Without Dogma

All the same, whenever I am present at these causeries Romaines I have always a feeling that my father, I, such as Mrs. Davis, and generally speaking, all the people of the so-called upper classes do not live a true, real life. Below us something is always going on, something always happens; there is the struggle for life, for bread, – a life full of diligent work, animal necessities, appetites, passions, every-day efforts, – a palpable life, which roars, leaps, and tumbles like ocean waves; and we are sitting eternally on terraces, discussing art, literature, love, woman, strangers to that other life far removed from it, obliterating, out of the seven, the six work-days. Without being conscious of it, our inclinations, nerves, and soul are fit only for holidays. Immersed into blissful dilettantism as in a warm bath, we are half awake, half dreaming. Consuming leisurely our wealth, and our inherited supply of nerves and muscles, we gradually lose our foothold upon the soil. We are as the down, carried away by the wind. Scarcely do we touch ground, when the real life pushes us back, and we draw aside; for we have no power of resistance.

When I think of it I see nothing but contradictions in us. We consider ourselves the outcome and highest rung of civilization, and yet have lost faith in ourselves; only the most foolish believe in our raison d'être. We look out instinctively for places of enjoyment, gayety, and happiness, and yet we do not believe in happiness. Though our pessimism be wan and ephemeral as the clouds from our Havanas, it obscures our view of wider horizons. Amidst these clouds and mists we create for ourselves a separate world, a world torn off from the immensity of all life, shut up within itself, a little empty and somnolent. If this merely concerned the aristocracy, whether by descent or wealth, the portent would be less weighty. But to this isolated world belong more or less all those who boast of a higher culture, – men of science, literature, and art. This world does not dwell within the very marrow of life, but parting from it creates a separate circle; in consequence withers within itself and does not help in softening down the animalism of those millions which writhe and surge below.

I do not speak as a reformer, because I lack the strength. Besides, what matters it to me? Who can avoid the inevitable? But at times I have the dim presentiment of a terrible danger which threatens the cultured world. The great wave which will wash us from off the surface of the earth will carry off more than that one which washed away hairpowder and shirtfrills. It is true that to those who perished then it seemed that with them the whole civilization was perishing.

In the mean while it is pleasant to sit on moonlit terraces and talk in subdued tones about art, love, and woman, and look at the divine profile of such a woman as Mrs. Davis.

10 March.

Mountains, towers, rocks, the further they recede from our view, appear as a mere outline through a veil of blue haze. There is a kind of psychical blue haze that enfolds those who are removed from us. Death itself is a removal, but the chasm is so wide that the beloved ones who have crossed it disappear within the haze and become as beloved shadows. The Greek genius understood this when he peopled the Elysian fields with shadows.

But I will not enlarge upon these mournful comparisons, especially when I want to write about Aniela. I am quite certain my feelings towards her have not changed, but I seem to see her a long distance off, shrouded in a blue haze and less real than at Ploszow. I do not feel her through my senses. When I compare my present feelings with those I had at Ploszow, she is more of a beloved spirit than a desired woman. From a certain point of view it is better, as a desired woman might be even such a woman as Mrs. Davis; but on the other hand this is not one of the reasons that have prevented me from writing to Aniela. Doubtless that profile of Mrs. Davis which I still see before me is a mere passing impression. When I compare these two women my feeling for the other becomes very tender; and yet I leave her in cruel suspense and uncertainty.

To-day my father wrote to my aunt, setting her mind at rest as to his health, and I added a postscript from myself, sending kind regards to Aniela and her mother. I could not say much in a few lines, but I might have promised them a longer letter. Such a promise would have comforted Aniela and the elder ladies. I did not do it because I could not. To-day my spirits are at a very low ebb. My wish for another life, and my trust in the future have retreated into the farthest distance; I can see them no more, see only the barren, sandy wilderness. I cannot get rid of the idea that I can only marry Aniela if I can conscientiously believe that our union would lead to mutual happiness. I cannot represent it otherwise to Aniela without uttering a lie; for I have none of that belief, and instead of it an utter hopelessness almost a dislike of life. She is ill at ease with longing and uncertainty, but I am worse, all the more so because I love her.

