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diff --git a/4057-0.txt b/4057-0.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..d1252b7 --- /dev/null +++ b/4057-0.txt @@ -0,0 +1,5745 @@ +The Project Gutenberg eBook of Marius the Epicurean, Volume One, by Walter Pater + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and +most other parts of the world 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. If you are not located in the United States, you +will have to check the laws of the country where you are located before +using this eBook. + +Title: Marius the Epicurean, + Volume One + +Author: Walter Horatio Pater + +Release Date: October 25, 2001 [eBook #4057] +[Most recently updated: September 1, 2021] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: UTF-8 + +Produced by: Alfred J. Drake. HTML version by Al Haines. + +*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK MARIUS THE EPICUREAN, VOLUME ONE *** + + + + +Marius the Epicurean + +HIS SENSATIONS AND IDEAS + +by WALTER PATER + +VOLUME ONE + +London: 1910. +(The Library Edition.) + + +Contents + + PART THE FIRST + 1. “The Religion of Numa” + 2. White-Nights + 3. Change of Air + 4. The Tree of Knowledge + 5. The Golden Book + 6. Euphuism + 7. A Pagan End + + PART THE SECOND + 8. Animula Vagula + 9. New Cyrenaicism + 10. On the Way + 11. “The Most Religious City in the World” + 12. “The Divinity that Doth Hedge a King” + 13. The “Mistress and Mother” of Palaces + 14. Manly Amusement + + +NOTES BY THE E-TEXT EDITOR: + +Notes: I have placed an asterisk immediately after each of Pater’s +footnotes and a + sign after my own notes, and have listed each of my +notes at that chapter’s end. + +Greek typeface: For this full-text edition, I have transliterated +Pater’s Greek quotations. If there is a need for the original Greek, it +can be viewed at my site, http://www.ajdrake.com/etexts, a Victorianist +archive that contains the complete works of Walter Pater and many other +nineteenth-century texts, mostly in first editions. + +MARIUS THE EPICUREAN, +VOLUME ONE +WALTER PATER + + +Χειμερινὸς ὄνειρος, ὅτε μήκισται αἱ νύκτες+ + + ++“A winter’s dream, when nights are longest.” +Lucian, The Dream, Vol. 3. + + +MARIUS THE EPICUREAN, VOLUME ONE + + + + +PART THE FIRST + + + + +CHAPTER I. +“THE RELIGION OF NUMA” + + +As, in the triumph of Christianity, the old religion lingered latest in +the country, and died out at last as but paganism—the religion of the +villagers, before the advance of the Christian Church; so, in an +earlier century, it was in places remote from town-life that the older +and purer forms of paganism itself had survived the longest. While, in +Rome, new religions had arisen with bewildering complexity around the +dying old one, the earlier and simpler patriarchal religion, “the +religion of Numa,” as people loved to fancy, lingered on with little +change amid the pastoral life, out of the habits and sentiment of which +so much of it had grown. Glimpses of such a survival we may catch below +the merely artificial attitudes of Latin pastoral poetry; in Tibullus +especially, who has preserved for us many poetic details of old Roman +religious usage. + +At mihi contingat patrios celebrare Penates, +Reddereque antiquo menstrua thura Lari: + + +—he prays, with unaffected seriousness. Something liturgical, with +repetitions of a consecrated form of words, is traceable in one of his +elegies, as part of the order of a birthday sacrifice. The hearth, from +a spark of which, as one form of old legend related, the child Romulus +had been miraculously born, was still indeed an altar; and the +worthiest sacrifice to the gods the perfect physical sanity of the +young men and women, which the scrupulous ways of that religion of the +hearth had tended to maintain. A religion of usages and sentiment +rather than of facts and belief, and attached to very definite things +and places—the oak of immemorial age, the rock on the heath fashioned +by weather as if by some dim human art, the shadowy grove of ilex, +passing into which one exclaimed involuntarily, in consecrated phrase, +Deity is in this Place! Numen Inest!—it was in natural harmony with the +temper of a quiet people amid the spectacle of rural life, like that +simpler faith between man and man, which Tibullus expressly connects +with the period when, with an inexpensive worship, the old wooden gods +had been still pressed for room in their homely little shrines. + +And about the time when the dying Antoninus Pius ordered his golden +image of Fortune to be carried into the chamber of his successor (now +about to test the truth of the old Platonic contention, that the world +would at last find itself happy, could it detach some reluctant +philosophic student from the more desirable life of celestial +contemplation, and compel him to rule it), there was a boy living in an +old country-house, half farm, half villa, who, for himself, recruited +that body of antique traditions by a spontaneous force of religious +veneration such as had originally called them into being. More than a +century and a half had past since Tibullus had written; but the +restoration of religious usages, and their retention where they still +survived, was meantime come to be the fashion through the influence of +imperial example; and what had been in the main a matter of family +pride with his father, was sustained by a native instinct of devotion +in the young Marius. A sense of conscious powers external to ourselves, +pleased or displeased by the right or wrong conduct of every +circumstance of daily life—that conscience, of which the old Roman +religion was a formal, habitual recognition, was become in him a +powerful current of feeling and observance. The old-fashioned, partly +puritanic awe, the power of which Wordsworth noted and valued so highly +in a northern peasantry, had its counterpart in the feeling of the +Roman lad, as he passed the spot, “touched of heaven,” where the +lightning had struck dead an aged labourer in the field: an upright +stone, still with mouldering garlands about it, marked the place. He +brought to that system of symbolic usages, and they in turn developed +in him further, a great seriousness—an impressibility to the sacredness +of time, of life and its events, and the circumstances of family +fellowship; of such gifts to men as fire, water, the earth, from labour +on which they live, really understood by him as gifts—a sense of +religious responsibility in the reception of them. It was a religion +for the most part of fear, of multitudinous scruples, of a year-long +burden of forms; yet rarely (on clear summer mornings, for instance) +the thought of those heavenly powers afforded a welcome channel for the +almost stifling sense of health and delight in him, and relieved it as +gratitude to the gods. + +The day of the “little” or private Ambarvalia was come, to be +celebrated by a single family for the welfare of all belonging to it, +as the great college of the Arval Brothers officiated at Rome in the +interest of the whole state. At the appointed time all work ceases; the +instruments of labour lie untouched, hung with wreaths of flowers, +while masters and servants together go in solemn procession along the +dry paths of vineyard and cornfield, conducting the victims whose blood +is presently to be shed for the purification from all natural or +supernatural taint of the lands they have “gone about.” The old Latin +words of the liturgy, to be said as the procession moved on its way, +though their precise meaning was long since become unintelligible, were +recited from an ancient illuminated roll, kept in the painted chest in +the hall, together with the family records. Early on that day the girls +of the farm had been busy in the great portico, filling large baskets +with flowers plucked short from branches of apple and cherry, then in +spacious bloom, to strew before the quaint images of the gods—Ceres and +Bacchus and the yet more mysterious Dea Dia—as they passed through the +fields, carried in their little houses on the shoulders of white-clad +youths, who were understood to proceed to this office in perfect +temperance, as pure in soul and body as the air they breathed in the +firm weather of that early summer-time. The clean lustral water and the +full incense-box were carried after them. The altars were gay with +garlands of wool and the more sumptuous sort of blossom and green herbs +to be thrown into the sacrificial fire, fresh-gathered this morning +from a particular plot in the old garden, set apart for the purpose. +Just then the young leaves were almost as fragrant as flowers, and the +scent of the bean-fields mingled pleasantly with the cloud of incense. +But for the monotonous intonation of the liturgy by the priests, clad +in their strange, stiff, antique vestments, and bearing ears of green +corn upon their heads, secured by flowing bands of white, the +procession moved in absolute stillness, all persons, even the children, +abstaining from speech after the utterance of the pontifical formula, +Favete linguis!—Silence! Propitious Silence!—lest any words save those +proper to the occasion should hinder the religious efficacy of the +rite. + +With the lad Marius, who, as the head of his house, took a leading part +in the ceremonies of the day, there was a devout effort to complete +this impressive outward silence by that inward tacitness of mind, +esteemed so important by religious Romans in the performance of these +sacred functions. To him the sustained stillness without seemed really +but to be waiting upon that interior, mental condition of preparation +or expectancy, for which he was just then intently striving. The +persons about him, certainly, had never been challenged by those +prayers and ceremonies to any ponderings on the divine nature: they +conceived them rather to be the appointed means of setting such +troublesome movements at rest. By them, “the religion of Numa,” so +staid, ideal and comely, the object of so much jealous conservatism, +though of direct service as lending sanction to a sort of high +scrupulosity, especially in the chief points of domestic conduct, was +mainly prized as being, through its hereditary character, something +like a personal distinction—as contributing, among the other +accessories of an ancient house, to the production of that aristocratic +atmosphere which separated them from newly-made people. But in the +young Marius, the very absence from those venerable usages of all +definite history and dogmatic interpretation, had already awakened much +speculative activity; and to-day, starting from the actual details of +the divine service, some very lively surmises, though scarcely distinct +enough to be thoughts, were moving backwards and forwards in his mind, +as the stirring wind had done all day among the trees, and were like +the passing of some mysterious influence over all the elements of his +nature and experience. One thing only distracted him—a certain pity at +the bottom of his heart, and almost on his lips, for the sacrificial +victims and their looks of terror, rising almost to disgust at the +central act of the sacrifice itself, a piece of everyday butcher’s +work, such as we decorously hide out of sight; though some then present +certainly displayed a frank curiosity in the spectacle thus permitted +them on a religious pretext. The old sculptors of the great procession +on the frieze of the Parthenon at Athens, have delineated the placid +heads of the victims led in it to sacrifice, with a perfect feeling for +animals in forcible contrast with any indifference as to their +sufferings. It was this contrast that distracted Marius now in the +blessing of his fields, and qualified his devout absorption upon the +scrupulous fulfilment of all the details of the ceremonial, as the +procession approached the altars. + +The names of that great populace of “little gods,” dear to the Roman +home, which the pontiffs had placed on the sacred list of the +Indigitamenta, to be invoked, because they can help, on special +occasions, were not forgotten in the long litany—Vatican who causes the +infant to utter his first cry, Fabulinus who prompts his first word, +Cuba who keeps him quiet in his cot, Domiduca especially, for whom +Marius had through life a particular memory and devotion, the goddess +who watches over one’s safe coming home. The urns of the dead in the +family chapel received their due service. They also were now become +something divine, a goodly company of friendly and protecting spirits, +encamped about the place of their former abode—above all others, the +father, dead ten years before, of whom, remembering but a tall, grave +figure above him in early childhood, Marius habitually thought as a +genius a little cold and severe. + +Candidus insuetum miratur limen Olympi, +Sub pedibusque videt nubes et sidera.— + + +Perhaps!—but certainly needs his altar here below, and garlands to-day +upon his urn. But the dead genii were satisfied with little—a few +violets, a cake dipped in wine, or a morsel of honeycomb. Daily, from +the time when his childish footsteps were still uncertain, had Marius +taken them their portion of the family meal, at the second course, +amidst the silence of the company. They loved those who brought them +their sustenance; but, deprived of these services, would be heard +wandering through the house, crying sorrowfully in the stillness of the +night. + +And those simple gifts, like other objects as trivial—bread, oil, wine, +milk—had regained for him, by their use in such religious service, that +poetic and as it were moral significance, which surely belongs to all +the means of daily life, could we but break through the veil of our +familiarity with things by no means vulgar in themselves. A hymn +followed, while the whole assembly stood with veiled faces. The fire +rose up readily from the altars, in clean, bright flame—a favourable +omen, making it a duty to render the mirth of the evening complete. Old +wine was poured out freely for the servants at supper in the great +kitchen, where they had worked in the imperfect light through the long +evenings of winter. The young Marius himself took but a very sober part +in the noisy feasting. A devout, regretful after-taste of what had been +really beautiful in the ritual he had accomplished took him early away, +that he might the better recall in reverie all the circumstances of the +celebration of the day. As he sank into a sleep, pleasant with all the +influences of long hours in the open air, he seemed still to be moving +in procession through the fields, with a kind of pleasurable awe. That +feeling was still upon him as he awoke amid the beating of violent rain +on the shutters, in the first storm of the season. The thunder which +startled him from sleep seemed to make the solitude of his chamber +almost painfully complete, as if the nearness of those angry clouds +shut him up in a close place alone in the world. Then he thought of the +sort of protection which that day’s ceremonies assured. To procure an +agreement with the gods—Pacem deorum exposcere: that was the meaning of +what they had all day been busy upon. In a faith, sincere but +half-suspicious, he would fain have those Powers at least not against +him. His own nearer household gods were all around his bed. The spell +of his religion as a part of the very essence of home, its intimacy, +its dignity and security, was forcible at that moment; only, it seemed +to involve certain heavy demands upon him. + + + + +CHAPTER II. +WHITE-NIGHTS + + +To an instinctive seriousness, the material abode in which the +childhood of Marius was passed had largely added. Nothing, you felt, as +you first caught sight of that coy, retired place,—surely nothing could +happen there, without its full accompaniment of thought or reverie. +White-nights! so you might interpret its old Latin name.* “The red rose +came first,” says a quaint German mystic, speaking of “the mystery of +so-called white things,” as being “ever an after-thought—the doubles, +or seconds, of real things, and themselves but half-real, +half-material—the white queen, the white witch, the white mass, which, +as the black mass is a travesty of the true mass turned to evil by +horrible old witches, is celebrated by young candidates for the +priesthood with an unconsecrated host, by way of rehearsal.” So, +white-nights, I suppose, after something like the same analogy, should +be nights not of quite blank forgetfulness, but passed in continuous +dreaming, only half veiled by sleep. Certainly the place was, in such +case, true to its fanciful name in this, that you might very well +conceive, in face of it, that dreaming even in the daytime might come +to much there. + +* _Ad Vigilias Albas_. + + +The young Marius represented an ancient family whose estate had come +down to him much curtailed through the extravagance of a certain +Marcellus two generations before, a favourite in his day of the +fashionable world at Rome, where he had at least spent his substance +with a correctness of taste Marius might seem to have inherited from +him; as he was believed also to resemble him in a singularly pleasant +smile, consistent however, in the younger face, with some degree of +sombre expression when the mind within was but slightly moved. + +As the means of life decreased, the farm had crept nearer and nearer to +the dwelling-house, about which there was therefore a trace of workday +negligence or homeliness, not without its picturesque charm for some, +for the young master himself among them. The more observant passer-by +would note, curious as to the inmates, a certain amount of dainty care +amid that neglect, as if it came in part, perhaps, from a reluctance to +disturb old associations. It was significant of the national character, +that a sort of elegant gentleman farming, as we say, had been much +affected by some of the most cultivated Romans. But it became something +more than an elegant diversion, something of a serious business, with +the household of Marius; and his actual interest in the cultivation of +the earth and the care of flocks had brought him, at least, intimately +near to those elementary conditions of life, a reverence for which, the +great Roman poet, as he has shown by his own half-mystic pre-occupation +with them, held to be the ground of primitive Roman religion, as of +primitive morals. But then, farm-life in Italy, including the culture +of the olive and the vine, has a grace of its own, and might well +contribute to the production of an ideal dignity of character, like +that of nature itself in this gifted region. Vulgarity seemed +impossible. The place, though impoverished, was still deservedly dear, +full of venerable memories, and with a living sweetness of its own for +to-day. + +To hold by such ceremonial traditions had been a part of the struggling +family pride of the lad’s father, to which the example of the head of +the state, old Antoninus Pius—an example to be still further enforced +by his successor—had given a fresh though perhaps somewhat artificial +popularity. It had been consistent with many another homely and +old-fashioned trait in him, not to undervalue the charm of +exclusiveness and immemorial authority, which membership in a local +priestly college, hereditary in his house, conferred upon him. To set a +real value on these things was but one element in that pious concern +for his home and all that belonged to it, which, as Marius afterwards +discovered, had been a strong motive with his father. The ancient +hymn—Fana Novella!—was still sung by his people, as the new moon grew +bright in the west, and even their wild custom of leaping through heaps +of blazing straw on a certain night in summer was not discouraged. The +privilege of augury itself, according to tradition, had at one time +belonged to his race; and if you can imagine how, once in a way, an +impressible boy might have an inkling, an inward mystic intimation, of +the meaning and consequences of all that, what was implied in it +becoming explicit for him, you conceive aright the mind of Marius, in +whose house the auspices were still carefully consulted before every +undertaking of moment. + +The devotion of the father then had handed on loyally—and that is all +many not unimportant persons ever find to do—a certain tradition of +life, which came to mean much for the young Marius. The feeling with +which he thought of his dead father was almost exclusively that of awe; +though crossed at times by a not unpleasant sense of liberty, as he +could but confess to himself, pondering, in the actual absence of so +weighty and continual a restraint, upon the arbitrary power which Roman +religion and Roman law gave to the parent over the son. On the part of +his mother, on the other hand, entertaining the husband’s memory, there +was a sustained freshness of regret, together with the recognition, as +Marius fancied, of some costly self-sacrifice to be credited to the +dead. The life of the widow, languid and shadowy enough but for the +poignancy of that regret, was like one long service to the departed +soul; its many annual observances centering about the funeral urn—a +tiny, delicately carved marble house, still white and fair, in the +family-chapel, wreathed always with the richest flowers from the +garden. To the dead, in fact, was conceded in such places a somewhat +closer neighbourhood to the old homes they were thought still to +protect, than is usual with us, or was usual in Rome itself—a closeness +which the living welcomed, so diverse are the ways of our human +sentiment, and in which the more wealthy, at least in the country, +might indulge themselves. All this Marius followed with a devout +interest, sincerely touched and awed by his mother’s sorrow. After the +deification of the emperors, we are told, it was considered impious so +much as to use any coarse expression in the presence of their images. +To Marius the whole of life seemed full of sacred presences, demanding +of him a similar collectedness. The severe and archaic religion of the +villa, as he conceived it, begot in him a sort of devout circumspection +lest he should fall short at any point of the demand upon him of +anything in which deity was concerned. He must satisfy with a kind of +sacred equity, he must be very cautious lest he be found wanting to, +the claims of others, in their joys and calamities—the happiness which +deity sanctioned, or the blows in which it made itself felt. And from +habit, this feeling of a responsibility towards the world of men and +things, towards a claim for due sentiment concerning them on his side, +came to be a part of his nature not to be put off. It kept him serious +and dignified amid the Epicurean speculations which in after years much +engrossed him, and when he had learned to think of all religions as +indifferent, serious amid many fopperies and through many languid days, +and made him anticipate all his life long as a thing towards which he +must carefully train himself, some great occasion of self-devotion, +such as really came, that should consecrate his life, and, it might be, +its memory with others, as the early Christian looked forward to +martyrdom at the end of his course, as a seal of worth upon it. + +The traveller, descending from the slopes of Luna, even as he got his +first view of the Port-of-Venus, would pause by the way, to read the +face, as it were, of so beautiful a dwelling-place, lying away from the +white road, at the point where it began to decline somewhat steeply to +the marsh-land below. The building of pale red and yellow marble, +mellowed by age, which he saw beyond the gates, was indeed but the +exquisite fragment of a once large and sumptuous villa. Two centuries +of the play of the sea-wind were in the velvet of the mosses which lay +along its inaccessible ledges and angles. Here and there the marble +plates had slipped from their places, where the delicate weeds had +forced their way. The graceful wildness which prevailed in garden and +farm gave place to a singular nicety about the actual habitation, and a +still more scrupulous sweetness and order reigned within. The old Roman +architects seem to have well understood the decorative value of the +floor—the real economy there was, in the production of rich interior +effect, of a somewhat lavish expenditure upon the surface they trod on. +The pavement of the hall had lost something of its evenness; but, +though a little rough to the foot, polished and cared for like a piece +of silver, looked, as mosaic-work is apt to do, its best in old age. +Most noticeable among the ancestral masks, each in its little cedarn +chest below the cornice, was that of the wasteful but elegant +Marcellus, with the quaint resemblance in its yellow waxen features to +Marius, just then so full of animation and country colour. A chamber, +curved ingeniously into oval form, which he had added to the mansion, +still contained his collection of works of art; above all, that head of +Medusa, for which the villa was famous. The spoilers of one of the old +Greek towns on the coast had flung away or lost the thing, as it +seemed, in some rapid flight across the river below, from the sands of +which it was drawn up in a fisherman’s net, with the fine golden +laminae still clinging here and there to the bronze. It was Marcellus +also who had contrived the prospect-tower of two storeys with the white +pigeon-house above, so characteristic of the place. The little glazed +windows in the uppermost chamber framed each its dainty landscape—the +pallid crags of Carrara, like wildly twisted snow-drifts above the +purple heath; the distant harbour with its freight of white marble +going to sea; the lighthouse temple of Venus Speciosa on its dark +headland, amid the long-drawn curves of white breakers. Even on summer +nights the air there had always a motion in it, and drove the scent of +the new-mown hay along all the passages of the house. + +Something pensive, spell-bound, and but half real, something cloistral +or monastic, as we should say, united to this exquisite order, made the +whole place seem to Marius, as it were, sacellum, the peculiar +sanctuary, of his mother, who, still in real widowhood, provided the +deceased Marius the elder with that secondary sort of life which we can +give to the dead, in our intensely realised memory of them—the +“subjective immortality,” to use a modern phrase, for which many a +Roman epitaph cries out plaintively to widow or sister or daughter, +still in the land of the living. Certainly, if any such considerations +regarding them do reach the shadowy people, he enjoyed that secondary +existence, that warm place still left, in thought at least, beside the +living, the desire for which is actually, in various forms, so great a +motive with most of us. And Marius the younger, even thus early, came +to think of women’s tears, of women’s hands to lay one to rest, in +death as in the sleep of childhood, as a sort of natural want. The soft +lines of the white hands and face, set among the many folds of the veil +and stole of the Roman widow, busy upon her needlework, or with music +sometimes, defined themselves for him as the typical expression of +maternity. Helping her with her white and purple wools, and caring for +her musical instruments, he won, as if from the handling of such +things, an urbane and feminine refinement, qualifying duly his +country-grown habits—the sense of a certain delicate blandness, which +he relished, above all, on returning to the “chapel” of his mother, +after long days of open-air exercise, in winter or stormy summer. For +poetic souls in old Italy felt, hardly less strongly than the English, +the pleasures of winter, of the hearth, with the very dead warm in its +generous heat, keeping the young myrtles in flower, though the hail is +beating hard without. One important principle, of fruit afterwards in +his Roman life, that relish for the country fixed deeply in him; in the +winters especially, when the sufferings of the animal world became so +palpable even to the least observant. It fixed in him a sympathy for +all creatures, for the almost human troubles and sicknesses of the +flocks, for instance. It was a feeling which had in it something of +religious veneration for life as such—for that mysterious essence which +man is powerless to create in even the feeblest degree. One by one, at +the desire of his mother, the lad broke down his cherished traps and +springes for the hungry wild birds on the salt marsh. A white bird, she +told him once, looking at him gravely, a bird which he must carry in +his bosom across a crowded public place—his own soul was like that! +Would it reach the hands of his good genius on the opposite side, +unruffled and unsoiled? And as his mother became to him the very type +of maternity in things, its unfailing pity and protectiveness, and +maternity itself the central type of all love;—so, that beautiful +dwelling-place lent the reality of concrete outline to a peculiar ideal +of home, which throughout the rest of his life he seemed, amid many +distractions of spirit, to be ever seeking to regain. + +And a certain vague fear of evil, constitutional in him, enhanced still +further this sentiment of home as a place of tried security. His +religion, that old Italian religion, in contrast with the really +light-hearted religion of Greece, had its deep undercurrent of gloom, +its sad, haunting imageries, not exclusively confined to the walls of +Etruscan tombs. The function of the conscience, not always as the +prompter of gratitude for benefits received, but oftenest as his +accuser before those angry heavenly masters, had a large part in it; +and the sense of some unexplored evil, ever dogging his footsteps, made +him oddly suspicious of particular places and persons. Though his +liking for animals was so strong, yet one fierce day in early summer, +as he walked along a narrow road, he had seen the snakes breeding, and +ever afterwards avoided that place and its ugly associations, for there +was something in the incident which made food distasteful and his sleep +uneasy for many days afterwards. The memory of it however had almost +passed away, when at the corner of a street in Pisa, he came upon an +African showman exhibiting a great serpent: once more, as the reptile +writhed, the former painful impression revived: it was like a peep into +the lower side of the real world, and again for many days took all +sweetness from food and sleep. He wondered at himself indeed, trying to +puzzle out the secret of that repugnance, having no particular dread of +a snake’s bite, like one of his companions, who had put his hand into +the mouth of an old garden-god and roused there a sluggish viper. A +kind of pity even mingled with his aversion, and he could hardly have +killed or injured the animals, which seemed already to suffer by the +very circumstance of their life, being what they were. It was something +like a fear of the supernatural, or perhaps rather a moral feeling, for +the face of a great serpent, with no grace of fur or feathers, so +different from quadruped or bird, has a sort of humanity of aspect in +its spotted and clouded nakedness. There was a humanity, dusty and +sordid and as if far gone in corruption, in the sluggish coil, as it +awoke suddenly into one metallic spring of pure enmity against him. +Long afterwards, when it happened that at Rome he saw, a second time, a +showman with his serpents, he remembered the night which had then +followed, thinking, in Saint Augustine’s vein, on the real greatness of +those little troubles of children, of which older people make light; +but with a sudden gratitude also, as he reflected how richly possessed +his life had actually been by beautiful aspects and imageries, seeing +how greatly what was repugnant to the eye disturbed his peace. + +Thus the boyhood of Marius passed; on the whole, more given to +contemplation than to action. Less prosperous in fortune than at an +earlier day there had been reason to expect, and animating his +solitude, as he read eagerly and intelligently, with the traditions of +the past, already he lived much in the realm of the imagination, and +became betimes, as he was to continue all through life, something of an +idealist, constructing the world for himself in great measure from +within, by the exercise of meditative power. A vein of subjective +philosophy, with the individual for its standard of all things, there +would be always in his intellectual scheme of the world and of conduct, +with a certain incapacity wholly to accept other men’s valuations. And +the generation of this peculiar element in his temper he could trace up +to the days when his life had been so like the reading of a romance to +him. Had the Romans a word for unworldly? The beautiful word umbratilis +perhaps comes nearest to it; and, with that precise sense, might +describe the spirit in which he prepared himself for the sacerdotal +function hereditary in his family—the sort of mystic enjoyment he had +in the abstinence, the strenuous self-control and ascêsis, which such +preparation involved. Like the young Ion in the beautiful opening of +the play of Euripides, who every morning sweeps the temple floor with +such a fund of cheerfulness in his service, he was apt to be happy in +sacred places, with a susceptibility to their peculiar influences which +he never outgrew; so that often in after-times, quite unexpectedly, +this feeling would revive in him with undiminished freshness. That +first, early, boyish ideal of priesthood, the sense of dedication, +survived through all the distractions of the world, and when all +thought of such vocation had finally passed from him, as a ministry, in +spirit at least, towards a sort of hieratic beauty and order in the +conduct of life. + +And now what relieved in part this over-tension of soul was the lad’s +pleasure in the country and the open air; above all, the ramble to the +coast, over the marsh with its dwarf roses and wild lavender, and +delightful signs, one after another—the abandoned boat, the ruined +flood-gates, the flock of wild birds—that one was approaching the sea; +the long summer-day of idleness among its vague scents and sounds. And +it was characteristic of him that he relished especially the grave, +subdued, northern notes in all that—the charm of the French or English +notes, as we might term them—in the luxuriant Italian landscape. + + + + +CHAPTER III. +CHANGE OF AIR + + +Dilexi decorem domus tuae. + +That almost morbid religious idealism, and his healthful love of the +country, were both alike developed by the circumstances of a journey, +which happened about this time, when Marius was taken to a certain +temple of Aesculapius, among the hills of Etruria, as was then usual in +such cases, for the cure of some boyish sickness. The religion of +Aesculapius, though borrowed from Greece, had been naturalised in Rome +in the old republican times; but had reached under the Antonines the +height of its popularity throughout the Roman world. That was an age of +valetudinarians, in many instances of imaginary ones; but below its +various crazes concerning health and disease, largely multiplied a few +years after the time of which I am speaking by the miseries of a great +pestilence, lay a valuable, because partly practicable, belief that all +the maladies of the soul might be reached through the subtle gateways +of the body. + +Salus, salvation, for the Romans, had come to mean bodily sanity. The +religion of the god of bodily health, Salvator, as they called him +absolutely, had a chance just then of becoming the one religion; that +mild and philanthropic son of Apollo surviving, or absorbing, all other +pagan godhead. The apparatus of the medical art, the salutary mineral +or herb, diet or abstinence, and all the varieties of the bath, came to +have a kind of sacramental character, so deep was the feeling, in more +serious minds, of a moral or spiritual profit in physical health, +beyond the obvious bodily advantages one had of it; the body becoming +truly, in that case, but a quiet handmaid of the soul. The priesthood +or “family” of Aesculapius, a vast college, believed to be in +possession of certain precious medical secrets, came nearest perhaps, +of all the institutions of the pagan world, to the Christian +priesthood; the temples of the god, rich in some instances with the +accumulated thank-offerings of centuries of a tasteful devotion, being +really also a kind of hospitals for the sick, administered in a full +conviction of the religiousness, the refined and sacred happiness, of a +life spent in the relieving of pain. + +Elements of a really experimental and progressive knowledge there were +doubtless amid this devout enthusiasm, bent so faithfully on the +reception of health as a direct gift from God; but for the most part +his care was held to take effect through a machinery easily capable of +misuse for purposes of religious fraud. Through dreams, above all, +inspired by Aesculapius himself, information as to the cause and cure +of a malady was supposed to come to the sufferer, in a belief based on +the truth that dreams do sometimes, for those who watch them carefully, +give many hints concerning the conditions of the body—those latent weak +points at which disease or death may most easily break into it. In the +time of Marcus Aurelius these medical dreams had become more than ever +a fashionable caprice. Aristeides, the “Orator,” a man of undoubted +intellectual power, has devoted six discourses to their interpretation; +the really scientific Galen has recorded how beneficently they had +intervened in his own case, at certain turning-points of life; and a +belief in them was one of the frailties of the wise emperor himself. +Partly for the sake of these dreams, living ministers of the god, more +likely to come to one in his actual dwelling-place than elsewhere, it +was almost a necessity that the patient should sleep one or more nights +within the precincts of a temple consecrated to his service, during +which time he must observe certain rules prescribed by the priests. + +For this purpose, after devoutly saluting the Lares, as was customary +before starting on a journey, Marius set forth one summer morning on +his way to the famous temple which lay among the hills beyond the +valley of the Arnus. It was his greatest adventure hitherto; and he had +much pleasure in all its details, in spite of his feverishness. +Starting early, under the guidance of an old serving-man who drove the +mules, with his wife who took all that was needful for their +refreshment on the way and for the offering at the shrine, they went, +under the genial heat, halting now and then to pluck certain flowers +seen for the first time on these high places, upwards, through a long +day of sunshine, while cliffs and woods sank gradually below their +path. The evening came as they passed along a steep white road with +many windings among the pines, and it was night when they reached the +temple, the lights of which shone out upon them pausing before the +gates of the sacred enclosure, while Marius became alive to a singular +purity in the air. A rippling of water about the place was the only +thing audible, as they waited till two priestly figures, speaking Greek +to one another, admitted them into a large, white-walled and clearly +lighted guest-chamber, in which, while he partook of a simple but +wholesomely prepared supper, Marius still seemed to feel pleasantly the +height they had attained to among the hills. + +The agreeable sense of all this was spoiled by one thing only, his old +fear of serpents; for it was under the form of a serpent that +Aesculapius had come to Rome, and the last definite thought of his +weary head before he fell asleep had been a dread either that the god +might appear, as he was said sometimes to do, under this hideous +aspect, or perhaps one of those great sallow-hued snakes themselves, +kept in the sacred place, as he had also heard was usual. + +And after an hour’s feverish dreaming he awoke—with a cry, it would +seem, for some one had entered the room bearing a light. The footsteps +of the youthful figure which approached and sat by his bedside were +certainly real. Ever afterwards, when the thought arose in his mind of +some unhoped-for but entire relief from distress, like blue sky in a +storm at sea, would come back the memory of that gracious countenance +which, amid all the kindness of its gaze, had yet a certain air of +predominance over him, so that he seemed now for the first time to have +found the master of his spirit. It would have been sweet to be the +servant of him who now sat beside him speaking. + +He caught a lesson from what was then said, still somewhat beyond his +years, a lesson in the skilled cultivation of life, of experience, of +opportunity, which seemed to be the aim of the young priest’s +recommendations. The sum of them, through various forgotten intervals +of argument, as might really have happened in a dream, was the precept, +repeated many times under slightly varied aspects, of a diligent +promotion of the capacity of the eye, inasmuch as in the eye would lie +for him the determining influence of life: he was of the number of +those who, in the words of a poet who came long after, must be “made +perfect by the love of visible beauty.” The discourse was conceived +from the point of view of a theory Marius found afterwards in Plato’s +Phaedrus, which supposes men’s spirits susceptible to certain +influences, diffused, after the manner of streams or currents, by fair +things or persons visibly present—green fields, for instance, or +children’s faces—into the air around them, acting, in the case of some +peculiar natures, like potent material essences, and conforming the +seer to themselves as with some cunning physical necessity. This +theory,* in itself so fantastic, had however determined in a range of +methodical suggestions, altogether quaint here and there from their +circumstantial minuteness. And throughout, the possibility of some +vision, as of a new city coming down “like a bride out of heaven,” a +vision still indeed, it might seem, a long way off, but to be granted +perhaps one day to the eyes thus trained, was presented as the motive +of this laboriously practical direction. + +* [Transliteration:] Ê aporroê tou kallous. +Translation: “Emanation +from a thing of beauty.” + + +“If thou wouldst have all about thee like the colours of some fresh +picture, in a clear light,” so the discourse recommenced after a pause, +“be temperate in thy religious notions, in love, in wine, in all +things, and of a peaceful heart with thy fellows.” To keep the eye +clear by a sort of exquisite personal alacrity and cleanliness, +extending even to his dwelling-place; to discriminate, ever more and +more fastidiously, select form and colour in things from what was less +select; to meditate much on beautiful visible objects, on objects, more +especially, connected with the period of youth—on children at play in +the morning, the trees in early spring, on young animals, on the +fashions and amusements of young men; to keep ever by him if it were +but a single choice flower, a graceful animal or sea-shell, as a token +and representative of the whole kingdom of such things; to avoid +jealously, in his way through the world, everything repugnant to sight; +and, should any circumstance tempt him to a general converse in the +range of such objects, to disentangle himself from that circumstance at +any cost of place, money, or opportunity; such were in brief outline +the duties recognised, the rights demanded, in this new formula of +life. And it was delivered with conviction; as if the speaker verily +saw into the recesses of the mental and physical being of the listener, +while his own expression of perfect temperance had in it a fascinating +power—the merely negative element of purity, the mere freedom from +taint or flaw, in exercise as a positive influence. Long afterwards, +when Marius read the Charmides—that other dialogue of Plato, into which +he seems to have expressed the very genius of old Greek temperance—the +image of this speaker came back vividly before him, to take the chief +part in the conversation. + +It was as a weighty sanction of such temperance, in almost visible +symbolism (an outward imagery identifying itself with unseen +moralities) that the memory of that night’s double experience, the +dream of the great sallow snake and the utterance of the young priest, +always returned to him, and the contrast therein involved made him +revolt with unfaltering instinct from the bare thought of an excess in +sleep, or diet, or even in matters of taste, still more from any excess +of a coarser kind. + +When he awoke again, still in the exceeding freshness he had felt on +his arrival, and now in full sunlight, it was as if his sickness had +really departed with the terror of the night: a confusion had passed +from the brain, a painful dryness from his hands. Simply to be alive +and there was a delight; and as he bathed in the fresh water set ready +for his use, the air of the room about him seemed like pure gold, the +very shadows rich with colour. Summoned at length by one of the +white-robed brethren, he went out to walk in the temple garden. At a +distance, on either side, his guide pointed out to him the Houses of +Birth and Death, erected for the reception respectively of women about +to become mothers, and of persons about to die; neither of those +incidents being allowed to defile, as was thought, the actual precincts +of the shrine. His visitor of the previous night he saw nowhere again. +But among the official ministers of the place there was one, already +marked as of great celebrity, whom Marius saw often in later days at +Rome, the physician Galen, now about thirty years old. He was standing, +the hood partly drawn over his face, beside the holy well, as Marius +and his guide approached it. + +This famous well or conduit, primary cause of the temple and its +surrounding institutions, was supplied by the water of a spring flowing +directly out of the rocky foundations of the shrine. From the rim of +its basin rose a circle of trim columns to support a cupola of singular +lightness and grace, itself full of reflected light from the rippling +surface, through which might be traced the wavy figure-work of the +marble lining below as the stream of water rushed in. Legend told of a +visit of Aesculapius to this place, earlier and happier than his first +coming to Rome: an inscription around the cupola recorded it in letters +of gold. “Being come unto this place the son of God loved it +exceedingly:”—Huc profectus filius Dei maxime amavit hunc locum;—and it +was then that that most intimately human of the gods had given men the +well, with all its salutary properties. The element itself when +received into the mouth, in consequence of its entire freedom from +adhering organic matter, was more like a draught of wonderfully pure +air than water; and after tasting, Marius was told many mysterious +circumstances concerning it, by one and another of the bystanders:—he +who drank often thereof might well think he had tasted of the Homeric +lotus, so great became his desire to remain always on that spot: +carried to other places, it was almost indefinitely conservative of its +fine qualities: nay! a few drops of it would amend other water; and it +flowed not only with unvarying abundance but with a volume so oddly +rhythmical that the well stood always full to the brim, whatever +quantity might be drawn from it, seeming to answer with strange +alacrity of service to human needs, like a true creature and pupil of +the philanthropic god. Certainly the little crowd around seemed to find +singular refreshment in gazing on it. The whole place appeared sensibly +influenced by the amiable and healthful spirit of the thing. All the +objects of the country were there at their freshest. In the great +park-like enclosure for the maintenance of the sacred animals offered +by the convalescent, grass and trees were allowed to grow with a kind +of graceful wildness; otherwise, all was wonderfully nice. And that +freshness seemed to have something moral in its influence, as if it +acted upon the body and the merely bodily powers of apprehension, +through the intelligence; and to the end of his visit Marius saw no +more serpents. + +A lad was just then drawing water for ritual uses, and Marius followed +him as he returned from the well, more and more impressed by the +religiousness of all he saw, on his way through a long cloister or +corridor, the walls well-nigh hidden under votive inscriptions +recording favours from the son of Apollo, and with a distant fragrance +of incense in the air, explained when he turned aside through an open +doorway into the temple itself. His heart bounded as the refined and +dainty magnificence of the place came upon him suddenly, in the flood +of early sunshine, with the ceremonial lights burning here and there, +and withal a singular expression of sacred order, a surprising +cleanliness and simplicity. Certain priests, men whose countenances +bore a deep impression of cultivated mind, each with his little group +of assistants, were gliding round silently to perform their morning +salutation to the god, raising the closed thumb and finger of the right +hand with a kiss in the air, as they came and went on their sacred +business, bearing their frankincense and lustral water. Around the +walls, at such a level that the worshippers might read, as in a book, +the story of the god and his sons, the brotherhood of the Asclepiadae, +ran a series of imageries, in low relief, their delicate light and +shade being heightened, here and there, with gold. Fullest of inspired +and sacred expression, as if in this place the chisel of the artist had +indeed dealt not with marble but with the very breath of feeling and +thought, was the scene in which the earliest generation of the sons of +Aesculapius were transformed into healing dreams; for “grown now too +glorious to abide longer among men, by the aid of their sire they put +away their mortal bodies, and came into another country, yet not indeed +into Elysium nor into the Islands of the Blest. But being made like to +the immortal gods, they began to pass about through the world, changed +thus far from their first form that they appear eternally young, as +many persons have seen them in many places—ministers and heralds of +their father, passing to and fro over the earth, like gliding stars. +Which thing is, indeed, the most wonderful concerning them!” And in +this scene, as throughout the series, with all its crowded personages, +Marius noted on the carved faces the same peculiar union of unction, +almost of hilarity, with a certain self-possession and reserve, which +was conspicuous in the living ministrants around him. + +In the central space, upon a pillar or pedestal, hung, ex voto, with +the richest personal ornaments, stood the image of Aesculapius himself, +surrounded by choice flowering plants. It presented the type, still +with something of the severity of the earlier art of Greece about it, +not of an aged and crafty physician, but of a youth, earnest and strong +of aspect, carrying an ampulla or bottle in one hand, and in the other +a traveller’s staff, a pilgrim among his pilgrim worshippers; and one +of the ministers explained to Marius this pilgrim guise.—One chief +source of the master’s knowledge of healing had been observation of the +remedies resorted to by animals labouring under disease or pain—what +leaf or berry the lizard or dormouse lay upon its wounded fellow; to +which purpose for long years he had led the life of a wanderer, in wild +places. The boy took his place as the last comer, a little way behind +the group of worshippers who stood in front of the image. There, with +uplifted face, the palms of his two hands raised and open before him, +and taught by the priest, he said his collect of thanksgiving and +prayer (Aristeides has recorded it at the end of his Asclepiadae) to +the Inspired Dreams:— + +“O ye children of Apollo! who in time past have stilled the waves of +sorrow for many people, lighting up a lamp of safety before those who +travel by sea and land, be pleased, in your great condescension, though +ye be equal in glory with your elder brethren the Dioscuri, and your +lot in immortal youth be as theirs, to accept this prayer, which in +sleep and vision ye have inspired. Order it aright, I pray you, +according to your loving-kindness to men. Preserve me from sickness; +and endue my body with such a measure of health as may suffice it for +the obeying of the spirit, that I may pass my days unhindered and in +quietness.” + +On the last morning of his visit Marius entered the shrine again, and +just before his departure the priest, who had been his special director +during his stay at the place, lifting a cunningly contrived panel, +which formed the back of one of the carved seats, bade him look +through. What he saw was like the vision of a new world, by the opening +of some unsuspected window in a familiar dwelling-place. He looked out +upon a long-drawn valley of singularly cheerful aspect, hidden, by the +peculiar conformation of the locality, from all points of observation +but this. In a green meadow at the foot of the steep olive-clad rocks +below, the novices were taking their exercise. The softly sloping sides +of the vale lay alike in full sunlight; and its distant opening was +closed by a beautifully formed mountain, from which the last wreaths of +morning mist were rising under the heat. It might have seemed the very +presentment of a land of hope, its hollows brimful of a shadow of blue +flowers; and lo! on the one level space of the horizon, in a long dark +line, were towers and a dome: and that was Pisa.—Or Rome, was it? asked +Marius, ready to believe the utmost, in his excitement. + +All this served, as he understood afterwards in retrospect, at once to +strengthen and to purify a certain vein of character in him. Developing +the ideal, pre-existent there, of a religious beauty, associated for +the future with the exquisite splendour of the temple of Aesculapius, +as it dawned upon him on that morning of his first visit—it developed +that ideal in connexion with a vivid sense of the value of mental and +bodily sanity. And this recognition of the beauty, even for the +aesthetic sense, of mere bodily health, now acquired, operated +afterwards as an influence morally salutary, counteracting the less +desirable or hazardous tendencies of some phases of thought, through +which he was to pass. + +He came home brown with health to find the health of his mother +failing; and about her death, which occurred not long afterwards, there +was a circumstance which rested with him as the cruellest touch of all, +in an event which for a time seemed to have taken the light out of the +sunshine. She died away from home, but sent for him at the last, with a +painful effort on her part, but to his great gratitude, pondering, as +he always believed, that he might chance otherwise to look back all his +life long upon a single fault with something like remorse, and find the +burden a great one. For it happened that, through some sudden, +incomprehensible petulance there had been an angry childish gesture, +and a slighting word, at the very moment of her departure, actually for +the last time. Remembering this he would ever afterwards pray to be +saved from offences against his own affections; the thought of that +marred parting having peculiar bitterness for one, who set so much +store, both by principle and habit, on the sentiment of home. + + + + +CHAPTER IV. +THE TREE OF KNOWLEDGE + + +O mare! O littus! verum secretumque Mouseion,+ +quam multa invenitis, quam multa dictatis! +Pliny’s Letters. + + +It would hardly have been possible to feel more seriously than did +Marius in those grave years of his early life. But the death of his +mother turned seriousness of feeling into a matter of the intelligence: +it made him a questioner; and, by bringing into full evidence to him +the force of his affections and the probable importance of their place +in his future, developed in him generally the more human and earthly +elements of character. A singularly virile consciousness of the +realities of life pronounced itself in him; still however as in the +main a poetic apprehension, though united already with something of +personal ambition and the instinct of self-assertion. There were days +when he could suspect, though it was a suspicion he was careful at +first to put from him, that that early, much cherished religion of the +villa might come to count with him as but one form of poetic beauty, or +of the ideal, in things; as but one voice, in a world where there were +many voices it would be a moral weakness not to listen to. And yet this +voice, through its forcible pre-occupation of his childish conscience, +still seemed to make a claim of a quite exclusive character, defining +itself as essentially one of but two possible leaders of his spirit, +the other proposing to him unlimited self-expansion in a world of +various sunshine. The contrast was so pronounced as to make the easy, +light-hearted, unsuspecting exercise of himself, among the temptations +of the new phase of life which had now begun, seem nothing less than a +rival religion, a rival religious service. The temptations, the various +sunshine, were those of the old town of Pisa, where Marius was now a +tall schoolboy. Pisa was a place lying just far enough from home to +make his rare visits to it in childhood seem like adventures, such as +had never failed to supply new and refreshing impulses to the +imagination. The partly decayed pensive town, which still had its +commerce by sea, and its fashion at the bathing-season, had lent, at +one time the vivid memory of its fair streets of marble, at another the +solemn outline of the dark hills of Luna on its background, at another +the living glances of its men and women, to the thickly gathering crowd +of impressions, out of which his notion of the world was then forming. +And while he learned that the object, the experience, as it will be +known to memory, is really from first to last the chief point for +consideration in the conduct of life, these things were feeding also +the idealism constitutional with him—his innate and habitual longing +for a world altogether fairer than that he saw. The child could find +his way in thought along those streets of the old town, expecting duly +the shrines at their corners, and their recurrent intervals of +garden-courts, or side-views of distant sea. The great temple of the +place, as he could remember it, on turning back once for a last look +from an angle of his homeward road, counting its tall gray columns +between the blue of the bay and the blue fields of blossoming flax +beyond; the harbour and its lights; the foreign ships lying there; the +sailors’ chapel of Venus, and her gilded image, hung with votive gifts; +the seamen themselves, their women and children, who had a whole +peculiar colour-world of their own—the boy’s superficial delight in the +broad light and shadow of all that was mingled with the sense of power, +of unknown distance, of the danger of storm and possible death. + +To this place, then, Marius came down now from White-nights, to live in +the house of his guardian or tutor, that he might attend the school of +a famous rhetorician, and learn, among other things, Greek. The school, +one of many imitations of Plato’s Academy in the old Athenian garden, +lay in a quiet suburb of Pisa, and had its grove of cypresses, its +porticoes, a house for the master, its chapel and images. For the +memory of Marius in after-days, a clear morning sunlight seemed to lie +perpetually on that severe picture in old gray and green. The lad went +to this school daily betimes, in state at first, with a young slave to +carry the books, and certainly with no reluctance, for the sight of his +fellow-scholars, and their petulant activity, coming upon the sadder +sentimental moods of his childhood, awoke at once that instinct of +emulation which is but the other side of sympathy; and he was not +aware, of course, how completely the difference of his previous +training had made him, even in his most enthusiastic participation in +the ways of that little world, still essentially but a spectator. While +all their heart was in their limited boyish race, and its transitory +prizes, he was already entertaining himself, very pleasurably +meditative, with the tiny drama in action before him, as but the mimic, +preliminary exercise for a larger contest, and already with an implicit +epicureanism. Watching all the gallant effects of their small +rivalries—a scene in the main of fresh delightful sunshine—he entered +at once into the sensations of a rivalry beyond them, into the passion +of men, and had already recognised a certain appetite for fame, for +distinction among his fellows, as his dominant motive to be. + +The fame he conceived for himself at this time was, as the reader will +have anticipated, of the intellectual order, that of a poet perhaps. +And as, in that gray monastic tranquillity of the villa, inward voices +from the reality of unseen things had come abundantly; so here, with +the sounds and aspects of the shore, and amid the urbanities, the +graceful follies, of a bathing-place, it was the reality, the tyrannous +reality, of things visible that was borne in upon him. The real world +around—a present humanity not less comely, it might seem, than that of +the old heroic days—endowing everything it touched upon, however +remotely, down to its little passing tricks of fashion even, with a +kind of fleeting beauty, exercised over him just then a great +fascination. + +That sense had come upon him in all its power one exceptionally fine +summer, the summer when, at a somewhat earlier age than was usual, he +had formally assumed the dress of manhood, going into the Forum for +that purpose, accompanied by his friends in festal array. At night, +after the full measure of those cloudless days, he would feel well-nigh +wearied out, as if with a long succession of pictures and music. As he +wandered through the gay streets or on the sea-shore, the real world +seemed indeed boundless, and himself almost absolutely free in it, with +a boundless appetite for experience, for adventure, whether physical or +of the spirit. His entire rearing hitherto had lent itself to an +imaginative exaltation of the past; but now the spectacle actually +afforded to his untired and freely open senses, suggested the +reflection that the present had, it might be, really advanced beyond +the past, and he was ready to boast in the very fact that it was +modern. If, in a voluntary archaism, the polite world of that day went +back to a choicer generation, as it fancied, for the purpose of a +fastidious self-correction, in matters of art, of literature, and even, +as we have seen, of religion, at least it improved, by a shade or two +of more scrupulous finish, on the old pattern; and the new era, like +the Neu-zeit of the German enthusiasts at the beginning of our own +century, might perhaps be discerned, awaiting one just a single step +onward—the perfected new manner, in the consummation of time, alike as +regards the things of the imagination and the actual conduct of life. +Only, while the pursuit of an ideal like this demanded entire liberty +of heart and brain, that old, staid, conservative religion of his +childhood certainly had its being in a world of somewhat narrow +restrictions. But then, the one was absolutely real, with nothing less +than the reality of seeing and hearing—the other, how vague, shadowy, +problematical! Could its so limited probabilities be worth taking into +account in any practical question as to the rejecting or receiving of +what was indeed so real, and, on the face of it, so desirable? + +And, dating from the time of his first coming to school, a great +friendship had grown up for him, in that life of so few attachments—the +pure and disinterested friendship of schoolmates. He had seen Flavian +for the first time the day on which he had come to Pisa, at the moment +when his mind was full of wistful thoughts regarding the new life to +begin for him to-morrow, and he gazed curiously at the crowd of +bustling scholars as they came from their classes. There was something +in Flavian a shade disdainful, as he stood isolated from the others for +a moment, explained in part by his stature and the distinction of the +low, broad forehead; though there was pleasantness also for the +newcomer in the roving blue eyes which seemed somehow to take a fuller +hold upon things around than is usual with boys. Marius knew that those +proud glances made kindly note of him for a moment, and felt something +like friendship at first sight. There was a tone of reserve or gravity +there, amid perfectly disciplined health, which, to his fancy, seemed +to carry forward the expression of the austere sky and the clear song +of the blackbird on that gray March evening. Flavian indeed was a +creature who changed much with the changes of the passing light and +shade about him, and was brilliant enough under the early sunshine in +school next morning. Of all that little world of more or less gifted +youth, surely the centre was this lad of servile birth. Prince of the +school, he had gained an easy dominion over the old Greek master by the +fascination of his parts, and over his fellow-scholars by the figure he +bore. He wore already the manly dress; and standing there in class, as +he displayed his wonderful quickness in reckoning, or his taste in +declaiming Homer, he was like a carved figure in motion, thought +Marius, but with that indescribable gleam upon it which the words of +Homer actually suggested, as perceptible on the visible forms of the +gods—hoia theous epenênothen aien eontas.+ + +A story hung by him, a story which his comrades acutely connected with +his habitual air of somewhat peevish pride. Two points were held to be +clear amid its general vagueness—a rich stranger paid his schooling, +and he was himself very poor, though there was an attractive piquancy +in the poverty of Flavian which in a scholar of another figure might +have been despised. Over Marius too his dominion was entire. Three +years older than he, Flavian was appointed to help the younger boy in +his studies, and Marius thus became virtually his servant in many +things, taking his humours with a sort of grateful pride in being +noticed at all, and, thinking over all this afterwards, found that the +fascination experienced by him had been a sentimental one, dependent on +the concession to himself of an intimacy, a certain tolerance of his +company, granted to none beside. + +That was in the earliest days; and then, as their intimacy grew, the +genius, the intellectual power of Flavian began its sway over him. The +brilliant youth who loved dress, and dainty food, and flowers, and +seemed to have a natural alliance with, and claim upon, everything else +which was physically select and bright, cultivated also that foppery of +words, of choice diction which was common among the élite spirits of +that day; and Marius, early an expert and elegant penman, transcribed +his verses (the euphuism of which, amid a genuine original power, was +then so delightful to him) in beautiful ink, receiving in return the +profit of Flavian’s really great intellectual capacities, developed and +accomplished under the ambitious desire to make his way effectively in +life. Among other things he introduced him to the writings of a +sprightly wit, then very busy with the pen, one Lucian—writings seeming +to overflow with that intellectual light turned upon dim places, which, +at least in seasons of mental fair weather, can make people laugh where +they have been wont, perhaps, to pray. And, surely, the sunlight which +filled those well-remembered early mornings in school, had had more +than the usual measure of gold in it! Marius, at least, would lie awake +before the time, thinking with delight of the long coming hours of hard +work in the presence of Flavian, as other boys dream of a holiday. + +It was almost by accident at last, so wayward and capricious was he, +that reserve gave way, and Flavian told the story of his father—a +freedman, presented late in life, and almost against his will, with the +liberty so fondly desired in youth, but on condition of the sacrifice +of part of his peculium—the slave’s diminutive hoard—amassed by many a +self-denial, in an existence necessarily hard. The rich man, interested +in the promise of the fair child born on his estate, had sent him to +school. The meanness and dejection, nevertheless, of that unoccupied +old age defined the leading memory of Flavian, revived sometimes, after +this first confidence, with a burst of angry tears amid the sunshine. +But nature had had her economy in nursing the strength of that one +natural affection; for, save his half-selfish care for Marius, it was +the single, really generous part, the one piety, in the lad’s +character. In him Marius saw the spirit of unbelief, achieved as if at +one step. The much-admired freedman’s son, as with the privilege of a +natural aristocracy, believed only in himself, in the brilliant, and +mainly sensuous gifts, he had, or meant to acquire. + +And then, he had certainly yielded himself, though still with untouched +health, in a world where manhood comes early, to the seductions of that +luxurious town, and Marius wondered sometimes, in the freer revelation +of himself by conversation, at the extent of his early corruption. How +often, afterwards, did evil things present themselves in malign +association with the memory of that beautiful head, and with a kind of +borrowed sanction and charm in its natural grace! To Marius, at a later +time, he counted for as it were an epitome of the whole pagan world, +the depth of its corruption, and its perfection of form. And still, in +his mobility, his animation, in his eager capacity for various life, he +was so real an object, after that visionary idealism of the villa. His +voice, his glance, were like the breaking in of the solid world upon +one, amid the flimsy fictions of a dream. A shadow, handling all things +as shadows, had felt a sudden real and poignant heat in them. + +Meantime, under his guidance, Marius was learning quickly and +abundantly, because with a good will. There was that in the actual +effectiveness of his figure which stimulated the younger lad to make +the most of opportunity; and he had experience already that education +largely increased one’s capacity for enjoyment. He was acquiring what +it is the chief function of all higher education to impart, the art, +namely, of so relieving the ideal or poetic traits, the elements of +distinction, in our everyday life—of so exclusively living in them—that +the unadorned remainder of it, the mere drift or débris of our days, +comes to be as though it were not. And the consciousness of this aim +came with the reading of one particular book, then fresh in the world, +with which he fell in about this time—a book which awakened the poetic +or romantic capacity as perhaps some other book might have done, but +was peculiar in giving it a direction emphatically sensuous. It made +him, in that visionary reception of every-day life, the seer, more +especially, of a revelation in colour and form. If our modern +education, in its better efforts, really conveys to any of us that kind +of idealising power, it does so (though dealing mainly, as its +professed instruments, with the most select and ideal remains of +ancient literature) oftenest by truant reading; and thus it happened +also, long ago, with Marius and his friend. + +NOTES + + +43. +Transliteration: Mouseion. The word means “seat of the muses.” +Translation: “O sea! O shore! my own Helicon, / How many things have +you uncovered to me, how many things suggested!” Pliny, Letters, Book +I, ix, to Minicius Fundanus. + + +50. +Transliteration: hoia theous epenênothen aien eontas. Translation: +“such as the gods are endowed with.” Homer, Odyssey, 8.365. + + + + +CHAPTER V. +THE GOLDEN BOOK + + +The two lads were lounging together over a book, half-buried in a heap +of dry corn, in an old granary—the quiet corner to which they had +climbed out of the way of their noisier companions on one of their +blandest holiday afternoons. They looked round: the western sun smote +through the broad chinks of the shutters. How like a picture! and it +was precisely the scene described in what they were reading, with just +that added poetic touch in the book which made it delightful and +select, and, in the actual place, the ray of sunlight transforming the +rough grain among the cool brown shadows into heaps of gold. What they +were intent on was, indeed, the book of books, the “golden” book of +that day, a gift to Flavian, as was shown by the purple writing on the +handsome yellow wrapper, following the title Flaviane!—it said, + +Flaviane! lege Felicitur! +Flaviane! Vivas! Fioreas! +Flaviane! Vivas! Gaudeas! + + +It was perfumed with oil of sandal-wood, and decorated with carved and +gilt ivory bosses at the ends of the roller. + +And the inside was something not less dainty and fine, full of the +archaisms and curious felicities in which that generation delighted, +quaint terms and images picked fresh from the early dramatists, the +lifelike phrases of some lost poet preserved by an old grammarian, racy +morsels of the vernacular and studied prettinesses:—all alike, mere +playthings for the genuine power and natural eloquence of the erudite +artist, unsuppressed by his erudition, which, however, made some people +angry, chiefly less well “got-up” people, and especially those who were +untidy from indolence. + +No! it was certainly not that old-fashioned, unconscious ease of the +early literature, which could never come again; which, after all, had +had more in common with the “infinite patience” of Apuleius than with +the hack-work readiness of his detractors, who might so well have been +“self-conscious” of going slip-shod. And at least his success was +unmistakable as to the precise literary effect he had intended, +including a certain tincture of “neology” in expression—nonnihil +interdum elocutione novella parum signatum—in the language of Cornelius +Fronto, the contemporary prince of rhetoricians. What words he had +found for conveying, with a single touch, the sense of textures, +colours, incidents! “Like jewellers’ work! Like a myrrhine +vase!”—admirers said of his writing. “The golden fibre in the hair, the +gold thread-work in the gown marked her as the mistress”—aurum in comis +et in tunicis, ibi inflexum hic intextum, matronam profecto +confitebatur—he writes, with his “curious felicity,” of one of his +heroines. Aurum intextum: gold fibre:—well! there was something of that +kind in his own work. And then, in an age when people, from the emperor +Aurelius downwards, prided themselves unwisely on writing in Greek, he +had written for Latin people in their own tongue; though still, in +truth, with all the care of a learned language. Not less happily +inventive were the incidents recorded—story within story—stories with +the sudden, unlooked-for changes of dreams. He had his humorous touches +also. And what went to the ordinary boyish taste, in those somewhat +peculiar readers, what would have charmed boys more purely boyish, was +the adventure:—the bear loose in the house at night, the wolves +storming the farms in winter, the exploits of the robbers, their +charming caves, the delightful thrill one had at the question—“Don’t +you know that these roads are infested by robbers?” + +The scene of the romance was laid in Thessaly, the original land of +witchcraft, and took one up and down its mountains, and into its old +weird towns, haunts of magic and incantation, where all the more +genuine appliances of the black art, left behind her by Medea when she +fled through that country, were still in use. In the city of Hypata, +indeed, nothing seemed to be its true self—“You might think that +through the murmuring of some cadaverous spell, all things had been +changed into forms not their own; that there was humanity in the +hardness of the stones you stumbled on; that the birds you heard +singing were feathered men; that the trees around the walls drew their +leaves from a like source. The statues seemed about to move, the walls +to speak, the dumb cattle to break out in prophecy; nay! the very sky +and the sunbeams, as if they might suddenly cry out.” Witches are there +who can draw down the moon, or at least the lunar virus—that white +fluid she sheds, to be found, so rarely, “on high, heathy places: which +is a poison. A touch of it will drive men mad.” + +And in one very remote village lives the sorceress Pamphile, who turns +her neighbours into various animals. What true humour in the scene +where, after mounting the rickety stairs, Lucius, peeping curiously +through a chink in the door, is a spectator of the transformation of +the old witch herself into a bird, that she may take flight to the +object of her affections—into an owl! “First she stripped off every rag +she had. Then opening a certain chest she took from it many small +boxes, and removing the lid of one of them, rubbed herself over for a +long time, from head to foot, with an ointment it contained, and after +much low muttering to her lamp, began to jerk at last and shake her +limbs. And as her limbs moved to and fro, out burst the soft feathers: +stout wings came forth to view: the nose grew hard and hooked: her +nails were crooked into claws; and Pamphile was an owl. She uttered a +queasy screech; and, leaping little by little from the ground, making +trial of herself, fled presently, on full wing, out of doors.” + +By clumsy imitation of this process, Lucius, the hero of the romance, +transforms himself, not as he had intended into a showy winged +creature, but into the animal which has given name to the book; for +throughout it there runs a vein of racy, homely satire on the love of +magic then prevalent, curiosity concerning which had led Lucius to +meddle with the old woman’s appliances. “Be you my Venus,” he says to +the pretty maid-servant who has introduced him to the view of Pamphile, +“and let me stand by you a winged Cupid!” and, freely applying the +magic ointment, sees himself transformed, “not into a bird, but into an +ass!” + +Well! the proper remedy for his distress is a supper of roses, could +such be found, and many are his quaintly picturesque attempts to come +by them at that adverse season; as he contrives to do at last, when, +the grotesque procession of Isis passing by with a bear and other +strange animals in its train, the ass following along with the rest +suddenly crunches the chaplet of roses carried in the High-priest’s +hand. + +Meantime, however, he must wait for the spring, with more than the +outside of an ass; “though I was not so much a fool, nor so truly an +ass,” he tells us, when he happens to be left alone with a daintily +spread table, “as to neglect this most delicious fare, and feed upon +coarse hay.” For, in truth, all through the book, there is an +unmistakably real feeling for asses, with bold touches like Swift’s, +and a genuine animal breadth. Lucius was the original ass, who peeping +slily from the window of his hiding-place forgot all about the big +shade he cast just above him, and gave occasion to the joke or proverb +about “the peeping ass and his shadow.” + +But the marvellous, delight in which is one of the really serious +elements in most boys, passed at times, those young readers still +feeling its fascination, into what French writers call the macabre—that +species of almost insane pre-occupation with the materialities of our +mouldering flesh, that luxury of disgust in gazing on corruption, which +was connected, in this writer at least, with not a little obvious +coarseness. It was a strange notion of the gross lust of the actual +world, that Marius took from some of these episodes. “I am told,” they +read, “that when foreigners are interred, the old witches are in the +habit of out-racing the funeral procession, to ravage the corpse”—in +order to obtain certain cuttings and remnants from it, with which to +injure the living—“especially if the witch has happened to cast her eye +upon some goodly young man.” And the scene of the night-watching of a +dead body lest the witches should come to tear off the flesh with their +teeth, is worthy of Théophile Gautier. + +But set as one of the episodes in the main narrative, a true gem amid +its mockeries, its coarse though genuine humanity, its burlesque +horrors, came the tale of Cupid and Psyche, full of brilliant, +life-like situations, speciosa locis, and abounding in lovely visible +imagery (one seemed to see and handle the golden hair, the fresh +flowers, the precious works of art in it!) yet full also of a gentle +idealism, so that you might take it, if you chose, for an allegory. +With a concentration of all his finer literary gifts, Apuleius had +gathered into it the floating star-matter of many a delightful old +story.