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Paracelsus (Browning)/III

Part III Paracelsus

Scene.— Basil; a chamber in the house of Paracelsus. 1526.

Paracelsus. Heap logs and let the blaze laugh out!

Festus. True, true! 'T is very fit all, time and chance and change Have wrought since last we sat thus, face to face And soul to soul—all cares, far-looking fears, Vague apprehensions, all vain fancies bred By your long absence, should be cast away, Forgotten in this glad unhoped renewal Of our affections.

Paracelsus. Oh, omit not aught Which witnesses your own and Michal's own Affection: spare not that! Only forget The honours and the glories and what not, It pleases you to tell profusely out.

Festus. Nay, even your honours, in a sense, I waive: The wondrous Paracelsus, life's dispenser, Fate's commissary, idol of the schools And courts, shall be no more than Aureole still, Still Aureole and my friend as when we parted Some twenty years ago, and I restrained As best I could the promptings of my spirit Which secretly advanced you, from the first, To the pre-eminent rank which, since, your own Adventurous ardour, nobly triumphing, Has won for you.

Paracelsus. Yes, yes. And Michal's face Still wears that quiet and peculiar light Like the dim circlet floating round a pearl?

Festus. Just so.

Paracelsus. And yet her calm sweet countenance, Though saintly, was not sad; for she would sing Alone. Does she still sing alone, bird-like, Not dreaming you are near? Her carols dropt In flakes through that old leafy bower built under The sunny wall at Würzburg, from her lattice Among the trees above, while I, unseen, Sat conning some rare scroll from Tritheim's shelves Much wondering notes so simple could divert My mind from study. Those were happy days. Respect all such as sing when all alone!

Festus. Scarcely alone: her children, you may guess, Are wild beside her.

Paracelsus. Ah, those children quite Unsettle the pure picture in my mind: A girl, she was so perfect, so distinct: No change, no change! Not but this added grace May blend and harmonize with its compeers, And Michal may become her motherhood; But 't is a change, and I detest all change, And most a change in aught I loved long since. So, Michal—you have said she thinks of me?

Festus. O very proud will Michal be of you! Imagine how we sat, long winter-nights, Scheming and wondering, shaping your presumed Adventure, or devising its reward; Shutting out fear with all the strength of hope. For it was strange how, even when most secure In our domestic peace, a certain dim And flitting shade could sadden all; it seemed A restlessness of heart, a silent yearning, A sense of something wanting, incomplete— Not to be put in words, perhaps avoided By mute consent—but, said or unsaid, felt To point to one so loved and so long lost. And then the hopes rose and shut out the fears— How you would laugh should I recount them now I still predicted your return at last With gifts beyond the greatest of them all, All Tritheim's wondrous troop; did one of which Attain renown by any chance, I smiled, As well aware of who would prove his peer Michal was sure some woman, long ere this, As beautiful as you were sage, had loved. ..

Paracelsus. Far-seeing, truly, to discern so much In the fantastic projects and day-dreams Of a raw restless boy!

Festus. Oh, no: the sunrise Well warranted our faith in this full noon! Can I forget the anxious voice which said "Festus, have thoughts like these ere shaped themselves "In other brains than mine? have their possessors "Existed in like circumstance? were they weak "As I, or ever constant from the first, "Despising youth's allurements and rejecting "As spider-films the shackles I endure? "Is there hope for me?"—and I answered gravely As an acknowledged elder, calmer, wiser, More gifted mortal. O you must remember, For all your glorious. ..

Paracelsus. Glorious? ay, this hair, These hands—nay, touch them, they are mine! Recall With all the said recallings, times when thus To lay them by your own ne'er turned you pale As now. Most glorious, are they not?

Festus. Why—why— Something must be subtracted from success So wide, no doubt. He would be scrupulous, truly, Who should object such drawbacks. Still, still, Aureole, You are changed, very changed! 'T were losing nothing To look well to it: you must not be stolen From the enjoyment of your well-won meed.

Paracelsus. My friend! you seek my pleasure, past a doubt: You will best gain your point, by talking, not Of me, but of yourself.

Festus. Have I not said All touching Michal and my children? Sure You know, by this, full well how Aennchen looks Gravely, while one disparts her thick brown hair; And Aureole's glee when some stray gannet builds Amid the birch-trees by the lake. Small hope Have I that he will honour (the wild imp) His namesake. Sigh not! 't is too much to ask That all we love should reach the same proud fate. But you are very kind to humour me By showing interest in my quiet life; You, who of old could never tame yourself To tranquil pleasures, must at heart despise. ..

Paracelsus. Festus, strange secrets are let out by death Who blabs so oft the follies of this world: And I am death's familiar, as you know. I helped a man to die, some few weeks since, Warped even from his go-cart to one end— The living on princes' smiles, reflected from A mighty herd of favourites. No mean trick He left untried, and truly well-nigh wormed All traces of God's finger out of him: Then died, grown old. And just an hour before, Having lain long with blank and soulless eyes, He sat up suddenly, and with natural voice Said that in spite of thick air and closed doors God told him it was June; and he knew well, Without such telling, harebells grew in June; And all that kings could ever give or take Would not be precious as those blooms to him. Just so, allowing I am passing sage, It seems to me much worthier argument Why pansies, eyes that laugh, bear beauty's prize From violets, eyes that dream—(your Michal's choice)— Than all fools find to wonder at in me Or in my fortunes. And be very sure I say this from no prurient restlessness, No self-complacency, itching to turn, Vary and view its pleasure from all points, And, in this instance, willing other men May be at pains, demonstrate to itself The realness of the very joy it tastes. What should delight me like the news of friends Whose memories were a solace to me oft, As mountain-baths to wild fowls in their flight? Ofter than you had wasted thought on me Had you been wise, and rightly valued bliss. But there 's no taming nor repressing hearts: God knows I need such!—So, you heard me speak?

Festus. Speak? when?

Paracelsus. When but this morning at my class? There was noise and crowd enough. I saw you not. Surely you know I am engaged to fill The chair here?—that 't is part of my proud fate To lecture to as many thick-skulled youths As please, each day, to throng the theatre, To my great reputation, and no small Danger of Basil's benches long unused To crack beneath such honour?

Festus. I was there; I mingled with the throng: shall I avow Small care was mine to listen?—too intent On gathering from the murmurs of the crowd A full corroboration of my hopes! What can I learn about your powers? but they Know, care for nought beyond your actual state, Your actual value; yet they worship you, Those various natures whom you sway as one! But ere I go, be sure I shall attend. ..

Paracelsus. Stop, o' God's name: the thing 's by no means yet Past remedy! Shall I read this morning's labour —At least in substance? Nought so worth the gaining As an apt scholar! Thus then, with all due Precision and emphasis—you, beside, are clearly Guiltless of understanding more, a whit, The subject than your stool—allowed to be A notable advantage.

Festus. Surely, Aureole, You laugh at me!

Paracelsus. I laugh? Ha, ha! thank heaven, I charge you, if 't be so! for I forget Much, and what laughter should be like. No less, However, I forego that luxury Since it alarms the friend who brings it back. True, laughter like my own must echo strangely To thinking men; a smile were better far; So, make me smile! If the exulting look You wore but now be smiling, 't is so long Since I have smiled! Alas, such smiles are born Alone of hearts like yours, or herdsmen's souls Of ancient time, whose eyes, calm as their flocks, Saw in the stars mere garnishry of heaven, And in the earth a stage for altars only. Never change, Festus: I say, never change!

Festus. My God, if he be wretched after all

Paracelsus. When last we parted, Festus, you declared, —Or Michal, yes, her soft lips whispered words I have preserved. She told me she believed I should succeed (meaning, that in the search I then engaged in, I should meet success) And yet be wretched: now, she augured false.

Festus. Thank heaven! but you spoke strangely: could I venture To think bare apprehension lest your friend, Dazzled by your resplendent course, might find Henceforth less sweetness in his own, could move Such earnest mood in you? Fear not, dear friend, That I shall leave you, inwardly repining Your lot was not my own!