11 March.

Mrs. Davis, to whom, during our causerie on the moonlit terrace, I unfolded my view as to the all-powerfulness of love, more or less as I have written it down, called me Anacreon, and advised me to crown my head with vine leaves, and then said more soberly, "If such be your opinions, why play the part of pessimist? Belief in such a deity ought to make any man happy."

Why? I did not tell her, but I know why. Love conquers death, but saves from it only the species. What matters it to me that the species be preserved, when I, the individual, am sentenced to a merciless, unavoidable death? Is it not rather a refined cruelty that the very affections, which can be felt only by the individual, should serve the future of the species only? To feel the throbbing of an eternal power, and yet to die, – that is the height of misery. In reality there exists only the individual; the species is an abstract idea, and in comparison to the individual, an utter Nirvana. I understand the love for a son, a grandson, a great grandson, – for the individual, in fact, that is sentenced to perish, – but to profess love for one's species one needs be insincere, or a fanatical sectarian. I can understand now how centuries after Empedocles there came Schopenhauer and Hartmann.

My brain feels as sore as the back of the laborer who carries burdens beyond his strength. But the laborer stooping to his work earns his daily bread and is at peace.

I still seem to hear Sniatynski's words: "Do not philosophize her away, as you have philosophized away your abilities and your thirty-five years of life." I know it leads to nothing, I know it is wrong, but I do not know how not to think.

13 March.

My father died this morning. He was ill only a few hours.

PELI, VILLA LAURA, 22 March.

Death is such a gulf, and though we know that all have to go thither, yet when it swallows up one of our dear ones, we who remain on the brink are torn with fear, sorrow, and despair. On that brink all reasoning leaves us, and we only cry out for help which cannot come from anywhere. The only solace and comfort lies in faith, but he who is deprived of that light gets well-nigh maddened by the impenetrable darkness. Ten times a day it seems to me impossible, too horrible, that death should be the end of everything, – and then again, a dozen times I feel that such is the case.

23 March.

When I arrived from Ploszow I found my father so much better that it never even entered my mind that the end could be so near. What strange twists there are in the human mind. God knows how sincerely I rejoiced when I found my father so much better than I had thought, and yet because throughout that anxious journey I had fancied him sick unto death, and already saw myself kneeling at his coffin, I was sorry for my wasted anxieties. Now the memory of this fills me with keen remorse.

How thoroughly unhappy is the individual whose heart and soul have lost their simplicity. Thus not less bitter, not less of a reproach is the remembrance that at my father's deathbed there were two persons in me: one of them the son full of anguish, who gnawed his hands to keep back his sobs; the other the philosopher, who studied the psychology of death. I am unutterably unhappy because my nature is an unhappy one.

My father died with full consciousness. Saturday evening he felt a little worse. I sent for the doctor, that he might be at hand in case we should want him. The doctor prescribed some physic, and my father, according to his habit, disputed the point, demonstrating that the physic would bring on a stroke. The doctor calmed my fears, and said though there was always fear of another stroke, he saw no immediate danger, and that my father most likely would live for many years to come. He repeated the same to the patient, who, hearing of the many years to come, incredulously shook his head and said: "We will see." As he has always been in the habit of contradicting his doctors, and proving to them that they know nothing, I did not take his words seriously. Towards ten at night, when taking his tea, he suddenly rose and called out: —

"Leon, come here, quick!"

A quarter of an hour later he was in his bed, and within an hour he was dying.

24 March.

I am convinced that people preserve their idiosyncracies and originality to the last minute of their life. Thus my father, in the solemn dignity of thoughts at the approaching end, still showed a gratified vanity that he, and not the doctor, had been right, and that his unbelief in medicine was well founded. I listened to what he said, and besides, read his thoughts in his face. He was deeply impressed with the importance of the moment; there was also curiosity as to the future life, – not a shadow of doubt as to its existence, but rather a certain uneasiness about how he would be received, joined to an almost unconscious, unsophisticated belief that he would not be treated as a mere nobody in particular. I shall never die like this, because I have no basis to uphold me in the hour of death. My father parted with his life in absolute faith and the deep contrition of a true Christian. At the moment when he received the last sacraments he was so venerable, so purely saintly, that his image will remain with me always.

