CHAPTER XV
THE HIGH PRIEST OF DEMETER
The affidavits read before the court by both sides brought out the factsof the case in a manner to leave no doubt in a reasonable mind as toChairo's guilt. It was true that the person who actually forced the gateof the cloister and overpowered the janitor remained unknown, but Chairohad been arrested in the act of flight and in the company of Lydia,whose capture was the only possible motive for the act. Then, too, onthe evening that preceded the capture a typewritten message had beenreceived by the high priest of the cult informing him that Chairo'scarriage would that night break down upon a certain road, and that thecult would have an interest in watching the event. Clearly, therefore,the capture had been planned by Chairo. Then, too, for every affidavitread by Ariston to prove that the attack on the House of Detention hadbeen arranged as well as executed by Balbus a dozen affidavits were readby the other side showing the preparations for violence that had beenmade by Chairo prior to the carrying off of Lydia. The only questionthat the court had to decide was, whether Chairo's immunity fromimprisonment as a member of the legislature applied to his case;obviously he was an accessory to the crime after as well as before thefact, even though he were not guilty of the crime itself; and he wascaught in the very act of carrying out the object for which the crimewas committed--that is to say, the placing of Lydia beyond the reach ofthe cult. But Ariston argued that there was no obligation upon the courtto hold Chairo; the matter under the peculiar conditions which presentedthemselves was practically left to their discretion; and he appealed tothem to liberate Chairo lest he should use his imprisonment as anargument before the higher tribunal of public opinion, to which thequestion must ultimately be referred. The court adjourned withoutrendering a decision; and it was later arranged that Lydia be removedfrom New York and Chairo released on parole not to leave the city limitsuntil the trial of his case.
Lydia, therefore, was taken to the Pater's farm at Tyringham; and Igladly accepted an invitation to join the party there, which includedAriston, Anna of Ann, the high priest of the cult, and a few others.
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I was much interested to learn there the particular form of Collectivismwhich prevailed in the country districts of New England. The land, it istrue, technically belonged to the state, but the enjoyment of it hadnever been taken from those farmers who were able and willing to pay tothe state the amount of produce exacted by it. Assessors periodicallyvisited every district to determine what crops the land was best fittedto produce, and what amount of the designated crop the occupying farmershould pay the state. The farmer was not bound to grow the particularcrop designated, unless a shortage in a preceding year obliged the stateto require a quota of the designated crop. He was free to furnish thestate some other crop according to a fixed scale, the bushel of wheatconstituting the standard--a bushel of wheat being equivalent to so muchhay, so many pounds of potatoes, etc. But the farmer generally grewenough of the particular crop designated to furnish the amount required.The state suggested the best rotation of crops and the farmer was left acertain choice.
The working of the system was to eliminate all the incapable farmers,leaving upon the land only the most capable. The eliminated were put toother employments. The surviving fit generally enjoyed an enviableexistence; for the exactions of the state were not exorbitant, and ithad become a rule that no farmer should ever be deprived of a farm solong as he paid the state contribution; thus, the state contribution waspractically nothing more nor less than a state tax.
The Pater had succeeded to his farm from his father, who himself hadsucceeded to his, so that the same land had remained in the same familysince our day. There was no limitation of hours of work on the farm. Theoccupation was regarded as so desirable that farm laborers willinglygave their whole time; for during the summer their life was enlivened bythe arrival of city dwellers, who occupied the colony buildings adjacentin the neighborhood; and in the depth of the winter, when the sportingseason was over, every farm laborer had his two or three months in town.The owner of the farm, for so every farmer was still called, supportedhis own laborers and supplied them with money for their annual cityvacation. His own wants, including the wages paid to the laborer, weresupplied by the sale to the state of the farm produce over and abovethat required by the state for rent. The essential Collectivist featureof the system consisted in the fact that no man was obliged by thenecessity of earning wages to work upon a farm. He could always refuseto work for a farmer by taking work from the state. Only those farmerswho knew how to make their farms not only prosperous but attractive,could secure laborers, the relation between a farmer and his hands beingthat of man to man rather than that of employer to employee. Indeed, itwas the security every man and woman had of employment by the state thathad caused pauperism and prostitution to disappear; and with them thedependence of one class upon another. In agriculture, as in manufacture,employment of one individual by another was a matter of inclination, notof compulsion; and under these circumstances every employer took care tomake his employment agreeable and to share equitably with hisfellow-workers the product of their joint labors.
As soon as the hearing of habeas corpus proceedings were concluded andLydia was transported to Tyringham she rapidly gained health. Chairowrote to her daily the progress of his preparations for the legislature,which was to meet in a few days. He was assured of Masters's support infavor of a bill of amnesty to all engaged in the carrying off of Lydiaand the attack on the House of Detention, and this bill would constitutethe first business to be brought before the Assembly. An identical billwould be introduced in the Senate, and efforts were being made at onceto secure the approval of the governor.
Meanwhile we often had leisure at Tyringham for the discussion of theDemetrian cult, which had given rise to so great a tumult. The day thatthe high priest received intelligence of the proposed amnesty bill Iasked him his views regarding it.
The high priest was a tall, aged man, closely shaven--as indeed were allthe priests--and very slow and distinct in his way of speaking. Thoughhe occupied the highest function in the cult he was by no means itscontrolling will. On the contrary, the Demetrian council was composedalmost entirely of women, that is to say, priestesses; but it had passedinto a tradition that in order to avoid too great animosity on the partof the men, these last should be permitted a representation on thecouncil and the presiding officer and the head of the cult should be aman.