— + +The Story of Cupid and Psyche. + + +In a certain city lived a king and queen who had three daughters +exceeding fair. But the beauty of the elder sisters, though pleasant to +behold, yet passed not the measure of human praise, while such was the +loveliness of the youngest that men’s speech was too poor to commend it +worthily and could express it not at all. Many of the citizens and of +strangers, whom the fame of this excellent vision had gathered thither, +confounded by that matchless beauty, could but kiss the finger-tips of +their right hands at sight of her, as in adoration to the goddess Venus +herself. And soon a rumour passed through the country that she whom the +blue deep had borne, forbearing her divine dignity, was even then +moving among men, or that by some fresh germination from the stars, not +the sea now, but the earth, had put forth a new Venus, endued with the +flower of virginity. + +This belief, with the fame of the maiden’s loveliness, went daily +further into distant lands, so that many people were drawn together to +behold that glorious model of the age. Men sailed no longer to Paphos, +to Cnidus or Cythera, to the presence of the goddess Venus: her sacred +rites were neglected, her images stood uncrowned, the cold ashes were +left to disfigure her forsaken altars. It was to a maiden that men’s +prayers were offered, to a human countenance they looked, in +propitiating so great a godhead: when the girl went forth in the +morning they strewed flowers on her way, and the victims proper to that +unseen goddess were presented as she passed along. This conveyance of +divine worship to a mortal kindled meantime the anger of the true +Venus. “Lo! now, the ancient parent of nature,” she cried, “the +fountain of all elements! Behold me, Venus, benign mother of the world, +sharing my honours with a mortal maiden, while my name, built up in +heaven, is profaned by the mean things of earth! Shall a perishable +woman bear my image about with her? In vain did the shepherd of Ida +prefer me! Yet shall she have little joy, whosoever she be, of her +usurped and unlawful loveliness!” Thereupon she called to her that +winged, bold boy, of evil ways, who wanders armed by night through +men’s houses, spoiling their marriages; and stirring yet more by her +speech his inborn wantonness, she led him to the city, and showed him +Psyche as she walked. + +“I pray thee,” she said, “give thy mother a full revenge. Let this maid +become the slave of an unworthy love.” Then, embracing him closely, she +departed to the shore and took her throne upon the crest of the wave. +And lo! at her unuttered will, her ocean-servants are in waiting: the +daughters of Nereus are there singing their song, and Portunus, and +Salacia, and the tiny charioteer of the dolphin, with a host of Tritons +leaping through the billows. And one blows softly through his sounding +sea-shell, another spreads a silken web against the sun, a third +presents the mirror to the eyes of his mistress, while the others swim +side by side below, drawing her chariot. Such was the escort of Venus +as she went upon the sea. + +Psyche meantime, aware of her loveliness, had no fruit thereof. All +people regarded and admired, but none sought her in marriage. It was +but as on the finished work of the craftsman that they gazed upon that +divine likeness. Her sisters, less fair than she, were happily wedded. +She, even as a widow, sitting at home, wept over her desolation, hating +in her heart the beauty in which all men were pleased. + +And the king, supposing the gods were angry, inquired of the oracle of +Apollo, and Apollo answered him thus: “Let the damsel be placed on the +top of a certain mountain, adorned as for the bed of marriage and of +death. Look not for a son-in-law of mortal birth; but for that evil +serpent-thing, by reason of whom even the gods tremble and the shadows +of Styx are afraid.” + +So the king returned home and made known the oracle to his wife. For +many days she lamented, but at last the fulfilment of the divine +precept is urgent upon her, and the company make ready to conduct the +maiden to her deadly bridal. And now the nuptial torch gathers dark +smoke and ashes: the pleasant sound of the pipe is changed into a cry: +the marriage hymn concludes in a sorrowful wailing: below her yellow +wedding-veil the bride shook away her tears; insomuch that the whole +city was afflicted together at the ill-luck of the stricken house. + +But the mandate of the god impelled the hapless Psyche to her fate, +and, these solemnities being ended, the funeral of the living soul goes +forth, all the people following. Psyche, bitterly weeping, assists not +at her marriage but at her own obsequies, and while the parents +hesitate to accomplish a thing so unholy the daughter cries to them: +“Wherefore torment your luckless age by long weeping? This was the +prize of my extraordinary beauty! When all people celebrated us with +divine honours, and in one voice named the New Venus, it was then ye +should have wept for me as one dead. Now at last I understand that that +one name of Venus has been my ruin. Lead me and set me upon the +appointed place. I am in haste to submit to that well-omened marriage, +to behold that goodly spouse. Why delay the coming of him who was born +for the destruction of the whole world?” + +She was silent, and with firm step went on the way. And they proceeded +to the appointed place on a steep mountain, and left there the maiden +alone, and took their way homewards dejectedly. The wretched parents, +in their close-shut house, yielded themselves to perpetual night; while +to Psyche, fearful and trembling and weeping sore upon the +mountain-top, comes the gentle Zephyrus. He lifts her mildly, and, with +vesture afloat on either side, bears her by his own soft breathing over +the windings of the hills, and sets her lightly among the flowers in +the bosom of a valley below. + +Psyche, in those delicate grassy places, lying sweetly on her dewy bed, +rested from the agitation of her soul and arose in peace. And lo! a +grove of mighty trees, with a fount of water, clear as glass, in the +midst; and hard by the water, a dwelling-place, built not by human +hands but by some divine cunning. One recognised, even at the entering, +the delightful hostelry of a god. Golden pillars sustained the roof, +arched most curiously in cedar-wood and ivory. The walls were hidden +under wrought silver:—all tame and woodland creatures leaping forward +to the visitor’s gaze. Wonderful indeed was the craftsman, divine or +half-divine, who by the subtlety of his art had breathed so wild a soul +into the silver! The very pavement was distinct with pictures in goodly +stones. In the glow of its precious metal the house is its own +daylight, having no need of the sun. Well might it seem a place +fashioned for the conversation of gods with men! + +Psyche, drawn forward by the delight of it, came near, and, her courage +growing, stood within the doorway. One by one, she admired the +beautiful things she saw; and, most wonderful of all! no lock, no +chain, nor living guardian protected that great treasure house. But as +she gazed there came a voice—a voice, as it were unclothed of bodily +vesture—“Mistress!” it said, “all these things are thine. Lie down, and +relieve thy weariness, and rise again for the bath when thou wilt. We +thy servants, whose voice thou hearest, will be beforehand with our +service, and a royal feast shall be ready.” + +And Psyche understood that some divine care was providing, and, +refreshed with sleep and the Bath, sat down to the feast. Still she saw +no one: only she heard words falling here and there, and had voices +alone to serve her. And the feast being ended, one entered the chamber +and sang to her unseen, while another struck the chords of a harp, +invisible with him who played on it. Afterwards the sound of a company +singing together came to her, but still so that none were present to +sight; yet it appeared that a great multitude of singers was there. + +And the hour of evening inviting her, she climbed into the bed; and as +the night was far advanced, behold a sound of a certain clemency +approaches her. Then, fearing for her maidenhood in so great solitude, +she trembled, and more than any evil she knew dreaded that she knew +not. And now the husband, that unknown husband, drew near, and ascended +the couch, and made her his wife; and lo! before the rise of dawn he +had departed hastily. And the attendant voices ministered to the needs +of the newly married. And so it happened with her for a long season. +And as nature has willed, this new thing, by continual use, became a +delight to her: the sound of the voice grew to be her solace in that +condition of loneliness and uncertainty. + +One night the bridegroom spoke thus to his beloved, “O Psyche, most +pleasant bride! Fortune is grown stern with us, and threatens thee with +mortal peril. Thy sisters, troubled at the report of thy death and +seeking some trace of thee, will come to the mountain’s top. But if by +chance their cries reach thee, answer not, neither look forth at all, +lest thou bring sorrow upon me and destruction upon thyself.” Then +Psyche promised that she would do according to his will. But the +bridegroom was fled away again with the night. And all that day she +spent in tears, repeating that she was now dead indeed, shut up in that +golden prison, powerless to console her sisters sorrowing after her, or +to see their faces; and so went to rest weeping. + +And after a while came the bridegroom again, and lay down beside her, +and embracing her as she wept, complained, “Was this thy promise, my +Psyche? What have I to hope from thee? Even in the arms of thy husband +thou ceasest not from pain. Do now as thou wilt. Indulge thine own +desire, though it seeks what will ruin thee. Yet wilt thou remember my +warning, repentant too late.” Then, protesting that she is like to die, +she obtains from him that he suffer her to see her sisters, and present +to them moreover what gifts she would of golden ornaments; but +therewith he ofttimes advised her never at any time, yielding to +pernicious counsel, to enquire concerning his bodily form, lest she +fall, through unholy curiosity, from so great a height of fortune, nor +feel ever his embrace again. “I would die a hundred times,” she said, +cheerful at last, “rather than be deprived of thy most sweet usage. I +love thee as my own soul, beyond comparison even with Love himself. +Only bid thy servant Zephyrus bring hither my sisters, as he brought +me. My honeycomb! My husband! Thy Psyche’s breath of life!” So he +promised; and after the embraces of the night, ere the light appeared, +vanished from the hands of his bride. + +And the sisters, coming to the place where Psyche was abandoned, wept +loudly among the rocks, and called upon her by name, so that the sound +came down to her, and running out of the palace distraught, she cried, +“Wherefore afflict your souls with lamentation? I whom you mourn am +here.” Then, summoning Zephyrus, she reminded him of her husband’s +bidding; and he bare them down with a gentle blast. “Enter now,” she +said, “into my house, and relieve your sorrow in the company of Psyche +your sister.” + +And Psyche displayed to them all the treasures of the golden house, and +its great family of ministering voices, nursing in them the malice +which was already at their hearts. And at last one of them asks +curiously who the lord of that celestial array may be, and what manner +of man her husband? And Psyche answered dissemblingly, “A young man, +handsome and mannerly, with a goodly beard. For the most part he hunts +upon the mountains.” And lest the secret should slip from her in the +way of further speech, loading her sisters with gold and gems, she +commanded Zephyrus to bear them away. + +And they returned home, on fire with envy. “See now the injustice of +fortune!” cried one. “We, the elder children, are given like servants +to be the wives of strangers, while the youngest is possessed of so +great riches, who scarcely knows how to use them. You saw, Sister! what +a hoard of wealth lies in the house; what glittering gowns; what +splendour of precious gems, besides all that gold trodden under foot. +If she indeed hath, as she said, a bridegroom so goodly, then no one in +all the world is happier. And it may be that this husband, being of +divine nature, will make her too a goddess. Nay! so in truth it is. It +was even thus she bore herself. Already she looks aloft and breathes +divinity, who, though but a woman, has voices for her handmaidens, and +can command the winds.” “Think,” answered the other, “how arrogantly +she dealt with us, grudging us these trifling gifts out of all that +store, and when our company became a burden, causing us to be hissed +and driven away from her through the air! But I am no woman if she keep +her hold on this great fortune; and if the insult done us has touched +thee too, take we counsel together. Meanwhile let us hold our peace, +and know naught of her, alive or dead. For they are not truly happy of +whose happiness other folk are unaware.” + +And the bridegroom, whom still she knows not, warns her thus a second +time, as he talks with her by night: “Seest thou what peril besets +thee? Those cunning wolves have made ready for thee their snares, of +which the sum is that they persuade thee to search into the fashion of +my countenance, the seeing of which, as I have told thee often, will be +the seeing of it no more for ever. But do thou neither listen nor make +answer to aught regarding thy husband. Besides, we have sown also the +seed of our race. Even now this bosom grows with a child to be born to +us, a child, if thou but keep our secret, of divine quality; if thou +profane it, subject to death.” And Psyche was glad at the tidings, +rejoicing in that solace of a divine seed, and in the glory of that +pledge of love to be, and the dignity of the name of mother. Anxiously +she notes the increase of the days, the waning months. And again, as he +tarries briefly beside her, the bridegroom repeats his warning: + +“Even now the sword is drawn with which thy sisters seek thy life. Have +pity on thyself, sweet wife, and upon our child, and see not those evil +women again.” But the sisters make their way into the palace once more, +crying to her in wily tones, “O Psyche! and thou too wilt be a mother! +How great will be the joy at home! Happy indeed shall we be to have the +nursing of the golden child. Truly if he be answerable to the beauty of +his parents, it will be a birth of Cupid himself.” + +So, little by little, they stole upon the heart of their sister. She, +meanwhile, bids the lyre to sound for their delight, and the playing is +heard: she bids the pipes to move, the quire to sing, and the music and +the singing come invisibly, soothing the mind of the listener with +sweetest modulation. Yet not even thereby was their malice put to +sleep: once more they seek to know what manner of husband she has, and +whence that seed. And Psyche, simple over-much, forgetful of her first +story, answers, “My husband comes from a far country, trading for great +sums. He is already of middle age, with whitening locks.” And therewith +she dismisses them again. + +And returning home upon the soft breath of Zephyrus one cried to the +other, “What shall be said of so ugly a lie? He who was a young man +with goodly beard is now in middle life. It must be that she told a +false tale: else is she in very truth ignorant what manner of man he +is. Howsoever it be, let us destroy her quickly. For if she indeed +knows not, be sure that her bridegroom is one of the gods: it is a god +she bears in her womb. And let that be far from us! If she be called +mother of a god, then will life be more than I can bear.” + +So, full of rage against her, they returned to Psyche, and said to her +craftily, “Thou livest in an ignorant bliss, all incurious of thy real +danger. It is a deadly serpent, as we certainly know, that comes to +sleep at thy side. Remember the words of the oracle, which declared +thee destined to a cruel beast. There are those who have seen it at +nightfall, coming back from its feeding. In no long time, they say, it +will end its blandishments. It but waits for the babe to be formed in +thee, that it may devour thee by so much the richer. If indeed the +solitude of this musical place, or it may be the loathsome commerce of +a hidden love, delight thee, we at least in sisterly piety have done +our part.” And at last the unhappy Psyche, simple and frail of soul, +carried away by the terror of their words, losing memory of her +husband’s precepts and her own promise, brought upon herself a great +calamity. Trembling and turning pale, she answers them, “And they who +tell those things, it may be, speak the truth. For in very deed never +have I seen the face of my husband, nor know I at all what manner of +man he is. Always he frights me diligently from the sight of him, +threatening some great evil should I too curiously look upon his face. +Do ye, if ye can help your sister in her great peril, stand by her +now.” + +Her sisters answered her, “The way of safety we have well considered, +and will teach thee. Take a sharp knife, and hide it in that part of +the couch where thou art wont to lie: take also a lamp filled with oil, +and set it privily behind the curtain. And when he shall have drawn up +his coils into the accustomed place, and thou hearest him breathe in +sleep, slip then from his side and discover the lamp, and, knife in +hand, put forth thy strength, and strike off the serpent’s head.” And +so they departed in haste. + +And Psyche left alone (alone but for the furies which beset her) is +tossed up and down in her distress, like a wave of the sea; and though +her will is firm, yet, in the moment of putting hand to the deed, she +falters, and is torn asunder by various apprehension of the great +calamity upon her. She hastens and anon delays, now full of distrust, +and now of angry courage: under one bodily form she loathes the monster +and loves the bridegroom. But twilight ushers in the night; and at +length in haste she makes ready for the terrible deed. Darkness came, +and the bridegroom; and he first, after some faint essay of love, falls +into a deep sleep. + +And she, erewhile of no strength, the hard purpose of destiny assisting +her, is confirmed in force. With lamp plucked forth, knife in hand, she +put by her sex; and lo! as the secrets of the bed became manifest, the +sweetest and most gentle of all creatures, Love himself, reclined +there, in his own proper loveliness! At sight of him the very flame of +the lamp kindled more gladly! But Psyche was afraid at the vision, and, +faint of soul, trembled back upon her knees, and would have hidden the +steel in her own bosom. But the knife slipped from her hand; and now, +undone, yet ofttimes looking upon the beauty of that divine +countenance, she lives again. She sees the locks of that golden head, +pleasant with the unction of the gods, shed down in graceful +entanglement behind and before, about the ruddy cheeks and white +throat. The pinions of the winged god, yet fresh with the dew, are +spotless upon his shoulders, the delicate plumage wavering over them as +they lie at rest. Smooth he was, and, touched with light, worthy of +Venus his mother. At the foot of the couch lay his bow and arrows, the +instruments of his power, propitious to men. + +And Psyche, gazing hungrily thereon, draws an arrow from the quiver, +and trying the point upon her thumb, tremulous still, drave in the +barb, so that a drop of blood came forth. Thus fell she, by her own +act, and unaware, into the love of Love. Falling upon the bridegroom, +with indrawn breath, in a hurry of kisses from eager and open lips, she +shuddered as she thought how brief that sleep might be. And it chanced +that a drop of burning oil fell from the lamp upon the god’s shoulder. +Ah! maladroit minister of love, thus to wound him from whom all fire +comes; though ’twas a lover, I trow, first devised thee, to have the +fruit of his desire even in the darkness! At the touch of the fire the +god started up, and beholding the overthrow of her faith, quietly took +flight from her embraces. + +And Psyche, as he rose upon the wing, laid hold on him with her two +hands, hanging upon him in his passage through the air, till she sinks +to the earth through weariness. And as she lay there, the divine lover, +tarrying still, lighted upon a cypress tree which grew near, and, from +the top of it, spake thus to her, in great emotion. “Foolish one! +unmindful of the command of Venus, my mother, who had devoted thee to +one of base degree, I fled to thee in his stead. Now know I that this +was vainly done. Into mine own flesh pierced mine arrow, and I made +thee my wife, only that I might seem a monster beside thee—that thou +shouldst seek to wound the head wherein lay the eyes so full of love to +thee! Again and again, I thought to put thee on thy guard concerning +these things, and warned thee in loving-kindness. Now I would but +punish thee by my flight hence.” And therewith he winged his way into +the deep sky. + +Psyche, prostrate upon the earth, and following far as sight might +reach the flight of the bridegroom, wept and lamented; and when the +breadth of space had parted him wholly from her, cast herself down from +the bank of a river which was nigh. But the stream, turning gentle in +honour of the god, put her forth again unhurt upon its margin. And as +it happened, Pan, the rustic god, was sitting just then by the +waterside, embracing, in the body of a reed, the goddess Canna; +teaching her to respond to him in all varieties of slender sound. Hard +by, his flock of goats browsed at will. And the shaggy god called her, +wounded and outworn, kindly to him and said, “I am but a rustic +herdsman, pretty maiden, yet wise, by favour of my great age and long +experience; and if I guess truly by those faltering steps, by thy +sorrowful eyes and continual sighing, thou labourest with excess of +love. Listen then to me, and seek not death again, in the stream or +otherwise. Put aside thy woe, and turn thy prayers to Cupid. He is in +truth a delicate youth: win him by the delicacy of thy service.” + +So the shepherd-god spoke, and Psyche, answering nothing, but with a +reverence to his serviceable deity, went on her way. And while she, in +her search after Cupid, wandered through many lands, he was lying in +the chamber of his mother, heart-sick. And the white bird which floats +over the waves plunged in haste into the sea, and approaching Venus, as +she bathed, made known to her that her son lies afflicted with some +grievous hurt, doubtful of life. And Venus cried, angrily, “My son, +then, has a mistress! And it is Psyche, who witched away my beauty and +was the rival of my godhead, whom he loves!” + +Therewith she issued from the sea, and returning to her golden chamber, +found there the lad, sick, as she had heard, and cried from the +doorway, “Well done, truly! to trample thy mother’s precepts under +foot, to spare my enemy that cross of an unworthy love; nay, unite her +to thyself, child as thou art, that I might have a daughter-in-law who +hates me! I will make thee repent of thy sport, and the savour of thy +marriage bitter. There is one who shall chasten this body of thine, put +out thy torch and unstring thy bow. Not till she has plucked forth that +hair, into which so oft these hands have smoothed the golden light, and +sheared away thy wings, shall I feel the injury done me avenged.” And +with this she hastened in anger from the doors. + +And Ceres and Juno met her, and sought to know the meaning of her +troubled countenance. “Ye come in season,” she cried; “I pray you, find +for me Psyche. It must needs be that ye have heard the disgrace of my +house.” And they, ignorant of what was done, would have soothed her +anger, saying, “What fault, Mistress, hath thy son committed, that thou +wouldst destroy the girl he loves? Knowest thou not that he is now of +age? Because he wears his years so lightly must he seem to thee ever +but a child? Wilt thou for ever thus pry into the pastimes of thy son, +always accusing his wantonness, and blaming in him those delicate wiles +which are all thine own?” Thus, in secret fear of the boy’s bow, did +they seek to please him with their gracious patronage. But Venus, angry +at their light taking of her wrongs, turned her back upon them, and +with hasty steps made her way once more to the sea. + +Meanwhile Psyche, tost in soul, wandering hither and thither, rested +not night or day in the pursuit of her husband, desiring, if she might +not soothe his anger by the endearments of a wife, at the least to +propitiate him with the prayers of a handmaid. And seeing a certain +temple on the top of a high mountain, she said, “Who knows whether +yonder place be not the abode of my lord?” Thither, therefore, she +turned her steps, hastening now the more because desire and hope +pressed her on, weary as she was with the labours of the way, and so, +painfully measuring out the highest ridges of the mountain, drew near +to the sacred couches. She sees ears of wheat, in heaps or twisted into +chaplets; ears of barley also, with sickles and all the instruments of +harvest, lying there in disorder, thrown at random from the hands of +the labourers in the great heat. These she curiously sets apart, one by +one, duly ordering them; for she said within herself, “I may not +neglect the shrines, nor the holy service, of any god there be, but +must rather win by supplication the kindly mercy of them all.” + +And Ceres found her bending sadly upon her task, and cried aloud, +“Alas, Psyche! Venus, in the furiousness of her anger, tracks thy +footsteps through the world, seeking for thee to pay her the utmost +penalty; and thou, thinking of anything rather than thine own safety, +hast taken on thee the care of what belongs to me!” Then Psyche fell +down at her feet, and sweeping the floor with her hair, washing the +footsteps of the goddess in her tears, besought her mercy, with many +prayers:—“By the gladdening rites of harvest, by the lighted lamps and +mystic marches of the Marriage and mysterious Invention of thy daughter +Proserpine, and by all beside that the holy place of Attica veils in +silence, minister, I pray thee, to the sorrowful heart of Psyche! +Suffer me to hide myself but for a few days among the heaps of corn, +till time have softened the anger of the goddess, and my strength, +out-worn in my long travail, be recovered by a little rest.” + +But Ceres answered her, “Truly thy tears move me, and I would fain help +thee; only I dare not incur the ill-will of my kinswoman. Depart hence +as quickly as may be.” And Psyche, repelled against hope, afflicted now +with twofold sorrow, making her way back again, beheld among the +half-lighted woods of the valley below a sanctuary builded with cunning +art. And that she might lose no way of hope, howsoever doubtful, she +drew near to the sacred doors. She sees there gifts of price, and +garments fixed upon the door-posts and to the branches of the trees, +wrought with letters of gold which told the name of the goddess to whom +they were dedicated, with thanksgiving for that she had done. So, with +bent knee and hands laid about the glowing altar, she prayed saying, +“Sister and spouse of Jupiter! be thou to these my desperate fortune’s +Juno the Auspicious! I know that thou dost willingly help those in +travail with child; deliver me from the peril that is upon me.” And as +she prayed thus, Juno in the majesty of her godhead, was straightway +present, and answered, “Would that I might incline favourably to thee; +but against the will of Venus, whom I have ever loved as a daughter, I +may not, for very shame, grant thy prayer.” + +And Psyche, dismayed by this new shipwreck of her hope, communed thus +with herself, “Whither, from the midst of the snares that beset me, +shall I take my way once more? In what dark solitude shall I hide me +from the all-seeing eye of Venus? What if I put on at length a man’s +courage, and yielding myself unto her as my mistress, soften by a +humility not yet too late the fierceness of her purpose? Who knows but +that I may find him also whom my soul seeketh after, in the abode of +his mother?” + +And Venus, renouncing all earthly aid in her search, prepared to return +to heaven. She ordered the chariot to be made ready, wrought for her by +Vulcan as a marriage-gift, with a cunning of hand which had left his +work so much the richer by the weight of gold it lost under his tool. +From the multitude which housed about the bed-chamber of their +mistress, white doves came forth, and with joyful motions bent their +painted necks beneath the yoke. Behind it, with playful riot, the +sparrows sped onward, and other birds sweet of song, making known by +their soft notes the approach of the goddess. Eagle and cruel hawk +alarmed not the quireful family of Venus. And the clouds broke away, as +the uttermost ether opened to receive her, daughter and goddess, with +great joy. + +And Venus passed straightway to the house of Jupiter to beg from him +the service of Mercury, the god of speech. And Jupiter refused not her +prayer. And Venus and Mercury descended from heaven together; and as +they went, the former said to the latter, “Thou knowest, my brother of +Arcady, that never at any time have I done anything without thy help; +for how long time, moreover, I have sought a certain maiden in vain. +And now naught remains but that, by thy heraldry, I proclaim a reward +for whomsoever shall find her. Do thou my bidding quickly.” And +therewith she conveyed to him a little scrip, in the which was written +the name of Psyche, with other things; and so returned home. + +And Mercury failed not in his office; but departing into all lands, +proclaimed that whosoever delivered up to Venus the fugitive girl, +should receive from herself seven kisses—one thereof full of the inmost +honey of her throat. With that the doubt of Psyche was ended. And now, +as she came near to the doors of Venus, one of the household, whose +name was Use-and-Wont, ran out to her, crying, “Hast thou learned, +Wicked Maid! now at last! that thou hast a mistress?” And seizing her +roughly by the hair, drew her into the presence of Venus. And when +Venus saw her, she cried out, saying, “Thou hast deigned then to make +thy salutations to thy mother-in-law. Now will I in turn treat thee as +becometh a dutiful daughter-in-law!” + +And she took barley and millet and poppy-seed, every kind of grain and +seed, and mixed them together, and laughed, and said to her: “Methinks +so plain a maiden can earn lovers only by industrious ministry: now +will I also make trial of thy service. Sort me this heap of seed, the +one kind from the others, grain by grain; and get thy task done before +the evening.” And Psyche, stunned by the cruelty of her bidding, was +silent, and moved not her hand to the inextricable heap. And there came +forth a little ant, which had understanding of the difficulty of her +task, and took pity upon the consort of the god of Love; and he ran +deftly hither and thither, and called together the whole army of his +fellows. “Have pity,” he cried, “nimble scholars of the Earth, Mother +of all things!—have pity upon the wife of Love, and hasten to help her +in her perilous effort.” Then, one upon the other, the hosts of the +insect people hurried together; and they sorted asunder the whole heap +of seed, separating every grain after its kind, and so departed quickly +out of sight. + +And at nightfall Venus returned, and seeing that task finished with so +wonderful diligence, she cried, “The work is not thine, thou naughty +maid, but his in whose eyes thou hast found favour.” And calling her +again in the morning, “See now the grove,” she said, “beyond yonder +torrent. Certain sheep feed there, whose fleeces shine with gold. Fetch +me straightway a lock of that precious stuff, having gotten it as thou +mayst.” + +And Psyche went forth willingly, not to obey the command of Venus, but +even to seek a rest from her labour in the depths of the river. But +from the river, the green reed, lowly mother of music, spake to her: “O +Psyche! pollute not these waters by self-destruction, nor approach that +terrible flock; for, as the heat groweth, they wax fierce. Lie down +under yon plane-tree, till the quiet of the river’s breath have soothed +them. Thereafter thou mayst shake down the fleecy gold from the trees +of the grove, for it holdeth by the leaves.” + +And Psyche, instructed thus by the simple reed, in the humanity of its +heart, filled her bosom with the soft golden stuff, and returned to +Venus. But the goddess smiled bitterly, and said to her, “Well know I +who was the author of this thing also. I will make further trial of thy +discretion, and the boldness of thy heart. Seest thou the utmost peak +of yonder steep mountain? The dark stream which flows down thence +waters the Stygian fields, and swells the flood of Cocytus. Bring me +now, in this little urn, a draught from its innermost source.” And +therewith she put into her hands a vessel of wrought crystal. + +And Psyche set forth in haste on her way to the mountain, looking there +at last to find the end of her hapless life. But when she came to the +region which borders on the cliff that was showed to her, she +understood the deadly nature of her task. From a great rock, steep and +slippery, a horrible river of water poured forth, falling straightway +by a channel exceeding narrow into the unseen gulf below. And lo! +creeping from the rocks on either hand, angry serpents, with their long +necks and sleepless eyes. The very waters found a voice and bade her +depart, in smothered cries of, Depart hence! and What doest thou here? +Look around thee! and Destruction is upon thee! And then sense left +her, in the immensity of her peril, as one changed to stone. + +Yet not even then did the distress of this innocent soul escape the +steady eye of a gentle providence. For the bird of Jupiter spread his +wings and took flight to her, and asked her, “Didst thou think, simple +one, even thou! that thou couldst steal one drop of that relentless +stream, the holy river of Styx, terrible even to the gods? But give me +thine urn.” And the bird took the urn, and filled it at the source, and +returned to her quickly from among the teeth of the serpents, bringing +with him of the waters, all unwilling—nay! warning him to depart away +and not molest them. + +And she, receiving the urn with great joy, ran back quickly that she +might deliver it to Venus, and yet again satisfied not the angry +goddess. “My child!” she said, “in this one thing further must thou +serve me. Take now this tiny casket, and get thee down even unto hell, +and deliver it to Proserpine. Tell her that Venus would have of her +beauty so much at least as may suffice for but one day’s use, that +beauty she possessed erewhile being foreworn and spoiled, through her +tendance upon the sick-bed of her son; and be not slow in returning.” + +And Psyche perceived there the last ebbing of her fortune—that she was +now thrust openly upon death, who must go down, of her own motion, to +Hades and the Shades. And straightway she climbed to the top of an +exceeding high tower, thinking within herself, “I will cast myself down +thence: so shall I descend most quickly into the kingdom of the dead.” +And the tower again, broke forth into speech: “Wretched Maid! Wretched +Maid! Wilt thou destroy thyself? If the breath quit thy body, then wilt +thou indeed go down into Hades, but by no means return hither. Listen +to me. Among the pathless wilds not far from this place lies a certain +mountain, and therein one of hell’s vent-holes. Through the breach a +rough way lies open, following which thou wilt come, by straight +course, to the castle of Orcus. And thou must not go empty-handed. Take +in each hand a morsel of barley-bread, soaked in hydromel; and in thy +mouth two pieces of money. And when thou shalt be now well onward in +the way of death, then wilt thou overtake a lame ass laden with wood, +and a lame driver, who will pray thee reach him certain cords to fasten +the burden which is falling from the ass: but be thou cautious to pass +on in silence. And soon as thou comest to the river of the dead, +Charon, in that crazy bark he hath, will put thee over upon the further +side. There is greed even among the dead: and thou shalt deliver to +him, for the ferrying, one of those two pieces of money, in such wise +that he take it with his hand from between thy lips. And as thou +passest over the stream, a dead old man, rising on the water, will put +up to thee his mouldering hands, and pray thee draw him into the +ferry-boat. But beware thou yield not to unlawful pity. + +“When thou shalt be come over, and art upon the causeway, certain aged +women, spinning, will cry to thee to lend thy hand to their work; and +beware again that thou take no part therein; for this also is the snare +of Venus, whereby she would cause thee to cast away one at least of +those cakes thou bearest in thy hands. And think not that a slight +matter; for the loss of either one of them will be to thee the losing +of the light of day. For a watch-dog exceeding fierce lies ever before +the threshold of that lonely house of Proserpine. Close his mouth with +one of thy cakes; so shalt thou pass by him, and enter straightway into +the presence of Proserpine herself. Then do thou deliver thy message, +and taking what she shall give thee, return back again; offering to the +watch-dog the other cake, and to the ferryman that other piece of money +thou hast in thy mouth. After this manner mayst thou return again +beneath the stars. But withal, I charge thee, think not to look into, +nor open, the casket thou bearest, with that treasure of the beauty of +the divine countenance hidden therein.” + +So spake the stones of the tower; and Psyche delayed not, but +proceeding diligently after the manner enjoined, entered into the house +of Proserpine, at whose feet she sat down humbly, and would neither the +delicate couch nor that divine food the goddess offered her, but did +straightway the business of Venus. And Proserpine filled the casket +secretly and shut the lid, and delivered it to Psyche, who fled +therewith from Hades with new strength. But coming back into the light +of day, even as she hasted now to the ending of her service, she was +seized by a rash curiosity. “Lo! now,” she said within herself, “my +simpleness! who bearing in my hands the divine loveliness, heed not to +touch myself with a particle at least therefrom, that I may please the +more, by the favour of it, my fair one, my beloved.” Even as she spoke, +she lifted the lid; and behold! within, neither beauty, nor anything +beside, save sleep only, the sleep of the dead, which took hold upon +her, filling all her members with its drowsy vapour, so that she lay +down in the way and moved not, as in the slumber of death. + +And Cupid being healed of his wound, because he would endure no longer +the absence of her he loved, gliding through the narrow window of the +chamber wherein he was holden, his pinions being now repaired by a +little rest, fled forth swiftly upon them, and coming to the place +where Psyche was, shook that sleep away from her, and set him in his +prison again, awaking her with the innocent point of his arrow. “Lo! +thine old error again,” he said, “which had like once more to have +destroyed thee! But do thou now what is lacking of the command of my +mother: the rest shall be my care.” With these words, the lover rose +upon the air; and being consumed inwardly with the greatness of his +love, penetrated with vehement wing into the highest place of heaven, +to lay his cause before the father of the gods. And the father of gods +took his hand in his, and kissed his face and said to him, “At no time, +my son, hast thou regarded me with due honour. Often hast thou vexed my +bosom, wherein lies the disposition of the stars, with those busy darts +of thine. Nevertheless, because thou hast grown up between these mine +hands, I will accomplish thy desire.” And straightway he bade Mercury +call the gods together; and, the council-chamber being filled, sitting +upon a high throne, “Ye gods,” he said, “all ye whose names are in the +white book of the Muses, ye know yonder lad. It seems good to me that +his youthful heats should by some means be restrained. And that all +occasion may be taken from him, I would even confine him in the bonds +of marriage. He has chosen and embraced a mortal maiden. Let him have +fruit of his love, and possess her for ever.” + +Thereupon he bade Mercury produce Psyche in heaven; and holding out to +her his ambrosial cup, “Take it,” he said, “and live for ever; nor +shall Cupid ever depart from thee.” And the gods sat down together to +the marriage-feast. + +On the first couch lay the bridegroom, and Psyche in his bosom. His +rustic serving-boy bare the wine to Jupiter; and Bacchus to the rest. +The Seasons crimsoned all things with their roses. Apollo sang to the +lyre, while a little Pan prattled on his reeds, and Venus danced very +sweetly to the soft music. Thus, with due rites, did Psyche pass into +the power of Cupid; and from them was born the daughter whom men call +Voluptas. + + + + +CHAPTER VI. +EUPHUISM + + +So the famous story composed itself in the memory of Marius, with an +expression changed in some ways from the original and on the whole +graver. The petulant, boyish Cupid of Apuleius was become more like +that “Lord, of terrible aspect,” who stood at Dante’s bedside and wept, +or had at least grown to the manly earnestness of the Erôs of +Praxiteles. Set in relief amid the coarser matter of the book, this +episode of Cupid and Psyche served to combine many lines of meditation, +already familiar to Marius, into the ideal of a perfect imaginative +love, centered upon a type of beauty entirely flawless and clean—an +ideal which never wholly faded from his thoughts, though he valued it +at various times in different degrees. The human body in its beauty, as +the highest potency of all the beauty of material objects, seemed to +him just then to be matter no longer, but, having taken celestial fire, +to assert itself as indeed the true, though visible, soul or spirit in +things. In contrast with that ideal, in all the pure brilliancy, and as +it were in the happy light, of youth and morning and the springtide, +men’s actual loves, with which at many points the book brings one into +close contact, might appear to him, like the general tenor of their +lives, to be somewhat mean