Villa Eden Part 132

The legend tells of that child-giant who took the ploughman, with plough and horse, to be a plaything, gathered them up in his ap.r.o.n, and carried them off.

This was the case with Manna. Her thoughts, by day and by night, had been so far removed from the world, so elevated, and so victorious over it, that all its doings seemed to her like children's plays. What is it all for? To pa.s.s away the time? Children succeed in that; they unconsciously persuade themselves that their dolls are alive; while children of a larger growth play with their dolls, but look upon them as shams.

Life is all idle play to them, and death alone is something serious.

It was with some such thought that Manna stood at the window, early on the morning after Roland's birthday; she saw nothing of the world, and yet she saw the whole world, far, far away.

So deeply impressed upon her memory were the tones of the convent-bell which had awakened the pupils at the first blush of dawn, that they had aroused her, this morning also, from her slumbers. She seemed to hear it ringing as she slept. It was some time before she realized where she was.

Thou art at home--where is thy home? who has built a house out of these stones, has made this bed?

In the villa all were still sleeping. Manna alone was awake, and with her the innumerable choirs of birds in the garden; and as the birds outside mingled together their twittering songs, so a thousand thoughts flitted through her mind.

She went into the park, and stood for a long time before the new gate that opened upon the path to the little green cottage. A voice within her seemed to say: Through this gate, and in this pathway, thou wilt have much to experience, much to struggle with, and much to overcome.

She wanted to find out, to image to herself what would enter there, but she succeeded no better than did Eric, as he gazed at the convent steps, in calling up before his mind's eye the various destinies of those who had pa.s.sed in and out over that threshold.

Who would have been able to tell her that Eric had once gazed with the same feelings!

Manna had a feeling of unrest, as if she knew that an eye was watching her. Eric was now in fact standing at the window, and his glance rested upon her; but he took care to keep out of her sight. His soul too was moved, but by wholly different thoughts. While he was asleep, there was with him the abiding feeling that now he was possessed of ample means and was his own master; and this consciousness finally waked him. In the earliest dawn, he had again counted over the money which Sonnenkamp had handed him on the previous day. It was enough to support himself and his mother. He was so unaccustomed to money, that he felt impelled to count it several times over, and finally even to write down the amount. Then he smiled, saying to himself:--

It's well, and I am glad to be put to the test whether I can perform my duty in life with the same earnestness, poor or rich.

He opened the window and perceived Manna. He drew back softly, and wondered what were the feelings and thoughts of the child, who had come from the seclusion of the cloister into the luxurious parental home.

Sounds were now heard from the neighboring village, from all quarters, from both sh.o.r.es of the river, up and down the stream.

Manna left the park and turned back to the house in order to get her prayer-book. Fraulein Perini was waiting for her in the hall.

Manna heard Fraulein Perini give directions to the servants to make ready a room for the Justice's daughter, and she had it upon her lips to reproach herself to her former governess, for having been insincere in permitting Lina to be invited. She dreaded her visit; the superficial and childish character, as she had seen it the day before, seemed something new and strange. She had resolved to gain the victory by herself alone, and had come to the conclusion to ask Lina plainly not to make the visit at this time; she owed it to herself to remain alone, and to admit no distracting influence.

As she was going down the steps with Fraulein Perini, a letter was handed her, brought by a messenger, who was waiting for an answer. Lina wrote how much she regretted that she was not permitted to accept the hospitable invitation to Villa Eden. She besought Manna to send back a single word, containing the a.s.surance that she was not angry with her.

Manna was glad that she could now reply without wounding the feelings of Lina, whose parents, she wrote, were in the right. On reading over again her friend's letter, it seemed strange to Manna that no sort of excuse was a.s.signed. Do all the neighbors still hold aloof from her parents' house?

Perhaps so! Another parental home, yonder, extends its invitation.

The church bell again rang, and Manna went with Fraulein Perini to church.

Fraulein Perini was elated and happy. Others might attempt to win Manna with every variety of influence; she alone could go with her to church.

"Do you still prefer to be silent in the morning?" asked Fraulein Perini quietly, extending her hand.

Manna nodded without speaking. Not another word was interchanged.

When the ma.s.s was over, and they had left the church together, Fraulein Perini said that she would like to introduce Manna to the Priest, who had been stationed here during her absence.

Manna begged to go alone. She lingered a while, without moving from the spot, and then went to the Priest's house. She seemed to be expected, for the Priest came out on the steps to meet her, and welcomed her with a benediction. He led her by the hand into his room, hastily removing his breakfast from the table, on which there was an open book.

Manna was directed to take a seat on the sofa. She began:--

"Fraulein Perini wished to introduce me to you, Reverend Sir. That might be necessary with a man; a stranger, but you are not a man, a stranger, you are a servant of our holy Church."

The Priest partially closed his eyes, brought together the ends of the fingers of his handsome hands, then drew them apart, and said in a quiet and clear tone:--

"The right way! You are in the right way, my child, keep in it. So it is! Worldlings come into a place, they are strangers, strangers as if they were among savages, and they are ignorant whether there is a single person who cherishes the same thoughts with them; and there are no two people who have the same thoughts, even when the words are the same, and they have no bond of unity; they are like the mote dancing here in the sunbeam. But you, if you should enter the remotest village, you would be at home. _There_ is a house, and within it is a man who welcomes you as a spiritual brother, as a father. He is not there of himself, but has been placed there by another; and you have not come of yourself, but have been led by another. You are doubly welcome, my child, for perceiving and realizing this immediately. You knock at my door, and it is open to you; and it will be open whenever you may come.