Paracelsus. And this for ever! For ever! gull who may, they will be gulled! They will not look nor think;'t is nothing new In them: but surely he is not of them! My Festus, do you know, I reckoned, you— Though all beside were sand-blind—you, my friend, Would look at me, once close, with piercing eye Untroubled by the false glare that confounds A weaker vision: would remain serene, Though singular amid a gaping throng. I feared you, or I had come, sure, long ere this, To Einsiedeln. Well, error has no end, And Rhasis is a sage, and Basil boasts A tribe of wits, and I am wise and blest Past all dispute! 'T is vain to fret at it. I have vowed long ago my worshippers Shall owe to their own deep sagacity All further information, good or bad. Small risk indeed my reputation runs, Unless perchance the glance now searching me Be fixed much longer; for it seems to spell Dimly the characters a simpler man Might read distinct enough. Old Eastern books Say, the fallen prince of morning some short space Remained unchanged in semblance; nay, his brow Was hued with triumph: every spirit then Praising, his heart on flame the while:—a tale! Well, Festus, what discover you, I pray?

Festus. Some foul deed sullies then a life which else Were raised supreme?

Paracelsus. Good: I do well, most well Why strive to make men hear, feel, fret themselves With what is past their power to comprehend? I should not strive now: only, having nursed The faint surmise that one yet walked the earth, One, at least, not the utter fool of show, Not absolutely formed to be the dupe Of shallow plausibilities alone: One who, in youth, found wise enough to choose The happiness his riper years approve, Was yet so anxious for another's sake, That, ere his friend could rush upon a mad And ruinous course, the converse of his own, His gentle spirit essayed, prejudged for him The perilous path, foresaw its destiny, And warned the weak one in such tender words, Such accents—his whole heart in every tone— That oft their memory comforted that friend When it by right should have increased despair: —Having believed, I say, that this one man Could never lose the light thus from the first His portion—how should I refuse to grieve At even my gain if it disturb our old Relation, if it make me out more wise? Therefore, once more reminding him how well He prophesied, I note the single flaw That spoils his prophet's title. In plain words, You were deceived, and thus were you deceived— I have not been successful, and yet am Most miserable; 't is said at last; nor you Give credit, lest you force me to concede That common sense yet lives upon the world!

Festus. You surely do not mean to banter me?

Paracelsus. You know, or—if you have been wise enough To cleanse your memory of such matters—knew, As far as words of mine could make it clear, That 't was my purpose to find joy or grief Solely in the fulfilment of my plan Or plot or whatsoe'er it was; rejoicing Alone as it proceeded prosperously, Sorrowing then only when mischance retarded Its progress. That was in those Würzburg days! Not to prolong a theme I thoroughly hate, I have pursued this plan with all my strength; And having failed therein most signally, Cannot object to ruin utter and drear As all-excelling would have been the prize Had fortune favoured me. I scarce have right To vex your frank good spirit late so glad In my supposed prosperity, I know, And, were I lucky in a glut of friends, Would well agree to let your error live, Nay, strengthen it with fables of success. But mine is no condition to refuse The transient solace of so rare a godsend, My solitary luxury, my one friend: Accordingly I venture to put off The wearisome vest of falsehood galling me, Secure when he is by. I lay me bare Prone at his mercy—but he is my friend! Not that he needs retain his aspect grave; That answers not my purpose; for 't is like, Some sunny morning—Basil being drained Of its wise population, every corner Of the amphitheatre crammed with learned clerks, Here Œcolampadius, looking worlds of wit, Here Castellanus, as profound as he, Munsterus here, Frobenius there, all squeezed And staring,—that the zany of the show, Even Paracelsus, shall put off before them His trappings with a grace but seldom judged Expedient in such cases:—the grim smile That will go round! Is it not therefore best To venture a rehearsal like the present In a small way? Where are the signs I seek, The first-fruits and fair sample of the scorn Due to all quacks? Why, this will never do!

Festus. These are foul vapours, Aureole; nought beside! The effect of watching, study, weariness. Were there a spark of truth in the confusion Of these wild words, you would not outrage thus Your youth's companion. I shall ne'er regard These wanderings, bred of faintness and much study. 'T is not thus you would trust a trouble to me, To Michal's friend.

Paracelsus. I have said it, dearest Festus! For the manner, 't is ungracious probably; You may have it told in broken sobs, one day, And scalding tears, ere long: but I thought best To keep that off as long as possible. Do you wonder still?

Festus. No; it must oft fall out That one whose labour perfects any work, Shall rise from it with eye so worn that he Of all men least can measure the extent Of what he has accomplished. He alone Who, nothing tasked, is nothing weary too, May clearly scan the little he effects: But we, the bystanders, untouched by toil, Estimate each aright.

Paracelsus. This worthy Festus Is one of them, at last! 'T is so with all! First, they set down all progress as a dream; And next, when he whose quick discomfiture Was counted on, accomplishes some few And doubtful steps in his career,—behold, They look for every inch of ground to vanish Beneath his tread, so sure they spy success!

Festus. Few doubtful steps? when death retires before Your presence—when the noblest of mankind, Broken in body or subdued in soul, May through your skill renew their vigour, raise The shattered frame to pristine stateliness? When men in racking pain may purchase dreams Of what delights them most, swooning at once Into a sea of bliss or rapt along As in a flying sphere of turbulent light? When we may look to you as one ordained To free the flesh from fell disease, as frees Our Luther's burning tongue the fettered soul? When. ..

Paracelsus. When and where, the devil, did you get This notable news?

Festus. Even from the common voice; From those whose envy, daring not dispute The wonders it decries, attributes them To magic and such folly.

Paracelsus. Folly? Why not To magic, pray? You find a comfort doubtless In holding, God ne'er troubles him about Us or our doings: once we were judged worth The devil's tempting. . . I offend: forgive me, And rest content. Your prophecy on the whole Was fair enough as prophesyings go; At fault a little in detail, but quite Precise enough in the main; and hereupon I pay due homage: you guessed long ago (The prophet!) I should fail—and I have failed.

Festus. You mean to tell me, then, the hopes which fed Your youth have not been realized as yet? Some obstacle has barred them hitherto? Or that their innate. ..

Paracelsus. As I said but now, You have a very decent prophet's fame, So you but shun details here. Little matter Whether those hopes were mad,—the aims they sought, Safe and secure from all ambitious fools; Or whether my weak wits are overcome By what a better spirit would scorn: I fail. And now methinks 't were best to change a theme I am a sad fool to have stumbled on. I say confusedly what comes uppermost; But there are times when patience proves at fault, As now: this morning's strange encounter—you Beside me once again! you, whom I guessed Alive, since hitherto (with Luther's leave) No friend have I among the saints at peace, To judge by any good their prayers effect. I knew you would have helped me—why not he, My strange competitor in enterprise, Bound for the same end by another path, Arrived, or ill or well, before the time, At our disastrous journey's doubtful close? How goes it with Aprile? Ah, they miss Your lone sad sunny idleness of heaven, Our martyrs for the world's sake; heaven shuts fast: The poor mad poet is howling by this time! Since you are my sole friend then, here or there, I could not quite repress the varied feelings This meeting wakens; they have had their vent, And now forget them. Do the rear-mice still Hang like a fretwork on the gate (or what In my time was a gate) fronting the road From Einsiedeln to Lachen?

Festus. Trifle not: Answer me, for my sake alone! You smiled Just now, when I supposed some deed, unworthy Yourself, might blot the else so bright result; Yet if your motives have continued pure, Your will unfaltering, and in spite of this, You have experienced a defeat, why then I say not you would cheerfully withdraw From contest—mortal hearts are not so fashioned— But surely you would ne'ertheless withdraw. You sought not fame nor gain nor even love, No end distinct from knowledge,—I repeat Your very words: once satisfied that knowledge Is a mere dream, you would announce as much, Yourself the first. But how is the event? You are defeated—and I find you here!