and sordid. The hiddenness of perfect +things: a shrinking mysticism, a sentiment of diffidence like that +expressed in Psyche’s so tremulous hope concerning the child to be born +of the husband she had never yet seen—“in the face of this little +child, at the least, shall I apprehend thine”—in hoc saltem parvulo +cognoscam faciem tuam: the fatality which seems to haunt any signal+ +beauty, whether moral or physical, as if it were in itself something +illicit and isolating: the suspicion and hatred it so often excites in +the vulgar:—these were some of the impressions, forming, as they do, a +constant tradition of somewhat cynical pagan experience, from Medusa +and Helen downwards, which the old story enforced on him. A book, like +a person, has its fortunes with one; is lucky or unlucky in the precise +moment of its falling in our way, and often by some happy accident +counts with us for something more than its independent value. The +Metamorphoses of Apuleius, coming to Marius just then, figured for him +as indeed The Golden Book: he felt a sort of personal gratitude to its +writer, and saw in it doubtless far more than was really there for any +other reader. It occupied always a peculiar place in his remembrance, +never quite losing its power in frequent return to it for the revival +of that first glowing impression. + +Its effect upon the elder youth was a more practical one: it stimulated +the literary ambition, already so strong a motive with him, by a signal +example of success, and made him more than ever an ardent, +indefatigable student of words, of the means or instrument of the +literary art. The secrets of utterance, of expression itself, of that +through which alone any intellectual or spiritual power within one can +actually take effect upon others, to over-awe or charm them to one’s +side, presented themselves to this ambitious lad in immediate connexion +with that desire for predominance, for the satisfaction of which +another might have relied on the acquisition and display of brilliant +military qualities. In him, a fine instinctive sentiment of the exact +value and power of words was connate with the eager longing for sway +over his fellows. He saw himself already a gallant and effective +leader, innovating or conservative as occasion might require, in the +rehabilitation of the mother-tongue, then fallen so tarnished and +languid; yet the sole object, as he mused within himself, of the only +sort of patriotic feeling proper, or possible, for one born of slaves. +The popular speech was gradually departing from the form and rule of +literary language, a language always and increasingly artificial. While +the learned dialect was yearly becoming more and more barbarously +pedantic, the colloquial idiom, on the other hand, offered a thousand +chance-tost gems of racy or picturesque expression, rejected or at +least ungathered by what claimed to be classical Latin. The time was +coming when neither the pedants nor the people would really understand +Cicero; though there were some indeed, like this new writer, Apuleius, +who, departing from the custom of writing in Greek, which had been a +fashionable affectation among the sprightlier wits since the days of +Hadrian, had written in the vernacular. + +The literary programme which Flavian had already designed for himself +would be a work, then, partly conservative or reactionary, in its +dealing with the instrument of the literary art; partly popular and +revolutionary, asserting, so to term them, the rights of the +proletariate of speech. More than fifty years before, the younger +Pliny, himself an effective witness for the delicate power of the Latin +tongue, had said,—“I am one of those who admire the ancients, yet I do +not, like some others, underrate certain instances of genius which our +own times afford. For it is not true that nature, as if weary and +effete, no longer produces what is admirable.” And he, Flavian, would +prove himself the true master of the opportunity thus indicated. In his +eagerness for a not too distant fame, he dreamed over all that, as the +young Caesar may have dreamed of campaigns. Others might brutalise or +neglect the native speech, that true “open field” for charm and sway +over men. He would make of it a serious study, weighing the precise +power of every phrase and word, as though it were precious metal, +disentangling the later associations and going back to the original and +native sense of each,—restoring to full significance all its wealth of +latent figurative expression, reviving or replacing its outworn or +tarnished images. Latin literature and the Latin tongue were dying of +routine and languor; and what was necessary, first of all, was to +re-establish the natural and direct relationship between thought and +expression, between the sensation and the term, and restore to words +their primitive power. + +For words, after all, words manipulated with all his delicate force, +were to be the apparatus of a war for himself. To be forcibly +impressed, in the first place; and in the next, to find the means of +making visible to others that which was vividly apparent, delightful, +of lively interest to himself, to the exclusion of all that was but +middling, tame, or only half-true even to him—this scrupulousness of +literary art actually awoke in Flavian, for the first time, a sort of +chivalrous conscience. What care for style! what patience of execution! +what research for the significant tones of ancient idiom—sonantia verba +et antiqua! What stately and regular word-building—gravis et decora +constructio! He felt the whole meaning of the sceptical Pliny’s +somewhat melancholy advice to one of his friends, that he should seek +in literature deliverance from mortality—ut studiis se literarum a +mortalitate vindicet. And there was everything in the nature and the +training of Marius to make him a full participator in the hopes of such +a new literary school, with Flavian for its leader. In the refinements +of that curious spirit, in its horror of profanities, its fastidious +sense of a correctness in external form, there was something which +ministered to the old ritual interest, still surviving in him; as if +here indeed were involved a kind of sacred service to the +mother-tongue. + +Here, then, was the theory of Euphuism, as manifested in every age in +which the literary conscience has been awakened to forgotten duties +towards language, towards the instrument of expression: in fact it does +but modify a little the principles of all effective expression at all +times. ’Tis art’s function to conceal itself: ars est celare artem:—is +a saying, which, exaggerated by inexact quotation, has perhaps been +oftenest and most confidently quoted by those who have had little +literary or other art to conceal; and from the very beginning of +professional literature, the “labour of the file”—a labour in the case +of Plato, for instance, or Virgil, like that of the oldest of +goldsmiths as described by Apuleius, enriching the work by far more +than the weight of precious metal it removed—has always had its +function. Sometimes, doubtless, as in later examples of it, this Roman +Euphuism, determined at any cost to attain beauty in writing—es kallos +graphein+—might lapse into its characteristic fopperies or mannerisms, +into the “defects of its qualities,” in truth, not wholly unpleasing +perhaps, or at least excusable, when looked at as but the toys (so +Cicero calls them), the strictly congenial and appropriate toys, of an +assiduously cultivated age, which could not help being polite, +critical, self-conscious. The mere love of novelty also had, of course, +its part there: as with the Euphuism of the Elizabethan age, and of the +modern French romanticists, its neologies were the ground of one of the +favourite charges against it; though indeed, as regards these tricks of +taste also, there is nothing new, but a quaint family likeness rather, +between the Euphuists of successive ages. Here, as elsewhere, the power +of “fashion,” as it is called, is but one minor form, slight enough, it +may be, yet distinctly symptomatic, of that deeper yearning of human +nature towards ideal perfection, which is a continuous force in it; and +since in this direction too human nature is limited, such fashions must +necessarily reproduce themselves. Among other resemblances to later +growths of Euphuism, its archaisms on the one hand, and its neologies +on the other, the Euphuism of the days of Marcus Aurelius had, in the +composition of verse, its fancy for the refrain. It was a snatch from a +popular chorus, something he had heard sounding all over the town of +Pisa one April night, one of the first bland and summer-like nights of +the year, that Flavian had chosen for the refrain of a poem he was then +pondering—the Pervigilium Veneris—the vigil, or “nocturn,” of Venus. + +Certain elderly counsellors, filling what may be thought a constant +part in the little tragi-comedy which literature and its votaries are +playing in all ages, would ask, suspecting some affectation or +unreality in that minute culture of form:—Cannot those who have a thing +to say, say it directly? Why not be simple and broad, like the old +writers of Greece? And this challenge had at least the effect of +setting his thoughts at work on the intellectual situation as it lay +between the children of the present and those earliest masters. +Certainly, the most wonderful, the unique, point, about the Greek +genius, in literature as in everything else, was the entire absence of +imitation in its productions. How had the burden of precedent, laid +upon every artist, increased since then! It was all around one:—that +smoothly built world of old classical taste, an accomplished fact, with +overwhelming authority on every detail of the conduct of one’s work. +With no fardel on its own back, yet so imperious towards those who came +labouring after it, Hellas, in its early freshness, looked as distant +from him even then as it does from ourselves. There might seem to be no +place left for novelty or originality,—place only for a patient, an +infinite, faultlessness. On this question too Flavian passed through a +world of curious art-casuistries, of self-tormenting, at the threshold +of his work. Was poetic beauty a thing ever one and the same, a type +absolute; or, changing always with the soul of time itself, did it +depend upon the taste, the peculiar trick of apprehension, the fashion, +as we say, of each successive age? Might one recover that old, earlier +sense of it, that earlier manner, in a masterly effort to recall all +the complexities of the life, moral and intellectual, of the earlier +age to which it had belonged? Had there been really bad ages in art or +literature? Were all ages, even those earliest, adventurous, matutinal +days, in themselves equally poetical or unpoetical; and poetry, the +literary beauty, the poetic ideal, always but a borrowed light upon +men’s actual life? + +Homer had said— + +Hoi d’ hote dê limenos polybentheos entos hikonto, +Histia men steilanto, thesan d’ en nêi melainê... +Ek de kai autoi bainon epi phêgmini thalassês.+ + + +And how poetic the simple incident seemed, told just thus! Homer was +always telling things after this manner. And one might think there had +been no effort in it: that here was but the almost mechanical +transcript of a time, naturally, intrinsically, poetic, a time in which +one could hardly have spoken at all without ideal effect, or, the +sailors pulled down their boat without making a picture in “the great +style,” against a sky charged with marvels. Must not the mere prose of +an age, itself thus ideal, have counted for more than half of Homer’s +poetry? Or might the closer student discover even here, even in Homer, +the really mediatorial function of the poet, as between the reader and +the actual matter of his experience; the poet waiting, so to speak, in +an age which had felt itself trite and commonplace enough, on his +opportunity for the touch of “golden alchemy,” or at least for the +pleasantly lighted side of things themselves? Might not another, in +one’s own prosaic and used-up time, so uneventful as it had been +through the long reign of these quiet Antonines, in like manner, +discover his ideal, by a due waiting upon it? Would not a future +generation, looking back upon this, under the power of the +enchanted-distance fallacy, find it ideal to view, in contrast with its +own languor—the languor that for some reason (concerning which +Augustine will one day have his view) seemed to haunt men always? Had +Homer, even, appeared unreal and affected in his poetic flight, to some +of the people of his own age, as seemed to happen with every new +literature in turn? In any case, the intellectual conditions of early +Greece had been—how different from these! And a true literary tact +would accept that difference in forming the primary conception of the +literary function at a later time. Perhaps the utmost one could get by +conscious effort, in the way of a reaction or return to the conditions +of an earlier and fresher age, would be but novitas, artificial +artlessness, naïveté; and this quality too might have its measure of +euphuistic charm, direct and sensible enough, though it must count, in +comparison with that genuine early Greek newness at the beginning, not +as the freshness of the open fields, but only of a bunch of +field-flowers in a heated room. + +There was, meantime, all this:—on one side, the old pagan culture, for +us but a fragment, for him an accomplished yet present fact, still a +living, united, organic whole, in the entirety of its art, its thought, +its religions, its sagacious forms of polity, that so weighty authority +it exercised on every point, being in reality only the measure of its +charm for every one: on the other side, the actual world in all its +eager self-assertion, with Flavian himself, in his boundless animation, +there, at the centre of the situation. From the natural defects, from +the pettiness, of his euphuism, his assiduous cultivation of manner, he +was saved by the consciousness that he had a matter to present, very +real, at least to him. That preoccupation of the dilettante with what +might seem mere details of form, after all, did but serve the purpose +of bringing to the surface, sincerely and in their integrity, certain +strong personal intuitions, a certain vision or apprehension of things +as really being, with important results, thus, rather than +thus,—intuitions which the artistic or literary faculty was called upon +to follow, with the exactness of wax or clay, clothing the model +within. Flavian too, with his fine clear mastery of the practically +effective, had early laid hold of the principle, as axiomatic in +literature: that to know when one’s self is interested, is the first +condition of interesting other people. It was a principle, the forcible +apprehension of which made him jealous and fastidious in the selection +of his intellectual food; often listless while others read or gazed +diligently; never pretending to be moved out of mere complaisance to +people’s emotions: it served to foster in him a very scrupulous +literary sincerity with himself. And it was this uncompromising demand +for a matter, in all art, derived immediately from lively personal +intuition, this constant appeal to individual judgment, which saved his +euphuism, even at its weakest, from lapsing into mere artifice. + +Was the magnificent exordium of Lucretius, addressed to the goddess +Venus, the work of his earlier manhood, and designed originally to open +an argument less persistently sombre than that protest against the +whole pagan heaven which actually follows it? It is certainly the most +typical expression of a mood, still incident to the young poet, as a +thing peculiar to his youth, when he feels the sentimental current +setting forcibly along his veins, and so much as a matter of purely +physical excitement, that he can hardly distinguish it from the +animation of external nature, the upswelling of the seed in the earth, +and of the sap through the trees. Flavian, to whom, again, as to his +later euphuistic kinsmen, old mythology seemed as full of untried, +unexpressed motives and interest as human life itself, had long been +occupied with a kind of mystic hymn to the vernal principle of life in +things; a composition shaping itself, little by little, out of a +thousand dim perceptions, into singularly definite form (definite and +firm as fine-art in metal, thought Marius) for which, as I said, he had +caught his “refrain,” from the lips of the young men, singing because +they could not help it, in the streets of Pisa. And as oftenest happens +also, with natures of genuinely poetic quality, those piecemeal +beginnings came suddenly to harmonious completeness among the fortunate +incidents, the physical heat and light, of one singularly happy day. + +It was one of the first hot days of March—“the sacred day”—on which, +from Pisa, as from many another harbour on the Mediterranean, the Ship +of Isis went to sea, and every one walked down to the shore-side to +witness the freighting of the vessel, its launching and final +abandonment among the waves, as an object really devoted to the Great +Goddess, that new rival, or “double,” of ancient Venus, and like her a +favourite patroness of sailors. On the evening next before, all the +world had been abroad to view the illumination of the river; the +stately lines of building being wreathed with hundreds of many-coloured +lamps. The young men had poured forth their chorus— + +Cras amet qui nunquam amavit, +Quique amavit cras amet— + + +as they bore their torches through the yielding crowd, or rowed their +lanterned boats up and down the stream, till far into the night, when +heavy rain-drops had driven the last lingerers home. Morning broke, +however, smiling and serene; and the long procession started betimes. +The river, curving slightly, with the smoothly paved streets on either +side, between its low marble parapet and the fair dwelling-houses, +formed the main highway of the city; and the pageant, accompanied +throughout by innumerable lanterns and wax tapers, took its course up +one of these streets, crossing the water by a bridge up-stream, and +down the other, to the haven, every possible standing-place, out of +doors and within, being crowded with sight-seers, of whom Marius was +one of the most eager, deeply interested in finding the spectacle much +as Apuleius had described it in his famous book. + +At the head of the procession, the master of ceremonies, quietly waving +back the assistants, made way for a number of women, scattering +perfumes. They were succeeded by a company of musicians, piping and +twanging, on instruments the strangest Marius had ever beheld, the +notes of a hymn, narrating the first origin of this votive rite to a +choir of youths, who marched behind them singing it. The tire-women and +other personal attendants of the great goddess came next, bearing the +instruments of their ministry, and various articles from the sacred +wardrobe, wrought of the most precious material; some of them with long +ivory combs, plying their hands in wild yet graceful concert of +movement as they went, in devout mimicry of the toilet. Placed in their +rear were the mirror-bearers of the goddess, carrying large mirrors of +beaten brass or silver, turned in such a way as to reflect to the great +body of worshippers who followed, the face of the mysterious image, as +it moved on its way, and their faces to it, as though they were in fact +advancing to meet the heavenly visitor. They comprehended a multitude +of both sexes and of all ages, already initiated into the divine +secret, clad in fair linen, the females veiled, the males with shining +tonsures, and every one carrying a sistrum—the richer sort of silver, a +few very dainty persons of fine gold—rattling the reeds, with a noise +like the jargon of innumerable birds and insects awakened from torpor +and abroad in the spring sun. Then, borne upon a kind of platform, came +the goddess herself, undulating above the heads of the multitude as the +bearers walked, in mystic robe embroidered with the moon and stars, +bordered gracefully with a fringe of real fruit and flowers, and with a +glittering crown upon the head. The train of the procession consisted +of the priests in long white vestments, close from head to foot, +distributed into various groups, each bearing, exposed aloft, one of +the sacred symbols of Isis—the corn-fan, the golden asp, the ivory hand +of equity, and among them the votive ship itself, carved and gilt, and +adorned bravely with flags flying. Last of all walked the high priest; +the people kneeling as he passed to kiss his hand, in which were those +well-remembered roses. + +Marius followed with the rest to the harbour, where the mystic ship, +lowered from the shoulders of the priests, was loaded with as much as +it could carry of the rich spices and other costly gifts, offered in +great profusion by the worshippers, and thus, launched at last upon the +water, left the shore, crossing the harbour-bar in the wake of a much +stouter vessel than itself with a crew of white-robed mariners, whose +function it was, at the appointed moment, finally to desert it on the +open sea. + +The remainder of the day was spent by most in parties on the water. +Flavian and Marius sailed further than they had ever done before to a +wild spot on the bay, the traditional site of a little Greek colony, +which, having had its eager, stirring life at the time when Etruria was +still a power in Italy, had perished in the age of the civil wars. In +the absolute transparency of the air on this gracious day, an +infinitude of detail from sea and shore reached the eye with sparkling +clearness, as the two lads sped rapidly over the waves—Flavian at work +suddenly, from time to time, with his tablets. They reached land at +last. The coral fishers had spread their nets on the sands, with a +tumble-down of quaint, many-hued treasures, below a little shrine of +Venus, fluttering and gay with the scarves and napkins and gilded +shells which these people had offered to the image. Flavian and Marius +sat down under the shadow of a mass of gray rock or ruin, where the +sea-gate of the Greek town had been, and talked of life in those old +Greek colonies. Of this place, all that remained, besides those rude +stones, was—a handful of silver coins, each with a head of pure and +archaic beauty, though a little cruel perhaps, supposed to represent +the Siren Ligeia, whose tomb was formerly shown here—only these, and an +ancient song, the very strain which Flavian had recovered in those last +months. They were records which spoke, certainly, of the charm of life +within those walls. How strong must have been the tide of men’s +existence in that little republican town, so small that this circle of +gray stones, of service now only by the moisture they gathered for the +blue-flowering gentians among them, had been the line of its rampart! +An epitome of all that was liveliest, most animated and adventurous, in +the old Greek people of which it was an offshoot, it had enhanced the +effect of these gifts by concentration within narrow limits. The band +of “devoted youth,”—hiera neotês.+—of the younger brothers, devoted to +the gods and whatever luck the gods might afford, because there was no +room for them at home—went forth, bearing the sacred flame from the +mother hearth; itself a flame, of power to consume the whole material +of existence in clear light and heat, with no smouldering residue. The +life of those vanished townsmen, so brilliant and revolutionary, +applying so abundantly the personal qualities which alone just then +Marius seemed to value, associated itself with the actual figure of his +companion, standing there before him, his face enthusiastic with the +sudden thought of all that; and struck him vividly as precisely the +fitting opportunity for a nature like his, so hungry for control, for +ascendency over men. + +Marius noticed also, however, as high spirits flagged at last, on the +way home through the heavy dew of the evening, more than physical +fatigue in Flavian, who seemed to find no refreshment in the coolness. +There had been something feverish, perhaps, and like the beginning of +sickness, about his almost forced gaiety, in this sudden spasm of +spring; and by the evening of the next day he was lying with a burning +spot on his forehead, stricken, as was thought from the first, by the +terrible new disease. + +NOTES + + +93. +Corrected from the Macmillan edition misprint “singal.” + + +98. +Transliteration: es kallos graphein. Translation: “To write +beautifully.” + + +100. +Iliad 1.432-33, 437. Transliteration: + + +Hoi d’ hote dê limenos polybentheos entos hikonto, +Histia men steilanto, thesan d’ en nêi melainê... +Ek de kai autoi bainon epi phêgmini thalassês. + + +Etext editor’s translation: + + +When they had safely made deep harbor +They took in the sail, laid it in their black ship... +And went ashore just past the breakers. + + +109. +Transliteration: hiera neotês. Pater translates the phrase, +“devoted youth.” + + + + +CHAPTER VII. +A PAGAN END + + +For the fantastical colleague of the philosophic emperor Marcus +Aurelius, returning in triumph from the East, had brought in his train, +among the enemies of Rome, one by no means a captive. People actually +sickened at a sudden touch of the unsuspected foe, as they watched in +dense crowds the pathetic or grotesque imagery of failure or success in +the triumphal procession. And, as usual, the plague brought with it a +power to develop all pre-existent germs of superstition. It was by +dishonour done to Apollo himself, said popular rumour—to Apollo, the +old titular divinity of pestilence, that the poisonous thing had come +abroad. Pent up in a golden coffer consecrated to the god, it had +escaped in the sacrilegious plundering of his temple at Seleucia by the +soldiers of Lucius Verus, after a traitorous surprise of that town and +a cruel massacre. Certainly there was something which baffled all +imaginable precautions and all medical science, in the suddenness with +which the disease broke out simultaneously, here and there, among both +soldiers and citizens, even in places far remote from the main line of +its march in the rear of the victorious army. It seemed to have invaded +the whole empire, and some have even thought that, in a mitigated form, +it permanently remained there. In Rome itself many thousands perished; +and old authorities tell of farmsteads, whole towns, and even entire +neighbourhoods, which from that time continued without inhabitants and +lapsed into wildness or ruin. + +Flavian lay at the open window of his lodging, with a fiery pang in the +brain, fancying no covering thin or light enough to be applied to his +body. His head being relieved after a while, there was distress at the +chest. It was but the fatal course of the strange new sickness, under +many disguises; travelling from the brain to the feet, like a material +resident, weakening one after another of the organic centres; often, +when it did not kill, depositing various degrees of lifelong infirmity +in this member or that; and after such descent, returning upwards +again, now as a mortal coldness, leaving the entrenchments of the +fortress of life overturned, one by one, behind it. + +Flavian lay there, with the enemy at his breast now in a painful cough, +but relieved from that burning fever in the head, amid the rich-scented +flowers—rare Paestum roses, and the like —procured by Marius for his +solace, in a fancied convalescence; and would, at intervals, return to +labour at his verses, with a great eagerness to complete and transcribe +the work, while Marius sat and wrote at his dictation, one of the +latest but not the poorest specimens of genuine Latin poetry. + +It was in fact a kind of nuptial hymn, which, taking its start from the +thought of nature as the universal mother, celebrated the preliminary +pairing and mating together of all fresh things, in the hot and genial +spring-time—the immemorial nuptials of the soul of spring itself and +the brown earth; and was full of a delighted, mystic sense of what +passed between them in that fantastic marriage. That mystic burden was +relieved, at intervals, by the familiar playfulness of the Latin +verse-writer in dealing with mythology, which, though coming at so late +a day, had still a wonderful freshness in its old age.—“Amor has put +his weapons by and will keep holiday. He was bidden go without apparel, +that none might be wounded by his bow and arrows. But take care! In +truth he is none the less armed than usual, though he be all unclad.” + +In the expression of all this Flavian seemed, while making it his chief +aim to retain the opulent, many-syllabled vocabulary of the Latin +genius, at some points even to have advanced beyond it, in anticipation +of wholly new laws of taste as regards sound, a new range of sound +itself. The peculiar resultant note, associating itself with certain +other experiences of his, was to Marius like the foretaste of an +entirely novel world of poetic beauty to come. Flavian had caught, +indeed, something of the rhyming cadence, the sonorous organ-music of +the medieval Latin, and therewithal something of its unction and +mysticity of spirit. There was in his work, along with the last +splendour of the classical language, a touch, almost prophetic, of that +transformed life it was to have in the rhyming middle age, just about +to dawn. The impression thus forced upon Marius connected itself with a +feeling, the exact inverse of that, known to every one, which seems to +say, You have been just here, just thus, before!—a feeling, in his +case, not reminiscent but prescient of the future, which passed over +him afterwards many times, as he came across certain places and people. +It was as if he detected there the process of actual change to a wholly +undreamed-of and renewed condition of human body and soul: as if he saw +the heavy yet decrepit old Roman architecture about him, rebuilding on +an intrinsically better pattern. Could it have been actually on a new +musical instrument that Flavian had first heard the novel accents of +his verse? And still Marius noticed there, amid all its richness of +expression and imagery, that firmness of outline he had always relished +so much in the composition of Flavian. Yes! a firmness like that of +some master of noble metal-work, manipulating tenacious bronze or gold. +Even now that haunting refrain, with its impromptu variations, from the +throats of those strong young men, came floating through the window. + +Cras amet qui nunquam amavit, +Quique amavit cras amet! + + +—repeated Flavian, tremulously, dictating yet one stanza more. + +What he was losing, his freehold of a soul and body so fortunately +endowed, the mere liberty of life above-ground, “those sunny mornings +in the cornfields by the sea,” as he recollected them one day, when the +window was thrown open upon the early freshness—his sense of all this, +was from the first singularly near and distinct, yet rather as of +something he was but debarred the use of for a time than finally +bidding farewell to. That was while he was still with no very grave +misgivings as to the issue of his sickness, and felt the sources of +life still springing essentially unadulterate within him. From time to +time, indeed, Marius, labouring eagerly at the poem from his dictation, +was haunted by a feeling of the triviality of such work just then. The +recurrent sense of some obscure danger beyond the mere danger of death, +vaguer than that and by so much the more terrible, like the menace of +some shadowy adversary in the dark with whose mode of attack they had +no acquaintance, disturbed him now and again through those hours of +excited attention to his manuscript, and to the purely physical wants +of Flavian. Still, during these three days there was much hope and +cheerfulness, and even jesting. Half-consciously Marius tried to +prolong one or another relieving circumstance of the day, the +preparations for rest and morning refreshment, for instance; sadly +making the most of the little luxury of this or that, with something of +the feigned cheer of the mother who sets her last morsels before her +famished child as for a feast, but really that he “may eat it and die.” + +On the afternoon of the seventh day he allowed Marius finally to put +aside the unfinished manuscript. For the enemy, leaving the chest quiet +at length though much exhausted, had made itself felt with full power +again in a painful vomiting, which seemed to shake his body asunder, +with great consequent prostration. From that time the distress +increased rapidly downwards. Omnia tum vero vitai claustra lababant;+ +and soon the cold was mounting with sure pace from the dead feet to the +head. + +And now Marius began more than to suspect what the issue must be, and +henceforward could but watch with a sort of agonised fascination the +rapid but systematic work of the destroyer, faintly relieving a little +the mere accidents of the sharper forms of suffering. Flavian himself +appeared, in full consciousness at last—in clear-sighted, deliberate +estimate of the actual crisis—to be doing battle with his adversary. +His mind surveyed, with great distinctness, the various suggested modes +of relief. He must without fail get better, he would fancy, might he be +removed to a certain place on the hills where as a child he had once +recovered from sickness, but found that he could scarcely raise his +head from the pillow without giddiness. As if now surely foreseeing the +end, he would set himself, with an eager effort, and with that eager +and angry look, which is noted as one of the premonitions of death in +this disease, to fashion out, without formal dictation, still a few +more broken verses of his unfinished work, in hard-set determination, +defiant of pain, to arrest this or that little drop at least from the +river of sensuous imagery rushing so quickly past him. + +But at length delirium—symptom that the work of the plague was done, +and the last resort of life yielding to the enemy—broke the coherent +order of words and thoughts; and Marius, intent on the coming agony, +found his best hope in the increasing dimness of the patient’s mind. In +intervals of clearer consciousness the visible signs of cold, of sorrow +and desolation, were very painful. No longer battling with the disease, +he seemed as it were to place himself at the disposal of the victorious +foe, dying passively, like some dumb creature, in hopeless acquiescence +at last. That old, half-pleading petulance, unamiable, yet, as it might +seem, only needing conditions of life a little happier than they had +actually been, to become refinement of affection, a delicate grace in +its demand on the sympathy of others, had changed in those moments of +full intelligence to a clinging and tremulous gentleness, as he lay—“on +the very threshold of death”—with a sharply contracted hand in the hand +of Marius, to his almost surprised joy, winning him now to an +absolutely self-forgetful devotion. There was a new sort of pleading in +the misty eyes, just because they took such unsteady note of him, which +made Marius feel as if guilty; anticipating thus a form of +self-reproach with which even the tenderest ministrant may be sometimes +surprised, when, at death, affectionate labour suddenly ceasing leaves +room for the suspicion of some failure of love perhaps, at one or +another minute point in it. Marius almost longed to take his share in +the suffering, that he might understand so the better how to relieve +it. + +It seemed that the light of the lamp distressed the patient, and Marius +extinguished it. The thunder which had sounded all day among the hills, +with a heat not unwelcome to Flavian, had given way at nightfall to +steady rain; and in the darkness Marius lay down beside him, faintly +shivering now in the sudden cold, to lend him his own warmth, +undeterred by the fear of contagion which had kept other people from +passing near the house. At length about day-break he perceived that the +last effort had come with a revival of mental clearness, as Marius +understood by the contact, light as it was, in recognition of him +there. “Is it a comfort,” he whispered then, “that I shall often come +and weep over you?”—“Not unless I be aware, and hear you weeping!” + +The sun shone out on the people going to work for a long hot day, and +Marius was standing by the dead, watching, with deliberate purpose to +fix in his memory every detail, that he might have this picture in +reserve, should any hour of forgetfulness hereafter come to him with +the temptation to feel completely happy again. A feeling of outrage, of +resentment against nature itself, mingled with an agony of pity, as he +noted on the now placid features a certain look of humility, almost +abject, like the expression of a smitten child or animal, as of one, +fallen at last, after bewildering struggle, wholly under the power of a +merciless adversary. From mere tenderness of soul he would not forget +one circumstance in all that; as a man might piously stamp on his +memory the death-scene of a brother wrongfully condemned to die, +against a time that may come. + +The fear of the corpse, which surprised him in his effort to watch by +it through the darkness, was a hint of his own failing strength, just +in time. The first night after the washing of the body, he bore stoutly +enough the tax which affection seemed to demand, throwing the incense +from time to time on the little altar placed beside the bier. It was +the recurrence of the thing—that unchanged outline below the coverlet, +amid a silence in which the faintest rustle seemed to speak—that +finally overcame his determination. Surely, here, in this alienation, +this sense of distance between them, which had come over him before +though in minor degree when the mind of Flavian had wandered in his +sickness, was another of the pains of death. Yet he was able to make +all due preparations, and go through the ceremonies, shortened a little +because of the infection, when, on a cloudless evening, the funeral +procession went forth; himself, the flames of the pyre having done +their work, carrying away the urn of the deceased, in the folds of his +toga, to its last resting-place in the cemetery beside the highway, and +so turning home to sleep in his own desolate lodging. + +Quis desiderio sit pudor aut modus + Tam cari capitis?