Books: Ardath

M >> Marie Corelli >> Ardath

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And in a few words he related how the leaders of English
journalism had judged him dead, and had praised his work chiefly
because it was posthumous. "I believe"--he added good-humoredly--
"that if this mistake had not arisen, I should scarcely have been
heard of, since I advocate no particular 'cult' and belong to no
Mutual Admiration Alliance, offensive or defensive. But my
supposed untimely decease served me better than the Browning
Society serves Browning!"

Again he laughed,--Heliobas had listened with a keen and sarcastic
enjoyment of the whole story.

"Undoubtedly your 'Zabastes' was no phantom!"--he observed
emphatically--"His was evidently a very real existence, and he
must have divided himself from one into several, to sit in
judgment again upon you in this present day! History repeats
itself,--and unhappily all the injustice, hypocrisy, and
inconsistency of man is repeated too,--and out of the multitudes
that inhabit the earth, how few will succeed in fulfilling their
highest destinies! This is the one bitter drop in the cup of our
knowledge,--we can, if we choose, save ourselves,--but we can
seldom, if ever, save others!"

Alwyn stopped short, his eyes darkening with a swift intensity of
feeling.

"Why not?"--he asked earnestly--"Must we look on, and see men
rushing toward certain misery, without making an effort to turn
them hack?--to warn them of the darkness whither they are bound?--
to rescue them before it is too late?"

"My friend, we can make the effort, certainly,--and we are bound
to make it, because it is our duty,--but in ninety-nine cases out
of a hundred we shall fail of our persuasion. What can I, or you,
or any one, do against the iron force of Free-Will? God Himself
will not constrain it,--how then shall we? In the Books of Esdras,
which have already been of such use to you, you will find the
following significant words: 'The Most High hath made this world
for many, but the world to come for few. As when thou askest the
earth, it shall say unto thee that it giveth much mold wherein
earthen vessels are made, and but little dust that gold cometh of,
even so is the course of this present world. There be many created
but FEW shall be saved.'--God elects to be served by CHOICE--and
NOT by compulsion; it is His Law that Man shall work out his own
immortal destiny,--and nothing can alter this overwhelming Fact.
The sublime Example of Christ was given us as a means to assist us
in forming our own conclusions,--but there is no coercion in it,--
only a Divine Love. You, for instance, were, and are, still
perfectly free to reject the whole of your experience on the Field
of Ardath as a delusion,--nothing would be easier, and, from the
world's point of view, nothing more natural. Faith and Doubt are
equally voluntary acts,--the one is the instinct of the immortal
Soul, the other the tendency of the perishable Body,--and the Will
decides which of the two shall conquer in the end. I know that you
are firm in your high and true conviction,--I know also what
thoughts are at work in your brain,--you are bending all your
energies on the task of trying to instil into the minds of your
fellow-men some comprehension of the enlightenment and hope you
yourself possess. Ah, you must prepare for disappointment!--for
though the times are tending toward strange upheavals and terrors,
when the trumpet-voice of an inspired Poet may do enormous good,--
still the name of the wilfully ignorant is Legion,--the age is one
of the grossest Mammon worship, and coarsest Atheism,--and the
noblest teachings of the noblest teacher, were he even another
Shakespeare, must of necessity be but a casting of pearls before
swine. Still"--and his rare sweet smile brightened the serene
dignity of his features--"fling out the pearls freely all the
same,--the swine may grunt at, but cannot rend you,--and a poet's
genius should be like the sunlight, that falls on rich and poor,
good and bad, with glorious impartiality! If you can comfort one
sorrow, check one sin, or rescue one soul from the widening
quicksand of the Atheist world, you have sufficient reason to be
devoutly thankful."

By this time their walk had led them imperceptibly to one of the
gates of egress from the Park, and Heliobas, pointing to a huge
square building opposite, said:

"There is the hotel at which I am staying--one of the Americanized
monster fabrics in which tired travellers find much splendid show,
and little rest! Will you lunch with me?--I am quite alone."