Paracelsus. As though "here" did not signify defeat! I spoke not of my little labours here, But of the break-down of my general aims: For you, aware of their extent and scope, To look on these sage lecturings, approved By beardless boys, and bearded dotards worse, As a fit consummation of such aims, Is worthy notice. A professorship At Basil! Since you see so much in it, And think my life was reasonably drained Of life's delights to render me a match For duties arduous as such post demands,— Be it far from me to deny my power To fill the petty circle lotted out Of infinite space, or justify the host Of honours thence accruing. So, take notice, This jewel dangling from my neck preserves The features of a prince, my skill restored To plague his people some few years to come: And all through a pure whim. He had eased the earth For me, but that the droll despair which seized The vermin of his household, tickled me. I came to see. Here, drivelled the physician, Whose most infallible nostrum was at fault; There quaked the astrologer, whose horoscope Had promised him interminable years; Here a monk fumbled at the sick man's mouth With some undoubted relic—a sudary Of the Virgin; while another piebald knave Of the same brotherhood (he loved them ever) Was actively preparing 'neath his nose Such a suffumigation as, once fired, Had stunk the patient dead ere he could groan. I cursed the doctor and upset the brother, Brushed past the conjurer, vowed that the first gust Of stench from the ingredients just alight Would raise a cross-grained devil in my sword, Not easily laid: and ere an hour the prince Slept as he never slept since prince he was. A day—and I was posting for my life, Placarded through the town as one whose spite Had near availed to stop the blessed effects Of the doctor's nostrum which, well seconded By the sudary, and most by the costly smoke— Not leaving out the strenuous prayers sent up Hard by in the abbey—raised the prince to life: To the great reputation of the seer Who, confident, expected all along The glad event—the doctor's recompense— Much largess from his highness to the monks— And the vast solace of his loving people, Whose general satisfaction to increase, The prince was pleased no longer to defer The burning of some dozen heretics Remanded till God's mercy should be shown Touching his sickness: last of all were joined Ample directions to all loyal folk To swell the complement by seizing me Who—doubtless some rank sorcerer—endeavoured To thwart these pious offices, obstruct The prince's cure, and frustrate heaven by help Of certain devils dwelling in his sword. By luck, the prince in his first fit of thanks Had forced this bauble on me as an earnest Of further favours. This one case may serve To give sufficient taste of many such, So, let them pass. Those shelves support a pile Of patents, licences, diplomas, titles From Germany, France, Spain, and Italy; They authorize some honour; ne'ertheless, I set more store by this Erasmus sent; He trusts me; our Frobenius is his friend, And him "I raised" (nay, read it) "from the dead." I weary you, I see. I merely sought To show, there 's no great wonder after all That, while I fill the class-room and attract A crowd to Basil, I get leave to stay, And therefore need not scruple to accept The utmost they can offer, if I please: For 't is but right the world should be prepared To treat with favour e'en fantastic wants Of one like me, used up in serving her. Just as the mortal, whom the gods in part Devoured, received in place of his lost limb Some virtue or other—cured disease, I think; You mind the fables we have read together.

Festus. You do not think I comprehend a word. The time was, Aureole, you were apt enough To clothe the airiest thoughts in specious breath; But surely you must feel how vague and strange These speeches sound.

Paracelsus. Well, then: you know my hopes; I am assured, at length, those hopes were vain; That truth is just as far from me as ever; That I have thrown my life away; that sorrow On that account is idle, and further effort To mend and patch what 's marred beyond repairing, As useless: and all this was taught your friend By the convincing good old-fashioned method Of force—by sheer compulsion. Is that plain?

Festus. Dear Aureole, can it be my fears were just? God wills not. ..

Paracelsus. Now, 't is this I most admire— The constant talk men of your stamp keep up Of God's will, as they style it; one would swear Man had but merely to uplift his eye, And see the will in question charactered On the heaven's vault. 'T is hardly wise to moot Such topics: doubts are many and faith is weak. I know as much of any will of God As knows some dumb and tortured brute what Man, His stern lord, wills from the perplexing blows That plague him every way; but there, of course, Where least he suffers, longest he remains— My case; and for such reasons I plod on, Subdued but not convinced. I know as little Why I deserve to fail, as why I hoped Better things in my youth. I simply know I am no master here, but trained and beaten Into the path I tread; and here I stay, Until some further intimation reach me, Like an obedient drudge. Though I prefer To view the whole thing as a task imposed Which, whether dull or pleasant, must be done— Yet, I deny not, there is made provision Of joys which tastes less jaded might affect; Nay, some which please me too, for all my pride— Pleasures that once were pains: the iron ring Festering about a slave's neck grows at length Into the flesh it eats. I hate no longer A host of petty vile delights, undreamed of Or spurned before; such now supply the place Of my dead aims: as in the autumn woods Where tall trees used to flourish, from their roots Springs up a fungous brood sickly and pale, Chill mushrooms coloured like a corpse's cheek.

Festus. If I interpret well your words, I own It troubles me but little that your aims, Vast in their dawning and most likely grown Extravagantly since, have baffled you. Perchance I am glad; you merit greater praise; Because they are too glorious to be gained, You do not blindly cling to them and die; You fell, but have not sullenly refused To rise, because an angel worsted you In wrestling, though the world holds not your peer; And though too harsh and sudden is the change To yield content as yet, still you pursue The ungracious path as though 't were rosv-strewn. 'T is well: and your reward, or soon or late, Will come from him whom no man serves in vain.

Paracelsus. Ah, very fine! For my part, I conceive The very pausing from all further toil, Which you find heinous, would become a seal To the sincerity of all my deeds. To be consistent I should die at once; I calculated on no after-life; Yet (how crept in, how fostered, I know not) Here am I with as passionate regret For youth and health and love so vainly lavished, As if their preservation had been first And foremost in my thoughts; and this strange fact Humbled me wondrously, and had due force In rendering me the less averse to follow A certain counsel, a mysterious warning— You will not understand—but 't was a man With aims not mine and yet pursued like mine, With the same fervour and no more success, Perishing in my sight; who summoned me As I would shun the ghastly fate I saw, To serve my race at once; to wait no longer That God should interfere in my behalf, But to distrust myself, put pride away, And give my gains, imperfect as they were, To men. I have not leisure to explain How, since, a singular series of events Has raised me to the station you behold, Wherein I seem to turn to most account The mere wreck of the past,—perhaps receive Some feeble glimmering token that God views And may approve my penance: therefore here You find me, doing most good or least harm. And if folks wonder much and profit little 'T is not my fault; only, I shall rejoice When my part in the farce is shuffled through, And the curtain falls: I must hold out till then.

Festus. Till when, dear Aureole?

Paracelsus. Till I 'm fairly thrust From my proud eminence. Fortune is fickle And even professors fall: should that arrive, I see no sin in ceding to my bent. You little fancy what rude shocks apprise us We sin; God's intimations rather fail In clearness than in energy: 't were well Did they but indicate the course to take Like that to be forsaken. I would fain Be spared a further sample. Here I stand, And here I stay, be sure, till forced to flit.

Festus. Be you but firm on that head! long ere then All I expect will come to pass, I trust: The cloud that wraps you will have disappeared. Meantime, I see small chance of such event: They praise you here as one whose lore, already Divulged, eclipses all the past can show, But whose achievements, marvellous as they be, Are faint anticipations of a glory About to be revealed. When Basil's crowds Dismiss their teacher, I shall be content That he depart.

Paracelsus. This favour at their hands I look for earlier than your view of things Would warrant. Of the crowd you saw to-day, Remove the full half sheer amazement draws, Mere novelty, nought else; and next, the tribe Whose innate blockish dulness just perceives That unless miracles (as seem my works) Be wrought in their behalf, their chance is slight To puzzle the devil; next, the numerous set Who bitterly hate established schools, and help The teacher that oppugns them, till he once Have planted his own doctrine, when the teacher May reckon on their rancour in his turn; Take, too, the sprinkling of sagacious knaves Whose cunning runs not counter to the vogue But seeks, by flattery and crafty nursing, To force my system to a premature Short-lived development. Why swell the list? Each has his end to serve, and his best way Of serving it: remove all these, remains A scantling, a poor dozen at the best, Worthy to look for sympathy and service, And likely to draw profit from my pains.

Festus. 'T is no encouraging picture: still these few Redeem their fellows. Once the germ implanted, Its growth, if slow, is sure.

Paracelsus. God grant it so! I would make some amends: but if I fail, The luckless rogues have this excuse to urge, That much is in my method and my manner, My uncouth habits, my impatient spirit, Which hinders of reception and result My doctrine: much to say, small skill to speak! These old aims suffered not a looking-off Though for an instant; therefore, only when I thus renounced them and resolved to reap Some present fruit—to teach mankind some truth So dearly purchased—only then I found Such teaching was an art requiring cares And qualities peculiar to itself: That to possess was one thing—to display Another. With renown first in my thoughts, Or popular praise, I had soon discovered it: One grows but little apt to learn these things.

Festus. If it be so, which nowise I believe, There needs no waiting fuller dispensation To leave a labour of so little use. Why not throw up the irksome charge at once?

Paracelsus. A task, a task!