How futile, how miserable, appears to me my scepticism in presence of that immense power of faith that, stronger even than love, triumphs over death at the very moment when it extinguishes life. After having received the last sacraments, a great tenderness took possession of him. He grasped my hand strongly, almost convulsively, and did not let it go again, as if through me he wanted to hold fast to life. And yet it was neither fear nor despair that moved him, he was not in the least afraid. Presently I saw the eyes riveted upon my face grow dim and fixed, his forehead became moist, as if covered by a gentle dew; he opened his mouth several times as if to catch his breath, – sighed deeply once more, – and died.

I was not present at the embalming of the body, – I had not the strength; but after that I did not leave the dear remains for a minute, out of fear they might treat him as a thing of no consequence. How truly awful are those last rites of death, – the whole funereal paraphernalia, the candles, the misericordia, with the covered faces of the singers. It still clings to my ears, the "Anima ejus," and "Requiem aeternam." There breathes from it all the gloomy, awful spirit of Death. We carried the remains to Santa Maria Maggiore, and there I looked for the last time at the dear, grand face. The Campo Santo looks already like a green isle. Spring is very early this year. The trees are in bloom and the white marble monuments bathed in sunshine. What an awful contrast, the young, nascent life, the budding trees, the birds in full song, – and a funeral. Crowds of people filled the cemetery, for my father was known for his benevolence in Rome as much as my aunt is at Warsaw. All these people so full of life, as if reflecting the joys of spring, jarred upon my feelings. Crowds, especially in Italy, consider everything as a spectacle got up for their special benefit, and even now their faces betrayed more curiosity to see a grand funeral than any sympathy. Human selfishness knows no limit, and I am convinced that even people morally and intellectually educated, when following a funeral, feel a kind of unconscious satisfaction that this has happened to somebody else, and it is not they who are to be interred.

My aunt arrived, as I had summoned her by telegram. She, from the standpoint of faith, looks upon death as a change essentially for the better; therefore received the blow with far more calmness than I. This did not prevent her from, shedding bitter tears at her brother's coffin.

Afterwards she spoke to me long and tenderly, – a conversation full of exceeding goodness, I took much amiss at the time, for which I am sorry now. She did not mention Aniela's name, – spoke only of my future loneliness, and insisted upon my coming to Ploszow; where, surrounded by tender hearts, especially the one old heart which loved me beyond everything on earth, I would feel less sad. I saw in all this only her desire to continue her matchmaking; and in presence of my recent bereavement this seemed to me improper, and irritated me very much. I felt not inclined to think of the life before me, nor of love-speeches or weddings, with the shadow of death across my path. I refused peremptorily, even curtly; told my aunt I was going away, – most likely to Corfu, then would come back to Rome in order to arrange my father's affairs, and after that would come to Ploszow.

She did not insist upon having her own way. Feeling deeply for me, she was even more gentle than usual, and left Rome three days after the funeral. I did not go to Corfu; instead of that, Mr. and Mrs. Davis carried me off to their villa at Peli, where I have been now for several days. Whether Mrs. Davis is sincere or not I do not know, and will not even enter upon that now; I know only that no sister could have shown more sympathy and solicitude. With a nature poisoned by scepticism, I am always prone to suspect and misjudge those around me; but if it should be proved that I misjudged this woman, I should feel truly guilty, – because her goodness to me is quite extraordinary.

26 March.

My windows look out upon the vast blueness of the Mediterranean, encompassed by bands of a darker blue on the far horizon. Close to the villa, the crisped waves glitter like fiery scales; in the distance, the sea is glassy and still, as if lulled to sleep in its blue veil. White lateen sails flash in the sun, and once a day a steamer from Marseilles for Genoa passes hence, dragging in her wake woolly coils of smoke that hang over the sea like a dark cloud, until it gradually dissolves and disappears. The restfulness of the place is indescribable. Thoughts dissolve like yonder black cloud between the blue sky and azure sea, and life is a blissful vegetation.