Alwyn gladly assented,--he was most unwilling to part at once from
this man, to whom in a measure he felt he owed his present happy
and tranquil condition of body and mind; besides, he was curious
to find out more about him--to obtain from him, if possible, an
entire explanation of the actual tenets and chief characteristics
of the system of religious worship he himself practiced and
followed. Heliobas seemed to guess his thoughts, for suddenly
turning upon him with a quick glance, he observed:

"You want to 'pluck out the heart of my mystery,' as Hamlet says,
do you not, my friend?"--and he smiled--"Well, so you shall, if
you can discover aught in me that is not already in yourself! I
assure you there is nothing preternatural about me,--my peculiar
'eccentricity' consists in steadily adapting myself to the
scientific spiritual, as well as scientific material, laws of the
Universe. The two sets of laws united make harmony,--hence I find
my life harmonious and satisfactory,--this is my 'abnormal'
condition of mind,--and you are now fully as 'abnormal' as I am.
Come, we will discuss our mutual strange non-conformity to the
wild world's custom or caprice over a glass of good wine,--
observe, please, that I am neither a 'total abstainer' nor a
'vegetarian,' and that I have a curious fashion of being
TEMPERATE, and of using all the gifts of beneficent Nature
equally, and without prejudice!' While he spoke, they had crossed
the road, and they now entered the vestibule of the hotel, where,
declining the hall-porter's offer of the "lift," Heliobas ascended
the stairs leisurely to the second floor, and ushered his
companion into a comfortable private sitting-room.

"Fancy men consenting to be drawn up to their apartments like
babes in a basket!" he said laughingly, alluding to the "lift"
process--"Upon my word, when I think of the strong people of a
past age and compare them with the enervated race of to-day, I
feel not only pity, but shame, for the visible degeneration of
mankind. Frail nerves, weak hearts, uncertain limbs,--these are
common characteristics of the young, nowadays, instead of being as
formerly the natural failings of the old. Wear and tear and worry
of modern existence?--Oh yes, I know!--but why the wear tear and
worry at all? What is it for? Simply for the OVER-GETTING of
money. One must live? ... certainly,--but one is not bound to live
in foolish luxury for the sake of out-flaunting one's neighbors.
Better to live simply and preserve health, than gain a fortune and
be a moping dyspeptic for life. But unless one toils and moils
like a beast of burden, one cannot even live simply, some will
say! I don't believe that assertion. The peasants of France live
simply, and save,--the peasants of England live wretchedly, and
waste! Voila la difference! As with nations, so with individuals,
--it is all a question of Will. 'Where there's a will there's a
way,' is a dreadfully trite copybook maxim, but it's amazingly
true all the same. Now let us to the acceptation of these good
things,"--this, as a pallid, boyish-looking waiter just then
entered the room with the luncheon, and in his bustling to and fro
manifested unusual eagerness to make himself agreeable--"I have
made excellent friends with this young Ganymede,--he has sworn
never to palm off raisin-wine upon me for Chambertin!"

The waiter blushed and chuckled as though he were conscious of
having gained special new dignity and importance,--and having laid
the table, and set the chairs, he departed with a flourishing bow
worthy of a prince's maitre-d'hotel.

"Your name must seem a curious one to these fellows"--observed
Alwyn, when he had gone,--"Unusual and even mysterious?"

"Why, yes!"--returned Heliobas with a laugh--"It would be judged
so, I suppose, if I ever gave it,--but I don't. It was only in
England, and by an Englishman, that I was once, to my utter
amazement, addressed as 'He-ly-oh-bas'--and I was quite alarmed at
the sound of it! One would think that most people in these
educational days knew the Greek word helios,--and one would also
imagine it as easy to say Heliobas as heliograph. But now to avoid
mistakes, whenever I touch British territory and come into contact
with British tongues, I give my Christian name only, Cassimir--the
result of which arrangement is, that I am known in this hotel as
Mr. Kasmer! Oh, I don't mind in the least--why should I?--neither
the English nor the Americans ever pronounce foreign names
properly. Why I met a newly established young publisher yesterday,
who assured me that most of his authors, the female ones
especially, are so ignorant of foreign literature that he doubts
whether any of them know whether Cervantes was a writer or an
ointment!"