But wherefore hide the whole Extent of degradation, once engaged In the confessing vein? Despite of all My fine talk of obedience and repugnance, Docility and what not, 't is yet to learn If when the task shall really be performed, My inclination free to choose once more, I shall do aught but slightly modify The nature of the hated task I quit. In plain words, I am spoiled; my life still tends As first it tended; I am broken and trained To my old habits: they are part of me. I know, and none so well, my darling ends Are proved impossible: no less, no less, Even now what humours me, fond fool, as when Their faint ghosts sit with me and flatter me And send me back content to my dull round? How can I change this soul?—this apparatus Constructed solely for their purposes, So well adapted to their every want, To search out and discover, prove and perfect; This intricate machine whose most minute And meanest motions have their charm to me Though to none else—an aptitude I seize, An object I perceive, a use, a meaning, A property, a fitness, I explain And I alone:—how can I change my soul? And this wronged body, worthless save when tasked Under that soul's dominion—used to care For its bright master's cares and quite subdue Its proper cravings—not to ail nor pine So he but prosper—whither drag this poor Tried patient body? God! how I essayed To live like that mad poet, for a while, To love alone; and how I felt too warped And twisted and deformed! What should I do, Even tho' released from drudgery, but return Faint, as you see, and halting, blind and sore, To my old life and die as I began? I cannot feed on beauty for the sake Of beauty only, nor can drink in balm From lovely objects for their loveliness; My nature cannot lose her first imprint; I still must hoard and heap and class all truths With one ulterior purpose: I must know! Would God translate me to his throne, believe That I should only listen to his word To further my own aim! For other men, Beauty is prodigally strewn around, And I were happy could I quench as they This mad and thriveless longing, and content me With beauty for itself alone: alas, I have addressed a frock of heavy mail Yet may not join the troop of sacred knights; And now the forest-creatures fly from me, The grass-banks cool, the sunbeams warm no more. Best follow, dreaming that ere night arrive, I shall o'ertake the company and ride Glittering as they!

Festus. I think I apprehend What you would say: if you, in truth, design To enter once more on the life thus left, Seek not to hide that all this consciousness Of failure is assumed!

Paracelsus. My friend, my friend, I toil, you listen; I explain, perhaps You understand: there our communion ends. Have you learnt nothing from to-day's discourse? When we would thoroughly know the sick man's state We feel awhile the fluttering pulse, press soft The hot brow, look upon the languid eye, And thence divine the rest. Must I lay bare My heart, hideous and beating, or tear up My vitals for your gaze, ere you will deem Enough made known? You! who are you, forsooth? That is the crowning operation claimed By the arch-demonstrator—heaven the hall, And earth the audience. Let Aprile and you Secure good places: 't will be worth the while.

Festus. Are you mad, Aureole? What can I have said To call for this? I judged from your own words.

Paracelsus. Oh, doubtless! A sick wretch describes the ape That mocks him from the bed-foot, and all gravely You thither turn at once: or he recounts The perilous journey he has late performed, And you are puzzled much how that could be! You find me here, half stupid and half mad; It makes no part of my delight to search Into these matters, much less undergo Another's scrutiny; but so it chances That I am led to trust my state to you: And the event is, you combine, contrast And ponder on my foolish words as though They thoroughly conveyed all hidden here— Here, loathsome with despair and hate and rage! Is there no fear, no shrinking and no shame? Will you guess nothing? will you spare me nothing? Must I go deeper? Ay or no?

Festus. Dear friend. ..

Paracelsus. True: I am brutal—'t is a part of it; The plague's sign—you are not a lazar-haunter, How should you know? Well then, you think it strange I should profess to have failed utterly, And yet propose an ultimate return To courses void of hope: and this, because You know not what temptation is, nor how 'T is like to ply men in the sickliest part. You are to understand that we who make Sport for the gods, are hunted to the end: There is not one sharp volley shot at us, Which 'scaped with life, though hurt, we slacken pace And gather by the wayside herbs and roots To staunch our wounds, secure from further harm: We are assailed to life's extremest verge. It will be well indeed if I return, A harmless busy fool, to my old ways! I would forget hints of another fate, Significant enough, which silent hours Have lately scared me with.

Festus. Another! and what?

Paracelsus. After all, Festus, you say well: I am A man yet: I need never humble me. I would have been—something, I know not what; But though I cannot soar, I do not crawl. There are worse portions than this one of mine. You say well!

Festus. Ah!

Paracelsus. And deeper degradation! If the mean stimulants of vulgar praise, If vanity should become the chosen food Of a sunk mind, should stifle even the wish To find its early aspirations true, Should teach it to breathe falsehood like life-breath— An atmosphere of craft and trick and lies; Should make it proud to emulate, surpass Base natures in the practices which woke Its most indignant loathing once. . . No, no! Utter damnation is reserved for hell! I had immortal feelings; such shall never Be wholly quenched: no, no!

My friend, you wear A melancholy face, and certain 't is There 's little cheer in all this dismal work. But was it my desire to set abroach Such memories and forebodings? I foresaw Where they would drive. 'T were better we discuss News from Lucerne or Zurich; ask and tell Of Egypt's flaring sky or Spain's cork-groves.

Festus. I have thought: trust me, this mood will pass away! I know you and the lofty spirit you bear, And easily ravel out a clue to all. These are the trials meet for such as you, Nor must you hope exemption: to be mortal Is to be plied with trials manifold. Look round! The obstacles which kept the rest From your ambition, have been spurned by you; Their fears, their doubts, the chains that bind themall, Were flax before your resolute soul, which nought Avails to awe save these delusions bred From its own strength, its selfsame strength disguised, Mocking itself. Be brave, dear Aureole! Since The rabbit has his shade to frighten him, The fawn a rustling bough, mortals their cares, And higher natures yet would slight and laugh At these entangling fantasies, as you At trammels of a weaker intellect,— Measure your mind's height by the shade it casts! I know you.

Paracelsus. And I know you, dearest Festus! And how you love unworthily; and how All admiration renders blind.

Festus. You hold That admiration blinds?

Paracelsus. Ay and alas!

Festus. Nought blinds you less than admiration, friend! Whether it be that all love renders wise In its degree; from love which blends with love— Heart answering heart—to love which spends itself In silent mad idolatry of some Pre-eminent mortal, some great soul of souls, Which ne'er will know how well it is adored. I say, such love is never blind; but rather Alive to every the minutest spot Which mars its object, and which hate (supposed So vigilant and searching) dreams not of. Love broods on such: what then? When first perceived Is there no sweet strife to forget, to change, To overflush those blemishes with all The glow of general goodness they disturb? —To make those very defects an endless source Of new affection grown from hopes and fears? And, when all fails, is there no gallant stand Made even for much proved weak? no shrinking-back Lest, since all love assimilates the soul To what it loves, it should at length become Almost a rival of its idol? Trust me, If there be fiends who seek to work our hurt, To ruin and drag down earth's mightiest spirits Even at God's foot, 't will be from such as love, Their zeal will gather most to serve their cause; And least from those who hate, who most essay By contumely and scorn to blot the light Which forces entrance even to their hearts: For thence will our defender tear the veil And show within each heart, as in a shrine, The giant image of perfection, grown In hate's despite, whose calumnies were spawned In the untroubled presence of its eyes. True admiration blinds not; nor am I So blind. I call your sin exceptional; It springs from one whose life has passed the bounds Prescribed to life. Compound that fault with God! I speak of men; to common men like me The weakness you reveal endears you more, Like the far traces of decay in suns. I bid you have good cheer!

Paracelsus. ''Præclare! Optime!'' Think of a quiet mountain-cloistered priest Instructing Paracelsus! yet 't is so. Come, I will show you where my merit lies. 'T is in the advance of individual minds That the slow crowd should ground their expectation Eventually to follow; as the sea Waits ages in its bed till some one wave Out of the multitudinous mass, extends The empire of the whole, some feet perhaps, Over the strip of sand which could confine Its fellows so long time: thenceforth the rest, Even to the meanest, hurry in at once, And so much is clear gained. I shall be glad If all my labours, failing of aught else, Suffice to make such inroad and procure A wider range for thought: nay, they do this; For, whatsoe'er my notions of true knowledge And a legitimate success, may be, I am not blind to my undoubted rank When classed with others: I precede my age: And whoso wills is very free to mount These labours as a platform whence his own May have a prosperous outset. But, alas! My followers—they are noisy as you heard; But, for intelligence, the best of them So clumsily wield the weapons I supply And they extol, that I begin to doubt Whether their own rude clubs and pebble-stones Would not do better service than my arms Thus vilely swayed—if error will not fall Sooner before the old awkward batterings Than my more subtle warfare, not half learned.

Festus. I would supply that art, then, or withhold New arms until you teach their mystery.