—+ + + +What thought of others’ thoughts about one could there be with the +regret for “so dear a head” fresh at one’s heart? + +NOTES + + +116. +Lucretius, Book VI.1153. + + +120. +Horace, Odes I.xxiv.1-2. + + + + +PART THE SECOND + + + + +CHAPTER VIII. +ANIMULA VAGULA + + +Animula, vagula, blandula +Hospes comesque corporis, +Quae nunc abibis in loca? +Pallidula, rigida, nudula. + + +The Emperor Hadrian to his Soul + + +Flavian was no more. The little marble chest with its dust and tears +lay cold among the faded flowers. For most people the actual spectacle +of death brings out into greater reality, at least for the imagination, +whatever confidence they may entertain of the soul’s survival in +another life. To Marius, greatly agitated by that event, the earthly +end of Flavian came like a final revelation of nothing less than the +soul’s extinction. Flavian had gone out as utterly as the fire among +those still beloved ashes. Even that wistful suspense of judgment +expressed by the dying Hadrian, regarding further stages of being still +possible for the soul in some dim journey hence, seemed wholly +untenable, and, with it, almost all that remained of the religion of +his childhood. Future extinction seemed just then to be what the +unforced witness of his own nature pointed to. On the other hand, there +came a novel curiosity as to what the various schools of ancient +philosophy had had to say concerning that strange, fluttering creature; +and that curiosity impelled him to certain severe studies, in which his +earlier religious conscience seemed still to survive, as a principle of +hieratic scrupulousness or integrity of thought, regarding this new +service to intellectual light. + +At this time, by his poetic and inward temper, he might have fallen a +prey to the enervating mysticism, then in wait for ardent souls in many +a melodramatic revival of old religion or theosophy. From all this, +fascinating as it might actually be to one side of his character, he +was kept by a genuine virility there, effective in him, among other +results, as a hatred of what was theatrical, and the instinctive +recognition that in vigorous intelligence, after all, divinity was most +likely to be found a resident. With this was connected the feeling, +increasing with his advance to manhood, of a poetic beauty in mere +clearness of thought, the actually aesthetic charm of a cold austerity +of mind; as if the kinship of that to the clearness of physical light +were something more than a figure of speech. Of all those various +religious fantasies, as so many forms of enthusiasm, he could well +appreciate the picturesque; that was made easy by his natural +Epicureanism, already prompting him to conceive of himself as but the +passive spectator of the world around him. But it was to the severer +reasoning, of which such matters as Epicurean theory are born, that, in +effect, he now betook himself. Instinctively suspicious of those +mechanical arcana, those pretended “secrets unveiled” of the +professional mystic, which really bring great and little souls to one +level, for Marius the only possible dilemma lay between that old, +ancestral Roman religion, now become so incredible to him and the +honest action of his own untroubled, unassisted intelligence. Even the +Arcana Celestia of Platonism—what the sons of Plato had had to say +regarding the essential indifference of pure soul to its bodily house +and merely occasional dwelling-place—seemed to him while his heart was +there in the urn with the material ashes of Flavian, or still lingering +in memory over his last agony, wholly inhuman or morose, as tending to +alleviate his resentment at nature’s wrong. It was to the sentiment of +the body, and the affections it defined—the flesh, of whose force and +colour that wandering Platonic soul was but so frail a residue or +abstract—he must cling. The various pathetic traits of the beloved, +suffering, perished body of Flavian, so deeply pondered, had made him a +materialist, but with something of the temper of a devotee. + +As a consequence it might have seemed at first that his care for poetry +had passed away, to be replaced by the literature of thought. His +much-pondered manuscript verses were laid aside; and what happened now +to one, who was certainly to be something of a poet from first to last, +looked at the moment like a change from poetry to prose. He came of age +about this time, his own master though with beardless face; and at +eighteen, an age at which, then as now, many youths of capacity, who +fancied themselves poets, secluded themselves from others chiefly in +affectation and vague dreaming, he secluded himself indeed from others, +but in a severe intellectual meditation, that salt of poetry, without +which all the more serious charm is lacking to the imaginative world. +Still with something of the old religious earnestness of his childhood, +he set himself—Sich im Denken zu orientiren—to determine his bearings, +as by compass, in the world of thought—to get that precise acquaintance +with the creative intelligence itself, its structure and capacities, +its relation to other parts of himself and to other things, without +which, certainly, no poetry can be masterly. Like a young man rich in +this world’s goods coming of age, he must go into affairs, and +ascertain his outlook. There must be no disguises. An exact estimate of +realities, as towards himself, he must have—a delicately measured +gradation of certainty in things—from the distant, haunted horizon of +mere surmise or imagination, to the actual feeling of sorrow in his +heart, as he reclined one morning, alone instead of in pleasant +company, to ponder the hard sayings of an imperfect old Greek +manuscript, unrolled beside him. His former gay companions, meeting him +in the streets of the old Italian town, and noting the graver lines +coming into the face of the sombre but enthusiastic student of +intellectual structure, who could hold his own so well in the society +of accomplished older men, were half afraid of him, though proud to +have him of their company. Why this reserve?—they asked, concerning the +orderly, self-possessed youth, whose speech and carriage seemed so +carefully measured, who was surely no poet like the rapt, dishevelled +Lupus. Was he secretly in love, perhaps, whose toga was so daintily +folded, and who was always as fresh as the flowers he wore; or bent on +his own line of ambition: or even on riches? + +Marius, meantime, was reading freely, in early morning for the most +part, those writers chiefly who had made it their business to know what +might be thought concerning that strange, enigmatic, personal essence, +which had seemed to go out altogether, along with the funeral fires. +And the old Greek who more than any other was now giving form to his +thoughts was a very hard master. From Epicurus, from the thunder and +lightning of Lucretius—like thunder and lightning some distance off, +one might recline to enjoy, in a garden of roses—he had gone back to +the writer who was in a certain sense the teacher of both, Heraclitus +of Ionia. His difficult book “Concerning Nature” was even then rare, +for people had long since satisfied themselves by the quotation of +certain brilliant, isolated, oracles only, out of what was at best a +taxing kind of lore. But the difficulty of the early Greek prose did +but spur the curiosity of Marius; the writer, the superior clearness of +whose intellectual view had so sequestered him from other men, who had +had so little joy of that superiority, being avowedly exacting as to +the amount of devout attention he required from the student. “The +many,” he said, always thus emphasising the difference between the many +and the few, are “like people heavy with wine,” “led by children,” +“knowing not whither they go;” and yet, “much learning doth not make +wise;” and again, “the ass, after all, would have his thistles rather +than fine gold.” + +Heraclitus, indeed, had not under-rated the difficulty for “the many” +of the paradox with which his doctrine begins, and the due reception of +which must involve a denial of habitual impressions, as the necessary +first step in the way of truth. His philosophy had been developed in +conscious, outspoken opposition to the current mode of thought, as a +matter requiring some exceptional loyalty to pure reason and its “dry +light.” Men are subject to an illusion, he protests, regarding matters +apparent to sense. What the uncorrected sense gives was a false +impression of permanence or fixity in things, which have really changed +their nature in the very moment in which we see and touch them. And the +radical flaw in the current mode of thinking would lie herein: that, +reflecting this false or uncorrected sensation, it attributes to the +phenomena of experience a durability which does not really belong to +them. Imaging forth from those fluid impressions a world of firmly +out-lined objects, it leads one to regard as a thing stark and dead +what is in reality full of animation, of vigour, of the fire of +life—that eternal process of nature, of which at a later time Goethe +spoke as the “Living Garment,” whereby God is seen of us, ever in +weaving at the “Loom of Time.” + +And the appeal which the old Greek thinker made was, in the first +instance, from confused to unconfused sensation; with a sort of +prophetic seriousness, a great claim and assumption, such as we may +understand, if we anticipate in this preliminary scepticism the +ulterior scope of his speculation, according to which the universal +movement of all natural things is but one particular stage, or measure, +of that ceaseless activity wherein the divine reason consists. The one +true being—that constant subject of all early thought—it was his merit +to have conceived, not as sterile and stagnant inaction, but as a +perpetual energy, from the restless stream of which, at certain points, +some elements detach themselves, and harden into non-entity and death, +corresponding, as outward objects, to man’s inward condition of +ignorance: that is, to the slowness of his faculties. It is with this +paradox of a subtle, perpetual change in all visible things, that the +high speculation of Heraclitus begins. Hence the scorn he expresses for +anything like a careless, half-conscious, “use-and-wont” reception of +our experience, which took so strong a hold on men’s memories! Hence +those many precepts towards a strenuous self-consciousness in all we +think and do, that loyalty to cool and candid reason, which makes +strict attentiveness of mind a kind of religious duty and service. + +The negative doctrine, then, that the objects of our ordinary +experience, fixed as they seem, are really in perpetual change, had +been, as originally conceived, but the preliminary step towards a large +positive system of almost religious philosophy. Then as now, the +illuminated philosophic mind might apprehend, in what seemed a mass of +lifeless matter, the movement of that universal life, in which things, +and men’s impressions of them, were ever “coming to be,” alternately +consumed and renewed. That continual change, to be discovered by the +attentive understanding where common opinion found fixed objects, was +but the indicator of a subtler but all-pervading motion—the sleepless, +ever-sustained, inexhaustible energy of the divine reason itself, +proceeding always by its own rhythmical logic, and lending to all mind +and matter, in turn, what life they had. In this “perpetual flux” of +things and of souls, there was, as Heraclitus conceived, a continuance, +if not of their material or spiritual elements, yet of orderly +intelligible relationships, like the harmony of musical notes, wrought +out in and through the series of their mutations—ordinances of the +divine reason, maintained throughout the changes of the phenomenal +world; and this harmony in their mutation and opposition, was, after +all, a principle of sanity, of reality, there. But it happened, that, +of all this, the first, merely sceptical or negative step, that easiest +step on the threshold, had alone remained in general memory; and the +“doctrine of motion” seemed to those who had felt its seduction to make +all fixed knowledge impossible. The swift passage of things, the still +swifter passage of those modes of our conscious being which seemed to +reflect them, might indeed be the burning of the divine fire: but what +was ascertained was that they did pass away like a devouring flame, or +like the race of water in the mid-stream—too swiftly for any real +knowledge of them to be attainable. Heracliteanism had grown to be +almost identical with the famous doctrine of the sophist Protagoras, +that the momentary, sensible apprehension of the individual was the +only standard of what is or is not, and each one the measure of all +things to himself. The impressive name of Heraclitus had become but an +authority for a philosophy of the despair of knowledge. + +And as it had been with his original followers in Greece, so it +happened now with the later Roman disciple. He, too, paused at the +apprehension of that constant motion of things—the drift of flowers, of +little or great souls, of ambitious systems, in the stream around him, +the first source, the ultimate issue, of which, in regions out of +sight, must count with him as but a dim problem. The bold mental flight +of the old Greek master from the fleeting, competing objects of +experience to that one universal life, in which the whole sphere of +physical change might be reckoned as but a single pulsation, remained +by him as hypothesis only—the hypothesis he actually preferred, as in +itself most credible, however scantily realisable even by the +imagination—yet still as but one unverified hypothesis, among many +others, concerning the first principle of things. He might reserve it +as a fine, high, visionary consideration, very remote upon the +intellectual ladder, just at the point, indeed, where that ladder +seemed to pass into the clouds, but for which there was certainly no +time left just now by his eager interest in the real objects so close +to him, on the lowlier earthy steps nearest the ground. And those +childish days of reverie, when he played at priests, played in many +another day-dream, working his way from the actual present, as far as +he might, with a delightful sense of escape in replacing the outer +world of other people by an inward world as himself really cared to +have it, had made him a kind of “idealist.” He was become aware of the +possibility of a large dissidence between an inward and somewhat +exclusive world of vivid personal apprehension, and the unimproved, +unheightened reality of the life of those about him. As a consequence, +he was ready now to concede, somewhat more easily than others, the +first point of his new lesson, that the individual is to himself the +measure of all things, and to rely on the exclusive certainty to +himself of his own impressions. To move afterwards in that outer world +of other people, as though taking it at their estimate, would be +possible henceforth only as a kind of irony. And as with the Vicaire +Savoyard, after reflecting on the variations of philosophy, “the first +fruit he drew from that reflection was the lesson of a limitation of +his researches to what immediately interested him; to rest peacefully +in a profound ignorance as to all beside; to disquiet himself only +concerning those things which it was of import for him to know.” At +least he would entertain no theory of conduct which did not allow its +due weight to this primary element of incertitude or negation, in the +conditions of man’s life. Just here he joined company, retracing in his +individual mental pilgrimage the historic order of human thought, with +another wayfarer on the journey, another ancient Greek master, the +founder of the Cyrenaic philosophy, whose weighty traditional +utterances (for he had left no writing) served in turn to give +effective outline to the contemplations of Marius. There was something +in the doctrine itself congruous with the place wherein it had its +birth; and for a time Marius lived much, mentally, in the brilliant +Greek colony which had given a dubious name to the philosophy of +pleasure. It hung, for his fancy, between the mountains and the sea, +among richer than Italian gardens, on a certain breezy table-land +projecting from the African coast, some hundreds of miles southward +from Greece. There, in a delightful climate, with something of +transalpine temperance amid its luxury, and withal in an inward +atmosphere of temperance which did but further enhance the brilliancy +of human life, the school of Cyrene had maintained itself as almost one +with the family of its founder; certainly as nothing coarse or unclean, +and under the influence of accomplished women. + +Aristippus of Cyrene too had left off in suspense of judgment as to +what might really lie behind—flammantia moenia mundi: the flaming +ramparts of the world. Those strange, bold, sceptical surmises, which +had haunted the minds of the first Greek enquirers as merely abstract +doubt, which had been present to the mind of Heraclitus as one element +only in a system of abstract philosophy, became with Aristippus a very +subtly practical worldly-wisdom. The difference between him and those +obscure earlier thinkers is almost like that between an ancient thinker +generally, and a modern man of the world: it was the difference between +the mystic in his cell, or the prophet in the desert, and the expert, +cosmopolitan, administrator of his dark sayings, translating the +abstract thoughts of the master into terms, first of all, of sentiment. +It has been sometimes seen, in the history of the human mind, that when +thus translated into terms of sentiment—of sentiment, as lying already +half-way towards practice—the abstract ideas of metaphysics for the +first time reveal their true significance. The metaphysical principle, +in itself, as it were, without hands or feet, becomes impressive, +fascinating, of effect, when translated into a precept as to how it +were best to feel and act; in other words, under its sentimental or +ethical equivalent. The leading idea of the great master of Cyrene, his +theory that things are but shadows, and that we, even as they, never +continue in one stay, might indeed have taken effect as a languid, +enervating, consumptive nihilism, as a precept of “renunciation,” which +would touch and handle and busy itself with nothing. But in the +reception of metaphysical formulae, all depends, as regards their +actual and ulterior result, on the pre-existent qualities of that soil +of human nature into which they fall—the company they find already +present there, on their admission into the house of thought; there +being at least so much truth as this involves in the theological maxim, +that the reception of this or that speculative conclusion is really a +matter of will. The persuasion that all is vanity, with this happily +constituted Greek, who had been a genuine disciple of Socrates and +reflected, presumably, something of his blitheness in the face of the +world, his happy way of taking all chances, generated neither frivolity +nor sourness, but induced, rather, an impression, just serious enough, +of the call upon men’s attention of the crisis in which they find +themselves. It became the stimulus towards every kind of activity, and +prompted a perpetual, inextinguishable thirst after experience. + +With Marius, then, the influence of the philosopher of pleasure +depended on this, that in him an abstract doctrine, originally somewhat +acrid, had fallen upon a rich and genial nature, well fitted to +transform it into a theory of practice, of considerable stimulative +power towards a fair life. What Marius saw in him was the spectacle of +one of the happiest temperaments coming, so to speak, to an +understanding with the most depressing of theories; accepting the +results of a metaphysical system which seemed to concentrate into +itself all the weakening trains of thought in earlier Greek +speculation, and making the best of it; turning its hard, bare truths, +with wonderful tact, into precepts of grace, and delicate wisdom, and a +delicate sense of honour. Given the hardest terms, supposing our days +are indeed but a shadow, even so, we may well adorn and beautify, in +scrupulous self-respect, our souls, and whatever our souls touch +upon—these wonderful bodies, these material dwelling-places through +which the shadows pass together for a while, the very raiment we wear, +our very pastimes and the intercourse of society. The most discerning +judges saw in him something like the graceful “humanities” of the later +Roman, and our modern “culture,” as it is termed; while Horace recalled +his sayings as expressing best his own consummate amenity in the +reception of life. + +In this way, for Marius, under the guidance of that old master of +decorous living, those eternal doubts as to the criteria of truth +reduced themselves to a scepticism almost drily practical, a scepticism +which developed the opposition between things as they are and our +impressions and thoughts concerning them—the possibility, if an outward +world does really exist, of some faultiness in our apprehension of +it—the doctrine, in short, of what is termed “the subjectivity of +knowledge.” That is a consideration, indeed, which lies as an element +of weakness, like some admitted fault or flaw, at the very foundation +of every philosophical account of the universe; which confronts all +philosophies at their starting, but with which none have really dealt +conclusively, some perhaps not quite sincerely; which those who are not +philosophers dissipate by “common,” but unphilosophical, sense, or by +religious faith. The peculiar strength of Marius was, to have +apprehended this weakness on the threshold of human knowledge, in the +whole range of its consequences. Our knowledge is limited to what we +feel, he reflected: we need no proof that we feel. But can we be sure +that things are at all like our feelings? Mere peculiarities in the +instruments of our cognition, like the little knots and waves on the +surface of a mirror, may distort the matter they seem but to represent. +Of other people we cannot truly know even the feelings, nor how far +they would indicate the same modifications, each one of a personality +really unique, in using the same terms as ourselves; that “common +experience,” which is sometimes proposed as a satisfactory basis of +certainty, being after all only a fixity of language. But our own +impressions!—The light and heat of that blue veil over our heads, the +heavens spread out, perhaps not like a curtain over anything!—How +reassuring, after so long a debate about the rival criteria of truth, +to fall back upon direct sensation, to limit one’s aspirations after +knowledge to that! In an age still materially so brilliant, so expert +in the artistic handling of material things, with sensible capacities +still in undiminished vigour, with the whole world of classic art and +poetry outspread before it, and where there was more than eye or ear +could well take in—how natural the determination to rely exclusively +upon the phenomena of the senses, which certainly never deceive us +about themselves, about which alone we can never deceive ourselves! + +And so the abstract apprehension that the little point of this present +moment alone really is, between a past which has just ceased to be and +a future which may never come, became practical with Marius, under the +form of a resolve, as far as possible, to exclude regret and desire, +and yield himself to the improvement of the present with an absolutely +disengaged mind. America is here and now—here, or nowhere: as Wilhelm +Meister finds out one day, just not too late, after so long looking +vaguely across the ocean for the opportunity of the development of his +capacities. It was as if, recognising in perpetual motion the law of +nature, Marius identified his own way of life cordially with it, +“throwing himself into the stream,” so to speak. He too must maintain a +harmony with that soul of motion in things, by constantly renewed +mobility of character. + +Omnis Aristippum decuit color et status et res.— + + +Thus Horace had summed up that perfect manner in the reception of life +attained by his old Cyrenaic master; and the first practical +consequence of the metaphysic which lay behind that perfect manner, had +been a strict limitation, almost the renunciation, of metaphysical +enquiry itself. Metaphysic—that art, as it has so often proved, in the +words of Michelet, _de s’égarer avec méthode_, of bewildering oneself +methodically:—one must spend little time upon that! In the school of +Cyrene, great as was its mental incisiveness, logical and physical +speculation, theoretic interests generally, had been valued only so far +as they served to give a groundwork, an intellectual justification, to +that exclusive concern with practical ethics which was a note of the +Cyrenaic philosophy. How earnest and enthusiastic, how true to itself, +under how many varieties of character, had been the effort of the +Greeks after Theory—Theôria—that vision of a wholly reasonable world, +which, according to the greatest of them, literally makes man like God: +how loyally they had still persisted in the quest after that, in spite +of how many disappointments! In the Gospel of Saint John, perhaps, some +of them might have found the kind of vision they were seeking for; but +not in “doubtful disputations” concerning “being” and “not being,” +knowledge and appearance. Men’s minds, even young men’s minds, at that +late day, might well seem oppressed by the weariness of systems which +had so far outrun positive knowledge; and in the mind of Marius, as in +that old school of Cyrene, this sense of ennui, combined with appetites +so youthfully vigorous, brought about reaction, a sort of suicide +(instances of the like have been seen since) by which a great +metaphysical acumen was devoted to the function of proving metaphysical +speculation impossible, or useless. Abstract theory was to be valued +only just so far as it might serve to clear the tablet of the mind from +suppositions no more than half realisable, or wholly visionary, leaving +it in flawless evenness of surface to the impressions of an experience, +concrete and direct. + +To be absolutely virgin towards such experience, by ridding ourselves +of such abstractions as are but the ghosts of bygone impressions—to be +rid of the notions we have made for ourselves, and that so often only +misrepresent the experience of which they profess to be the +representation—_idola_, idols, false appearances, as Bacon calls them +later—to neutralise the distorting influence of metaphysical system by +an all-accomplished metaphysic skill: it is this bold, hard, sober +recognition, under a very “dry light,” of its own proper aim, in union +with a habit of feeling which on the practical side may perhaps open a +wide doorway to human weakness, that gives to the Cyrenaic doctrine, to +reproductions of this doctrine in the time of Marius or in our own, +their gravity and importance. It was a school to which the young man +might come, eager for truth, expecting much from philosophy, in no +ignoble curiosity, aspiring after nothing less than an “initiation.” He +would be sent back, sooner or later, to experience, to the world of +concrete impressions, to things as they may be seen, heard, felt by +him; but with a wonderful machinery of observation, and free from the +tyranny of mere theories. + +So, in intervals of repose, after the agitation which followed the +death of Flavian, the thoughts of Marius ran, while he felt himself as +if returned to the fine, clear, peaceful light of that pleasant school +of healthfully sensuous wisdom, in the brilliant old Greek colony, on +its fresh upland by the sea. Not pleasure, but a general completeness +of life, was the practical ideal to which this anti-metaphysical +metaphysic really pointed. And towards such a full or complete life, a +life of various yet select sensation, the most direct and effective +auxiliary must be, in a word, Insight. Liberty of soul, freedom from +all partial and misrepresentative doctrine which does but relieve one +element in our experience at the cost of another, freedom from all +embarrassment alike of regret for the past and of calculation on the +future: this would be but preliminary to the real business of +education—insight, insight through culture, into all that the present +moment holds in trust for us, as we stand so briefly in its presence. +From that maxim of Life as the end of life, followed, as a practical +consequence, the desirableness of refining all the instruments of +inward and outward intuition, of developing all their capacities, of +testing and exercising one’s self in them, till one’s whole nature +became one complex medium of reception, towards the vision—the +“beatific vision,” if we really cared to make it such—of our actual +experience in the world. Not the conveyance of an abstract body of +truths or principles, would be the aim of the right education of one’s +self, or of another, but the conveyance of an art—an art in some degree +peculiar to each individual character; with the modifications, that is, +due to its special constitution, and the peculiar circumstances of its +growth, inasmuch as no one of us is “like another, all in all.” + + + + +CHAPTER IX. +NEW CYRENAICISM + + +Such were the practical conclusions drawn for himself by Marius, when +somewhat later he had outgrown the mastery of others, from the +principle that “all is vanity.” If he could but count upon the present, +if a life brief at best could not certainly be shown to conduct one +anywhere beyond itself, if men’s highest curiosity was indeed so +persistently baffled—then, with the Cyrenaics of all ages, he would at +least fill up the measure of that present with vivid sensations, and +such intellectual apprehensions, as, in strength and directness and +their immediately realised values at the bar of an actual experience, +are most like sensations. So some have spoken in every age; for, like +all theories which really express a strong natural tendency of the +human mind or even one of its characteristic modes of weakness, this +vein of reflection is a constant tradition in philosophy. Every age of +European thought has had its Cyrenaics or Epicureans, under many +disguises: even under the hood of the monk. + +But—Let us eat and drink, for to-morrow we die!—is a proposal, the real +import of which differs immensely, according to the natural taste, and +the acquired judgment, of the guests who sit at the table. It may +express nothing better than the instinct of Dante’s Ciacco, the +accomplished glutton, in the mud of the Inferno;+ or, since on no +hypothesis does man “live by bread alone,” may come to be identical +with—“My meat is to do what is just and kind;” while the soul, which +can make no sincere claim to have apprehended anything beyond the veil +of immediate experience, yet never loses a sense of happiness in +conforming to the highest moral ideal it can clearly define for itself; +and actually, though but with so faint hope, does the “Father’s +business.” + +In that age of Marcus Aurelius, so completely disabused of the +metaphysical ambition to pass beyond “the flaming ramparts of the +world,” but, on the other hand, possessed of so vast an accumulation of +intellectual treasure, with so wide a view before it over all varieties +of what is powerful or attractive in man and his works, the thoughts of +Marius did but follow the line taken by the majority of educated +persons, though to a different issue. Pitched to a really high and +serious key, the precept—Be perfect in regard to what is here and now: +the precept of “culture,” as it is called, or of a complete +education—might at least save him from the vulgarity and heaviness of a +generation, certainly of no general fineness of temper, though with a +material well-being abundant enough. Conceded that what is secure in +our existence is but the sharp apex of the present moment between two +hypothetical eternities, and all that is real in our experience but a +series of fleeting impressions:—so Marius continued the sceptical +argument he had condensed, as the matter to hold by, from his various +philosophical reading:—given, that we are never to get beyond the walls +of the closely shut cell of one’s own personality; that the ideas we +are somehow impelled to form of an outer world, and of other minds akin +to our own, are, it may be, but a day-dream, and the thought of any +world beyond, a day-dream perhaps idler still: then, he, at least, in +whom those fleeting impressions—faces, voices, material sunshine—were +very real and imperious, might well set himself to the consideration, +how such actual moments as they passed might be made to yield their +utmost, by the most dexterous training of capacity. Amid abstract +metaphysical doubts, as to what might lie one step only beyond that +experience, reinforcing the deep original materialism or earthliness of +human nature itself, bound so intimately to the sensuous world, let him +at least make the most of what was “here and now.” In the actual +dimness of ways from means to ends—ends in themselves desirable, yet +for the most part distant and for him, certainly, below the visible +horizon—he would at all events be sure that the means, to use the +well-worn terminology, should have something of finality or perfection +about them, and themselves partake, in a measure, of the more excellent +nature of ends—that the means should justify the end. + +With this view he would demand culture, paideia,+ as the Cyrenaics +said, or, in other words, a wide, a complete, education—an education +partly negative, as ascertaining the true limits of man’s capacities, +but for the most part positive, and directed especially to the +expansion and refinement of the power of reception; of those powers, +above all, which are immediately relative to fleeting phenomena, the +powers of emotion and sense. In such an education, an “aesthetic” +education, as it might now be termed, and certainly occupied very +largely with those aspects of things which affect us pleasurably +through sensation, art, of course, including all the finer sorts of +literature, would have a great part to play. The study of music, in +that wider Platonic sense, according to which, music comprehends all +those matters over which the Muses of Greek mythology preside, would +conduct one to an exquisite appreciation of all the finer traits of +nature and of man. Nay! the products of the imagination must themselves +be held to present the most perfect forms of life—spirit and matter +alike under their purest and most perfect conditions—the most strictly +appropriate objects of that impassioned contemplation, which, in the +world of intellectual discipline, as in the highest forms of morality +and religion, must be held to be the essential function of the +“perfect.” Such manner of life might come even to seem a kind of +religion—an inward, visionary, mystic piety, or religion, by virtue of +its effort to live days “lovely and pleasant” in themselves, here and +now, and with an all-sufficiency of well-being in the immediate sense +of the object contemplated, independently of any faith, or hope that +might be entertained as to their ulterior tendency. In this way, the +true aesthetic culture would be realisable as a new form of the +contemplative life, founding its claim on the intrinsic “blessedness” +of “vision”—the vision of perfect men and things. One’s human nature, +indeed, would fain reckon on an assured and endless future, pleasing +itself with the dream of a final home, to be attained at some still +remote date, yet with a conscious, delightful home-coming at last, as +depicted in many an old poetic Elysium. On the other hand, the world of +perfected sensation, intelligence, emotion, is so close to us, and so +attractive, that the most visionary of spirits must needs represent the +world unseen in colours, and under a form really borrowed from it. Let +me be sure then—might he not plausibly say?—that I miss no detail of +this life of realised consciousness in the present! Here at least is a +vision, a theory, theôria,+ which reposes on no basis of unverified +hypothesis, which makes no call upon a future after all somewhat +problematic; as it would be unaffected by any discovery of an +Empedocles (improving on the old story of Prometheus) as to what had +really been the origin, and course of development, of man’s actually +attained faculties and that seemingly divine particle of reason or +spirit in him. Such a doctrine, at more leisurable moments, would of +course have its precepts to deliver on the embellishment, generally, of +what is near at hand, on the adornment of life, till, in a not +impracticable rule of conduct, one’s existence, from day to day, came +to be like a well-executed piece of music; that “perpetual motion” in +things (so Marius figured the matter to himself, under the old Greek +imageries) according itself to a kind of cadence or harmony. + +It was intelligible that this “aesthetic” philosophy might find itself +(theoretically, at least, and by way of a curious question in +casuistry, legitimate from its own point of view) weighing the claims +of that eager, concentrated, impassioned realisation of experience, +against those of the received morality. Conceiving its own function in +a somewhat desperate temper, and becoming, as every high-strung form of +sentiment, as the religious sentiment itself, may become, somewhat +antinomian, when, in its effort towards the order of experiences it +prefers, it is confronted with the traditional and popular morality, at +points where that morality may look very like a convention, or a mere +stage-property of the world, it would be found, from time to time, +breaking beyond the limits of the actual moral order; perhaps not +without some pleasurable excitement in so bold a venture. + +With the possibility of some such hazard as this, in thought or even in +practice—that it might be, though refining, or tonic even, in the case +of those strong and in health, yet, as Pascal says of the kindly and +temperate wisdom of Montaigne, “pernicious for those who have any +natural tendency to impiety or vice,” the line of reflection traced out +above, was fairly chargeable.—Not, however, with “hedonism” and its +supposed consequences. The blood, the heart, of Marius were still pure. +He knew that his carefully considered theory of practice braced him, +with the effect of a moral principle duly recurring to mind every +morning, towards the work of a student, for which he might seem +intended. Yet there were some among his acquaintance who jumped to the +conclusion that, with the “Epicurean stye,” he was making +pleasure—pleasure, as they so poorly conceived it—the sole motive of +life; and they precluded any exacter estimate of the situation by +covering it with a high-sounding general term, through the vagueness of +which they were enabled to see the severe and laborious youth in the +vulgar company of Lais. Words like “hedonism”— terms of large and vague +comprehension—above all when used for a purpose avowedly controversial, +have ever been the worst examples of what are called “question-begging +terms;” and in that late age in which Marius lived, amid the dust of so +many centuries of philosophical debate, the air was full of them. Yet +those who used that reproachful Greek term for the philosophy of +pleasure, were hardly more likely than the old Greeks themselves (on +whom regarding this very subject of the theory of pleasure, their +masters in the art of thinking had so emphatically to impress the +necessity of “making distinctions”) to come to any very delicately +correct ethical conclusions by a reasoning, which began with a general +term, comprehensive enough to cover pleasures so different in quality, +in their causes and effects, as the pleasures of wine and love, of art +and science, of religious enthusiasm and political enterprise, and of +that taste or curiosity which satisfied itself with long days of +serious study. Yet, in truth, each of those pleasurable modes of +activity, may, in its turn, fairly become the ideal of the “hedonistic” +doctrine. Really, to the phase of reflection through which Marius was +then passing, the charge of “hedonism,” whatever its true weight might +be, was not properly applicable at all. Not pleasure, but fulness of +life, and “insight” as conducting to that fulness—energy, variety, and +choice of experience, including noble pain and sorrow even, loves such +as those in the exquisite old story of Apuleius, sincere and strenuous +forms of the moral life, such as Seneca and Epictetus—whatever form of +human life, in short, might be heroic, impassioned, ideal: from these +the “new Cyrenaicism” of Marius took its criterion of values. It was a +theory, indeed, which might properly be regarded as in great degree +coincident with the main principle of the Stoics themselves, and an +older version of the precept “Whatsoever thy hand findeth to do, do it +with thy might”—a doctrine so widely acceptable among the nobler +spirits of that time. And, as with that, its mistaken tendency would +lie in the direction of a kind of idolatry of mere life, or natural +gift, or strength—l’idôlatrie des talents. + +To understand the various forms of ancient art and thought, the various +forms of actual human feeling (the only new thing, in a world almost +too opulent in what was old) to satisfy, with a kind of scrupulous +equity, the claims of these concrete and actual objects on his +sympathy, his intelligence, his senses—to “pluck out the heart of their +mystery,” and in turn become the interpreter of them to others: this +had now defined itself for Marius as a very narrowly practical design: +it determined his choice of a vocation to live by. It was the era of +the rhetoricians, or sophists, as they were sometimes called; of men +who came in some instances to great fame and fortune, by way of a +literary cultivation of “science.” That science, it has been often +said, must have been wholly an affair of words. But in a world, +confessedly so opulent in what was old, the work, even of genius, must +necessarily consist very much in criticism; and, in the case of the +more excellent specimens of his class, the rhetorician was, after all, +the eloquent and effective interpreter, for the delighted ears of +others, of what understanding himself had come by, in years of travel +and study, of the beautiful house of art and thought which was the +inheritance of the age. The emperor Marcus Aurelius, to whose service +Marius had now been called, was himself, more or less openly, a +“lecturer.” That late world, amid many curiously vivid modern traits, +had this spectacle, so familiar to ourselves, of the public lecturer or +essayist; in some cases adding to his other gifts that of the Christian +preacher, who knows how to touch people’s sensibilities on behalf of +the suffering. To follow in the way of these successes, was the natural +instinct of youthful ambition; and it was with no vulgar egotism that +Marius, at the age of nineteen, determined, like many another young man +of parts, to enter as a student of rhetoric at Rome. + +Though the manner of his work was changed formally from poetry to +prose, he remained, and must always be, of the poetic temper: by which, +I mean, among other things, that quite independently of the general +habit of that pensive age he lived much, and as it were by system, in +reminiscence. Amid his eager grasping at the sensation, the +consciousness, of the present, he had come to see that, after all, the +main point of economy in the conduct of the present, was the +question:—How will it look to me, at what shall I value it, this day +next year?