I felt very tired yesterday, but to-day I inhale with eager lungs the fresh sea-breezes, that leave a salty taste on my lips. Say what they like, the Riviera is one of the gems of God's creation. I fancy to myself how the wind whistles at Ploszow; the sudden changes from mild spring weather to wintry blasts; the darkness, sleet, and hail, with intermittent gleams of sunshine. Here the sky is transparent and serene; the soft breeze which even now caresses my face comes through the open window together with the scent of heliotropes, roses, and mignonette. It is the enchanted land, where the orange blossoms, and also an enchanted palace; because everything that millions can buy, combined with the exquisite taste of Mrs. Davis, is to be found in this villa. I am surrounded by masterworks of art, – statues, pictures, matchless specimens of ceramics, chased works by Benvenuto. Eyes feast on nature, feast on art, and do not know where to dwell longest, – unless it be on the splendid pagan, the mistress of all these splendors, and whose only religion is beauty.

But is it quite just to call her a pagan? because, I say again, whether sincere or not, she shares my sorrows and tries to soothe them. We talk for hours about my father, and I have often seen tears in her eyes. Since she found out that music acts soothingly upon my mind, she plays for hours, and often until late at night. Sometimes I sit in my room in the dark, look absently at the sea riddled by a silver network, and listen to the sounds of her music mingling with the splashing of the waves. I listen until I feel half distracted, half sleepy, – until in sleep I forget the real life, with all its sorrows.

29 March.

I do not even feel inclined to write every day. We are reading together the Divina Commedia, – or rather, its last part. There was a time when I felt more attracted by the awful plasticity of the Inferno. Now I like to plunge into the luminous mist, peopled with still more luminous spirits, of the Dantesque heaven. At times it seems as if amid all that radiance I see the dear, familiar features, and my sorrow becomes almost sweet to me. I never before understood the exceeding beauty of heaven. Never has human mind taken such a lofty flight, encompassed such greatness, or borrowed such a slice from infinity as in this sublime, immortal poem. The day before yesterday and the two days following, we read it together in the boat. We usually go out a long distance, and when the sea is quite still I furl the sail; and we read, rocked by the waves, – or rather, she reads and I listen. Surrounded by the glories of the sunset, far from the shore, with the most beautiful woman reading to me Dante, I was under a delusion, that I had been transferred to another world.

30 March.

At times the sorrow that seemed to be lulled to sleep wakes up with renewed force. I feel then as if I wanted to fly hence.

VILLA LAURA, 31 March.

To-day I thought a great deal about Aniela. I have a strange feeling, as if lands and seas divided us. It seems to me as if Ploszow were a Hyperborean island somewhere at the confines of the world. We have delusions of that kind when personal impression takes the place of tangible reality. It is not Aniela who is far from me, it is I who go farther and farther away from the Leon whose heart and thoughts were once so full of her. This does not mean that my feelings for her have vanished. By close analysis I find they have only changed in their active character. Some weeks ago, I loved her and wanted something; I love her still, but want nothing. My father's death has scattered the concentration of the feelings. It would be the same, for instance, had I begun some literary work, and some unfortunate accident interrupted the even flow of my thoughts. But that is not all. Not long ago, all the faculties of my mind were strung to their highest pitch; now, under the influence of a heavy sorrow, a soft atmosphere, and the gently rocking sea, they have relaxed. I live, as I said before, the life of a plant; I rest as one rests after a long fatigue, and as if immersed in a warm bath. Never did I feel less inclined to any kind of exertion; the very thought of it gives me pain. If I had to choose a watchword, it would be, "Do not wake me." What will happen when I wake up, I do not know. I am sad now, but not unhappy; therefore I do not want to wake up, and do not consider it my duty. It is even difficult to me to recall the image of the Ploszowski who fancied himself bound to Aniela. Bound, – why? by what reason? What has happened between us?

A slight, almost imperceptible kiss on the forehead, – a caress which, among near relations, can be put down to brotherly affection. These are ridiculous scruples. I have broken ties far different from these without the slightest twinge of conscience. Were she not a relation, it would be a different matter. It is true, she understood it in a different way, and so did I at the time, – but let it pass. One prick of conscience more or less, what does it matter? We do worse things continually, to which the disappointment I caused Aniela is mere childishness. Conscience that can occupy itself with such peccadilloes must have nothing else to do. There is about the same proportion of such kinds of crime to real ones as our conversations on the terrace to real life.