The high priest answered my question with his usual deliberation andcare:
"I cannot tell you what my own views regarding this matter are; thesubject will be discussed by the council and its argument presented indue time by its representative in the legislature, but I can tell yousome of the things that occur to me in favor of this measure and againstit:
"In the first place, it is clear that whatever may be the merits of theDemetrian cult it is bound sometimes to occasion misfortune; misfortuneis seldom distinguished from injustice, and so the cult is made to bearthe brunt of every disappointment that results from the working of thesystem, whether it proceeds from unwisdom, caprice, or accident. Nowagainst caprice and accident the cult is powerless; but as regardsunwisdom, whether it be in the council or in those to whom the counciltenders the mission, the cult is responsible, and must be heldresponsible. Whether the misfortune in this case results from unwisdomor not is a question which I do not care to discuss; but obviouslysomething has occurred that can be used to discredit our cult, and it isthe part of wisdom to diminish the evil resulting therefrom to theutmost possible.
"In the second place, there has been recourse to violence, and violenceis the greatest crime against social welfare which any man can commit.Are the persons guilty of this crime to be left uncorrected and free toframe new plots of violence against the state?
"In the third place, a trial of all the persons involved in this matteris going to give rise to a great public scandal. The trial isessentially of a political character, and no pol
itical trial can beconducted impartially; the very fact that political prejudice entersinto it necessarily impairs the impartiality of the court; and even if afair court could be secured, the defeated political faction would surelyaccuse the court of unfairness.
"All these things make the decision of this question complicated anddifficult."
"But," asked I, "does not the very fact that your cult raises thesedifficulties put into question the wisdom of the cult itself?"
"Do you mean to say that in your opinion the mission of Demeter, withthe beauty of its sacrifice and the blessing it must eventually bringupon the race, should be abandoned because in a single instance it hascrossed the passion of a Chairo?"
"In the first place," asked I, "is it sure to bring a sensible benefitto the race? And in the second, is the sacrifice a beautiful one? Is itnot rather inhuman and repulsive?"
"I shall answer your questions in the order you put them: Plato was thefirst philosopher on record who proposed applying to the breeding of menthe same art as we apply to the breeding of animals--and he did notseriously propose it; his proposition was spurned, as you know, by allso-called practical statesmen up to the day of Latona, not because theevil attending the existing system was not recognized, but because theremedy proposed seemed worse than the evil. And, indeed, if men andwomen were to be obliged to mate or refrain from mating at the biddingof the state, one may well ask whether life would not become intolerableto the point of universal suicide. The evil, therefore, remainedunabated. Consumption, scrofula, cancer, and other unnamable diseasesbecame rooted in the race on the one hand, and no attempt was made tocompensate the evil by selecting according to art. Not only so, but thepauper proved the most prolific, the cultured the least prolific; sothat the breeding of man--far more important to human happiness than thebreeding of sheep--seemed contrived so as to occasion the minimum ofgood and the maximum of evil. There seemed to be only two ways tomitigate this curse: one, to restore marriage to the sanctity ittheoretically had under the canons of the church; the other, to appealto the self-sacrifice of a few gifted women. As to the first, Latonabelieved marriage to be degraded in great part through the inability ofyoung men and women to choose their mates with wisdom, and sheinstituted therefore the system of provisional marriage, tolerable onlyin youth, and though possible in later years, tolerated then only underextraordinary circumstances. As to the second, Latona instituted themission of Demeter.
"It is not easy yet to draw any definite conclusion from the practicalworking of the system, for it has not been working long enough.Nevertheless, it would be impossible, I think, to find anywhere a morehopeful band of youths than those to whose education Irene and her staffare now devoting themselves. Indeed, wherever the cult is in operationthe girls and boys who proceed from the cloister are, to my judgment,immeasurably superior in the average to any similar number drawn athaphazard from the community at large. And, indeed, how could it beotherwise? Heredity must in the long run count for a great deal; and bysecuring to the Demetrian issue, not only the highest conceivableeducation and parental care, but a sense that they owe something more tothemselves as regards standard of conduct because they owe so much tothe state, we create an environment which gives hereditary tendenciesthe best possible opportunities for development.
"Now, as regards the last part of your question, my answer is a verysimple one: The mission is beautiful only when wisely tendered andwisely accepted; when unwisely tendered or unwisely accepted it islikely to be, as you say, inhuman and even repulsive."
"But how are you going to learn wisdom," asked I, "in a matter sodifficult?"
"Experience has already helped us, I think, to avoid serious mistakesexcept in such exceptional cases as this of Lydia. For your attentionhas perhaps not been called to a profound difference that exists inwomen little recognized in your day. This difference can, I think, bestbe defined as follows: some women are essentially wives, others areessentially mothers. Love is the key that opens the heart of the one,maternity the instinct that animates the other. You are a lawyer, areyou not? Did you ever have any divorce cases?"
"Many!"
"Ransack your brain, then, and see if you do not find there evidence ofwhat I have stated."
He paused; and there came back to me an interview with a woman whocomplained that her husband did not wish her to have children; and as itwas children she wanted--so she said--the husband was almost immaterial.There came to my mind also many women I had known for whom the husbandceased to have importance the moment a child was born.
"Our art," continued he, "consists in selecting the women who combinewillingness to sacrifice themselves with this maternal instinct; and notthe maternal instinct alone--most women have this--but a maternalinstinct that preponderates every other. We have made a double mistakein Lydia: her love for Chairo is the prepondering instinct; and thoughshe has undoubtedly a strongly developed religion of sacrifice, she isalso fond of pleasure. That pretty little tip-tilted nose of hers," headded, smiling, "should have warned us of this!"