Paracelsus. Content you, 't is my wish; I have recourse To the simplest training. Day by day I seek To wake the mood, the spirit which alone Can make those arms of any use to men. Of course they are for swaggering forth at once Graced with Ulysses' bow, Achilles' shield— Flash on us, all in armour, thou Achilles! Make our hearts dance to thy resounding step! A proper sight to scare the crows away!

Festus. Pity you choose not then some other method Of coming at your point. The marvellous art At length established in the world bids fair To remedy all hindrances like these: Trust to Frobenius' press the precious lore Obscured by uncouth manner, or unfit For raw beginners; let his types secure A deathless monument to after-time; Meanwhile wait confidently and enjoy The ultimate effect: sooner or later You shall be all-revealed.

Paracelsus. The old dull question In a new form; no more. Thus: I possess Two sorts of knowledge; one,—vast, shadowy, Hints of the unbounded aim I once pursued: The other consists of many secrets, caught While bent on nobler prize,—perhaps a few Prime principles which may conduct to much: These last I offer to my followers here. Now, bid me chronicle the first of these, My ancient study, and in effect you bid Revert to the wild courses just abjured: I must go find them scattered through the world. Then, for the principles, they are so simple (Being chiefly of the overturning sort), That one time is as proper to propound them As any other—to-morrow at my class, Or half a century hence embalmed in print. For if mankind intend to learn at all, They must begin by giving faith to them And acting on them: and I do not see But that my lectures serve indifferent well: No doubt these dogmas fall not to the earth, For all their novelty and rugged setting. I think my class will not forget the day I let them know the gods of Israel, Aëtius, Oribasius, Galen, Rhasis, Serapion, Avicenna, Averröes, Were blocks!

Festus. And that reminds me, I heard something About your waywardness: you burned their books, It seems, instead of answering those sages.

Paracelsus. And who said that?

Festus. Some I met yesternight With Œcolampadius. As you know, the purpose Of this short stay at Basil was to learn His pleasure touching certain missives sent For our Zuinglius and himself. 'T was he Apprised me that the famous teacher here Was my old friend.

Paracelsus. Ah, I forgot: you went. ..

Festus. From Zurich with advices for the ear Of Luther, now at Wittenberg—(you know, I make no doubt, the differences of late With Carolostadius)—and returning sought Basil and. ..

Paracelsus. I remember. Here 's a case, now, Will teach you why I answer not, but burn The books you mention. Pray, does Luther dream His arguments convince by their own force The crowds that own his doctrine? No, indeed! His plain denial of established points Ages had sanctified and men supposed Could never be oppugned while earth was under And heaven above them—points which chance or time Affected not—did more than the array Of argument which followed. Boldly deny! There is much breath-stopping, hair-stiffening Awhile; then, amazed glances, mute awaiting The thunderbolt which does not come: and next, Reproachful wonder and inquiry: those Who else had never stirred, are able now To find the rest out for themselves, perhaps To outstrip him who set the whole at work, —As never will my wise class its instructor. And you saw Luther?

Festus. 'T is a wondrous soul!

Paracelsus. True: the so-heavy chain which galled mankind Is shattered, and the noblest of us all Must bow to the deliverer—nay, the worker Of our own project—we who long before Had burst our trammels, but forgot the crowd, We should have taught, still groaned beneath the load: This he has done and nobly. Speed that may! Whatever be my chance or my mischance, What benefits mankind must glad me too; And men seem made, though not as I believed, For something better than the times produce. Witness these gangs of peasants your new lights From Suabia have possessed, whom Münzer leads, And whom the duke, the landgrave and the elector Will calm in blood! Well, well; 't is not my world!

Festus. Hark!

Paracelsus. 'T is the melancholy wind astir Within the trees; the embers too are grey: Morn must be near.

Festus. Best ope the casement: see, The night, late strewn with clouds and flying stars, Is blank and motionless: how peaceful sleep The tree-tops altogether! Like an asp, The wind slips whispering from bough to bough.

Paracelsus. Ay; you would gaze on a wind-shaken tree By the hour, nor count time lost.

Festus. So you shall gaze: Those happy times will come again.

Paracelsus. Gone, gone, Those pleasant times! Does not the moaning wind Seem to bewail that we have gained such gains And bartered sleep for them?

Festus. It is our trust That there is yet another world to mend All error and mischance.

Paracelsus. Another world! And why this world, this common world, to be A make-shift, a mere foil, how fair soever, To some fine life to come? Man must be fed With angels' food, forsooth; and some few traces Of a diviner nature which look out Through his corporeal baseness, warrant him In a supreme contempt of all provision For his inferior tastes—some straggling marks Which constitute his essence, just as truly As here and there a gem would constitute The rock, their barren bed, one diamond. But were it so—were man all mind—he gains A station little enviable. From God Down to the lowest spirit ministrant, Intelligence exists which casts our mind Into immeasurable shade. No, no: Love, hope, fear, faith—these make humanity; These are its sign and note and character, And these I have lost!—gone, shut from me for ever, Like a dead friend safe from unkindness more! See, morn at length. The heavy darkness seems Diluted, grey and clear without the stars; The shrubs bestir and rouse themselves as if Some snake, that weighed them down all night, let go His hold; and from the East, fuller and fuller Day, like a mighty river, flowing in; But clouded, wintry, desolate and cold. Yet see how that broad prickly star-shaped plant, Half-down in the crevice, spreads its woolly leaves All thick and glistering with diamond dew. And you depart for Einsiedeln this day, And we have spent all night in talk like this! If you would have me better for your love, Revert no more to these sad themes.

Festus. One favour, And I have done. I leave you, deeply moved; Unwilling to have fared so well, the while My friend has changed so sorely. If this mood Shall pass away, if light once more arise Where all is darkness now, if you see fit To hope and trust again, and strive again, You will remember—not our love alone— But that my faith in God's desire that man Should trust on his support, (as I must think You trusted) is obscured and dim through you: For you are thus, and this is no reward. Will you not call me to your side, dear Aureole?

title: Paracelsus (Browning)/III


text:
Author:Charlton Thomas Lewis

Works

 * Gnomon of the New Testament, translated from the German of Bengel (1861)
 * Lewis and Short's Latin Dictionary (1879)
 * History of Germany (1870)
 * Latin Dictionary for Schools (1889)
 * Elementary Latin Dictionary (1890)
 * (in part)

license: Creative Commons - Attribution Share-Alike - https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/

title: Author:Charlton Thomas Lewis


text:
Paracelsus (Browning)/IV

Part IV Paracelsus Aspires

Scene.— Colmar in Alsatia: an Inn. 1528.

Paracelsus. [to Johannes Oporinus, his Secretary] Sic itur ad astra! Dear Von Visenburg Is scandalized, and poor Torinus paralysed, And every honest soul that Basil holds Aghast; and yet we live, as one may say, Just as though Liechtenfels had never set So true a value on his sorry carcass, And learned Pütter had not frowned us dumb. We live; and shall as surely start to morrow For Nuremberg, as we drink speedy scathe To Basil in this mantling wine, suffused A delicate blush, no fainter tinge is born I' the shut heart of a bud. Pledge me, good John— "Basil; a hot plague ravage it, and Pütter "Oppose the plague!" Even so? Do you too share Their panic, the reptiles? Ha, ha; faint through these, Desist for these! They manage matters so At Basil, 't is like: but others may find means To bring the stoutest braggart of the tribe Once more to crouch in silence—means to breed A stupid wonder in each fool again, Now big with admiration at the skill Which stript a vain pretender of his plumes: And, that done,—means to brand each slavish brow So deeply, surely, ineffaceably, That henceforth flattery shall not pucker it Out of the furrow; there that stamp shall stay To show the next they fawn on, what they are, This Basil with its magnates,—fill my cup,— Whom I curse soul and limb. And now despatch, Despatch, my trusty John; and what remains To do, whate'er arrangements for our trip Are yet to be completed, see you hasten This night; we'll weather the storm at least: to-morrow For Nuremberg! Now leave us; this grave clerk Has divers weighty matters for my ear: [Oporinus goes out.] And spare my lungs. At last, my gallant Festus, I am rid of this arch-knave that dogs my heels As a gaunt crow a gasping sheep; at last May give a loose to my delight. How kind, How very kind, my first best only friend! Why, this looks like fidelity. Embrace me! Not a hair silvered yet? Right! you shall live Till I am worth your love; you shall be pround, And I—but let time show! Did you not wonder? I sent to you because our compact weighed Upon my conscience—(you recall the night At Basil, which the gods confound!)—because Once more I aspire. I call you to my side: You come. You thought my message strange?

