CHAPTER XLII. "THE IMITATION."
As we have already said, M. Hardy occupied a pavilion in the "Retreat"annexed to the house in the Rue de Vaugirard, inhabited by a goodlynumber of the reverend fathers of the Company of Jesus. Nothing could becalmer and more silent than this dwelling. Every one spoke in whispers,and the servants themselves had something oily in their words, somethingsanctified in their very walk.
Like all that is subject to the chilling and destructive influences ofthese men, this mournfully quiet house was entirely wanting in lifeand animation. The boarders passed an existence of wearisome and icymonotony, only broken by the use of certain devotional exercises;and thus, in accordance with the selfish calculation of the reverendfathers, the mind, deprived of all nourishment and all external support,soon began to droop and pine away in solitude. The heart seemed to beatmore slowly, the soul was benumbed, the character weakened; at last,all freewill, all power of discrimination, was extinguished, and theboarders, submitting to the same process of self-annihilation as thenovices of the Company, became, like them, mere "corpses" in the handsof the brotherhood.
The object of these manoeuvres was clear and simple. They secured themeans of obtaining all kinds of donations, the constant aim of theskillful policy and merciless cupidity of these priests. By the aid ofenormous sums, of which they thus become the possessors or the trustees,they follow out and obtain the success of their projects, even thoughmurder, incendiarism, revolt, and all the horrors of civil war, excitedby and through them, should drench in blood the lands over which theyseek to extend their dark dominion.
Such, then, was the asylum of peace and innocence in which FrancoisHardy had taken refuge. He occupied the ground-floor of a summer-house,which opened upon a portion of the garden. His apartments had beenjudiciously chosen, for we know with what profound and diabolical craftthe reverend fathers avail themselves of material influences, to makea deep impression upon the minds they are moulding to their purpose.Imagine a prospect bounded by a high wall, of a blackish gray,half-covered with ivy, the plant peculiar to ruins. A dark avenue ofold yew-trees, so fit to shade the grave with their sepulchral verdure,extended from this wall to a little semicircle, in front of theapartment generally occupied by M. Hardy. Two or three mounds of earth,bordered with box, symmetrically cut, completed the charms of thisgarden, which in every respect resembled a cemetery.
It was about two o'clock in the afternoon. Though the April sun shonebrightly, its rays, intercepted by the high wall of which we havespoken, could not penetrate into that portion of the garden, obscure,damp, and cold as a cavern, which communicated with M. Hardy'sapartment. The room was furnished with a perfect sense of thecomfortable. A soft carpet covered the floor; thick curtains of darkgreen baize, the same color as the walls, sheltered an excellent bed,and hung in folds about the glass door, which opened on the garden. Somepieces of mahogany furniture, plain, but very clean and bright, stoodround the room. Above the secretary, placed just in front of thebed, was a large ivory crucifix, upon a black velvet ground. Thechimney-piece was adorned with a clock, in an ebony case, withivory ornaments representing all sorts of gloomy emblems, such ashour-glasses, scythes, death's-heads, etc. Now imagine this scene intwilight, with its solitary and mournful silence, only broken at thehour of prayer by the lugubrious sound of the bells of the neighboringchapel, and you will recognize the infernal skill, with which thesedangerous priests know how to turn to account every external object,when they wish to influence the mind of those they are anxious to gainover.
And this was not all. After appealing to the senses, it was necessary toaddress themselves to the intellect--and this was the method adopted bythe reverend fathers. A single book--but one--was left, as if by chance,within reach. This book was Thomas a Kempis' "Imitation." But as itmight happen that M. Hardy would not have the courage or the desire toread this book, thoughts and reflections borrowed from its mercilesspages, and written in very large characters, were suspended in blackframes close to the bed, or at other parts within sight, so that,involuntarily, in the sad leisure of his inactive dejection, thedweller's eyes were almost necessarily attracted by them. To that fatalcircle of despairing thoughts they confined the already weakened mind ofthis unfortunate man, so long a prey to the most acute sorrow. Whathe read mechanically, every instant of the day and night, whenever theblessed sleep fled from his eyes inflamed with tears, was not enoughmerely to plunge the soul of the victim into incurable despair, but alsoto reduce him to the corpse-like obedience required by the Society ofJesus. In that awful book may be found a thousand terrors to operateon weak minds, a thousand slavish maxims to chain and degrade thepusillanimous soul.