Alwyn laughed. "I dare say the young publisher may be perfectly
right,"--he said--"But all the same he has no business to publish
the literary emanations of such ignorance."

"Perhaps not!--but what is he to do, if nothing else is offered to
him? He has to keep his occupation going somehow,--from bad he
must select the best. He cannot create a great genius--he has to
wait till Nature, in the course of events, evolves one from the
elements. And in the present general dearth of high ability the
publishers are really more sinned against than sinning. They spend
large sums, and incur large risks, in launching new ventures on
the fickle sea of popular favor, and often their trouble is taken
all in vain. It is really the stupid egotism of authors that is
the stumbling-block in the way of true literature,--each little
scribbler that produces a shilling sensational thinks his or her
own work a marvel of genius, and nothing can shake them from their
obstinate conviction. If every man or woman, before putting pen to
paper, would be sure they had something new, suggestive,
symbolical, or beautiful to say, how greatly Art might gain by
their labors! Authors who take up arms against publishers en
masse, and in every transaction expect to be cheated, are doing
themselves irreparable injury--they betray the cloven hoof,--
namely a greed for money--and when once that passion dominates
them, down goes their reputation and they with it. It is the old
story over again--'ye cannot serve God and Mammon,'--and all Art
is a portion of God,--a descending of the Divine into Humanity."

Alwyn sat for a minute silent and thoughtful. "A descending of the
Divine into Humanity!" he repeated slowly--"It seems to me that
'miracle' is forever being enacted--and yet ... we doubt!"

"WE do not doubt--" said Heliobas--"WE know,--we have touched
Reality! But see yonder!"--and he pointed through the window to
the crowded thoroughfare below--"There are the flying phantoms of
life,--the men and women who are God-oblivious, and who are
therefore no more actually LIVING than the shadows of Al-Kyris!
They shall pass as a breath and be no more,--and this roaring,
trafficking metropolis, this immediate centre of civilization,
shall ere long disappear off the surface of the earth, and leave
not a stone to mark the spot where once it stood! So have
thousands of such cities fallen since this planet was flung into
space,--and even so shall thousands still fall. Learning,
civilization, science, progress,--these things exist merely for
the training and education of a chosen few--and out of many earth
centuries and generations of men, shall be won only a very small
company of angels! Be glad that you have fathomed the mystery of
your own life's purpose,--for you are now as much a Positive
Identity among vanishing spectres, as you were when, on the Field
of Ardath, you witnessed and took part in the Mirage of your
Past."

CHAPTER XXXVII.

A MISSING RECORD.

He spoke the last words with deep feeling and earnestness, and
Alwyn, meeting his clear, grave, brilliant eyes, was more than
ever impressed by the singular dignity and overpowering magnetism
of his presence. Remembering how insufficiently he had realized
this man's true worth, when he had first sought him out in his
monastic retreat, he was struck by a sudden sense of remorse, and
leaning across the table, gently touched his hand.

"How greatly I wronged you once, Heliobas!" he said penitently,
with a tremor of appeal in his voice--"Forgive me, will you?--
though I shall never forgive myself!"

Heliobas smiled, and cordially pressed the extended hand in his
own.

"Nay, there is nothing to forgive, my friend," he answered
cheerfully--"and nothing to regret. Your doubts of me were very
natural,--indeed, viewed by the world's standard of opinion, much
more natural than your present faith, for faith is always a SUPER-
natural instinct. Would you be practically sensible according to
modern social theories?--then learn to suspect everybody and
everything, even your best friend's good intentions!"

He laughed, and the luncheon being concluded, he rose from the
table, and taking an easy-chair nearer the window, motioned Alwyn
to do the same.

"I want to talk to you"--he continued, "We may not meet again for
years,--you are entering on a difficult career, and a few hints
from one who knows and thoroughly understands your position may
possibly be of use to you. In the first place, then, let me ask
you, have you told any one, save me, the story of your Ardath
adventure?"

"One friend only,--my old school comrade, Frank Villiers"--replied
Alwyn.

"And what does he say about it?"