Festus. So strange That I must hope, indeed, your messenger Has mingled his own fancies with the words Purporting to be yours.

Paracelsus. He said no more, 'T is probable, than the precious folk I leave Said fiftyfold more roughly. Well-a-day, 'T is true! poor Paracelsus is exposed At last; a most egregious quack he proves: And those he overreached must spit their hate On one who, utterly beneath contempt, Could yet deceive their topping wits. You heard Bare truth; and at my bidding you come here To speed me on my enterprise, as once Your lavish wishes sped me, my own friend!

Festus. What is your purpose, Aureole?

Paracelsus. Oh, for purpose, There is no lack of precedents in a case Like mine; at least, if not precisely mine, The case of men cast off by those they sought To benefit.

Festus. They really cast you off? I only heard a vague tale of some priest, Cured by your skill, who wrangled at your claim, Knowing his life's worth best; and how the judge The matter was referred to, saw no cause To interfere, nor you to hide your full Contempt of him; nor he, again, to smother His wrath thereat, which raised so fierce a flame That Basil soon was made no place for you.

Paracelsus. The affair of Liechtenfels? the shallowest fable, The last and silliest outrage—mere pretence! I knew it, I foretold it from the first, How soon the stupid wonder you mistook For genuine loyalty—a cheering promise Of better things to come—would pall and pass; And every word comes true. Saul is among The prophets! Just so long as I was pleased To play off the mere antics of my art, Fantastic gambols leading to no end, I got huge praise: but one can ne'er keep down Our foolish nature's weakness. There they flocked, Poor devils, jostling, swearing and perspiring, Till the walls rang again; and all for me! I had a kindness for them, which was right; But then I stopped not till I tacked to that A trust in them and a respect—a sort Of sympathy for them; I must needs begin To teach them, not amaze them, "to impart "The spirit which should instigate the search "Of truth," just what you bade me! I spoke out. Forthwith a mighty squadron, in disgust, Filed off—"the sifted chaff of the sack," I said, Redoubling my endeavours to secure The rest. When lo! one man had tarried so long Only to ascertain if I supported This tenet of his, or that; another loved To hear impartially before he judged, And having heard, now judged; this bland disciple Passed for my dupe, but all along, it seems, Spied error where his neighbours marvelled most; That fiery doctor who had hailed me friend, Did it because my by-paths, once proved wrong And beaconed properly, would commend again The good old ways our sires jogged safely o'er, Though not their squeamish sons; the other worthy Discovered divers verses of St. John, Which, read successively, refreshed the soul, But, muttered backwards, cured the gout, the stone, The colic and what not. Quid multa? The end Was a clear class-room, and a quiet leer From grave folk, and a sour reproachful glance From those in chief who, cap in hand, installed The new professor scarce a year before; And a vast flourish about patient merit Obscured awhile by flashy tricks, but sure Sooner or later to emerge in splendour— Of which the example was some luckless wight Whom my arrival had discomfited, But now, it seems, the general voice recalled To fill my chair and so efface the stain Basil had long incurred. I sought no better, Only a quiet dismissal from my post, And from my heart I wished them better suited And better served. Good night to Basil, then! But fast as I proposed to rid the tribe Of my obnoxious back, I could not spare them The pleasure of a parting kick.

Festus. You smile: Despise them as they merit!

Paracelsus. If I smile, 'T is with as very contempt as ever turned Flesh into stone. This courteous recompense, This grateful. . . Festus, were your nature fit To be defiled, your eyes the eyes to ache At gangrene-blotches, eating poison-blains, The ulcerous barky scurf of leprosy Which finds—a man, and leaves—a hideous thing That cannot but be mended by hell fire, —I would lay bare to you the human heart Which God cursed long ago, and devils make since Their pet nest and their never-tiring home. Oh, sages have discovered we are born For various ends—to love, to know: has ever One stumbled, in his search, on any signs Of a nature in us formed to hate? To hate? If that be our true object which evokes Our powers in fullest strength, be sure 't is hate! Yet men have doubted if the best and bravest Of spirits can nourish him with hate alone. I had not the monopoly of fools, It seems, at Basil.

Festus. But your plans, your plans! I have yet to learn your purpose, Aureole!

Paracelsus. Whether to sink beneath such ponderous shame, To shrink up like a crushed snail, undergo In silence and desist from further toil, and so subside into a monument Of one their censure blasted? or to bow Cheerfully as submissively, to lower My old pretensions even as Basil dictates, To drop into the rank her wits assign me And live as they prescribe, and make that use Of my poor knowledge which their rules allow, Proud to be patted now and then, and careful To practise the true posture for receiving The amplest benefit from their hoofs' appliance When they shall condescend to tutor me? Then, one may feel resentment like a flame Within, and deck false systems in truth's garb, And tangle and entwine mankind with error, And give them darkness for a dower and falsehood For a possession, ages: or one may mope Into a shade through thinking, or else drowse Into a dreamless sleep and so die off. But I,—now Festus shall divine!—but I Am merely setting out once more, embracing My earliest aims again! What thinks he now?

Festus. Your aims? the aims?—to ? and where is found The early trust. ..

Paracelsus. Nay, not so fast; I say, The aims—not the old means. You know they made me A laughing-stock; I was a fool; you know The when and the how: hardly those means again! Not but they had their beauty; who should know Their passing beauty, if not I? Still, dreams They were, so let them vanish, yet in beauty If that may be. Stay: thus they pass in song!

[He sings.] Heap cassia, sandal-buds and stripes Of labdanum, and aloe-balls, Smeared with dull nard an Indian wipes From out her hair: such balsam falls Down sea-side mountain pedestals, From tree-tops where tired winds are fain, Spent with the vast and howling main, To treasure half their island-gain.

And strew faint sweetness from some old Egyptian's fine worm-eaten shroud Which breaks to dust when once unrolled; Or shredded perfume, like a cloud From closet long to quiet vowed, With mothed and dropping arras hung, Mouldering her lute and books among, As when a queen, long dead, was young.

Mine, every word! And on such pile shall die My lovely fancies, with fair perished things, Themselves fair and forgotten; yes, forgotten, Or why abjure them? So, I made this rhyme That fitting dignity might be preserved; No little proud was I; though the list of drugs Smacks of my old vocation, and the verse Halts like the best of Luther's psalms.

Festus. But, Aureole, Talk not thus wildly and madly. I am here— Did you know all! I have travelled far, indeed, To learn your wishes. Be yourself again! For in this mood I recognize you less Than in the horrible despondency I witnessed last. You may account this, joy; But rather let me gaze on that despair Than hear these incoherent words and see This flushed cheek and intensely-sparkling eye.

Paracelsus. Why, man, I was light-hearted in my prime I am light-hearted now; what would you have? Aprile was a poet, I make songs— 'T is the very augury of success I want! Why should I not be joyous now as then?

Festus. Joyous! and how? and what remains for joy? You have declared the ends (which I am sick Of naming) are impracticable.

Paracelsus. Ay, Pursued as I pursued them—the arch-fool! Listen: my plan will please you not, 't is like, But you are little versed in the world's ways. This is my plan—(first drinking its good luck)— I will accept all helps; all I despised So rashly at the outset, equally With early impulses, late years have quenched: I have tried each way singly: now for both! All helps! no one sort shall exclude the rest. I seek to know and to enjoy at once, Not one without the other as before. Suppose my labour should seem God's own cause Once more, as first I dreamed,—it shall not baulk me Of the meanest earthliest sensualest delight That may be snatched; for every joy is gain, And gain is gain, however small. My soul Can die then, nor be taunted—"what was gained?" Nor, on the other hand, should pleasure follow As though I had not spurned her hitherto, Shall she o'ercloud my spirit's rapt communion With the tumultuous past, the teeming future, Glorious with visions of a full success.

Festus. Success!

Paracelsus. And wherefore not? Why not prefer Results obtained in my best state of being, To those derived alone from seasons dark As the thoughts they bred? When I was best, my youth Unwasted, seemed success not surest too? It is the nature of darkness to obscure. I am a wanderer: I remember well One journey, how I feared the track was missed, So long the city I desired to reach Lay hid; when suddenly its spires afar Flashed through the circling clouds; you may conceive My transport. Soon the vapours closed again, But I had seen the city, and one such glance No darkness could obscure: nor shall the present— A few dull hours, a passing shame or two, Destroy the vivid memories of the past. I will fight the battle out; a little spent Perhaps, but still an able combatant. You look at my grey hair and furrowed brow? But I can turn even weakness to account: Of many tricks I know, 't is not the least To push the ruins of my frame, whereon The fire of vigour trembles scarce alive, Into a heap, and send the flame aloft. What should I do with age? So, sickness lends An aid; it being, I fear, the source of all We boast of: mind is nothing but disease, And natural health is ignorance.