And now imagine M. Hardy carried wounded into this house; while hisheart, torn by bitter grief and the sense of horrible treachery, bledeven faster than his external injuries. Attended with the utmost care,and thanks to the acknowledged skill of Dr. Baleinier, M. Hardy soonrecovered from the hurts he had received when he threw himself into theembers of his burning factory. Yet, in order to favor the projectsof the reverend fathers, a drug, harmless enough in its effects, butdestined to act for a time upon the mind of the patient, and oftenemployed for that purpose in similar important cases by the piousdoctor, was administered to Hardy, and had kept him pretty long ina state of mental torpor. To a soul agonized by cruel deceptions, itappears an inestimable benefit to be plunged into that kind of torpor,which at least prevents one from dwelling upon the past.
Hardy resigned himself entirely to this profound apathy, and at lengthcame to regard it as the supreme good. Thus do unfortunate wretches,tortured by cruel diseases, accept with gratitude the opiate which killsthem slowly, but which at least deadens the sense of pain.
In sketching the portrait of M. Hardy, we tried to give some idea ofthe exquisite delicacy of his tender soul, of his painful susceptibilitywith regard to anything base or wicked, and of his extreme goodness,uprightness, and generosity. We now allude to these admirable qualities,because we must observe, that with him, as with almost all who possessthem, they were not, and could not be, united with an energetic andresolute character. Admirably persevering in good deeds, the influenceof this excellent man, was insinuating rather than commanding; it wasnot by the bold energy and somewhat overbearing will, peculiar to othermen of great and noble heart, that Hardy had realized the prodigy of hisCommon Dwelling-house; it was by affectionate persuasion, for with himmildness took the place of force. At sight of any baseness or injustice,he did not rouse himself, furious and threatening; but he sufferedintense pain. He did not boldly attack the criminal, but he turnedaway from him in pity and sorrow. And then his loving heart, so full offeminine delicacy, had an irresistible longing for the blessed contactof dear affections; they alone could keep it alive. Even as a poor,frail bird dies with the cold, when it can no longer lie close to itsbrethren, and receive and communicate the sweet warmth of the maternalnest. And now this sensitive organization, this extremely susceptiblenature, receives blow after blow from sorrows and deceptions, one ofwhich would suffice to shake, if it did not conquer, the firmest andmost resolute character. Hardy's best friend has infamously betrayedhim. His adored mistress has abandoned him.
The house which he had founded for the benefit of his workmen, whom heloved as brethren, is reduced to a heap of ashes. What then happens? Allthe springs of his soul are at once broken. Too feeble to resistsuch frightful attacks, too fatally deceived to seek refuge in otheraffections, too much discouraged to think of laying the first stoneof any new edifice--this poor heart, isolated from every salutaryinfluence, finds oblivion of the world and of itself in a kind of gloomytorpor. And if some remaining instincts of life and affection, atlong intervals, endeavored to rouse themselves within him, and if,half-opening his mind's eye, which he had kept closed against thepresent, the past, and the future, Hardy looks around him--what does hesee? Only these sentences, so full of terrible despair:
"Thou art nothing but dust and ashes. Grief and tears art thy portion.Believe not
in any son of man. There are no such things as friendship orties of kindred. All human affections are false. Die in the morning, andthou wilt be forgotten before night. Be humble--despise thyself--andlet others despise thee. Think not, reason not, live not--but committhy fate to the hands of a superior, who will think and reason for thee.Weep, suffer, think upon death. Yes, death! always death--that shouldbe thy thought when thou thinkest--but it is better not to think at all.Let a feeling of ceaseless woe prepare thy way to heaven. It is only bysorrow that we are welcome to the terrible God whom we adore!"
Such were the consolations offered to this unfortunate man. Affrighted,he again closed his eyes, and fell back into his lethargy. As forleaving this gloomy retreat, he could not, or rather he did not desireto do so. He had lost the power of will; and then, it must be confessed,he had finished by getting accustomed to this house, and liked itwell--they paid him such discreet attentions, and yet left him somuch alone with his grief--there reigned all around such a death-likesilence, which harmonized closely with the silence of his heart; andthat was now the tomb of his last love, last friendship, last hope.All energy was dead within him! Then began that slow, but inevitabletransformation, so judiciously foreseen by Rodin, who directed the wholeof this machination, even in its smallest details. At first alarmedby the dreadful maxims which surrounded him, M. Hardy had at lengthaccustomed himself to read them over almost mechanically, just as thecaptive, in his mournful hours of leisure, counts the nails in the doorof his prison, or the bars of the grated window. This was already agreat point gained by the reverend fathers.