—that in any given day or month one’s main concern was its +impression for the memory. A strange trick memory sometimes played him; +for, with no natural gradation, what was of last month, or of +yesterday, of to-day even, would seem as far off, as entirely detached +from him, as things of ten years ago. Detached from him, yet very real, +there lay certain spaces of his life, in delicate perspective, under a +favourable light; and, somehow, all the less fortunate detail and +circumstance had parted from them. Such hours were oftenest those in +which he had been helped by work of others to the pleasurable +apprehension of art, of nature, or of life. “Not what I do, but what I +am, under the power of this vision”—he would say to himself—“is what +were indeed pleasing to the gods!” + +And yet, with a kind of inconsistency in one who had taken for his +philosophic ideal the monochronos hêdonê+ of Aristippus—the pleasure of +the ideal present, of the mystic now—there would come, together with +that precipitate sinking of things into the past, a desire, after all, +to retain “what was so transitive.” Could he but arrest, for others +also, certain clauses of experience, as the imaginative memory +presented them to himself! In those grand, hot summers, he would have +imprisoned the very perfume of the flowers. To create, to live, +perhaps, a little while beyond the allotted hours, if it were but in a +fragment of perfect expression:—it was thus his longing defined itself +for something to hold by amid the “perpetual flux.” With men of his +vocation, people were apt to say, words were things. Well! with him, +words should be indeed things,—the word, the phrase, valuable in exact +proportion to the transparency with which it conveyed to others the +apprehension, the emotion, the mood, so vividly real within himself. +Verbaque provisam rem non invita sequentur:+ Virile apprehension of the +true nature of things, of the true nature of one’s own impression, +first of all!—words would follow that naturally, a true understanding +of one’s self being ever the first condition of genuine style. Language +delicate and measured, the delicate Attic phrase, for instance, in +which the eminent Aristeides could speak, was then a power to which +people’s hearts, and sometimes even their purses, readily responded. +And there were many points, as Marius thought, on which the heart of +that age greatly needed to be touched. He hardly knew how strong that +old religious sense of responsibility, the conscience, as we call it, +still was within him—a body of inward impressions, as real as those so +highly valued outward ones—to offend against which, brought with it a +strange feeling of disloyalty, as to a person. And the determination, +adhered to with no misgiving, to add nothing, not so much as a +transient sigh, to the great total of men’s unhappiness, in his way +through the world:—that too was something to rest on, in the drift of +mere “appearances.” + +All this would involve a life of industry, of industrious study, only +possible through healthy rule, keeping clear the eye alike of body and +soul. For the male element, the logical conscience asserted itself now, +with opening manhood—asserted itself, even in his literary style, by a +certain firmness of outline, that touch of the worker in metal, amid +its richness. Already he blamed instinctively alike in his work and in +himself, as youth so seldom does, all that had not passed a long and +liberal process of erasure. The happy phrase or sentence was really +modelled upon a cleanly finished structure of scrupulous thought. The +suggestive force of the one master of his development, who had battled +so hard with imaginative prose; the utterance, the golden utterance, of +the other, so content with its living power of persuasion that he had +never written at all,—in the commixture of these two qualities he set +up his literary ideal, and this rare blending of grace with an +intellectual rigour or astringency, was the secret of a singular +expressiveness in it. + +He acquired at this time a certain bookish air, the somewhat sombre +habitude of the avowed scholar, which though it never interfered with +the perfect tone, “fresh and serenely disposed,” of the Roman +gentleman, yet qualified it as by an interesting oblique trait, and +frightened away some of his equals in age and rank. The sober +discretion of his thoughts, his sustained habit of meditation, the +sense of those negative conclusions enabling him to concentrate +himself, with an absorption so entire, upon what is immediately here +and now, gave him a peculiar manner of intellectual confidence, as of +one who had indeed been initiated into a great secret.—Though with an +air so disengaged, he seemed to be living so intently in the visible +world! And now, in revolt against that pre-occupation with other +persons, which had so often perturbed his spirit, his wistful +speculations as to what the real, the greater, experience might be, +determined in him, not as the longing for love—to be with Cynthia, or +Aspasia—but as a thirst for existence in exquisite places. The veil +that was to be lifted for him lay over the works of the old masters of +art, in places where nature also had used her mastery. And it was just +at this moment that a summons to Rome reached him. + +NOTES + + +145. +Canto VI. + + +147. +Transliteration: paideia. Definition “rearing, education.” + + +149. +Transliteration: theôria. Definition “a looking at ... observing +... contemplation.” + + +154. +Transliteration: monochronos hêdonê. Pater’s definition “the +pleasure of the ideal present, of the mystic now.” The definition is +fitting; the unusual adjective monokhronos means, literally, “single or +unitary time.” + + +155. +Horace, Ars Poetica 311. +Etext editor’s translation: “The +subject once foreknown, the words will follow easily.” + + + + +CHAPTER X. +ON THE WAY + + +Mirum est ut animus agitatione motuque corporis excitetur. +Pliny’s Letters. + + +Many points in that train of thought, its harder and more energetic +practical details especially, at first surmised but vaguely in the +intervals of his visits to the tomb of Flavian, attained the coherence +of formal principle amid the stirring incidents of the journey, which +took him, still in all the buoyancy of his nineteen years and greatly +expectant, to Rome. That summons had come from one of the former +friends of his father in the capital, who had kept himself acquainted +with the lad’s progress, and, assured of his parts, his courtly ways, +above all of his beautiful penmanship, now offered him a place, +virtually that of an amanuensis, near the person of the philosophic +emperor. The old town-house of his family on the Caelian hill, so long +neglected, might well require his personal care; and Marius, relieved a +little by his preparations for travelling from a certain over-tension +of spirit in which he had lived of late, was presently on his way, to +await introduction to Aurelius, on his expected return home, after a +first success, illusive enough as it was soon to appear, against the +invaders from beyond the Danube. + +The opening stage of his journey, through the firm, golden weather, for +which he had lingered three days beyond the appointed time of +starting—days brown with the first rains of autumn—brought him, by the +byways among the lower slopes of the Apennines of Luna, to the town of +Luca, a station on the Cassian Way; travelling so far mainly on foot, +while the baggage followed under the care of his attendants. He wore a +broad felt hat, in fashion not unlike a more modern pilgrim’s, the neat +head projecting from the collar of his gray paenula, or travelling +mantle, sewed closely together over the breast, but with its two sides +folded up upon the shoulders, to leave the arms free in walking, and +was altogether so trim and fresh, that, as he climbed the hill from +Pisa, by the long steep lane through the olive-yards, and turned to +gaze where he could just discern the cypresses of the old school +garden, like two black lines down the yellow walls, a little child took +possession of his hand, and, looking up at him with entire confidence, +paced on bravely at his side, for the mere pleasure of his company, to +the spot where the road declined again into the valley beyond. From +this point, leaving the servants behind, he surrendered himself, a +willing subject, as he walked, to the impressions of the road, and was +almost surprised, both at the suddenness with which evening came on, +and the distance from his old home at which it found him. + +And at the little town of Luca, he felt that indescribable sense of a +welcoming in the mere outward appearance of things, which seems to mark +out certain places for the special purpose of evening rest, and gives +them always a peculiar amiability in retrospect. Under the deepening +twilight, the rough-tiled roofs seem to huddle together side by side, +like one continuous shelter over the whole township, spread low and +broad above the snug sleeping-rooms within; and the place one sees for +the first time, and must tarry in but for a night, breathes the very +spirit of home. The cottagers lingered at their doors for a few minutes +as the shadows grew larger, and went to rest early; though there was +still a glow along the road through the shorn corn-fields, and the +birds were still awake about the crumbling gray heights of an old +temple. So quiet and air-swept was the place, you could hardly tell +where the country left off in it, and the field-paths became its +streets. Next morning he must needs change the manner of his journey. +The light baggage-wagon returned, and he proceeded now more quickly, +travelling a stage or two by post, along the Cassian Way, where the +figures and incidents of the great high-road seemed already to tell of +the capital, the one centre to which all were hastening, or had lately +bidden adieu. That Way lay through the heart of the old, mysterious and +visionary country of Etruria; and what he knew of its strange religion +of the dead, reinforced by the actual sight of the funeral houses +scattered so plentifully among the dwelling-places of the living, +revived in him for a while, in all its strength, his old instinctive +yearning towards those inhabitants of the shadowy land he had known in +life. It seemed to him that he could half divine how time passed in +those painted houses on the hillsides, among the gold and silver +ornaments, the wrought armour and vestments, the drowsy and dead +attendants; and the close consciousness of that vast population gave +him no fear, but rather a sense of companionship, as he climbed the +hills on foot behind the horses, through the genial afternoon. + +The road, next day, passed below a town not less primitive, it might +seem, than its rocky perch—white rocks, that had long been glistening +before him in the distance. Down the dewy paths the people were +descending from it, to keep a holiday, high and low alike in rough, +white-linen smocks. A homely old play was just begun in an open-air +theatre, with seats hollowed out of the turf-grown slope. Marius caught +the terrified expression of a child in its mother’s arms, as it turned +from the yawning mouth of a great mask, for refuge in her bosom. The +way mounted, and descended again, down the steep street of another +place, all resounding with the noise of metal under the hammer; for +every house had its brazier’s workshop, the bright objects of brass and +copper gleaming, like lights in a cave, out of their dark roofs and +corners. Around the anvils the children were watching the work, or ran +to fetch water to the hissing, red-hot metal; and Marius too watched, +as he took his hasty mid-day refreshment, a mess of chestnut-meal and +cheese, while the swelling surface of a great copper water-vessel grew +flowered all over with tiny petals under the skilful strokes. Towards +dusk, a frantic woman at the roadside, stood and cried out the words of +some philter, or malison, in verse, with weird motion of her hands, as +the travellers passed, like a wild picture drawn from Virgil. + +But all along, accompanying the superficial grace of these incidents of +the way, Marius noted, more and more as he drew nearer to Rome, marks +of the great plague. Under Hadrian and his successors, there had been +many enactments to improve the condition of the slave. The ergastula+ +were abolished. But no system of free labour had as yet succeeded. A +whole mendicant population, artfully exaggerating every symptom and +circumstance of misery, still hung around, or sheltered themselves +within, the vast walls of their old, half-ruined task-houses. And for +the most part they had been variously stricken by the pestilence. For +once, the heroic level had been reached in rags, squints, scars—every +caricature of the human type—ravaged beyond what could have been +thought possible if it were to survive at all. Meantime, the farms were +less carefully tended than of old: here and there they were lapsing +into their natural wildness: some villas also were partly fallen into +ruin. The picturesque, romantic Italy of a later time—the Italy of +Claude and Salvator Rosa—was already forming, for the delight of the +modern romantic traveller. + +And again Marius was aware of a real change in things, on crossing the +Tiber, as if some magic effect lay in that; though here, in truth, the +Tiber was but a modest enough stream of turbid water. Nature, under the +richer sky, seemed readier and more affluent, and man fitter to the +conditions around him: even in people hard at work there appeared to be +a less burdensome sense of the mere business of life. How dreamily the +women were passing up through the broad light and shadow of the steep +streets with the great water-pots resting on their heads, like women of +Caryae, set free from slavery in old Greek temples. With what a fresh, +primeval poetry was daily existence here impressed—all the details of +the threshing-floor and the vineyard; the common farm-life even; the +great bakers’ fires aglow upon the road in the evening. In the presence +of all this Marius felt for a moment like those old, early, unconscious +poets, who created the famous Greek myths of Dionysus, and the Great +Mother, out of the imagery of the wine-press and the ploughshare. And +still the motion of the journey was bringing his thoughts to systematic +form. He seemed to have grown to the fulness of intellectual manhood, +on his way hither. The formative and literary stimulus, so to call it, +of peaceful exercise which he had always observed in himself, doing its +utmost now, the form and the matter of thought alike detached +themselves clearly and with readiness from the healthfully excited +brain.—“It is wonderful,” says Pliny, “how the mind is stirred to +activity by brisk bodily exercise.” The presentable aspects of inmost +thought and feeling became evident to him: the structure of all he +meant, its order and outline, defined itself: his general sense of a +fitness and beauty in words became effective in daintily pliant +sentences, with all sorts of felicitous linking of figure to +abstraction. It seemed just then as if the desire of the artist in +him—that old longing to produce—might be satisfied by the exact and +literal transcript of what was then passing around him, in simple +prose, arresting the desirable moment as it passed, and prolonging its +life a little.—To live in the concrete! To be sure, at least, of one’s +hold upon that!—Again, his philosophic scheme was but the reflection of +the data of sense, and chiefly of sight, a reduction to the abstract, +of the brilliant road he travelled on, through the sunshine. + +But on the seventh evening there came a reaction in the cheerful flow +of our traveller’s thoughts, a reaction with which mere bodily fatigue, +asserting itself at last over his curiosity, had much to do; and he +fell into a mood, known to all passably sentimental wayfarers, as night +deepens again and again over their path, in which all journeying, from +the known to the unknown, comes suddenly to figure as a mere foolish +truancy—like a child’s running away from home—with the feeling that one +had best return at once, even through the darkness. He had chosen to +climb on foot, at his leisure, the long windings by which the road +ascended to the place where that day’s stage was to end, and found +himself alone in the twilight, far behind the rest of his +travelling-companions. Would the last zigzag, round and round those +dark masses, half natural rock, half artificial substructure, ever +bring him within the circuit of the walls above? It was now that a +startling incident turned those misgivings almost into actual fear. +From the steep slope a heavy mass of stone was detached, after some +whisperings among the trees above his head, and rushing down through +the stillness fell to pieces in a cloud of dust across the road just +behind him, so that he felt the touch upon his heel. That was +sufficient, just then, to rouse out of its hiding-place his old vague +fear of evil—of one’s “enemies”—a distress, so much a matter of +constitution with him, that at times it would seem that the best +pleasures of life could but be snatched, as it were hastily, in one +moment’s forgetfulness of its dark, besetting influence. A sudden +suspicion of hatred against him, of the nearness of “enemies,” seemed +all at once to alter the visible form of things, as with the child’s +hero, when he found the footprint on the sand of his peaceful, dreamy +island. His elaborate philosophy had not put beneath his feet the +terror of mere bodily evil; much less of “inexorable fate, and the +noise of greedy Acheron.” + +The resting-place to which he presently came, in the keen, wholesome +air of the market-place of the little hill-town, was a pleasant +contrast to that last effort of his journey. The room in which he sat +down to supper, unlike the ordinary Roman inns at that day, was trim +and sweet. The firelight danced cheerfully upon the polished, +three-wicked lucernae burning cleanly with the best oil, upon the +white-washed walls, and the bunches of scarlet carnations set in glass +goblets. The white wine of the place put before him, of the true colour +and flavour of the grape, and with a ring of delicate foam as it +mounted in the cup, had a reviving edge or freshness he had found in no +other wine. These things had relieved a little the melancholy of the +hour before; and it was just then that he heard the voice of one, newly +arrived at the inn, making his way to the upper floor—a youthful voice, +with a reassuring clearness of note, which completed his cure. + +He seemed to hear that voice again in dreams, uttering his name: then, +awake in the full morning light and gazing from the window, saw the +guest of the night before, a very honourable-looking youth, in the rich +habit of a military knight, standing beside his horse, and already +making preparations to depart. It happened that Marius, too, was to +take that day’s journey on horseback. Riding presently from the inn, he +overtook Cornelius—of the Twelfth Legion—advancing carefully down the +steep street; and before they had issued from the gates of Urbs-vetus, +the two young men had broken into talk together. They were passing +along the street of the goldsmiths; and Cornelius must needs enter one +of the workshops for the repair of some button or link of his knightly +trappings. Standing in the doorway, Marius watched the work, as he had +watched the brazier’s business a few days before, wondering most at the +simplicity of its processes, a simplicity, however, on which only +genius in that craft could have lighted.—By what unguessed-at stroke of +hand, for instance, had the grains of precious metal associated +themselves with so daintily regular a roughness, over the surface of +the little casket yonder? And the conversation which followed, hence +arising, left the two travellers with sufficient interest in each other +to insure an easy companionship for the remainder of their journey. In +time to come, Marius was to depend very much on the preferences, the +personal judgments, of the comrade who now laid his hand so brotherly +on his shoulder, as they left the workshop. + +Itineris matutini gratiam capimus,+—observes one of our scholarly +travellers; and their road that day lay through a country, well-fitted, +by the peculiarity of its landscape, to ripen a first acquaintance into +intimacy; its superficial ugliness throwing the wayfarers back upon +each other’s entertainment in a real exchange of ideas, the tension of +which, however, it would relieve, ever and anon, by the unexpected +assertion of something singularly attractive. The immediate aspect of +the land was, indeed, in spite of abundant olive and ilex, unpleasing +enough. A river of clay seemed, “in some old night of time,” to have +burst up over valley and hill, and hardened there into fantastic +shelves and slides and angles of cadaverous rock, up and down among the +contorted vegetation; the hoary roots and trunks seeming to confess +some weird kinship with them. But that was long ago; and these pallid +hillsides needed only the declining sun, touching the rock with purple, +and throwing deeper shadow into the immemorial foliage, to put on a +peculiar, because a very grave and austere, kind of beauty; while the +graceful outlines common to volcanic hills asserted themselves in the +broader prospect. And, for sentimental Marius, all this was associated, +by some perhaps fantastic affinity, with a peculiar trait of severity, +beyond his guesses as to the secret of it, which mingled with the +blitheness of his new companion. Concurring, indeed, with the condition +of a Roman soldier, it was certainly something far more than the +expression of military hardness, or ascêsis; and what was earnest, or +even austere, in the landscape they had traversed together, seemed to +have been waiting for the passage of this figure to interpret or inform +it. Again, as in his early days with Flavian, a vivid personal presence +broke through the dreamy idealism, which had almost come to doubt of +other men’s reality: reassuringly, indeed, yet not without some sense +of a constraining tyranny over him from without. + +For Cornelius, returning from the campaign, to take up his quarters on +the Palatine, in the imperial guard, seemed to carry about with him, in +that privileged world of comely usage to which he belonged, the +atmosphere of some still more jealously exclusive circle. They halted +on the morrow at noon, not at an inn, but at the house of one of the +young soldier’s friends, whom they found absent, indeed, in consequence +of the plague in those parts, so that after a mid-day rest only, they +proceeded again on their journey. The great room of the villa, to which +they were admitted, had lain long untouched; and the dust rose, as they +entered, into the slanting bars of sunlight, that fell through the +half-closed shutters. It was here, to while away the time, that +Cornelius bethought himself of displaying to his new friend the various +articles and ornaments of his knightly array—the breastplate, the +sandals and cuirass, lacing them on, one by one, with the assistance of +Marius, and finally the great golden bracelet on the right arm, +conferred on him by his general for an act of valour. And as he gleamed +there, amid that odd interchange of light and shade, with the staff of +a silken standard firm in his hand, Marius felt as if he were face to +face, for the first time, with some new knighthood or chivalry, just +then coming into the world. + +It was soon after they left this place, journeying now by carriage, +that Rome was seen at last, with much excitement on the part of our +travellers; Cornelius, and some others of whom the party then +consisted, agreeing, chiefly for the sake of Marius, to hasten forward, +that it might be reached by daylight, with a cheerful noise of rapid +wheels as they passed over the flagstones. But the highest light upon +the mausoleum of Hadrian was quite gone out, and it was dark, before +they reached the Flaminian Gate. The abundant sound of water was the +one thing that impressed Marius, as they passed down a long street, +with many open spaces on either hand: Cornelius to his military +quarters, and Marius to the old dwelling-place of his fathers. + +NOTES + + +162. +E-text editor’s note: ergastula were the Roman agrarian +equivalent of prison-workhouses. + + +168. +Apuleius, The Golden Ass, I.17. + + + + +CHAPTER XI. +“THE MOST RELIGIOUS CITY IN THE WORLD” + + +Marius awoke early and passed curiously from room to room, noting for +more careful inspection by and by the rolls of manuscripts. Even +greater than his curiosity in gazing for the first time on this ancient +possession, was his eagerness to look out upon Rome itself, as he +pushed back curtain and shutter, and stepped forth in the fresh morning +upon one of the many balconies, with an oft-repeated dream realised at +last. He was certainly fortunate in the time of his coming to Rome. +That old pagan world, of which Rome was the flower, had reached its +perfection in the things of poetry and art—a perfection which indicated +only too surely the eve of decline. As in some vast intellectual +museum, all its manifold products were intact and in their places, and +with custodians also still extant, duly qualified to appreciate and +explain them. And at no period of history had the material Rome itself +been better worth seeing—lying there not less consummate than that +world of pagan intellect which it represented in every phase of its +darkness and light. The various work of many ages fell here +harmoniously together, as yet untouched save by time, adding the final +grace of a rich softness to its complex expression. Much which spoke of +ages earlier than Nero, the great re-builder, lingered on, antique, +quaint, immeasurably venerable, like the relics of the medieval city in +the Paris of Lewis the Fourteenth: the work of Nero’s own time had come +to have that sort of old world and picturesque interest which the work +of Lewis has for ourselves; while without stretching a parallel too far +we might perhaps liken the architectural finesses of the archaic +Hadrian to the more excellent products of our own Gothic revival. The +temple of Antoninus and Faustina was still fresh in all the majesty of +its closely arrayed columns of cipollino; but, on the whole, little had +been added under the late and present emperors, and during fifty years +of public quiet, a sober brown and gray had grown apace on things. The +gilding on the roof of many a temple had lost its garishness: cornice +and capital of polished marble shone out with all the crisp freshness +of real flowers, amid the already mouldering travertine and brickwork, +though the birds had built freely among them. What Marius then saw was +in many respects, after all deduction of difference, more like the +modern Rome than the enumeration of particular losses might lead us to +suppose; the Renaissance, in its most ambitious mood and with amplest +resources, having resumed the ancient classical tradition there, with +no break or obstruction, as it had happened, in any very considerable +work of the middle age. Immediately before him, on the square, steep +height, where the earliest little old Rome had huddled itself together, +arose the palace of the Caesars. Half-veiling the vast substruction of +rough, brown stone—line upon line of successive ages of builders—the +trim, old-fashioned garden walks, under their closely-woven walls of +dark glossy foliage, test of long and careful cultivation, wound +gradually, among choice trees, statues and fountains, distinct and +sparkling in the full morning sunlight, to the richly tinted mass of +pavilions and corridors above, centering in the lofty, white-marble +dwelling-place of Apollo himself. + +How often had Marius looked forward to that first, free wandering +through Rome, to which he now went forth with a heat in the town +sunshine (like a mist of fine gold-dust spread through the air) to the +height of his desire, making the dun coolness of the narrow streets +welcome enough at intervals. He almost feared, descending the stair +hastily, lest some unforeseen accident should snatch the little cup of +enjoyment from him ere he passed the door. In such morning rambles in +places new to him, life had always seemed to come at its fullest: it +was then he could feel his youth, that youth the days of which he had +already begun to count jealously, in entire possession. So the grave, +pensive figure, a figure, be it said nevertheless, fresher far than +often came across it now, moved through the old city towards the +lodgings of Cornelius, certainly not by the most direct course, however +eager to rejoin the friend of yesterday. + +Bent as keenly on seeing as if his first day in Rome were to be also +his last, the two friends descended along the _Vicus Tuscus_, with its +rows of incense-stalls, into the _Via Nova_, where the fashionable +people were busy shopping; and Marius saw with much amusement the +frizzled heads, then _à la mode_. A glimpse of the _Marmorata_, the +haven at the river-side, where specimens of all the precious marbles of +the world were lying amid great white blocks from the quarries of Luna, +took his thoughts for a moment to his distant home. They visited the +flower-market, lingering where the _coronarii_ pressed on them the +newest species, and purchased zinias, now in blossom (like painted +flowers, thought Marius), to decorate the folds of their togas. +Loitering to the other side of the Forum, past the great Galen’s +drug-shop, after a glance at the announcements of new poems on sale +attached to the doorpost of a famous bookseller, they entered the +curious library of the Temple of Peace, then a favourite resort of +literary men, and read, fixed there for all to see, the _Diurnal_ or +Gazette of the day, which announced, together with births and deaths, +prodigies and accidents, and much mere matter of business, the date and +manner of the philosophic emperor’s joyful return to his people; and, +thereafter, with eminent names faintly disguised, what would carry that +day’s news, in many copies, over the provinces—a certain matter +concerning the great lady, known to be dear to him, whom he had left at +home. It was a story, with the development of which “society” had +indeed for some time past edified or amused itself, rallying +sufficiently from the panic of a year ago, not only to welcome back its +ruler, but also to relish a _chronique scandaleuse;_ and thus, when +soon after Marius saw the world’s wonder, he was already acquainted +with the suspicions which have ever since hung about her name. Twelve +o’clock was come before they left the Forum, waiting in a little crowd +to hear the _Accensus_, according to old custom, proclaim the hour of +noonday, at the moment when, from the steps of the Senate-house, the +sun could be seen standing between the _Rostra_ and the _Græcostasis_. +He exerted for this function a strength of voice, which confirmed in +Marius a judgment the modern visitor may share with him, that Roman +throats and Roman chests, namely, must, in some peculiar way, be +differently constructed from those of other people. Such judgment +indeed he had formed in part the evening before, noting, as a religious +procession passed him, how much noise a man and a boy could make, +though not without a great deal of real music, of which in truth the +Romans were then as ever passionately fond. + +Hence the two friends took their way through the Via Flaminia, almost +along the line of the modern Corso, already bordered with handsome +villas, turning presently to the left, into the Field-of-Mars, still +the playground of Rome. But the vast public edifices were grown to be +almost continuous over the grassy expanse, represented now only by +occasional open spaces of verdure and wild-flowers. In one of these a +crowd was standing, to watch a party of athletes stripped for exercise. +Marius had been surprised at the luxurious variety of the litters borne +through Rome, where no carriage horses were allowed; and just then one +far more sumptuous than the rest, with dainty appointments of ivory and +gold, was carried by, all the town pressing with eagerness to get a +glimpse of its most beautiful woman, as she passed rapidly. Yes! there, +was the wonder of the world—the empress Faustina herself: Marius could +distinguish, could distinguish clearly, the well-known profile, between +the floating purple curtains. + +For indeed all Rome was ready to burst into gaiety again, as it awaited +with much real affection, hopeful and animated, the return of its +emperor, for whose ovation various adornments were preparing along the +streets through which the imperial procession would pass. He had left +Rome just twelve months before, amid immense gloom. The alarm of a +barbarian insurrection along the whole line of the Danube had happened +at the moment when Rome was panic-stricken by the great pestilence. + +In fifty years of peace, broken only by that conflict in the East from +which Lucius Verus, among other curiosities, brought back the plague, +war had come to seem a merely romantic, superannuated incident of +bygone history. And now it was almost upon Italian soil. Terrible were +the reports of the numbers and audacity of the assailants. Aurelius, as +yet untried in war, and understood by a few only in the whole scope of +a really great character, was known to the majority of his subjects as +but a careful administrator, though a student of philosophy, perhaps, +as we say, a dilettante. But he was also the visible centre of +government, towards whom the hearts of a whole people turned, grateful +for fifty years of public happiness—its good genius, its +“Antonine”—whose fragile person might be foreseen speedily giving way +under the trials of military life, with a disaster like that of the +slaughter of the legions by Arminius. Prophecies of the world’s +impending conflagration were easily credited: “the secular fire” would +descend from heaven: superstitious fear had even demanded the sacrifice +of a human victim. + +Marcus Aurelius, always philosophically considerate of the humours of +other people, exercising also that devout appreciation of every +religious claim which was one of his characteristic habits, had +invoked, in aid of the commonwealth, not only all native gods, but all +foreign deities as well, however strange.—“Help! Help! in the ocean +space!” A multitude of foreign priests had been welcomed to Rome, with +their various peculiar religious rites. The sacrifices made on this +occasion were remembered for centuries; and the starving poor, at +least, found some satisfaction in the flesh of those herds of “white +bulls,” which came into the city, day after day, to yield the savour of +their blood to the gods. + +In spite of all this, the legions had but followed their standards +despondently. But prestige, personal prestige, the name of “Emperor,” +still had its magic power over the nations. The mere approach of the +Roman army made an impression on the barbarians. Aurelius and his +colleague had scarcely reached Aquileia when a deputation arrived to +ask for peace. And now the two imperial “brothers” were returning home +at leisure; were waiting, indeed, at a villa outside the walls, till +the capital had made ready to receive them. But although Rome was thus +in genial reaction, with much relief, and hopefulness against the +winter, facing itself industriously in damask of red and gold, those +two enemies were still unmistakably extant: the barbarian army of the +Danube was but over-awed for a season; and the plague, as we saw when +Marius was on his way to Rome, was not to depart till it had done a +large part in the formation of the melancholy picturesque of modern +Italy—till it had made, or prepared for the making of the Roman +Campagna. The old, unaffected, really pagan, peace or gaiety, of +Antoninus Pius—that genuine though unconscious humanist—was gone for +ever. And again and again, throughout this day of varied observation, +Marius had been reminded, above all else, that he was not merely in +“the most religious city of the world,” as one had said, but that Rome +was become the romantic home of the wildest superstition. Such +superstition presented itself almost as religious mania in many an +incident of his long ramble,—incidents to which he gave his full +attention, though contending in some measure with a reluctance on the +part of his companion, the motive of which he did not understand till +long afterwards. Marius certainly did not allow this reluctance to +deter his own curiosity. Had he not come to Rome partly under poetic +vocation, to receive all those things, the very impress of life itself, +upon the visual, the imaginative, organ, as upon a mirror; to reflect +them; to transmute them into golden words? He must observe that strange +medley of superstition, that centuries’ growth, layer upon layer, of +the curiosities of religion (one faith jostling another out of place) +at least for its picturesque interest, and as an indifferent outsider +might, not too deeply concerned in the question which, if any of them, +was to be the survivor. + +Superficially, at least, the Roman religion, allying itself with much +diplomatic economy to possible rivals, was in possession, as a vast and +complex system of usage, intertwining itself with every detail of +public and private life, attractively enough for those who had but “the +historic temper,” and a taste for the past, however much a Lucian might +depreciate it. Roman religion, as Marius knew, had, indeed, been always +something to be done, rather than something to be thought, or believed, +or loved; something to be done in minutely detailed manner, at a +particular time and place, correctness in which had long been a matter +of laborious learning with a whole school of ritualists—as also, now +and again, a matter of heroic sacrifice with certain exceptionally +devout souls, as when Caius Fabius Dorso, with his life in his hand, +succeeded in passing the sentinels of the invading Gauls to perform a +sacrifice on the Quirinal, and, thanks to the divine protection, had +returned in safety. So jealous was the distinction between sacred and +profane, that, in the matter of the “regarding of days,” it had made +more than half the year a holiday. Aurelius had, indeed, ordained that +there should be no more than a hundred and thirty-five festival days in +the year; but in other respects he had followed in the steps of his +predecessor, Antoninus Pius—commended especially for his “religion,” +his conspicuous devotion to its public ceremonies—and whose coins are +remarkable for their reference to the oldest and most hieratic types of +Roman mythology. Aurelius had succeeded in more than healing the old +feud between philosophy and religion, displaying himself, in singular +combination, as at once the most zealous of philosophers and the most +devout of polytheists, and lending himself, with an air of conviction, +to all the pageantries of public worship. To his pious recognition of +that one orderly spirit, which, according to the doctrine of the +Stoics, diffuses itself through the world, and animates it—a +recognition taking the form, with him, of a constant effort towards +inward likeness thereto, in the harmonious order of his own soul—he had +added a warm personal devotion towards the whole multitude of the old +national gods, and a great many new foreign ones besides, by him, at +least, not ignobly conceived. If the comparison may be reverently made, +there was something here of the method by which the catholic church has +added the cultus of the saints to its worship of the one Divine Being. + +And to the view of the majority, though the emperor, as the personal +centre of religion, entertained the hope of converting his people to +philosophic faith, and had even pronounced certain public discourses +for their instruction in it, that polytheistic devotion was his most +striking feature. Philosophers, indeed, had, for the most part, thought +with Seneca, “that a man need not lift his hands to heaven, nor ask the +sacristan’s leave to put his mouth to the ear of an image, that his +prayers might be heard the better.”—Marcus Aurelius, “a master in +Israel,” knew all that well enough. Yet his outward devotion was much +more than a concession to popular sentiment, or a mere result of that +sense of fellow-citizenship with others, which had made him again and +again, under most difficult circumstances, an excellent comrade. Those +others, too!