Festus. I see But one good symptom in this notable scheme. I feared your sudden journey had in view To wreak immediate vengeance on your foes 'T is not so: I am glad.

Paracelsus. And if I please To spit on them, to trample them, what then? 'T is sorry warfare truly, but the fools Provoke it. I would spare their self-conceit But if they must provoke me, cannot suffer Forbearance on my part, if I may keep No quality in the shade, must needs put forth Power to match power, my strength against their strength, And teach them their own game with their own arms— Why, be it so and let them take their chance! I am above them like a god, there's no Hiding the fact: what idle scruples, then, Were those that ever bade me soften it, Communicate it gently to the world, Instead of proving my supremacy, Taking my natural station o'er their head, Then owning all the glory was a man's! —And in my elevation man's would be. But live and learn, though life's short, learning, hard! And therefore, though the wreck of my past self, I fear, dear Pütter, that your lecture-room Must wait awhile for its best ornament, The penitent empiric, who set up For somebody, but soon was taught his place; Now, but too happy to be let confess His error, snuff the candles, and illustrate (Fiat experientia corpore vili) Your medicine's soundness in his person. Wait, Good Pütter!

Festus. He who sneers thus, is a god!

Paracelsus. Ay, ay, laugh at me! I am very glad You are not gulled by all this swaggering; you Can see the root of the matter!—how I strive To put a good face on the overthrow I have experienced, and to bury and hide My degradation in its length and breadth; How the mean motives I would make you think Just mingle as is due with nobler aims, The appetites I modestly allow May influence me as being mortal still— Do goad me, drive me on, and fast supplant My youth's desires. You are no stupid dupe: You find me out! Yes, I had sent for you To palm these childish lies upon you, Festus! Laugh—you shall laugh at me!

Festus. The past, then, Aureole, Proves nothing? Is our interchange of love Yet to begin? Have I to swear I mean No flattery in this speech or that? For you, Whate'er you say, there is no degradation; These low thoughts are no inmates of your mind, Or wherefore this disorder? You are vexed As much by the intrusion of base views, Familiar to your adversaries, as they Were troubled should your qualities alight Amid their murky souls; not otherwise, A stray wolf which the winter forces down From our bleak hills, suffices to affright A village in the vales—while foresters Sleep calm, though all night long the famished troop Snuff round and scratch against their crazy huts. These evil thoughts are monsters, and will flee.

Paracelsus. May you be happy, Festus, my own friend!

Festus. Nay, further; the delights you fain would think The superseders of your nobler aims, Though ordinary and harmless stimulants, Will ne'er content you. . ..

Paracelsus. Hush! I once despised them, But that soon passes. We are high at first In our demand, nor will abate a jot Of toil's strict value; but time passes o'er, And humbler spirits accept what we refuse: In short, when some such comfort is doled out As these delights, we cannot long retain Bitter contempt which urges us at first To hurl it back, but hug it to our breast And thankfully retire. This life of mine Must be lived out and a grave thoroughly earned: I am just fit for that and nought beside. I told you once, I cannot now enjoy, Unless I deem my knowledge gains through joy; Nor can I know, but straight warm tears reveal My need of linking also joy to knowledge: So, on I drive, enjoying all I can, And knowing all I can. I speak, of course, Confusedly; this will better explain—feel here! Quick beating, is it not?—a fire of the heart To work off some way, this as well as any. So, Festus sees me fairly launched; his calm Compassionate look might have disturbed me once, But now, far from rejecting, I invite What bids me press the closer, lay myself Open before him, and be soothed with pity; I hope, if he command hope, and believe As he directs me—satiating myself With his enduring love. And Festus quits me To give place to some credulous disciple Who holds that God is wise, but Paracelsus Has his peculiar merits: I suck in That homage, chuckle o'er that admiration, And then dismiss the fool; for night is come. And I betake myself to study again, Till patient searchings after hidden lore Half wring some bright truth from its prison; my frame Trembles, my forehead's veins swell out, my hair Tingles for triumph. Slow and sure the morn Shall break on my pent room and dwindling lamp And furnace dead, and scattered earths and ores; When, with a failing heart and throbbing brow, I must review my captured truth, sum up Its value, trace what ends to what begins, Its present power with its eventual bearings, Latent affinities, the views it opens, And its full length in perfecting my scheme. I view it sternly circumscribed, cast down From the high place my fond hopes yielded it, Proved worthless—which, in getting, yet had cost Another wrench to this fast-falling frame. Then, quick, the cup to quaff, that chases sorrow! I lapse back into youth, and take again My fluttering pulse for evidence that God Means good to me, will make my cause his own. See! I have cast off this remorseless care Which clogged a spirit born to soar so free, And my dim chamber has become a tent, Festus is sitting by me, and his Michal. . . Why do you start? I say, she listening here, (For yonder—Würzburg through the orchard-bough!) Motions as though such ardent words should find No echo in a maiden's quiet soul, But her pure bosom heaves, her eyes fill fast With tears, her sweet lips tremble all the while! Ha, ha!

Festus. It seems, then, you expect to reap No unreal joy from this your present course, But rather. ..

Paracelsus. Death! To die! I owe that much To what, at least, I was. I should be sad To live contented after such a fall, To thrive and fatten after such reverse! The whole plan is a makeshift, but will last My time.

Festus. And you have never mused and said, "I had a noble purpose, and the strength "To compass it; but I have stopped half-way, "And wrongly given the first-fruits of my toil "To objects little worthy of the gift. "Why linger round them still? why clench my fault? "Why seek for consolation in defeat, "In vain endeavours to derive a beauty "From ugliness? why seek to make the most "Of what no power can change, nor strive instead "With mighty effort to redeem the past "And, gathering up the treasures thus cast down, "To hold a steadfast course till I arrive "At their fit destination and my own?" You have never pondered thus?

Paracelsus. Have I, you ask? Often at midnight, when most fancies come, Would some such airy project visit me: But ever at the end. . . or will you hear The same thing in a tale, a parable? You and I, wandering over the world wide, Chance to set foot upon a desert coast. Just as we cry, "No human voice before "Broke the inveterate silence of these rocks!" —Their querulous echo startles us; we turn: What ravaged structure still looks o'er the sea? Some characters remain, too! While we read, The sharp salt wind, impatient for the last Of even this record, wistfully comes and goes, Or sings what we recover, mocking it. This is the record; and my voice, the wind's.

[He sings.] Over the sea our galleys went, With cleaving prows in order brave To a speeding wind and a bounding wave, A gallant armament: Each bark built out of a forest-tree Left leafy and rough as first it grew, And nailed all over the gaping sides, Within and without, with black bull-hides, Seethed in fat and suppled in flame, To bear the playful billows' game: So, each good ship was rude to see, Rude and bare to the outward view, But each upbore a stately tent Where cedar pales in scented row Kept out the flakes of the dancing brine, And an awning drooped the mast below, In fold on fold of the purple fine, That neither noontide nor starshine Nor moonlight cold which maketh mad, Might pierce the regal tenement. When the sun dawned, oh, gay and glad We set the sail and plied the oar; But when the night-wind blew like breath, For joy of one day's voyage more, We sang together on the wide sea, Like men at peace on a peaceful shore; Each sail was loosed to the wind so free, Each helm made sure by the twilight star, And in a sleep as calm as death, We, the voyagers from afar, Lay stretched along, each weary crew In a circle round its wondrous tent Whence gleamed soft light and curled rich scent, And with light and perfume, music too: So the stars wheeled round, and the darkness past, And at morn we started beside the mast, And still each ship was sailing fast.

Now, one morn, land appeared—a speck Dim trembling betwixt sea and sky: "Avoid it," cried our pilot, "check    "The shout, restrain the eager eye!" But the heaving sea was black behind For many a night and many a day, And land, though but a rock, drew nigh; So, we broke the cedar pales away, Let the purple awning flap in the wind,     And a statute bright was on every deck! We shouted, every man of us, And steered right into the harbour thus, With pomp and pæan glorious.