And soon his weakened mind was struck with the apparent correctness ofthese false and melancholy aphorisms.
Thus he read: "Do not count upon the affection of any humancreature"--and he had himself been shamefully betrayed.
"Man is born to sorrow and despair"--and he was himself despairing.
"There is no rest save in the cessation of thought"--and the slumber ofhis mind had brought some relief to his pain.
Peepholes, skillfully concealed by the hangings and in the wainscotingof these apartments, enabled the reverend fathers at all times to seeand hear the boarders, and above all to observe their countenance andmanner, when they believed themselves to be alone. Every exclamation ofgrief which escaped Hardy in his gloomy solitude, was repeated to Fatherd'Aigrigny by a mysterious listener. The reverend father, followingscrupulously Rodin's instructions, had at first visited his boarder veryrarely. We have said, that when Father d'Aigrigny wished it, he coulddisplay an almost irresistible power of charming, and accordingly hethrew all his tact and skill into the interviews he had with Hardy,when he came from time to time to inquire after his health. Informed ofeverything by his spies, and aided by his natural sagacity, he soon sawall the use that might be made of the physical and moral prostration ofthe boarder. Certain beforehand that Hardy would not take the hint,he spoke to him frequently of the gloom of the house, advising himaffectionately to leave it, if he felt oppressed by its monotony, or atall events to seek beyond its walls for some pleasure and amusement.To speak of pleasure and amusement to this unfortunate man, was in hispresent state to insure a refusal, and so it of course happened. Fatherd'Aigrigny did not at first try to gain the recluse's confidence, nordid he speak to him of sorrow; but every time he came, he appeared totake such a tender interest in him, and showed it by a few simple andwell timed words. By degrees, these interviews, at first so rare, becamemore frequent and longer. Endowed with a flow of honeyed, insinuating,and persuasive eloquence, Father d'Aigrigny naturally took for histheme those gloomy maxims, to which Hardy's attention was now so oftendirected.
Supple, prudent, skillful, knowing that the hermit had hithertoprofessed that generous natural religion which teaches the gratefuladoration of God, the love of humanity, the worship of what is just andgood, and which, disdaining dogmas, professes the same veneration forMarcus Aurelius as for Confucius, for Plato as for Christ, for Moses asfor Lycurgus--Father d'Aigrigny did not at first attempt to converthim, but began by incessantly reminding him of the abominable deceptionspractised upon him; and, instead of describing such treachery as anexception in life--instead of trying to calm, encourage, and revivehis drooping soul--instead of exhorting Hardy to seek oblivion andconsolation in the discharge of his duties toward humanity, towards hisbrethren, whom he had previously loved and succored--Father d'Aigrignystrove to inflame the bleeding wounds of the unfortunate man, paintedthe human race in the most atrocious blackness, and, by declaring allmen treacherous, ungrateful, wicked, succeeded in rendering his despairincurable. Having attained this object, the Jesuit took another step.Knowing Hardy's admirable goodness of heart, and profiting by theweakened state of his mind, he spoke to him of the consolation to bederived by a man overwhelmed with sorrow, from the belief that every oneof his tears, instead of being unfruitful, was in fact agreeable to God,and might aid in the salvation of souls--the belief, as the reverendfather adroitly added, that by faith alone can sorrow be made useful tohumanity, and acceptable to Divinity.
Whatever impiety, whatever atrocious Machiavelism there was in thesedetestable maxims, which make of a loving-kind Deity a being delightedwith the tears of his creatures, was thus skillfully concealed fromHardy's eyes, whose generous instincts were still alive. Soon did thisloving and tender soul, whom unworthy priests were driving to a sort ofmoral suicide, find a mournful charm in the fiction, that his sorrowswould at least be profitable to other men. It was at first only afiction; but the enfeebled mind which takes pleasure in such a fable,finishes by receiving it as a reality, and by degrees will submit to theconsequences. Such was Hardy's moral and physical state, when, by meansof a servant who had been bought over, he received from Agricola Baudoina letter requesting an interview. Alone, the workman could not havebroken the band of the Jesuit's pleadings, but he was accompanied byGabriel, whose eloquence and reasonings were of a most convincing natureto a spirit like Hardy's.
It is unnecessary to point out to the reader, with what dignifiedreserve Gabriel had confined himself to the most generous means ofrescuing Hardy from the deadly influence of the reverend fathers. Itwas repugnant to the great soul of the young missionary, to stoop toa revelation of the odious plots of these priests. He would only havetaken this extreme course, had his powerful and sympathetic words havefailed to have any effect on Hardy's blindness. About a quarter of anhour had elapsed since Gabriel's departure, when the servant appointedto wait on this boarder of the reverend fathers entered and delivered tohim a letter.