—amid all their ignorances, what were they but instruments +in the administration of the Divine Reason, “from end to end sweetly +and strongly disposing all things”? Meantime “Philosophy” itself had +assumed much of what we conceive to be the religious character. It had +even cultivated the habit, the power, of “spiritual direction”; the +troubled soul making recourse in its hour of destitution, or amid the +distractions of the world, to this or that director—philosopho suo—who +could really best understand it. + +And it had been in vain that the old, grave and discreet religion of +Rome had set itself, according to its proper genius, to prevent or +subdue all trouble and disturbance in men’s souls. In religion, as in +other matters, plebeians, as such, had a taste for movement, for +revolution; and it had been ever in the most populous quarters that +religious changes began. To the apparatus of foreign religion, above +all, recourse had been made in times of public disquietude or sudden +terror; and in those great religious celebrations, before his +proceeding against the barbarians, Aurelius had even restored the +solemnities of Isis, prohibited in the capital since the time of +Augustus, making no secret of his worship of that goddess, though her +temple had been actually destroyed by authority in the reign of +Tiberius. Her singular and in many ways beautiful ritual was now +popular in Rome. And then—what the enthusiasm of the swarming plebeian +quarters had initiated, was sure to be adopted, sooner or later, by +women of fashion. A blending of all the religions of the ancient world +had been accomplished. The new gods had arrived, had been welcomed, and +found their places; though, certainly, with no real security, in any +adequate ideal of the divine nature itself in the background of men’s +minds, that the presence of the new-comer should be edifying, or even +refining. High and low addressed themselves to all deities alike +without scruple; confusing them together when they prayed, and in the +old, authorised, threefold veneration of their visible images, by +flowers, incense, and ceremonial lights—those beautiful usages, which +the church, in her way through the world, ever making spoil of the +world’s goods for the better uses of the human spirit, took up and +sanctified in her service. + +And certainly “the most religious city in the world” took no care to +veil its devotion, however fantastic. The humblest house had its little +chapel or shrine, its image and lamp; while almost every one seemed to +exercise some religious function and responsibility. Colleges, composed +for the most part of slaves and of the poor, provided for the service +of the Compitalian Lares—the gods who presided, respectively, over the +several quarters of the city. In one street, Marius witnessed an +incident of the festival of the patron deity of that neighbourhood, the +way being strewn with box, the houses tricked out gaily in such poor +finery as they possessed, while the ancient idol was borne through it +in procession, arrayed in gaudy attire the worse for wear. Numerous +religious clubs had their stated anniversaries, on which the members +issued with much ceremony from their guild-hall, or schola, and +traversed the thoroughfares of Rome, preceded, like the confraternities +of the present day, by their sacred banners, to offer sacrifice before +some famous image. Black with the perpetual smoke of lamps and incense, +oftenest old and ugly, perhaps on that account the more likely to +listen to the desires of the suffering—had not those sacred effigies +sometimes given sensible tokens that they were aware? The image of the +Fortune of Women—Fortuna Muliebris, in the Latin Way, had spoken (not +once only) and declared; Bene me, Matronae! vidistis riteque +dedicastis! The Apollo of Cumae had wept during three whole nights and +days. The images in the temple of Juno Sospita had been seen to sweat. +Nay! there was blood—divine blood—in the hearts of some of them: the +images in the Grove of Feronia had sweated blood! + +From one and all Cornelius had turned away: like the “atheist” of whom +Apuleius tells he had never once raised hand to lip in passing image or +sanctuary, and had parted from Marius finally when the latter +determined to enter the crowded doorway of a temple, on their return +into the Forum, below the Palatine hill, where the mothers were +pressing in, with a multitude of every sort of children, to touch the +lightning-struck image of the wolf-nurse of Romulus—so tender to little +ones!—just discernible in its dark shrine, amid a blaze of lights. +Marius gazed after his companion of the day, as he mounted the steps to +his lodging, singing to himself, as it seemed. Marius failed precisely +to catch the words. + +And, as the rich, fresh evening came on, there was heard all over Rome, +far above a whisper, the whole town seeming hushed to catch it +distinctly, the lively, reckless call to “play,” from the sons and +daughters of foolishness, to those in whom their life was still +green—Donec virenti canities abest!—Donec virenti canities abest!+ +Marius could hardly doubt how Cornelius would have taken the call. And +as for himself, slight as was the burden of positive moral obligation +with which he had entered Rome, it was to no wasteful and vagrant +affections, such as these, that his Epicureanism had committed him. + +NOTES + + +187. +Horace, Odes I.ix.17. Translation: “So long as youth is fresh and +age is far away.” + + + + +CHAPTER XII. +THE DIVINITY THAT DOTH HEDGE A KING + + +But ah! Maecenas is yclad in claye, +And great Augustus long ygoe is dead, +And all the worthies liggen wrapt in lead, +That matter made for poets on to playe.+ + + +Marcus Aurelius who, though he had little relish for them himself, had +ever been willing to humour the taste of his people for magnificent +spectacles, was received back to Rome with the lesser honours of the +Ovation, conceded by the Senate (so great was the public sense of +deliverance) with even more than the laxity which had become its habit +under imperial rule, for there had been no actual bloodshed in the late +achievement. Clad in the civic dress of the chief Roman magistrate, and +with a crown of myrtle upon his head, his colleague similarly attired +walking beside him, he passed up to the Capitol on foot, though in +solemn procession along the Sacred Way, to offer sacrifice to the +national gods. The victim, a goodly sheep, whose image we may still see +between the pig and the ox of the Suovetaurilia, filleted and stoled +almost like some ancient canon of the church, on a sculptured fragment +in the Forum, was conducted by the priests, clad in rich white +vestments, and bearing their sacred utensils of massive gold, +immediately behind a company of flute-players, led by the great +choir-master, or conductor, of the day, visibly tetchy or delighted, +according as the instruments he ruled with his tuning-rod, rose, more +or less adequately amid the difficulties of the way, to the dream of +perfect music in the soul within him. The vast crowd, including the +soldiers of the triumphant army, now restored to wives and children, +all alike in holiday whiteness, had left their houses early in the +fine, dry morning, in a real affection for “the father of his country,” +to await the procession, the two princes having spent the preceding +night outside the walls, at the old Villa of the Republic. Marius, full +of curiosity, had taken his position with much care; and stood to see +the world’s masters pass by, at an angle from which he could command +the view of a great part of the processional route, sprinkled with fine +yellow sand, and punctiliously guarded from profane footsteps. + +The coming of the pageant was announced by the clear sound of the +flutes, heard at length above the acclamations of the people—Salve +Imperator!—Dii te servent!—shouted in regular time, over the hills. It +was on the central figure, of course, that the whole attention of +Marius was fixed from the moment when the procession came in sight, +preceded by the lictors with gilded fasces, the imperial image-bearers, +and the pages carrying lighted torches; a band of knights, among whom +was Cornelius in complete military, array, following. Amply swathed +about in the folds of a richly worked toga, after a manner now long +since become obsolete with meaner persons, Marius beheld a man of about +five-and-forty years of age, with prominent eyes—eyes, which although +demurely downcast during this essentially religious ceremony, were by +nature broadly and benignantly observant. He was still, in the main, as +we see him in the busts which represent his gracious and courtly youth, +when Hadrian had playfully called him, not Verus, after the name of his +father, but Verissimus, for his candour of gaze, and the bland capacity +of the brow, which, below the brown hair, clustering thickly as of old, +shone out low, broad, and clear, and still without a trace of the +trouble of his lips. You saw the brow of one who, amid the blindness or +perplexity of the people about him, understood all things clearly; the +dilemma, to which his experience so far had brought him, between Chance +with meek resignation, and a Providence with boundless possibilities +and hope, being for him at least distinctly defined. + +That outward serenity, which he valued so highly as a point of manner +or expression not unworthy the care of a public minister—outward +symbol, it might be thought, of the inward religious serenity it had +been his constant purpose to maintain—was increased to-day by his sense +of the gratitude of his people; that his life had been one of such +gifts and blessings as made his person seem in very deed divine to +them. Yet the cloud of some reserved internal sorrow, passing from time +to time into an expression of fatigue and effort, of loneliness amid +the shouting multitude, might have been detected there by the more +observant—as if the sagacious hint of one of his officers, “The +soldiers can’t understand you, they don’t know Greek,” were applicable +always to his relationships with other people. The nostrils and mouth +seemed capable almost of peevishness; and Marius noted in them, as in +the hands, and in the spare body generally, what was new to his +experience—something of asceticism, as we say, of a bodily gymnastic, +by which, although it told pleasantly in the clear blue humours of the +eye, the flesh had scarcely been an equal gainer with the spirit. It +was hardly the expression of “the healthy mind in the healthy body,” +but rather of a sacrifice of the body to the soul, its needs and +aspirations, that Marius seemed to divine in this assiduous student of +the Greek sages—a sacrifice, in truth, far beyond the demands of their +very saddest philosophy of life. + +Dignify thyself with modesty and simplicity for thine ornaments!—had +been ever a maxim with this dainty and high-bred Stoic, who still +thought manners a true part of morals, according to the old sense of +the term, and who regrets now and again that he cannot control his +thoughts equally well with his countenance. That outward composure was +deepened during the solemnities of this day by an air of pontifical +abstraction; which, though very far from being pride—nay, a sort of +humility rather—yet gave, to himself, an air of unapproachableness, and +to his whole proceeding, in which every minutest act was considered, +the character of a ritual. Certainly, there was no haughtiness, social, +moral, or even philosophic, in Aurelius, who had realised, under more +trying conditions perhaps than any one before, that no element of +humanity could be alien from him. Yet, as he walked to-day, the centre +of ten thousand observers, with eyes discreetly fixed on the ground, +veiling his head at times and muttering very rapidly the words of the +“supplications,” there was something many spectators may have noted as +a thing new in their experience, for Aurelius, unlike his predecessors, +took all this with absolute seriousness. The doctrine of the sanctity +of kings, that, in the words of Tacitus, Princes are as Gods—Principes +instar deorum esse—seemed to have taken a novel, because a literal, +sense. For Aurelius, indeed, the old legend of his descent from Numa, +from Numa who had talked with the gods, meant much. Attached in very +early years to the service of the altars, like many another noble +youth, he was “observed to perform all his sacerdotal functions with a +constancy and exactness unusual at that age; was soon a master of the +sacred music; and had all the forms and ceremonies by heart.” And now, +as the emperor, who had not only a vague divinity about his person, but +was actually the chief religious functionary of the state, recited from +time to time the forms of invocation, he needed not the help of the +prompter, or ceremoniarius, who then approached, to assist him by +whispering the appointed words in his ear. It was that pontifical +abstraction which then impressed itself on Marius as the leading +outward characteristic of Aurelius; though to him alone, perhaps, in +that vast crowd of observers, it was no strange thing, but a matter he +had understood from of old. + +Some fanciful writers have assigned the origin of these triumphal +processions to the mythic pomps of Dionysus, after his conquests in the +East; the very word Triumph being, according to this supposition, only +Thriambos-the Dionysiac Hymn. And certainly the younger of the two +imperial “brothers,” who, with the effect of a strong contrast, walked +beside Aurelius, and shared the honours of the day, might well have +reminded people of the delicate Greek god of flowers and wine. This new +conqueror of the East was now about thirty-six years old, but with his +scrupulous care for all the advantages of his person, and a soft +curling beard powdered with gold, looked many years younger. One result +of the more genial element in the wisdom of Aurelius had been that, +amid most difficult circumstances, he had known throughout life how to +act in union with persons of character very alien from his own; to be +more than loyal to the colleague, the younger brother in empire, he had +too lightly taken to himself, five years before, then an uncorrupt +youth, “skilled in manly exercises and fitted for war.” When Aurelius +thanks the gods that a brother had fallen to his lot, whose character +was a stimulus to the proper care of his own, one sees that this could +only have happened in the way of an example, putting him on his guard +against insidious faults. But it is with sincere amiability that the +imperial writer, who was indeed little used to be ironical, adds that +the lively respect and affection of the junior had often “gladdened” +him. To be able to make his use of the flower, when the fruit perhaps +was useless or poisonous:—that was one of the practical successes of +his philosophy; and his people noted, with a blessing, “the concord of +the two Augusti.” + +The younger, certainly, possessed in full measure that charm of a +constitutional freshness of aspect which may defy for a long time +extravagant or erring habits of life; a physiognomy, healthy-looking, +cleanly, and firm, which seemed unassociable with any form of +self-torment, and made one think of the muzzle of some young hound or +roe, such as human beings invariably like to stroke—a physiognomy, in +effect, with all the goodliness of animalism of the finer sort, though +still wholly animal. The charm was that of the blond head, the +unshrinking gaze, the warm tints: neither more nor less than one may +see every English summer, in youth, manly enough, and with the stuff +which makes brave soldiers, in spite of the natural kinship it seems to +have with playthings and gay flowers. But innate in Lucius Verus there +was that more than womanly fondness for fond things, which had made the +atmosphere of the old city of Antioch, heavy with centuries of +voluptuousness, a poison to him: he had come to love his delicacies +best out of season, and would have gilded the very flowers. But with a +wonderful power of self-obliteration, the elder brother at the capital +had directed his procedure successfully, and allowed him, become now +also the husband of his daughter Lucilla, the credit of a “Conquest,” +though Verus had certainly not returned a conqueror over himself. He +had returned, as we know, with the plague in his company, along with +many another strange creature of his folly; and when the people saw him +publicly feeding his favourite horse Fleet with almonds and sweet +grapes, wearing the animal’s image in gold, and finally building it a +tomb, they felt, with some un-sentimental misgiving, that he might +revive the manners of Nero.—What if, in the chances of war, he should +survive the protecting genius of that elder brother? + +He was all himself to-day: and it was with much wistful curiosity that +Marius regarded him. For Lucius Verus was, indeed, but the highly +expressive type of a class,—the true son of his father, adopted by +Hadrian. Lucius Verus the elder, also, had had the like strange +capacity for misusing the adornments of life, with a masterly grace; as +if such misusing were, in truth, the quite adequate occupation of an +intelligence, powerful, but distorted by cynical philosophy or some +disappointment of the heart. It was almost a sort of genius, of which +there had been instances in the imperial purple: it was to ascend the +throne, a few years later, in the person of one, now a hopeful little +lad at home in the palace; and it had its following, of course, among +the wealthy youth at Rome, who concentrated no inconsiderable force of +shrewdness and tact upon minute details of attire and manner, as upon +the one thing needful. Certainly, flowers were pleasant to the eye. +Such things had even their sober use, as making the outside of human +life superficially attractive, and thereby promoting the first steps +towards friendship and social amity. But what precise place could there +be for Verus and his peculiar charm, in that Wisdom, that Order of +divine Reason “reaching from end to end, strongly and sweetly disposing +all things,” from the vision of which Aurelius came down, so tolerant +of persons like him? Into such vision Marius too was certainly +well-fitted to enter, yet, noting the actual perfection of Lucius Verus +after his kind, his undeniable achievement of the select, in all minor +things, felt, though with some suspicion of himself, that he entered +into, and could understand, this other so dubious sort of character +also. There was a voice in the theory he had brought to Rome with him +which whispered “nothing is either great nor small;” as there were +times when he could have thought that, as the “grammarian’s” or the +artist’s ardour of soul may be satisfied by the perfecting of the +theory of a sentence, or the adjustment of two colours, so his own life +also might have been fulfilled by an enthusiastic quest after +perfection—say, in the flowering and folding of a toga. + +The emperors had burned incense before the image of Jupiter, arrayed in +its most gorgeous apparel, amid sudden shouts from the people of Salve +Imperator! turned now from the living princes to the deity, as they +discerned his countenance through the great open doors. The imperial +brothers had deposited their crowns of myrtle on the richly embroidered +lapcloth of the god; and, with their chosen guests, sat down to a +public feast in the temple itself. There followed what was, after all, +the great event of the day:—an appropriate discourse, a discourse +almost wholly de contemptu mundi, delivered in the presence of the +assembled Senate, by the emperor Aurelius, who had thus, on certain +rare occasions, condescended to instruct his people, with the double +authority of a chief pontiff and a laborious student of philosophy. In +those lesser honours of the ovation, there had been no attendant slave +behind the emperors, to make mock of their effulgence as they went; and +it was as if with the discretion proper to a philosopher, and in fear +of a jealous Nemesis, he had determined himself to protest in time +against the vanity of all outward success. + +The Senate was assembled to hear the emperor’s discourse in the vast +hall of the Curia Julia. A crowd of high-bred youths idled around, or +on the steps before the doors, with the marvellous toilets Marius had +noticed in the Via Nova; in attendance, as usual, to learn by +observation the minute points of senatorial procedure. Marius had +already some acquaintance with them, and passing on found himself +suddenly in the presence of what was still the most august assembly the +world had seen. Under Aurelius, ever full of veneration for this +ancient traditional guardian of public religion, the Senate had +recovered all its old dignity and independence. Among its members many +hundreds in number, visibly the most distinguished of them all, Marius +noted the great sophists or rhetoricians of the day, in all their +magnificence. The antique character of their attire, and the ancient +mode of wearing it, still surviving with them, added to the imposing +character of their persons, while they sat, with their staves of ivory +in their hands, on their curule chairs—almost the exact pattern of the +chair still in use in the Roman church when a Bishop pontificates at +the divine offices—“tranquil and unmoved, with a majesty that seemed +divine,” as Marius thought, like the old Gaul of the Invasion. The rays +of the early November sunset slanted full upon the audience, and made +it necessary for the officers of the Court to draw the purple curtains +over the windows, adding to the solemnity of the scene. In the depth of +those warm shadows, surrounded by her ladies, the empress Faustina was +seated to listen. The beautiful Greek statue of Victory, which since +the days of Augustus had presided over the assemblies of the Senate, +had been brought into the hall, and placed near the chair of the +emperor; who, after rising to perform a brief sacrificial service in +its honour, bowing reverently to the assembled fathers left and right, +took his seat and began to speak. + +There was a certain melancholy grandeur in the very simplicity or +triteness of the theme: as it were the very quintessence of all the old +Roman epitaphs, of all that was monumental in that city of tombs, layer +upon layer of dead things and people. As if in the very fervour of +disillusion, he seemed to be composing—Hôsper epigraphas chronôn kai +holôn ethnôn+—the sepulchral titles of ages and whole peoples; nay! the +very epitaph of the living Rome itself. The grandeur of the ruins of +Rome,—heroism in ruin: it was under the influence of an imaginative +anticipation of this, that he appeared to be speaking. And though the +impression of the actual greatness of Rome on that day was but enhanced +by the strain of contempt, falling with an accent of pathetic +conviction from the emperor himself, and gaining from his pontifical +pretensions the authority of a religious intimation, yet the curious +interest of the discourse lay in this, that Marius, for one, as he +listened, seemed to forsee a grass-grown Forum, the broken ways of the +Capitol, and the Palatine hill itself in humble occupation. That +impression connected itself with what he had already noted of an actual +change even then coming over Italian scenery. Throughout, he could +trace something of a humour into which Stoicism at all times tends to +fall, the tendency to cry, Abase yourselves! There was here the almost +inhuman impassibility of one who had thought too closely on the +paradoxical aspect of the love of posthumous fame. With the ascetic +pride which lurks under all Platonism, resultant from its opposition of +the seen to the unseen, as falsehood to truth—the imperial Stoic, like +his true descendant, the hermit of the middle age, was ready, in no +friendly humour, to mock, there in its narrow bed, the corpse which had +made so much of itself in life. Marius could but contrast all that with +his own Cyrenaic eagerness, just then, to taste and see and touch; +reflecting on the opposite issues deducible from the same text. “The +world, within me and without, flows away like a river,” he had said; +“therefore let me make the most of what is here and now.”—“The world +and the thinker upon it, are consumed like a flame,” said Aurelius, +“therefore will I turn away my eyes from vanity: renounce: withdraw +myself alike from all affections.” He seemed tacitly to claim as a sort +of personal dignity, that he was very familiarly versed in this view of +things, and could discern a death’s-head everywhere. Now and again +Marius was reminded of the saying that “with the Stoics all people are +the vulgar save themselves;” and at times the orator seemed to have +forgotten his audience, and to be speaking only to himself. + +“Art thou in love with men’s praises, get thee into the very soul of +them, and see!—see what judges they be, even in those matters which +concern themselves. Wouldst thou have their praise after death, bethink +thee, that they who shall come hereafter, and with whom thou wouldst +survive by thy great name, will be but as these, whom here thou hast +found so hard to live with. For of a truth, the soul of him who is +aflutter upon renown after death, presents not this aright to itself, +that of all whose memory he would have each one will likewise very +quickly depart, until memory herself be put out, as she journeys on by +means of such as are themselves on the wing but for a while, and are +extinguished in their turn.—Making so much of those thou wilt never +see! It is as if thou wouldst have had those who were before thee +discourse fair things concerning thee. + +“To him, indeed, whose wit hath been whetted by true doctrine, that +well-worn sentence of Homer sufficeth, to guard him against regret and +fear.— + + Like the race of leaves +The race of man is:— + + + The wind in autumn strows +The earth with old leaves: then the spring + the woods with new endows.+ + + +Leaves! little leaves!—thy children, thy flatterers, thine enemies! +Leaves in the wind, those who would devote thee to darkness, who scorn +or miscall thee here, even as they also whose great fame shall outlast +them. For all these, and the like of them, are born indeed in the +spring season—Earos epigignetai hôrê+: and soon a wind hath scattered +them, and thereafter the wood peopleth itself again with another +generation of leaves. And what is common to all of them is but the +littleness of their lives: and yet wouldst thou love and hate, as if +these things should continue for ever. In a little while thine eyes +also will be closed, and he on whom thou perchance hast leaned thyself +be himself a burden upon another. + +“Bethink thee often of the swiftness with which the things that are, or +are even now coming to be, are swept past thee: that the very substance +of them is but the perpetual motion of water: that there is almost +nothing which continueth: of that bottomless depth of time, so close at +thy side. Folly! to be lifted up, or sorrowful, or anxious, by reason +of things like these! Think of infinite matter, and thy portion—how +tiny a particle, of it! of infinite time, and thine own brief point +there; of destiny, and the jot thou art in it; and yield thyself +readily to the wheel of Clotho, to spin of thee what web she will. + +“As one casting a ball from his hand, the nature of things hath had its +aim with every man, not as to the ending only, but the first beginning +of his course, and passage thither. And hath the ball any profit of its +rising, or loss as it descendeth again, or in its fall? or the bubble, +as it groweth or breaketh on the air? or the flame of the lamp, from +the beginning to the end of its brief story? + +“All but at this present that future is, in which nature, who disposeth +all things in order, will transform whatsoever thou now seest, +fashioning from its substance somewhat else, and therefrom somewhat +else in its turn, lest the world grow old. We are such stuff as dreams +are made of—disturbing dreams. Awake, then! and see thy dream as it is, +in comparison with that erewhile it seemed to thee. + +“And for me, especially, it were well to mind those many mutations of +empire in time past; therein peeping also upon the future, which must +needs be of like species with what hath been, continuing ever within +the rhythm and number of things which really are; so that in forty +years one may note of man and of his ways little less than in a +thousand. Ah! from this higher place, look we down upon the ship-wrecks +and the calm! Consider, for example, how the world went, under the +emperor Vespasian. They are married and given in marriage, they breed +children; love hath its way with them; they heap up riches for others +or for themselves; they are murmuring at things as then they are; they +are seeking for great place; crafty, flattering, suspicious, waiting +upon the death of others:—festivals, business, war, sickness, +dissolution: and now their whole life is no longer anywhere at all. +Pass on to the reign of Trajan: all things continue the same: and that +life also is no longer anywhere at all. Ah! but look again, and +consider, one after another, as it were the sepulchral inscriptions of +all peoples and times, according to one pattern.—What multitudes, after +their utmost striving—a little afterwards! were dissolved again into +their dust. + +“Think again of life as it was far off in the ancient world; as it must +be when we shall be gone; as it is now among the wild heathen. How many +have never heard your names and mine, or will soon forget them! How +soon may those who shout my name to-day begin to revile it, because +glory, and the memory of men, and all things beside, are but vanity—a +sand-heap under the senseless wind, the barking of dogs, the +quarrelling of children, weeping incontinently upon their laughter. + +“This hasteth to be; that other to have been: of that which now cometh +to be, even now somewhat hath been extinguished. And wilt thou make thy +treasure of any one of these things? It were as if one set his love +upon the swallow, as it passeth out of sight through the air! + +“Bethink thee often, in all contentions public and private, of those +whom men have remembered by reason of their anger and vehement +spirit—those famous rages, and the occasions of them—the great +fortunes, and misfortunes, of men’s strife of old. What are they all +now, and the dust of their battles? Dust and ashes indeed; a fable, a +mythus, or not so much as that. Yes! keep those before thine eyes who +took this or that, the like of which happeneth to thee, so hardly; were +so querulous, so agitated. And where again are they? Wouldst thou have +it not otherwise with thee? + +Consider how quickly all things vanish away—their bodily structure into +the general substance; the very memory of them into that great gulf and +abysm of past thoughts. Ah! ’tis on a tiny space of earth thou art +creeping through life—a pigmy soul carrying a dead body to its grave. + +“Let death put thee upon the consideration both of thy body and thy +soul: what an atom of all matter hath been distributed to thee; what a +little particle of the universal mind. Turn thy body about, and +consider what thing it is, and that which old age, and lust, and the +languor of disease can make of it. Or come to its substantial and +causal qualities, its very type: contemplate that in itself, apart from +the accidents of matter, and then measure also the span of time for +which the nature of things, at the longest, will maintain that special +type. Nay! in the very principles and first constituents of things +corruption hath its part—so much dust, humour, stench, and scraps of +bone! Consider that thy marbles are but the earth’s callosities, thy +gold and silver its faeces; this silken robe but a worm’s bedding, and +thy purple an unclean fish. Ah! and thy life’s breath is not otherwise, +as it passeth out of matters like these, into the like of them again. + +“For the one soul in things, taking matter like wax in the hands, +moulds and remoulds—how hastily!—beast, and plant, and the babe, in +turn: and that which dieth hath not slipped out of the order of nature, +but, remaining therein, hath also its changes there, disparting into +those elements of which nature herself, and thou too, art compacted. +She changes without murmuring. The oaken chest falls to pieces with no +more complaining than when the carpenter fitted it together. If one +told thee certainly that on the morrow thou shouldst die, or at the +furthest on the day after, it would be no great matter to thee to die +on the day after to-morrow, rather than to-morrow. Strive to think it a +thing no greater that thou wilt die—not to-morrow, but a year, or two +years, or ten years from to-day. + +“I find that all things are now as they were in the days of our buried +ancestors—all things sordid in their elements, trite by long usage, and +yet ephemeral. How ridiculous, then, how like a countryman in town, is +he, who wonders at aught. Doth the sameness, the repetition of the +public shows, weary thee? Even so doth that likeness of events in the +spectacle of the world. And so must it be with thee to the end. For the +wheel of the world hath ever the same motion, upward and downward, from +generation to generation. When, when, shall time give place to +eternity? + +“If there be things which trouble thee thou canst put them away, +inasmuch as they have their being but in thine own notion concerning +them. Consider what death is, and how, if one does but detach from it +the appearances, the notions, that hang about it, resting the eye upon +it as in itself it really is, it must be thought of but as an effect of +nature, and that man but a child whom an effect of nature shall +affright. Nay! not function and effect of nature, only; but a thing +profitable also to herself. + +“To cease from action—the ending of thine effort to think and do: there +is no evil in that. Turn thy thought to the ages of man’s life, +boyhood, youth, maturity, old age: the change in every one of these +also is a dying, but evil nowhere. Thou climbedst into the ship, thou +hast made thy voyage and touched the shore. Go forth now! Be it into +some other life: the divine breath is everywhere, even there. Be it +into forgetfulness for ever; at least thou wilt rest from the beating +of sensible images upon thee, from the passions which pluck thee this +way and that like an unfeeling toy, from those long marches of the +intellect, from thy toilsome ministry to the flesh. + +“Art thou yet more than dust and ashes and bare bone—a name only, or +not so much as that, which, also, is but whispering and a resonance, +kept alive from mouth to mouth of dying abjects who have hardly known +themselves; how much less thee, dead so long ago! + +“When thou lookest upon a wise man, a lawyer, a captain of war, think +upon another gone. When thou seest thine own face in the glass, call up +there before thee one of thine ancestors—one of those old Caesars. Lo! +everywhere, thy double before thee! Thereon, let the thought occur to +thee: And where are they? anywhere at all, for ever? And thou, +thyself—how long? Art thou blind to that thou art—thy matter, how +temporal; and thy function, the nature of thy business? Yet tarry, at +least, till thou hast assimilated even these things to thine own proper +essence, as a quick fire turneth into heat and light whatsoever be cast +upon it. + +“As words once in use are antiquated to us, so is it with the names +that were once on all men’s lips: Camillus, Volesus, Leonnatus: then, +in a little while, Scipio and Cato, and then Augustus, and then +Hadrian, and then Antoninus Pius. How many great physicians who lifted +wise brows at other men’s sick-beds, have sickened and died! Those wise +Chaldeans, who foretold, as a great matter, another man’s last hour, +have themselves been taken by surprise. Ay! and all those others, in +their pleasant places: those who doated on a Capreae like Tiberius, on +their gardens, on the baths: Pythagoras and Socrates, who reasoned so +closely upon immortality: Alexander, who used the lives of others as +though his own should last for ever—he and his mule-driver alike +now!—one upon another. Well-nigh the whole court of Antoninus is +extinct. Panthea and Pergamus sit no longer beside the sepulchre of +their lord. The watchers over Hadrian’s dust have slipped from his +sepulchre.