Idolatry Part 10

About two hundred yards up stream, to the northward, stood a small wooden house, on the beach in front of which a shabby old mariner was bailing out his boat. Southwards, some miles away, curved the shadowed edge of the city, a spire mounting here and there, a pencilled mist of smoke from chimneys, a fringe of thready masts around the farthest point. In front slid ceaselessly away the vast sweep of levelled water, and still it came undiminished on. The opposing sh.o.r.e was a mile distant, its rocky front gradually gaining abruptness and height until lost round the northern curve. But directly opposite Helwyse's promontory, the stony wall was for some way especially precipitous and high, its lofty brink serried with a thick phalanx of trees.

This spot finally monopolized the adventurer's attention; had he been in Germany, he would have looked for gray castle-towers rising behind the foliage. The place looked inaccessible and romantic, and was undeniably picturesque. New York was far enough away to be mistaken for--say--Alexandria; while the broad river certainly took its rise in as prehistoric an age as the Nile itself. Perhaps in the early morning of the world some chieftain built his stronghold there, and fought notable battles and gave mighty feasts; and later married, and begat stalwart sons, or a daughter beautiful as earth and sky! Where to-day were her youth and beauty, her loving n.o.ble heart, her warm melodious voice, her eyes full of dark light? Why were there no such women now?--not warped, imperfect, only half alive in body and spirit; but charged from the heart outwards with pure divine vitality,--natures vivid as fire, yet by strength serene!

"Why did not I live when she lived, to marry her?" muttered Helwyse in a dream. "A woman whose infinite variety age could not alter nor custom stale! A true wife would have kept me from error. What man can comprehend the world, if he puts half the world away? Now it is too late; she might have helped me rise to greatness, but not to bear disgrace. Ah, Balder Helwyse, poor fool! you babble as if she stood before you to take or leave. _You_ rise to greatness? You never had the germs of greatness in you! You are so little that not the G.o.ddess Freya herself could have made you tall! Through what delusion did you fancy yourself better than any other worm?"

There was an interval, not more than a rod or two in width, in the tree-hedge which lined the opposite cliff. Through this one might get a narrow glimpse of what lay beyond. A strip of gra.s.sy lawn extended in front of what seemed to be the stone corner of a house. The distance obscured detail, but it looked ma.s.sively built, though not after the modern style. As Helwise gazed, sharpening his eyes to discern more clearly, he saw a figure moving across the lawn directly towards him. Advancing to the brink of the cliff, it there paused and seemed to return his glance. Helwyse could not tell whether it were man or woman. Had the river only been narrower!

The next moment he remembered his telescope, and, taking it from its case, he was at a bound within one hundred yards of the western sh.o.r.e.

Man or woman? he steadied the gla.s.s on his knee and looked again. A woman, surely,--but how strangely dressed! Such a costume had not been in vogue since Damascus was a new name in men's mouths. Balder gazed and gazed. Accurately to distinguish the features was impossible,--tantalizingly so; for the gazer was convinced that she was both young and beautiful. Her motions, her bearing, the graceful peculiarity of her garb,--a hundred nameless evidences made it sure.

How delightful to watch her in her unconsciousness! yet Helwyse felt a delicacy in thus stealing on her without her knowledge or consent. But the misgiving was not strong enough to shut up his telescope; perhaps it added a zest to the enjoyment.

"The very princess you were just now dreaming of! the most beautiful and complete woman! Would I were the prince to win thee!"

This aspiration was whispered, as though its object were within conversable distance. Balder could be imaginative enough when the humor took him.

Hardly had the whisper pa.s.sed his lips when he saw the princess majestically turn her lovely head, slowly and heedfully, until her glance seemed directly to meet his own. His cheeks burned; it was as if she had actually overheard him. Was she gracious or offended? He saw her stretch towards him her arms, and then, with a gesture of beautiful power, clasp her hands and draw them in to her bosom.

Prince Balder's hand trembled, the telescope slipped; the quick effort to regain it lent it an impetus that shot it far into the water. It had done its work and was gone forever. The beautiful princess was once more a vague speck across a mile of rapid river; now, even the speck had moved beyond the trees and was out of sight!

The episode had come so unexpected, and so quickly pa.s.sed, that now it seemed never to have been at all! But Helwyse had yielded himself unreservedly to the influence of the moment. Following so aptly the fanciful creation of his thought, the apparition had acquired peculiar significance. The abrupt disappearance afflicted him like a positive loss.

Did he, then, soberly believe himself and the princess to have exchanged glances (not to speak of thoughts) across a river a mile wide? Perhaps he merely courted a fancy from which the test of reason was deliberately withheld. Spirits not being amenable to material laws, what was the odds (so far as exchange of spiritual sentiment was concerned) whether the prince and princess were separated by miles or inches?

But however plausible the fancy, it was over. Helwyse leaned back on the rock, drew his hat over his eyes, folded his hands beneath his head, and appeared to sleep.

XIV.

THE TOWER OF BABEL.

In a perfect state of society, where people will think and act in harmony with only the purest aesthetic laws, a knowledge of stenography and photography will suffice for the creation of perfect works of art.

But until that epoch comes, the artist must be content to do the grouping, toning, and proportioning of his picture for himself, under penalty of redundancy and confusion. People nowadays seldom do or think the right thing at the fitting moment; insomuch that the biographer, if he would be intelligible, must use his own discretion in arranging his materials.

Now, in view of the rough shaking which late events had given Balder and his opinions, it is doing no violence to probability to fancy him taking an early opportunity to pa.s.s these opinions in review. It would be easy, by a glance at the magic ring, to reproduce his meditations just as they pa.s.sed through his brain. Brevity and pertinence, however, counsel us to recall a dialogue which had taken place about three years before.