"Oh, he thinks it was a dream from beginning to end,"--and Alwyn
smiled a little,--"He believes that I set out on my journey with
my brain already heated to an imaginative excess, and that the
whole thing, even my Angel's presence, was a pure delusion of my
own overwrought fancy,--a curious and wonderful delusion, but
always a delusion."

"He is a very excellent fellow to judge you so leniently"--
observed Heliobas composedly, "Most people would call you mad."

"Mad!" exclaimed Alwyn hotly--"Why, I am as sane as any man in
London!"

"Saner, I should say,"--replied Heliobas, smiling,--"Compared with
some of the eminently 'practical' speculating maniacs that howl
and struggle among the fluctuating currents of the Stock Exchange,
for instance, you are indeed a marvel of sound and wholesome
mental capability! But let us view the matter coolly. You must not
expect such an exceptional experience as yours to be believed in
by ordinary persons. Because the majority of people, being utterly
UNspiritual and worldly, have NO such experiences, and they
therefore deem them impossible;--they are the gold-fish born in a
bowl, who have no consciousness of the existence of an ocean.
Moreover, you have no proofs of the truth of your narrative,
beyond the change in your own life and disposition,--and that can
be easily referred to various other causes. You spoke of having
gathered one of the miracle-flowers on the Prophet's field,--may I
see it?"

Silently Alwyn drew from his breast-pocket the velvet case in
which he always kept the cherished blossom, and taking it tenderly
out, placed it in his companion's hand.

"An immortelle"--said Heliobas softly, while the flower, uncurling
its silvery petals in the warmth of his palm, opened star-like and
white as snow. "An immortelle, rare and possibly unique!--that is
all the world would say of it! It cannot be matched,--it will not
fade,--true! but you will get no one to believe that! Frown not,
good Poet!--I want you to consider me for the moment a practical
worldling, bent on driving you from the spiritual position yon
have taken up,--and you will see how necessary it is for you to
keep the secret of your own enlightenment to yourself, or at least
only hint at it through the parables of poesy."

He gave back the Ardath blossom to its owner with reverent care,--
and when Alwyn had as reverently put it by, he resumed:

"Your friend Villiers has offered you a perfectly logical and
common-sense solution of the mystery of Ardath,--one which, if you
chose to accept it, would drive you back into skepticism as easily
as a strong wind blows a straw. Only see how simple the intricate
problem is unravelled by this means! You, a man of ardent and
imaginative temperament, made more or less unhappy by the
doctrines of materialism, come to me, Heliobas, a Chaldean student
of the Higher Philosophies, an individual whose supposed
mysterious power and inexplicably studious way of life entitle him
to be considered by the world at large an IMPOSTER!--Now don't
look so indignant!"--and he laughed,--"I am merely discussing the
question from the point of view that would be sure to be adopted
by 'wise' modern society! Thus--I, Heliobas, the impostor, take
advantage of your state of mind to throw you into a trance, in
which, by occult means, you see the vision of an Angel, who bids
you meet her at a place called Ardath,--and you, also, in your
hypnotized condition, write a poem which you entitle 'Nourhalma.'
Then I,--always playing my own little underhand game!--read you
portions of 'Esdras,' and prove to you that 'Ardath' exists, while
I delicately SUGGEST, if I do not absolutely COMMAND, your going
thither. You go,--but I, still by magnetic power, retain my
influence over you. You visit Elzear, a hermit, whom we will, for
the sake of the present argument, call my accomplice,--he reads
between the lines of the letter you deliver to him from me, and he
understands its secret import. He continues, no matter how, your
delusion. You broke your fast with him,--and surely it was easy
for him to place some potent drug in the wine he gave you, which
made you DREAM the rest;--nay, viewed from this standpoint, it is
open to question whether you ever went to the Field of Ardath at
all, but merely DREAMED you did! You see how admirably I can, with
little trouble, disprove the whole story, and make myself out to
be the veriest charlatan and trickster that ever duped his
credulous fellow-man! How do you like my practical dissection of
your new-found joys?"

Alwyn was gazing at him with puzzled and anxious eyes.

"I do not like it at all"--he murmured, in a pained tone--"It is
an insidious SEMBLANCE of truth;--but I know it is not the Truth
itself!"