You knock at my heart, and that is open to you, be sure of that. I have no house of my own; my house belongs to him who shall come after me, and not to him either, and my heart is His who has made it beat."

The Priest stopped speaking, and fixed his regard upon Manna, who had closed her eyes, as if she could not bear the sunlight, could not gaze at the countenance on which the Spirit was now descending. The Priest could see how deeply she was moved; he placed his hand in a friendly way upon her head, saying:--

"Look up at me. I repeat to you, that you have come alone, and you know why you have come alone; this spares us the necessity of coming to an understanding, as worldlings term it. Coming to an understanding!"

The Priest laughed.

"Coming to an understanding! and they never do understand each other, they, the cultivated, as they call themselves, or the self-cultivating, as they ought to call themselves, for they believe that they can make themselves into anything they please. They need a recommendation from someone, who must say who they are and what they are; but we, we need no introduction, no recommendation. You are recommended and introduced, inasmuch as you are a child of our holy Church. Hold fast to this, my child, and speak to me about whatever you wish to, of what is sacred and what is profane, of what is great and what is small; you will always find with me a home. If they disgust you in the world, and make you feel homeless, remember, here is rest and here is home. Look out of doors! Your father has, above there, a hot-house for foreign plants which, are not at home in our climate; this room is your hot-house for the plant of holy faith which, is not at home yonder. My child, I cast no stone at any one, but I tell you, and you know already, this plant is not of this world, and is, in this world, in a foreign climate; it has been brought to us from heaven."

The Priest stood looking out of the window, and Manna sat on the sofa.

For some time not a word was spoken. Manna was deeply affected by this elevated strain of cordial sympathy. There was no need of any hesitating preliminaries; she was at once conducted into the inmost sanctuary.

She asked at last in a timid way, how she ought to conduct herself towards all the persons who were received as friends in the house of her parents, and who plumed themselves upon their culture.

"You question well, you question definitely, and that is the mark of a mature mind," replied the Priest. "Know then, that you are to smile at all the boastful things you will be obliged to listen to; they pretend to be so great, and they are so very little. These learned ones believe that the world is without understanding, and that it is ruled with no more wisdom than their understanding and their wisdom attribute to it; they put G.o.d in one scale, and their own brain in the other. Pah!"

The Priest spoke now in a wholly different tone; he was violent and bitter, so that Manna shrank together with affright. The Priest, who noticed this, composed himself again, saying:--

"You see that I am still weak, and allow myself to be carried away by excitement. My child, there are two things which conquer the world: their names are G.o.d and the Devil, or, when transferred into the domain of our own interior being, Piety and Frivolity. Piety sees everything as holy; appearances are only a veil, while Frivolity sees nothing as holy. Piety is the law of G.o.d; Frivolity has released herself from the law of G.o.d, and sports with the world of appearances according to her own pleasure. Between piety and frivolity there is a half-and-half state, and that is the worst of all. Frivolity reaches its extreme point and is capable of being converted, to which we have some glorious witnesses; but the heroes of reason, so-called, or, more properly speaking, the weaklings of reason, _they_ are not capable of being converted, for they are wholly dest.i.tute of that disposition which tends to humility."

The Priest thought that Manna would understand him to be pointing out Eric and Pranken; he did not want to be any more personal at first, but the ground was to be broken. Now he turned round, smiling, and seating himself said:--

"But, my child, let us not to-day lose ourselves in such general considerations. What have you to say?"

Manna complained of finding it so hard to complete another year of probation, moving about in the world in order to be released from it.

The Priest rea.s.sured her with the words:--

"You wish to take the veil; you have taken it already; it is drawn over you, and over the world, though invisible to every body else. Things in the world do not affect your real self at all; there is a veil between you and the world, which will be wholly dropped only when death gives us deliverance."

The Priest proceeded to exhort her to subject herself to what was the hardest of all experiences to youth and ardent zeal,--she was not to consider it as her vocation to change the opinions of others, but she was to labor for her own perfection.

He went more cautiously to work than Pranken did; he avoided a direct attack upon Eric, as this might awaken an interest in Manna towards him. He even praised him; but it was done in that tone of condescension and pity, which comes so natural to him who upholds a dogmatic faith.

He inculcated upon her the fact, that she would soon understand how trifling an affair it would be to annihilate this liberal culture, as it was termed,--that it was in its very nature exceedingly fragile.

This could be plainly seen from each one of these so-called liberally cultivated people wanting to be something entirely different from his neighbor. Each one of Roland's teachers, for instance, had a different method, a different course of instruction, different principles, and a different end in view.

When Manna asked why the Priest had not used his influence to keep Eric from being received into the family, he replied that he was glad to find her so zealous, but a person was obliged to let some things take their course in this world; and besides, from the outset, all resistance to her father would have been to no purpose, for Roland had insisted upon having his own way. And notwithstanding Eric was a complete heretic, he recognized the holy, to a certain extent, although there was much pride mingled with this recognition.

He feared to make Eric of too much importance, and so he added, almost with timidity, that these apparently mild and enthusiastic idealists were just the most dangerous.