Upon the whole, I do foresee what will happen; but I want to be left in peace at present and not think of anything. "Do not wake me." To-day it was determined that we ought to leave Peli as soon as the hot weather sets in, – perhaps in the middle of April, – and go to Switzerland. Even that terrifies me. I fancy Mrs. Davis will have to place her husband under restraint; he shows symptoms of insanity. He says not a word for whole days, but sits staring either at the floor or at his finger-nails; he is afraid they will come off. These are with him the consequences of a wild life and narcotics.

I leave off writing as it is our time for sailing.

2 April.

Yesterday there was a thunderstorm. A strong southern wind drove the clouds along as a herd of wild horses. It pulled and tore, chased and scattered them, then got them under and threw them with a mighty effort upon the sea, which darkened instantly as man in wrath, and began in its turn to send its foam aloft, – a veritable battle of two furies, which, battering each other, produce thunder and lightning flashes. But all this lasted only a short time. We did not go out to sea, as the waves were too rough. Instead of it we looked at the storm from the glazed balcony, and sometimes looked at each other. It is no use deluding myself any longer; there is something going on between us, – a subtle change in our relations to each other. Neither of us has said a word or overstepped the boundary line of friendship; neither has confessed to anything, and yet speaking to each other we feel that our words serve only to disguise our thoughts. It is the same when we are in the boat, reading together, or when I listen to her music. All our acts seem mere shadows, – an outward form that hides the real essence of things, with its face still veiled, but following us wherever we go. Neither of us has given it a name; but we both feel its presence. Manifestations like these take place probably every time man and woman begin to influence each other. I could not tell exactly when it began; but I confess it did not come upon me quite unexpectedly.

I accepted their hospitality because Mrs. Davis was my father's friend; and it was she who, after his death, showed me more sympathy than any one else in Rome. I have so much consciousness of self, am so able to divide myself, that soon after my arrival here, in spite of my heavy sorrow I had the presentiment that our mutual relation would undergo a change. I hated myself that so soon after my father's death I should harbor thoughts like these; but they were there. I find now that my presentiments were right. If I said that the changed relation has still its face veiled, I meant to say that I do not know exactly when the veil will be torn asunder, and I am under the spell of expectation. I should be unsophisticated indeed, if I supposed she were less conscious of all this than I. She is probably more so. Most likely she is guiding all these changes; and everything that is happening happens according to her wishes and cool reflection. Diana the Huntress is spreading her net for the game! But what does it matter to me? what is there for me to lose? As nearly every man, I am that kind of game which allows itself to be hunted for the purpose of turning at a given moment against the hunter. In such circumstances we all have energy enough. In a hand-to-hand fight, like this, the victory rests always with us. I know perfectly well that Mrs. Davis does not love me, any more than I love her. We simply react upon each other through our pagan nature, our sensuous and artistic instincts.

With her it is also a question of vanity, – the worse for her, as it may lead her whither love leads. I shall not go too far. In my feeling for her there is neither affection nor tenderness, – nothing but rapture at the sight of nature's masterwork, and the attraction natural in a man when that masterwork is a woman. My father said that the height of victory would be to change an angel into a woman; I maintain that it is no less a triumph to feel around one's neck the arms, palpitating with life, of a Florentine Venus.

As far as beauty goes she is the highest expression of whatever the most exalted imagination is able to conceive. She is a Phryne. It would turn most men's heads to see her in a tight-fitting riding-habit that shows the outline of her figure as beautiful as that of a statue. In the boat, reading Dante, she looked like a Sybil, and one could understand a Nero's sacrilegious passion. Hers is an almost baleful beauty. Only the joining eyebrows make her appear a woman of our times, and this makes her all the more irritating. She has a certain habit of pushing back her hair by putting both hands at the back of her head; then her shoulders are raised; the whole shape acquires a certain curve, and the breast stands firmly out, – and one feels a desire to carry her off in one's arms from everybody's eyes.

In each of us there is a hidden Satyr. As to myself, as I said already, I am highly impressionable; therefore, when I think of it, that there is something going on between me and this live statue of a Juno, that some mysterious power pushes us towards each other, – my head is in a whirl, and I ask myself what would I wish for more perfect than this.

3 April.