other. We were wedded at Cremona; we never saw each other's lips but
+decked with pearls of a smile; our eyes always shone; our hair, like
+our desires, flowed together; our heads were always bent over one book
+when we read, our feet walked in equal step. Life was one long kiss,
+our home was a nest.
+
+" 'One day, for the first time, Teresa turned pale and said, "I am in
+pain!"--And I was not in pain!
+
+" 'She never rose again. I saw her sweet face change, her golden hair
+fade--and I did not die! She smiled to hide her sufferings, but I
+could read them in her blue eyes, of which I could interpret the
+slightest trembling. "Honorino, I love you!" said she, at the very
+moment when her lips turned white, and she was clasping my hand still
+in hers when death chilled them. So I killed myself that she might not
+lie alone in her sepulchral bed, under her marble sheet. Teresa is
+above and I am here. I could not bear to leave her, but God has
+divided us. Why, then, did He unite us on earth? He is jealous!
+Paradise was no doubt so much the fairer on the day when Teresa
+entered in.
+
+" 'Do you see her? She is sad in her bliss; she is parted from me!
+Paradise must be a desert to her.'
+
+" 'Master,' said I with tears, for I thought of my love, 'when this
+one shall desire Paradise for God's sake alone, shall he not be
+delivered?' And the Father of Poets mildly bowed his head in sign of
+assent.
+
+"We departed, cleaving the air, and making no more noise than the
+birds that pass overhead sometimes when we lie in the shade of a tree.
+It would have been vain to try to check the hapless shade in his
+blasphemy. It is one of the griefs of the angels of darkness that they
+can never see the light even when they are surrounded by it. He would
+not have understood us."
+
+
+
+At this moment the swift approach of many horses rang through the
+stillness, the dog barked, the constable's deep growl replied; the
+horsemen dismounted, knocked at the door; the noise was so unexpected
+that it seemed like some sudden explosion.
+
+The two exiles, the two poets, fell to earth through all the space
+that divides us from the skies. The painful shock of this fall rushed
+through their veins like strange blood, hissing as it seemed, and full
+of scorching sparks. Their pain was like an electric discharge. The
+loud, heavy step of a man-at-arms sounded on the stairs with the iron
+clank of his sword, his cuirass, and spurs; a soldier presently stood
+before the astonished stranger.
+
+"We can return to Florence," said the man, whose bass voice sounded
+soft as he spoke in Italian.
+
+"What is that you say?" asked the old man.
+
+"The /Bianchi/ are triumphant."
+
+"Are you not mistaken?" asked the poet.
+
+"No, dear Dante!" replied the soldier, whose warlike tones rang with
+the thrill of battle and the exultation of victory.
+
+"To Florence! To Florence! Ah, my Florence!" cried Dante Alighieri,
+drawing himself up, and gazing into the distance. In fancy he saw
+Italy; he was gigantic.
+
+"But I--when shall I be in Heaven?" said Godefroid, kneeling on one
+knee before the immortal poet, like an angel before the sanctuary.
+
+"Come to Florence," said Dante in compassionate tones. "Come! when you
+see its lovely landscape from the heights of Fiesole you will fancy
+yourself in Paradise."
+
+The soldier smiled. For the first time, perhaps for the only time in
+his life, Dante's gloomy and solemn features wore a look of joy; his
+eyes and brows expressed the happiness he has depicted so lavishly in
+his vision of Paradise. He thought perhaps that he heard the voice of
+Beatrice.
+
+A light step, and the rustle of a woman's gown, were audible in the
+silence. Dawn was now showing its first streaks of light. The fair
+Comtesse de Mahaut came in and flew to Godefroid.
+
+"Come, my child, my son! I may at last acknowledge you. Your birth is
+recognized, your rights are under the protection of the King of
+France, and you will find Paradise in your mother's heart."
+
+"I hear, I know, the voice of Heaven!" cried the youth in rapture.
+
+The exclamation roused Dante, who saw the young man folded in the
+Countess' arms. He took leave of them with a look, and left his young
+companion on his mother's bosom.
+
+"Come away!" he cried in a voice of thunder. "Death to the Guelphs!"
+
+
+
+PARIS, October 1831.
+
+
+
+
+
+End of The Project Gutenberg Etext of The Exiles, by Honore de Balzac
+
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