Balder and his father were then in the North of England; and the latter (who never concerned himself with any save the plainest and most practical philosophy) was not a little startled at an a.n.a.logy drawn by his son between the cloud-cap on Helvellyn's head and the Almighty! Premising that the cloud-cap, though apparently stable, was really created by the continuous pa.s.sage of warmer air through a cold region around the summit of the mountain, whereby it was for a moment condensed into visibility and then swept on,--having postulated this fact, and disregarding the elder's remark that he believed not a word of it,--Balder went on to say that G.o.d was only a set of attributes,--in a word, the perfection of all human attributes,--and not at all an individual!

"And what has that to do with your cloud-making theory?" demanded Thor, with scorn.

"The perfect human attributes," replied Balder, unruffled, "correspond to the region of condensation,--the cold place, you understand."

"Do they? Well?"

"The constant condensation of the warm current from below corresponds to the taking on of these attributes by a ceaseless succession of human souls. Filling out the Divine character, they lose ident.i.ty, and so make room for others."

"What are these attributes?"

"They are ineffable,--they are omniscience,--the comprehension of the whole creative idea."

"You expect me to believe that,--eh?" growled Thor.

"If I could believe you understood it, dear old sceptic!" returned Balder, with affectionate irreverence, throwing his arm across his father's broad shoulders. "I say that every soul of right capacity, living for culture, and not afraid of itself, will at last reach that highest point. It is the sublime goal of man, and no human life is complete unless in gaining it. Many fail, but not all. I will not! No, I am not blasphemous; I think life without definite aim not worth having; and that aim, the highest conceivable."

Thor, having stared in silence at his descendant, came out with a stentorian Viking laugh, which Balder sustained with perfect good-humor.

"Ho, ho!--the devil is in you, son!--in those black eyes of yours,--ho, ho! No other Helwyse ever had such eyes,--or such ideas either! Well, but supposing you pa.s.sed the condensation point, what then?"

Balder, who was entirely in earnest about the matter, answered gravely,--

"I cease to be; but what was I becomes the pure, life-giving, spiritual substance, and enters into fresh personalities, and so pa.s.ses up again in endless circulation."

"Hum! and how with the evil ones, boy?"

"As with all waste matter; they are cast aside, and, as distinct souls, are gradually annihilated. But they may still manure the soil, and involuntarily help the growth of others. Sooner or later, in one or another form, all come into use."

"For all I see, then," quoth Thor, "your devils come to the same end as your G.o.ds!"

"There is the same kind of difference," returned the philosopher, "as between light and earth,--both of which help the growth of flowers; but light gives color and beauty, earth only the insipid matter. I would rather be the light."

"Another thing," proceeded Thor, ignoring this distinction; "admitting all else, how do you account for your region of condensation?"

"By the necessity of perfection," answered Balder, after some consideration. "There would be no meaning in existence unless it tended towards perfection. But you have hit on the unanswerable question."

Thor shook his head and huge grizzled beard. "German University humbug!" growled he. "Get you into a sc.r.a.pe some day. The cloud's not made in that way, I tell you! Come, let's go back to the inn."

"Take my arm," said Balder; and as together they descended the spur of the mountain, he added lovingly, "I'll bring no clouds across your sky, my dear old man!" So the hospitable inn received them.

The discussion between the two was never renewed; but Balder held to his creed. He elaborated and fortified what had been mere outline before. No dogma can be conceived which many circ.u.mstances will not seem to confirm and justify. But we cannot attempt to keep abreast of Balder's deductions. There are as many theological systems as individual souls; and no system can be wholly apprehended by any one save its author.

Mastery of men and things,--supreme knowledge to the end of supreme power,--such seems to have been his ambition,--an ambition too abstract and lofty for much rivalry. Nature and human nature were at once his laboratory and his instruments. His senses were to him outlets of divinity. The good and evil of such a scheme scarce need pointing out. It was the apotheosis of self-respect; but self-respect raised to such a height becomes self-wors.h.i.+p; human vision dazzles at the sublimity of the prospect; at the moment of greatest weakness the soul arrogates invincible power, and falls! For, the mightier man is, the more absolutely does he need the support of a mightier Man than he can ever be.

No doubt Balder had often been a.s.sailed by doubts and weariness; the path had seemed too long and arduous, and he had secretly pined for some swift issue from perplexity and delay. In such a moment was it that the voice of darkness gained his ear, and, like a will-o'-the-wisp, lured him to calamity. Verily, it is not easy to be G.o.d. Only builders of the Tower of Babel know the awfulness of its overthrow.

Balder's spirit lay prostrate among the ruins, too stunned and bewildered to see the reason or justice of his fall. Such a state is dangerous, for, the better part of the mind being either occupied with its disaster or stupefied by it, the superficial part is readily moved to folly or extravagance,--to deeds and thoughts which a saner moment would scout and ridicule. Well is it, then, if the blind steps are guided to better foothold than they know how to choose. Angels are said to be particularly watchful over those who sleep; perhaps, also, during the darkness which follows on moral perversion.

XV.

CHARON'S FERRY.

After lying motionless for half an hour, Balder suddenly sat upright and settled his hat on his head. A new purpose had come to him which, arriving later than it might have done, made him wish to act upon it without delay.

The old mariner had by this time bailed out his boat, and, having s.h.i.+pped a mast in the forward thwart, was dropping down stream. As he neared the promontory Balder hailed him:--