"From whom is this?" asked Hardy.
"From a boarder in the house, sir," answered the servant bowing.
This man had a crafty hypocritical face; he wore his hair combed overhis forehead, spoke in a low voice, and always cast clown his eyes.Waiting the answer, he joined his hands, and began to twiddle histhumbs. Hardy opened the letter, and read as follows:
"SIR,--I have only just heard, by mere chance, that you also inhabitthis respectable house: a long illness, and the retirement in which Ilive, will explain my ignorance of your being so near. Though we haveonly met once, sir, the circumstance which led to that meeting was of soserious a nature, that I cannot think you have forgotten it."
Hardy stopped, and tasked his memory for an explanation, and not findinganything to put him on the right track, he continued to read:
"This circumstance excited in me a feeling of such deep and respectfulsympathy for you, sir, that I cannot resist my anxious desire to waitupon you, particularly as I learn, that you intend leaving this house today--a piece of information I have just derived from the excellent andworthy Abbe Gabriel, one of the men I most love, esteem, and reverence.May I venture to hope, sir, that just at the moment of quitting ourcommon retreat to return to the world, you will deign to receivefavorably the request, however intrusive, of a poor old man, whose lifewill henceforth be passed in solitude, and who cannot therefore haveany prospect of meeting you, in that vortex of society which he hasabandoned forever. Waiting the honor of y
our answer, I beg you toaccept, sir, the assurance of the sentiments of high esteem with which Iremain, sir, with the deepest respect,
"Your very humble and most obedient servant,
"RODIN."
After reading this letter and the signature of the writer, Hardyremained for some time in deep thought, without being able to recollectthe name of Rodin, or to what serious circumstances he alluded.
After a silence of some duration, he said to the servant "M. Rodin gaveyou this letter?"
"Yes, sir."
"And who is M. Rodin?"
"A good old gentleman, who is just recovering from a long illness, thatalmost carried him off. Lately, he has been getting better, but he isstill so weak and melancholy, that it makes one sad to see him. It is agreat pity, for there is not a better and more worthy gentleman in thehouse--unless it be you, sir," added the servant, bowing with an air offlattering respect.
"M. Rodin;" said Hardy, thoughtfully. "It is singular, that I should notremember the name nor any circumstance connected with it."
"If you will give me your answer, sir," resumed the servant, "I willtake it to M. Rodin. He is now with Father d'Aigrigny, to whom he isbidding farewell."
"Farewell?"
"Yes, sir, the post-horses have just come."
"Post-horses for whom?" asked Hardy.
"For Father d'Aigrigny, sir."
"He is going on a journey then!" said Hardy, with some surprise.
"Oh! he will not, I think be long absent," said the servant, with aconfidential air, "for the reverend father takes no one with him, andbut very light luggage. No doubt, the reverend father will come to sayfarewell to you, sir, before he starts. But what answer shall I give M.Rodin?"
The letter, just received, was couched in such polite terms--it spokeof Gabriel with so much respect--that Hardy, urged moreover by a naturalcuriosity, and seeing no motive to refuse this interview before quittingthe house, said to the servant: "Please tell M. Rodin, that if he willgive himself the trouble to come to me, I shall be glad to see him."
"I will let him know immediately, sir," answered the servant, bowing ashe left the room.
When alone, Hardy, while wondering who this M. Rodin could be, beganto make some slight preparations for his departure. For nothing in theworld would he have passed another night in this house; and, in orderto keep up his courage, he recalled every instant the mild, evangelicallanguage of Gabriel, just as the superstitious recite certain litanies,with a view of escaping from temptation.
The servant soon returned, and said: "M. Rodin is here, sir."
"Beg him to walk in."
Rodin entered, clad in his long black dressing-gown, and with hisold silk cap in his hand. The servant then withdrew. The day was justclosing. Hardy rose to meet Rodin, whose features he did not at firstdistinguish. But as the reverend father approached the window, Hardylooked narrowly at him for an instant, and then uttered an exclamation,wrung from him by surprise and painful remembrance. But, recoveringhimself from this first movement, Hardy said to the Jesuit, in anagitated voice: "You here, sir? Oh, you are right! It was indeed a veryserious circumstance that first brought us together."
"Oh, my dear sir!" said Rodin, in a kindly and unctuous tone; "I wassure you would not have forgotten me."