A hundred shapes of lucid stone! All day we built its shrine for each, A shrine of rock for every one, Nor paused till in the westering sun We sat together on the beach To sing because our task was done. When lo! what shouts and merry songs! What laughter all the distance stirs! A loaded raft with happy throngs Of gentle islanders! "Our isles are just at hand," they cried, "Like cloudlets faint in even sleeping "Our temple-gates are opened wide, "Our olive-groves thick shade are keeping "For these majestic forms"—they cried. Oh, then we awoke with sudden start From our deep dream, and knew, too late, How bare the rock, how desolate, Which had received our precious freight:    Yet we called out—"Depart! "Our gifts, once given, must here abide.    "Our work is done; we have no heart "To mar our work,"—we cried.

Festus. In truth?

Paracelsus. Nay, wait: all this in tracings faint On rugged stones strewn here and there, but piled In order once: then follows—mark what follows! "The sad rhyme of the men who proudly clung "To their first fault, and withered in their pride."

Festus. Come back then, Aureole; as you fear God, come! This is foul sin; come back! Renounce the past, Forswear the future; look for joy no more, But wait death's summons amid holy sights, And trust me for the event—peace, if not joy. Return with me to Einsiedeln, dear Aureole!

Paracelsus. No way, no way! it would not turn to good. A spotless child sleeps on the flowering moss— 'T is well for him; but when a sinful man, Envying such slumber, may desire to put His guilt away, shall he return at once To rest by lying there? Our sires knew well (Spite of the grave discoveries of their sons) The fitting course for such: dark cells, dim lamps, A stone floor one may writhe on like a worm: No mossy pillow blue with violets!

Festus. I see no symptom of these absolute And tyrannous passions. You are calmer now. This verse-making can purge you well enough Without the terrible penance you describe. You love me still: the lusts you fear will never Outrage your friend. To Einsiedeln, once more! Say but the word!

Paracelsus. No, no; those lusts forbid: They crouch, I know, cowering with half-shut eye Beside you; 't is their nature. Thrust yourself Between them and their prey; let some fool style me Or king or quack, it matters not—then try Your wisdom, urge them to forego their treat! No, no; learn better and look deeper, Festus! If you knew how a devil sneers within me While you are talking now of this, now that, As though we differed scarcely save in trifles!

Festus. Do we so differ? True, change must proceed, Whether for good or ill; keep from me, which! Do not confide all secrets: I was born To hope, and you. ..

Paracelsus. To trust: you know the fruits!

Festus. Listen: I do believe, what you call trust Was self-delusion at the best: for, see! So long as God would kindly pioneer A path for you, and screen you from the world, Procure you full exemption from man's lot, Man's common hopes and fears, on the mere pretext Of your engagement in his service—yield you A limitless licence, make you God, in fact, And turn your slave—you were content to say Most courtly praises! What is it, at last, But selfishness without example? None Could trace God's will so plain as you, while yours Remained implied in it; but now you fail, And we, who prate about that will, are fools! In short, God's service is established here As he determines fit, and not your way, And this you cannot brook. Such discontent Is weak. Renounce all creatureship at once! Affirm an absolute right to have and use Your energies; as though the rivers should say— "We rush to the ocean; what have we to do "With feeding streamlets, lingering in the vales, "Sleeping in lazy pools?" Set up that plea, That will be bold at least!

Paracelsus. 'T is like enough. The serviceable spirits are those, no doubt, The East produces: lo, the master bids,— They wake, raise terraces and garden-grounds In one night's space; and, this done, straight begin Another century's sleep, to the great praise Of him that framed them wise and beautiful, Till a lamp's rubbing, or some chance akin, Wake them again. I am of different mould. I would have soothed my lord, and slaved for him And done him service past my narrow bond, And thus I get rewarded for my pains! Beside, 't is vain to talk of forwarding God's glory otherwise; this is alone The sphere of its increase, as far as men Increase it; why, then, look beyond this sphere? We are his glory; and if we be glorious, Is not the thing achieved?

Festus. Shall one like me Judge hearts like yours? Though years have changed you much, And you have left your first love, and retain Its empty shade to veil your crooked ways, Yet I still hold that you have honoured God. And who shall call your course without reward? For, wherefore this repining at defeat Had triumph ne'er inured you to high hopes? I urge you to forsake the life you curse, And what success attends me?—simply talk Of passion, weakness and remorse; in short, Anything but the naked truth—you choose This so-despised career, and cheaply hold My happiness, or rather other men's. Once more, return!

Paracelsus. And quickly. John the thief Has pilfered half my secrets by this time: And we depart by daybreak. I am weary, I know not how; not even the wine-cup soothes My brain to-night. . . Do you not thoroughly despise me, Festus? No flattery! One like you needs not be told We live and breathe deceiving and deceived. Do you not scorn me from your heart of hearts, Me and my cant, each petty subterfuge, My rhymes and all this frothy shower of words, My glozing self-deceit, my outward crust Of lies which wrap, as tetter, morphew, furfair Wrapt the sound flesh?—so, see you flatter not! Even God flatters: but my friend, at least, Is true. I would depart, secure henceforth Against all further insult, hate and wrong From puny foes; my one friend's scorn shall brand me: No fear of sinking deeper!

Festus. No, dear Aureole! No, no; I came to counsel faithfully. There are old rules, made long ere we were born, By which I judge you. I, so fallible, So infinitely low beside your mighty Majestic spirit!—even I can see You own some higher law than ours which call Sin, what is no sin—weakness, what is strength. But I have only these, such as they are, To guide me; and I blame you where they bid, Only so long as blaming promises To win peace for your soul: the more, that sorrow Has fallen on me of late, and they have helped me So that I faint not under my distress. But wherefore should I scruple to avow In spite of all, as brother judging brother, Your fate is most inexplicable to me? And should you perish without recompense And satisfaction yet—too hastily I have relied on love: you may have sinned, But you have loved. As a mere human matter— As I would have God deal with fragile men In the end—I say that you will triumph yet!

Paracelsus. Have you felt sorrow, Festus?—'t is because You love me. Sorrow, and sweet Michal yours! Well thought on: never let her know this last Dull winding-up of all: these miscreants dared Insult me—me she loved:—so, grieve her not!

Festus. Your ill success can little grieve her now.

Paracelsus. Michal is dead! pray Christ we do not craze!

Festus. Aureole, dear Aureole, look not on me thus! Fool, fool! this is the heart grown sorrow-proof— I cannot bear those eyes.

Paracelsus. Nay, really dead?

Festus. 'T is scarce a month.

Paracelsus. Stone dead!—then you have laid her Among the flowers ere this. Now, do you know, I can reveal a secret which shall comfort Even you. I have no julep, as men think, To cheat the grave; but a far better secret. Know, then, you did not ill to trust your love To the cold earth: I have thought much of it: For I believe we do not wholly die.

Festus. Aureole!

Paracelsus. Nay, do not laugh; there is a reason For what I say: I think the soul can never Taste death. I am, just now, as you may see, Very unfit to put so strange a thought In an intelligible dress of words; But take it as my trust, she is not dead.

Festus. But not on this account alone? you surely, —Aureole, you have believed this all along?

Paracelsus. And Michal sleeps among the roots and dews, While I am moved at Basil, and full of schemes For Nuremberg, and hoping and despairing, As though it mattered how the farce plays out, So it be quickly played. Away, away! Have your will, rabble! while we fight the prize, Troop you in safety to the snug back-seats And leave a clear arena for the brave About to perish for your sport!—Behold!

title: Paracelsus (Browning)/IV


text:
1922 Encyclopædia Britannica/Marsh, Catharine

MARSH, CATHARINE (1818-1912), English philanthropic worker, was born at Colchester Sept. 15 1818, being the child of an evangelical clergyman, sometime rector of Beckenham. In company with her father she did remarkable pioneer missionary work amongst navvies. She wrote Memorials of Captain Hedley Vicars (1856), an account of the officer-missionary who was killed in the trenches before Sevastopol, and English Hearts

and English Hands (1858), a description of her own work with the navvies. She died in London Dec. 12 1912.


text:
1922 Encyclopædia Britannica/Marshall, Alfred

MARSHALL, ALFRED (1842-      ), English economist (see 17.770), produced a memorandum for the Government on the Fiscal Policy of International Trade in 1908. In 1919 he published Industry and Trade (vol. 1., 4th ed. 1921). All his work since the publication of his first book in 1879 was done in conjunction with his wife Mary, daughter of the Rev. Thomas Paley, whom he married in 1877. She was one of the first women students at Cambridge, and was highly commended for her work in the Moral Sciences tripos in 1874. In 1875 she became resident lecturer at Newnham Hall, when it was first opened under Miss A. J. Clough, resigning this post on her marriage.