—It were jesting to stay longer. Did they sit there still, +would the dead feel it? or feeling it, be glad? or glad, hold those +watchers for ever? The time must come when they too shall be aged men +and aged women, and decease, and fail from their places; and what shift +were there then for imperial service? This too is but the breath of the +tomb, and a skinful of dead men’s blood. + +“Think again of those inscriptions, which belong not to one soul only, +but to whole families: Eschatos tou idiou genous:+ He was the last of +his race. Nay! of the burial of whole cities: Helice, Pompeii: of +others, whose very burial place is unknown. + +“Thou hast been a citizen in this wide city. Count not for how long, +nor repine; since that which sends thee hence is no unrighteous judge, +no tyrant, but Nature, who brought thee hither; as when a player leaves +the stage at the bidding of the conductor who hired him. Sayest thou, +‘I have not played five acts’? True! but in human life, three acts only +make sometimes an entire play. That is the composer’s business, not +thine. Withdraw thyself with a good will; for that too hath, perchance, +a good will which dismisseth thee from thy part.” + +The discourse ended almost in darkness, the evening having set in +somewhat suddenly, with a heavy fall of snow. The torches, made ready +to do him a useless honour, were of real service now, as the emperor +was solemnly conducted home; one man rapidly catching light from +another—a long stream of moving lights across the white Forum, up the +great stairs, to the palace. And, in effect, that night winter began, +the hardest that had been known for a lifetime. The wolves came from +the mountains; and, led by the carrion scent, devoured the dead bodies +which had been hastily buried during the plague, and, emboldened by +their meal, crept, before the short day was well past, over the walls +of the farmyards of the Campagna. The eagles were seen driving the +flocks of smaller birds across the dusky sky. Only, in the city itself +the winter was all the brighter for the contrast, among those who could +pay for light and warmth. The habit-makers made a great sale of the +spoil of all such furry creatures as had escaped wolves and eagles, for +presents at the Saturnalia; and at no time had the winter roses from +Carthage seemed more lustrously yellow and red. + +NOTES + + +188. +Spenser, Shepheardes Calendar, October, 61-66. + + +200. +Transliteration: Hôsper epigraphas chronôn kai holôn ethnôn. +Pater’s Translation: “the sepulchral titles of ages and whole peoples.” + + +202. +Homer, Iliad VI.146-48. + + +202. +Transliteration: Earos epigignetai hôrê. Translation: “born in +springtime.” Homer, Iliad VI.147. + + +210. +Transliteration: Eschatos tou idiou genous. Translation: “He was +the last of his race.” + + + + +CHAPTER XIII. +THE “MISTRESS AND MOTHER” OF PALACES + + +After that sharp, brief winter, the sun was already at work, softening +leaf and bud, as you might feel by a faint sweetness in the air; but he +did his work behind an evenly white sky, against which the abode of the +Caesars, its cypresses and bronze roofs, seemed like a picture in +beautiful but melancholy colour, as Marius climbed the long flights of +steps to be introduced to the emperor Aurelius. Attired in the newest +mode, his legs wound in dainty fasciae of white leather, with the heavy +gold ring of the ingenuus, and in his toga of ceremony, he still +retained all his country freshness of complexion. The eyes of the +“golden youth” of Rome were upon him as the chosen friend of Cornelius, +and the destined servant of the emperor; but not jealously. In spite +of, perhaps partly because of, his habitual reserve of manner, he had +become “the fashion,” even among those who felt instinctively the irony +which lay beneath that remarkable self-possession, as of one taking all +things with a difference from other people, perceptible in voice, in +expression, and even in his dress. It was, in truth, the air of one +who, entering vividly into life, and relishing to the full the +delicacies of its intercourse, yet feels all the while, from the point +of view of an ideal philosophy, that he is but conceding reality to +suppositions, choosing of his own will to walk in a day-dream, of the +illusiveness of which he at least is aware. + +In the house of the chief chamberlain Marius waited for the due moment +of admission to the emperor’s presence. He was admiring the peculiar +decoration of the walls, coloured like rich old red leather. In the +midst of one of them was depicted, under a trellis of fruit you might +have gathered, the figure of a woman knocking at a door with wonderful +reality of perspective. Then the summons came; and in a few minutes, +the etiquette of the imperial household being still a simple matter, he +had passed the curtains which divided the central hall of the palace +into three parts—three degrees of approach to the sacred person—and was +speaking to Aurelius himself; not in Greek, in which the emperor +oftenest conversed with the learned, but, more familiarly, in Latin, +adorned however, or disfigured, by many a Greek phrase, as now and +again French phrases have made the adornment of fashionable English. It +was with real kindliness that Marcus Aurelius looked upon Marius, as a +youth of great attainments in Greek letters and philosophy; and he +liked also his serious expression, being, as we know, a believer in the +doctrine of physiognomy—that, as he puts it, not love only, but every +other affection of man’s soul, looks out very plainly from the window +of the eyes. + +The apartment in which Marius found himself was of ancient aspect, and +richly decorated with the favourite toys of two or three generations of +imperial collectors, now finally revised by the high connoisseurship of +the Stoic emperor himself, though destined not much longer to remain +together there. It is the repeated boast of Aurelius that he had +learned from old Antoninus Pius to maintain authority without the +constant use of guards, in a robe woven by the handmaids of his own +consort, with no processional lights or images, and “that a prince may +shrink himself almost into the figure of a private gentleman.” And yet, +again as at his first sight of him, Marius was struck by the profound +religiousness of the surroundings of the imperial presence. The effect +might have been due in part to the very simplicity, the discreet and +scrupulous simplicity, of the central figure in this splendid abode; +but Marius could not forget that he saw before him not only the head of +the Roman religion, but one who might actually have claimed something +like divine worship, had he cared to do so. Though the fantastic +pretensions of Caligula had brought some contempt on that claim, which +had become almost a jest under the ungainly Claudius, yet, from +Augustus downwards, a vague divinity had seemed to surround the Caesars +even in this life; and the peculiar character of Aurelius, at once a +ceremonious polytheist never forgetful of his pontifical calling, and a +philosopher whose mystic speculation encircled him with a sort of +saintly halo, had restored to his person, without his intending it, +something of that divine prerogative, or prestige. Though he would +never allow the immediate dedication of altars to himself, yet the +image of his Genius—his spirituality or celestial counterpart—was +placed among those of the deified princes of the past; and his family, +including Faustina and the young Commodus, was spoken of as the “holy” +or “divine” house. Many a Roman courtier agreed with the barbarian +chief, who, after contemplating a predecessor of Aurelius, withdrew +from his presence with the exclamation:—“I have seen a god to-day!” The +very roof of his house, rising into a pediment or gable, like that of +the sanctuary of a god, the laurels on either side its doorway, the +chaplet of oak-leaves above, seemed to designate the place for +religious veneration. And notwithstanding all this, the household of +Aurelius was singularly modest, with none of the wasteful expense of +palaces after the fashion of Lewis the Fourteenth; the palatial dignity +being felt only in a peculiar sense of order, the absence of all that +was casual, of vulgarity and discomfort. A merely official residence of +his predecessors, the Palatine had become the favourite dwelling-place +of Aurelius; its many-coloured memories suiting, perhaps, his pensive +character, and the crude splendours of Nero and Hadrian being now +subdued by time. The window-less Roman abode must have had much of what +to a modern would be gloom. How did the children, one wonders, endure +houses with so little escape for the eye into the world outside? +Aurelius, who had altered little else, choosing to live there, in a +genuine homeliness, had shifted and made the most of the level lights, +and broken out a quite medieval window here and there, and the clear +daylight, fully appreciated by his youthful visitor, made pleasant +shadows among the objects of the imperial collection. Some of these, +indeed, by reason of their Greek simplicity and grace, themselves shone +out like spaces of a purer, early light, amid the splendours of the +Roman manufacture. + +Though he looked, thought Marius, like a man who did not sleep enough, +he was abounding and bright to-day, after one of those pitiless +headaches, which since boyhood had been the “thorn in his side,” +challenging the pretensions of his philosophy to fortify one in humble +endurances. At the first moment, to Marius, remembering the spectacle +of the emperor in ceremony, it was almost bewildering to be in private +conversation with him. There was much in the philosophy of +Aurelius—much consideration of mankind at large, of great bodies, +aggregates and generalities, after the Stoic manner—which, on a nature +less rich than his, might have acted as an inducement to care for +people in inverse proportion to their nearness to him. That has +sometimes been the result of the Stoic cosmopolitanism. Aurelius, +however, determined to beautify by all means, great or little, a +doctrine which had in it some potential sourness, had brought all the +quickness of his intelligence, and long years of observation, to bear +on the conditions of social intercourse. He had early determined “not +to make business an excuse to decline the offices of humanity—not to +pretend to be too much occupied with important affairs to concede what +life with others may hourly demand;” and with such success, that, in an +age which made much of the finer points of that intercourse, it was +felt that the mere honesty of his conversation was more pleasing than +other men’s flattery. His agreeableness to his young visitor to-day +was, in truth, a blossom of the same wisdom which had made of Lucius +Verus really a brother—the wisdom of not being exigent with men, any +more than with fruit-trees (it is his own favourite figure) beyond +their nature. And there was another person, still nearer to him, +regarding whom this wisdom became a marvel, of equity—of charity. + +The centre of a group of princely children, in the same apartment with +Aurelius, amid all the refined intimacies of a modern home, sat the +empress Faustina, warming her hands over a fire. With her long fingers +lighted up red by the glowing coals of the brazier Marius looked close +upon the most beautiful woman in the world, who was also the great +paradox of the age, among her boys and girls. As has been truly said of +the numerous representations of her in art, so in life, she had the air +of one curious, restless, to enter into conversation with the first +comer. She had certainly the power of stimulating a very ambiguous sort +of curiosity about herself. And Marius found this enigmatic point in +her expression, that even after seeing her many times he could never +precisely recall her features in absence. The lad of six years, looking +older, who stood beside her, impatiently plucking a rose to pieces over +the hearth, was, in outward appearance, his father—the young +Verissimus—over again; but with a certain feminine length of feature, +and with all his mother’s alertness, or license, of gaze. + +Yet rumour knocked at every door and window of the imperial house +regarding the adulterers who knocked at them, or quietly left their +lovers’ garlands there. Was not that likeness of the husband, in the +boy beside her, really the effect of a shameful magic, in which the +blood of the murdered gladiator, his true father, had been an +ingredient? Were the tricks for deceiving husbands which the Roman poet +describes, really hers, and her household an efficient school of all +the arts of furtive love? Or, was the husband too aware, like every one +beside? Were certain sudden deaths which happened there, really the +work of apoplexy, or the plague? + +The man whose ears, whose soul, those rumours were meant to penetrate, +was, however, faithful to his sanguine and optimist philosophy, to his +determination that the world should be to him simply what the higher +reason preferred to conceive it; and the life’s journey Aurelius had +made so far, though involving much moral and intellectual loneliness, +had been ever in affectionate and helpful contact with other wayfarers, +very unlike himself. Since his days of earliest childhood in the +Lateran gardens, he seemed to himself, blessing the gods for it after +deliberate survey, to have been always surrounded by kinsmen, friends, +servants, of exceptional virtue. From the great Stoic idea, that we are +all fellow-citizens of one city, he had derived a tenderer, a more +equitable estimate than was common among Stoics, of the eternal +shortcomings of men and women. Considerations that might tend to the +sweetening of his temper it was his daily care to store away, with a +kind of philosophic pride in the thought that no one took more +good-naturedly than he the “oversights” of his neighbours. For had not +Plato taught (it was not paradox, but simple truth of experience) that +if people sin, it is because they know no better, and are “under the +necessity of their own ignorance”? Hard to himself, he seemed at times, +doubtless, to decline too softly upon unworthy persons. Actually, he +came thereby upon many a useful instrument. The empress Faustina he +would seem at least to have kept, by a constraining affection, from +becoming altogether what most people have believed her, and won in her +(we must take him at his word in the “Thoughts,” abundantly confirmed +by letters, on both sides, in his correspondence with Cornelius Fronto) +a consolation, the more secure, perhaps, because misknown of others. +Was the secret of her actual blamelessness, after all, with him who has +at least screened her name? At all events, the one thing quite certain +about her, besides her extraordinary beauty, is her sweetness to +himself. + +No! The wise, who had made due observation on the trees of the garden, +would not expect to gather grapes of thorns or fig-trees: and he was +the vine, putting forth his genial fruit, by natural law, again and +again, after his kind, whatever use people might make of it. Certainly, +his actual presence never lost its power, and Faustina was glad in it +to-day, the birthday of one of her children, a boy who stood at her +knee holding in his fingers tenderly a tiny silver trumpet, one of his +birthday gifts.—“For my part, unless I conceive my hurt to be such, I +have no hurt at all,”—boasts the would-be apathetic emperor:—“and how I +care to conceive of the thing rests with me.” Yet when his children +fall sick or die, this pretence breaks down, and he is broken-hearted: +and one of the charms of certain of his letters still extant, is his +reference to those childish sicknesses.—“On my return to Lorium,” he +writes, “I found my little lady—domnulam meam—in a fever;” and again, +in a letter to one of the most serious of men, “You will be glad to +hear that our little one is better, and running about the room—parvolam +nostram melius valere et intra cubiculum discurrere.” + +The young Commodus had departed from the chamber, anxious to witness +the exercises of certain gladiators, having a native taste for such +company, inherited, according to popular rumour, from his true +father—anxious also to escape from the too impressive company of the +gravest and sweetest specimen of old age Marius had ever seen, the +tutor of the imperial children, who had arrived to offer his birthday +congratulations, and now, very familiarly and affectionately, made a +part of the group, falling on the shoulders of the emperor, kissing the +empress Faustina on the face, the little ones on the face and hands. +Marcus Cornelius Fronto, the “Orator,” favourite teacher of the +emperor’s youth, afterwards his most trusted counsellor, and now the +undisputed occupant of the sophistic throne, whose equipage, elegantly +mounted with silver, Marius had seen in the streets of Rome, had +certainly turned his many personal gifts to account with a good +fortune, remarkable even in that age, so indulgent to professors or +rhetoricians. The gratitude of the emperor Aurelius, always generous to +his teachers, arranging their very quarrels sometimes, for they were +not always fair to one another, had helped him to a really great place +in the world. But his sumptuous appendages, including the villa and +gardens of Maecenas, had been borne with an air perfectly becoming, by +the professor of a philosophy which, even in its most accomplished and +elegant phase, presupposed a gentle contempt for such things. With an +intimate practical knowledge of manners, physiognomies, smiles, +disguises, flatteries, and courtly tricks of every kind—a whole +accomplished rhetoric of daily life—he applied them all to the +promotion of humanity, and especially of men’s family affection. +Through a long life of now eighty years, he had been, as it were, +surrounded by the gracious and soothing air of his own eloquence—the +fame, the echoes, of it—like warbling birds, or murmuring bees. Setting +forth in that fine medium the best ideas of matured pagan philosophy, +he had become the favourite “director” of noble youth. + +Yes! it was the one instance Marius, always eagerly on the look-out for +such, had yet seen of a perfectly tolerable, perfectly beautiful, old +age—an old age in which there seemed, to one who perhaps habitually +over-valued the expression of youth, nothing to be regretted, nothing +really lost, in what years had taken away. The wise old man, whose blue +eyes and fair skin were so delicate, uncontaminate and clear, would +seem to have replaced carefully and consciously each natural trait of +youth, as it departed from him, by an equivalent grace of culture; and +had the blitheness, the placid cheerfulness, as he had also the +infirmity, the claim on stronger people, of a delightful child. And yet +he seemed to be but awaiting his exit from life—that moment with which +the Stoics were almost as much preoccupied as the Christians, however +differently—and set Marius pondering on the contrast between a +placidity like this, at eighty years, and the sort of desperateness he +was aware of in his own manner of entertaining that thought. His +infirmities nevertheless had been painful and long-continued, with +losses of children, of pet grandchildren. What with the crowd, and the +wretched streets, it was a sign of affection which had cost him +something, for the old man to leave his own house at all that day; and +he was glad of the emperor’s support, as he moved from place to place +among the children he protests so often to have loved as his own. + +For a strange piece of literary good fortune, at the beginning of the +present century, has set free the long-buried fragrance of this famous +friendship of the old world, from below a valueless later manuscript, +in a series of letters, wherein the two writers exchange, for the most +part their evening thoughts, especially at family anniversaries, and +with entire intimacy, on their children, on the art of speech, on all +the various subtleties of the “science of images”—rhetorical +images—above all, of course, on sleep and matters of health. They are +full of mutual admiration of each other’s eloquence, restless in +absence till they see one another again, noting, characteristically, +their very dreams of each other, expecting the day which will terminate +the office, the business or duty, which separates them—“as +superstitious people watch for the star, at the rising of which they +may break their fast.” To one of the writers, to Aurelius, the +correspondence was sincerely of value. We see him once reading his +letters with genuine delight on going to rest. Fronto seeks to deter +his pupil from writing in Greek.—Why buy, at great cost, a foreign +wine, inferior to that from one’s own vineyard? Aurelius, on the other +hand, with an extraordinary innate susceptibility to words—la parole +pour la parole, as the French say—despairs, in presence of Fronto’s +rhetorical perfection. + +Like the modern visitor to the Capitoline and some other museums, +Fronto had been struck, pleasantly struck, by the family likeness among +the Antonines; and it was part of his friendship to make much of it, in +the case of the children of Faustina. “Well! I have seen the little +ones,” he writes to Aurelius, then, apparently, absent from them: “I +have seen the little ones—the pleasantest sight of my life; for they +are as like yourself as could possibly be. It has well repaid me for my +journey over that slippery road, and up those steep rocks; for I beheld +you, not simply face to face before me, but, more generously, whichever +way I turned, to my right and my left. For the rest, I found them, +Heaven be thanked! with healthy cheeks and lusty voices. One was +holding a slice of white bread, like a king’s son; the other a crust of +brown bread, as becomes the offspring of a philosopher. I pray the gods +to have both the sower and the seed in their keeping; to watch over +this field wherein the ears of corn are so kindly alike. Ah! I heard +too their pretty voices, so sweet that in the childish prattle of one +and the other I seemed somehow to be listening—yes! in that chirping of +your pretty chickens—to the limpid+ and harmonious notes of your own +oratory. Take care! you will find me growing independent, having those +I could love in your place:—love, on the surety of my eyes and ears.” + ++“Limpid” is misprinted “Limped.” + + +“Magistro meo salutem!” replies the Emperor, “I too have seen my little +ones in your sight of them; as, also, I saw yourself in reading your +letter. It is that charming letter forces me to write thus:” with +reiterations of affection, that is, which are continual in these +letters, on both sides, and which may strike a modern reader perhaps as +fulsome; or, again, as having something in common with the old Judaic +unction of friendship. They were certainly sincere. + +To one of those children Fronto had now brought the birthday gift of +the silver trumpet, upon which he ventured to blow softly now and +again, turning away with eyes delighted at the sound, when he thought +the old man was not listening. It was the well-worn, valetudinarian +subject of sleep, on which Fronto and Aurelius were talking together; +Aurelius always feeling it a burden, Fronto a thing of magic +capacities, so that he had written an encomium in its praise, and often +by ingenious arguments recommends his imperial pupil not to be sparing +of it. To-day, with his younger listeners in mind, he had a story to +tell about it:— + +“They say that our father Jupiter, when he ordered the world at the +beginning, divided time into two parts exactly equal: the one part he +clothed with light, the other with darkness: he called them Day and +Night; and he assigned rest to the night and to day the work of life. +At that time Sleep was not yet born and men passed the whole of their +lives awake: only, the quiet of the night was ordained for them, +instead of sleep. But it came to pass, little by little, being that the +minds of men are restless, that they carried on their business alike by +night as by day, and gave no part at all to repose. And Jupiter, when +he perceived that even in the night-time they ceased not from trouble +and disputation, and that even the courts of law remained open (it was +the pride of Aurelius, as Fronto knew, to be assiduous in those courts +till far into the night) resolved to appoint one of his brothers to be +the overseer of the night and have authority over man’s rest. But +Neptune pleaded in excuse the gravity of his constant charge of the +seas, and Father Dis the difficulty of keeping in subjection the +spirits below; and Jupiter, having taken counsel with the other gods, +perceived that the practice of nightly vigils was somewhat in favour. +It was then, for the most part, that Juno gave birth to her children: +Minerva, the mistress of all art and craft, loved the midnight lamp: +Mars delighted in the darkness for his plots and sallies; and the +favour of Venus and Bacchus was with those who roused by night. Then it +was that Jupiter formed the design of creating Sleep; and he added him +to the number of the gods, and gave him the charge over night and rest, +putting into his hands the keys of human eyes. With his own hands he +mingled the juices wherewith Sleep should soothe the hearts of +mortals—herb of Enjoyment and herb of Safety, gathered from a grove in +Heaven; and, from the meadows of Acheron, the herb of Death; expressing +from it one single drop only, no bigger than a tear one might hide. +‘With this juice,’ he said, ‘pour slumber upon the eyelids of mortals. +So soon as it hath touched them they will lay themselves down +motionless, under thy power. But be not afraid: they shall revive, and +in a while stand up again upon their feet.’ Thereafter, Jupiter gave +wings to Sleep, attached, not, like Mercury’s, to his heels, but to his +shoulders, like the wings of Love. For he said, ‘It becomes thee not to +approach men’s eyes as with the noise of chariots, and the rushing of a +swift courser, but in placid and merciful flight, as upon the wings of +a swallow—nay! with not so much as the flutter of the dove.’ Besides +all this, that he might be yet pleasanter to men, he committed to him +also a multitude of blissful dreams, according to every man’s desire. +One watched his favourite actor; another listened to the flute, or +guided a charioteer in the race: in his dream, the soldier was +victorious, the general was borne in triumph, the wanderer returned +home. Yes!—and sometimes those dreams come true! + +Just then Aurelius was summoned to make the birthday offerings to his +household gods. A heavy curtain of tapestry was drawn back; and beyond +it Marius gazed for a few moments into the Lararium, or imperial +chapel. A patrician youth, in white habit, was in waiting, with a +little chest in his hand containing incense for the use of the altar. +On richly carved consoles, or side boards, around this narrow chamber, +were arranged the rich apparatus of worship and the golden or gilded +images, adorned to-day with fresh flowers, among them that image of +Fortune from the apartment of Antoninus Pius, and such of the emperor’s +own teachers as were gone to their rest. A dim fresco on the wall +commemorated the ancient piety of Lucius Albinius, who in flight from +Rome on the morrow of a great disaster, overtaking certain priests on +foot with their sacred utensils, descended from the wagon in which he +rode and yielded it to the ministers of the gods. As he ascended into +the chapel the emperor paused, and with a grave but friendly look at +his young visitor, delivered a parting sentence, audible to him alone: +_Imitation is the most acceptable part of worship:—the gods had much +rather mankind should resemble than flatter them. Make sure that those +to whom you come nearest be the happier by your presence!_ + +It was the very spirit of the scene and the hour—the hour Marius had +spent in the imperial house. How temperate, how tranquillising! what +humanity! Yet, as he left the eminent company concerning whose ways of +life at home he had been so youthfully curious, and sought, after his +manner, to determine the main trait in all this, he had to confess that +it was a sentiment of mediocrity, though of a mediocrity for once +really golden. + + + + +CHAPTER XIV. +MANLY AMUSEMENT + + +During the Eastern war there came a moment when schism in the empire +had seemed possible through the defection of Lucius Verus; when to +Aurelius it had also seemed possible to confirm his allegiance by no +less a gift than his beautiful daughter Lucilla, the eldest of his +children—the domnula, probably, of those letters. The little lady, +grown now to strong and stately maidenhood, had been ever something of +the good genius, the better soul, to Lucius Verus, by the law of +contraries, her somewhat cold and apathetic modesty acting as +counterfoil to the young man’s tigrish fervour. Conducted to Ephesus, +she had become his wife by form of civil marriage, the more solemn +wedding rites being deferred till their return to Rome. + +The ceremony of the Confarreation, or religious marriage, in which +bride and bridegroom partook together of a certain mystic bread, was +celebrated accordingly, with due pomp, early in the spring; Aurelius +himself assisting, with much domestic feeling. A crowd of fashionable +people filled the space before the entrance to the apartments of Lucius +on the Palatine hill, richly decorated for the occasion, commenting, +not always quite delicately, on the various details of the rite, which +only a favoured few succeeded in actually witnessing. “She comes!” +Marius could hear them say, “escorted by her young brothers: it is the +young Commodus who carries the torch of white-thornwood, the little +basket of work-things, the toys for the children:”—and then, after a +watchful pause, “she is winding the woollen thread round the doorposts. +Ah! I see the marriage-cake: the bridegroom presents the fire and +water.” Then, in a longer pause, was heard the chorus, Thalassie! +Thalassie! and for just a few moments, in the strange light of many wax +tapers at noonday, Marius could see them both, side by side, while the +bride was lifted over the doorstep: Lucius Verus heated and +handsome—the pale, impassive Lucilla looking very long and slender, in +her closely folded yellow veil, and high nuptial crown. + +As Marius turned away, glad to escape from the pressure of the crowd, +he found himself face to face with Cornelius, an infrequent spectator +on occasions such as this. It was a relief to depart with him—so fresh +and quiet he looked, though in all his splendid equestrian array in +honour of the ceremony—from the garish heat of the marriage scene. The +reserve which had puzzled Marius so much on his first day in Rome, was +but an instance of many, to him wholly unaccountable, avoidances alike +of things and persons, which must certainly mean that an intimate +companionship would cost him something in the way of seemingly +indifferent amusements. Some inward standard Marius seemed to detect +there (though wholly unable to estimate its nature) of distinction, +selection, refusal, amid the various elements of the fervid and corrupt +life across which they were moving together:—some secret, constraining +motive, ever on the alert at eye and ear, which carried him through +Rome as under a charm, so that Marius could not but think of that +figure of the white bird in the market-place as undoubtedly made true +of him. And Marius was still full of admiration for this companion, who +had known how to make himself very pleasant to him. Here was the clear, +cold corrective, which the fever of his present life demanded. Without +it, he would have felt alternately suffocated and exhausted by an +existence, at once so gaudy and overdone, and yet so intolerably empty; +in which people, even at their best, seemed only to be brooding, like +the wise emperor himself, over a world’s disillusion. For with all the +severity of Cornelius, there was such a breeze of hopefulness—freshness +and hopefulness, as of new morning, about him. For the most part, as I +said, those refusals, that reserve of his, seemed unaccountable. But +there were cases where the unknown monitor acted in a direction with +which the judgment, or instinct, of Marius himself wholly concurred; +the effective decision of Cornelius strengthening him further therein, +as by a kind of outwardly embodied conscience. And the entire drift of +his education determined him, on one point at least, to be wholly of +the same mind with this peculiar friend (they two, it might be, +together, against the world!) when, alone of a whole company of +brilliant youth, he had withdrawn from his appointed place in the +amphitheatre, at a grand public show, which after an interval of many +months, was presented there, in honour of the nuptials of Lucius Verus +and Lucilla. + +And it was still to the eye, through visible movement and aspect, that +the character, or genius of Cornelius made itself felt by Marius; even +as on that afternoon when he had girt on his armour, among the +expressive lights and shades of the dim old villa at the roadside, and +every object of his knightly array had seemed to be but sign or symbol +of some other thing far beyond it. For, consistently with his really +poetic temper, all influence reached Marius, even more exclusively than +he was aware, through the medium of sense. From Flavian in that brief +early summer of his existence, he had derived a powerful impression of +the “perpetual flux”: he had caught there, as in cipher or symbol, or +low whispers more effective than any definite language, his own +Cyrenaic philosophy, presented thus, for the first time, in an image or +person, with much attractiveness, touched also, consequently, with a +pathetic sense of personal sorrow:—a concrete image, the abstract +equivalent of which he could recognise afterwards, when the agitating +personal influence had settled down for him, clearly enough, into a +theory of practice. But of what possible intellectual formula could +this mystic Cornelius be the sensible exponent; seeming, as he did, to +live ever in close relationship with, and recognition of, a mental +view, a source of discernment, a light upon his way, which had +certainly not yet sprung up for Marius? Meantime, the discretion of +Cornelius, his energetic clearness and purity, were a charm, rather +physical than moral: his exquisite correctness of spirit, at all +events, accorded so perfectly with the regular beauty of his person, as +to seem to depend upon it. And wholly different as was this later +friendship, with its exigency, its warnings, its restraints, from the +feverish attachment to Flavian, which had made him at times like an +uneasy slave, still, like that, it was a reconciliation to the world of +sense, the visible world. From the hopefulness of this gracious +presence, all visible things around him, even the commonest objects of +everyday life—if they but stood together to warm their hands at the +same fire—took for him a new poetry, a delicate fresh bloom, and +interest. It was as if his bodily eyes had been indeed mystically +washed, renewed, strengthened. + +And how eagerly, with what a light heart, would Flavian have taken his +place in the amphitheatre, among the youth of his own age! with what an +appetite for every detail of the entertainment, and its various +accessories:—the sunshine, filtered into soft gold by the vela, with +their serpentine patterning, spread over the more select part of the +company; the Vestal virgins, taking their privilege of seats near the +empress Faustina, who sat there in a maze of double-coloured gems, +changing, as she moved, like the waves of the sea; the cool circle of +shadow, in which the wonderful toilets of the fashionable told so +effectively around the blazing arena, covered again and again during +the many hours’ show, with clean sand for the absorption of certain +great red patches there, by troops of white-shirted boys, for whom the +good-natured audience provided a scramble of nuts and small coin, flung +to them over a trellis-work of silver-gilt and amber, precious gift of +Nero, while a rain of flowers and perfume fell over themselves, as they +paused between the parts of their long feast upon the spectacle of +animal suffering. + +During his sojourn at Ephesus, Lucius Verus had readily become a +patron, patron or protégé, of the great goddess of Ephesus, the goddess +of hunters; and the show, celebrated by way of a compliment to him +to-day, was to present some incidents of her story, where she figures +almost as the genius of madness, in animals, or in the humanity which +comes in contact with them. The entertainment would have an element of +old Greek revival in it, welcome to the taste of a learned and +Hellenising society; and, as Lucius Verus was in some sense a lover of +animals, was to be a display of animals mainly. There would be real +wild and domestic creatures, all of rare species; and a real slaughter. +On so happy an occasion, it was hoped, the elder emperor might even +concede a point, and a living criminal fall into the jaws of the wild +beasts. And the spectacle was, certainly, to end in the destruction, by +one mighty shower of arrows, of a hundred lions, “nobly” provided by +Aurelius himself for the amusement of his people.—Tam magnanimus fuit! + +The arena, decked and in order for the first scene, looked delightfully +fresh, re-inforcing on the spirits of the audience the actual freshness +of the morning, which at this season still brought the dew. Along the +subterranean ways that led up to it, the sound of an advancing chorus +was heard at last, chanting the words of a sacred song, or hymn to +Diana; for the spectacle of the amphitheatre was, after all, a +religious occasion. To its grim acts of blood-shedding a kind of +sacrificial character still belonged in the view of certain religious +casuists, tending conveniently to soothe the humane sensibilities of so +pious an emperor as Aurelius, who, in his fraternal complacency, had +consented to preside over the shows. + +Artemis or Diana, as she may be understood in the actual development of +her worship, was, indeed, the symbolical expression of two allied yet +contrasted elements of human temper and experience—man’s amity, and +also his enmity, towards the wild creatures, when they were still, in a +certain sense, his brothers. She is the complete, and therefore highly +complex, representative of a state, in which man was still much +occupied with animals, not as his flock, or as his servants after the +pastoral relationship of our later, orderly world, but rather as his +equals, on friendly terms or the reverse,—a state full of primeval +sympathies and antipathies, of rivalries and common wants—while he +watched, and could enter into, the humours of those “younger brothers,” +with an intimacy, the “survivals” of which in a later age seem often to +have had a kind of madness about them. Diana represents alike the +bright and the dark side of such relationship. But the humanities of +that relationship were all forgotten to-day in the excitement of a +show, in which mere cruelty to animals, their useless suffering and +death, formed the main point of interest. People watched their +destruction, batch after batch, in a not particularly inventive +fashion; though it was expected that the animals themselves, as living +creatures are apt to do when hard put to it, would become inventive, +and make up, by the fantastic accidents of their agony, for the +deficiencies of an age fallen behind in this matter of manly amusement. +It was as a Deity of Slaughter—the Taurian goddess who demands the +sacrifice of the shipwrecked sailors thrown on her coasts—the cruel, +moonstruck huntress, who brings not only sudden death, but rabies, +among the wild creatures that Diana was to be presented, in the person +of a famous courtesan. The aim at an actual theatrical illusion, after +the first introductory scene, was frankly surrendered to the display of +the animals, artificially stimulated and maddened to attack each other. +And as Diana was also a special protectress of new-born creatures, +there would be a certain curious interest in the dexterously contrived +escape of the young from their mother’s torn bosoms; as many pregnant +animals as possible being carefully selected for the purpose. + +The time had been, and was to come again, when the pleasures of the +amphitheatre centered in a similar practical joking upon human beings. +What more ingenious diversion had stage manager ever contrived than +that incident, itself a practical epigram never to be forgottten, when +a criminal, who, like slaves and animals, had no rights, was compelled +to present the part of Icarus; and, the wings failing him in due +course, had fallen into a pack of hungry bears? For the long shows of +the amphitheatre were, so to speak, the novel-reading of that age—a +current help provided for sluggish imaginations, in regard, for +instance, to grisly accidents, such as might happen to one’s self; but +with every facility for comfortable inspection. Scaevola might watch +his own hand, consuming, crackling, in the fire, in the person of a +culprit, willing to redeem his life by an act so delightful to the +eyes, the very ears, of a curious public. If the part of Marsyas was +called for, there was a criminal condemned to lose his skin. It might +be almost edifying to study minutely the expression of his face, while +the assistants corded and pegged him to the bench, cunningly; the +servant of the law waiting by, who, after one short cut with his knife, +would slip the man’s leg from his skin, as neatly as if it were a +stocking—a finesse in providing the due amount of suffering for +wrong-doers only brought to its height in Nero’s living bonfires. But +then, by making his suffering ridiculous, you enlist against the +sufferer, some real, and all would-be manliness, and do much to stifle +any false sentiment of compassion. The philosophic emperor, having no +great taste for sport, and asserting here a personal scruple, had +greatly changed all that; had provided that nets should be spread under +the dancers on the tight-rope, and buttons for the swords of the +gladiators. But the gladiators were still there. Their bloody contests +had, under the form of a popular amusement, the efficacy of a human +sacrifice; as, indeed, the whole system of the public shows was +understood to possess a religious import. Just at this point, +certainly, the judgment of Lucretius on pagan religion is without +reproach— + +Tantum religio potuit suadere malorum. + + +And Marius, weary and indignant, feeling isolated in the great +slaughter-house, could not but observe that, in his habitual +complaisance to Lucius Verus, who, with loud shouts of applause from +time to time, lounged beside him, Aurelius had sat impassibly through +all the hours Marius himself had remained there. For the most part +indeed, the emperor had actually averted his eyes from the show, +reading, or writing on matters of public business, but had seemed, +after all, indifferent. He was revolving, perhaps, that old Stoic +paradox of the Imperceptibility of pain; which might serve as an +excuse, should those savage popular humours ever again turn against men +and women. Marius remembered well his very attitude and expression on +this day, when, a few years later, certain things came to pass in Gaul, +under his full authority; and that attitude and expression defined +already, even thus early in their so friendly intercourse, and though +he was still full of gratitude for his interest, a permanent point of +difference between the emperor and himself—between himself, with all +the convictions of his life taking centre to-day in his merciful, angry +heart, and Aurelius, as representing all the light, all the +apprehensive power there might be in pagan intellect. There was +something in a tolerance such as this, in the bare fact that he could +sit patiently through a scene like this, which seemed to Marius to mark +Aurelius as his inferior now and for ever on the question of +righteousness; to set them on opposite sides, in some great conflict, +of which that difference was but a single presentment. Due, in whatever +proportions, to the abstract principles he had formulated for himself, +or in spite of them, there was the loyal conscience within him, +deciding, judging himself and every one else, with a wonderful sort of +authority:—You ought, methinks, to be something quite different from +what you are; here! and here! Surely Aurelius must be lacking in that +decisive conscience at first sight, of the intimations of which Marius +could entertain no doubt—which he looked for in others. He at least, +the humble follower of the bodily eye, was aware of a crisis in life, +in this brief, obscure existence, a fierce opposition of real good and +real evil around him, the issues of which he must by no means +compromise or confuse; of the antagonisms of which the “wise” Marcus +Aurelius was unaware. + +That long chapter of the cruelty of the Roman public shows may, +perhaps, leave with the children of the modern world a feeling of +self-complacency. Yet it might seem well to ask ourselves—it is always +well to do so, when we read of the slave-trade, for instance, or of +great religious persecutions on this side or on that, or of anything +else which raises in us the question, “Is thy servant a dog, that he +should do this thing?”—not merely, what germs of feeling we may +entertain which, under fitting circumstances, would induce us to the +like; but, even more practically, what thoughts, what sort of +considerations, may be actually present to our minds such as might have +furnished us, living in another age, and in the midst of those legal +crimes, with plausible excuses for them: each age in turn, perhaps, +having its own peculiar point of blindness, with its consequent +peculiar sin—the touch-stone of an unfailing conscience in the select +few. + +Those cruel amusements were, certainly, the sin of blindness, of +deadness and stupidity, in the age of Marius; and his light had not +failed him regarding it. Yes! what was needed was the heart that would +make it impossible to witness all this; and the future would be with +the forces that could beget a heart like that. His chosen philosophy +had said,—Trust the eye: Strive to be right always in regard to the +concrete experience: Beware of falsifying your impressions. And its +sanction had at least been effective here, in protesting—“This, and +this, is what you may not look upon!” Surely evil was a real thing, and +the wise man wanting in the sense of it, where, not to have been, by +instinctive election, on the right side, was to have failed in life. + +END OF VOL. 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