"Why, how obstinate you are!" said Heliobas, good-humoredly, with
a quick, flashing glance at him. "You insist on seeing things in a
directly reverse way to that in which the world sees them! How can
you be so foolish! To the world your Ardath adventure is the
SEMBLANCE of truth,--and only man's opinion thereon is worth
trusting as the Truth itself!"

Over the wistful, brooding thoughtfulness of Alwyn's countenance
swept a sudden light of magnificent resolution.

"Heliobas, do not jest with me!" he cried passionately--"I know,
better perhaps than most men, how divine things can be argued away
by the jargon of tongues, till heart and brain grow weary,--I
know, God help me!--how the noblest ideals of the soul can be
swept down and dispersed into blank ruin, by the specious
arguments of cold-blooded casuists,--but I also know, by a supreme
INNER knowledge beyond all human proving, that GOD EXISTS, and
with His Being exist likewise all splendors, great and small,
spiritual and material,--splendors vaster than our intelligence
can reach,--ideals loftier than imagination can depict! I want no
proof of this save those that burn in my own individual
consciousness,--I do not need a miserable taper of human reason to
help me to discern the Sun! I, OF MY OWN CHOICE, PRAYER, AND HOPE,
voluntarily believe in God, in Christ, in angels, in all things
beautiful and pure and grand!--let the world and its ephemeral
opinions wither, I will NOT be shaken down from the first step of
the ladder whereon one climbs to Heaven!"

His features were radiant with fervor and feeling,--his eyes
brilliant with the kindling inward light of noblest aspiration,--
and Heliobas, who had watched him intently, now bent toward him
with a grave gesture of the gentlest homage.

"How strong is he whom an Angel's love makes glorious!" he said--
"We are partners in the same destiny, my friend,--and I have but
spoken to you as the world might speak, to prepare you for
opposition. The specious arguments of men confront us at every
turn, in every book, in every society,--and it is not always that
we are ready to meet them. As a rule, silence on all matters of
personal faith is best,--let your life bear witness for you;--it
shall thunder loud oracles when your mortal limbs are dumb."

He paused a moment--then went on: "You have desired to know the
secret of the active and often miraculous power of the special
form of religion I and my brethren follow; well, it is all
contained in Christ, and Christ only. His is the only true
Spiritualism in the world--there was never any before He came. We
obey Christ in the simple rules he preached,--Christ according to
His own enunciated wish and will. Moreover, we,--that is, our
Fraternity,--received our commission from Christ Himself in
person."

Alwyn started,--his eyes dilated with amazement and awe.

"From Christ Himself in person?"--he echoed incredulously.

"Even so"--returned Heliobas calmly. "What do you suppose our
Divine Master was about during the years between His appearance
among the Rabbis of the Temple and the commencement of His public
preaching? Do you, can you, imagine with the rest of the purblind
world, that he would have left His marvellous Gospel in the charge
of a few fishermen and common folk ONLY"

"I never thought,--I never inquired--" began Alwyn hurriedly.

"No!"--and Heliobas smiled rather sadly, "Few men do think or
inquire very far on sacred subjects! Listen,--for what I have to
say to you will but strengthen you in your faith,--and you will
need more than all the strength of the Four Evangelists to bear
you stiffly up against the suicidal Negation of this present
disastrous epoch. Ages ago,--ay, more than six or seven thousand
years ago, there were certain communities of men in the East,--
scholars, sages, poets, astronomers, and scientists, who, desiring
to give themselves up entirely to study and research, withdrew
from the world, and formed themselves into Fraternities, dividing
whatever goods they had in common, and living together under one
roof as the brotherhoods of the Catholic Church do to this day.
The primal object of these men's investigations was a search after
the Divine Cause of Creation; and as it was undertaken with
prayer, penance, humility, and reverence, much enlightenment was
vouchsafed to them, and secrets of science, both spiritual and
material, were discovered by them,--secrets which the wisest of
modern sages know nothing of as yet. Out of these Fraternities
came many of the prophets and preachers of the Old Testament,--
Esdras for one,--Isaiah for another. They were the chroniclers of
many now forgotten events,--they kept the history of the times, as
far is it was possible,--and in their ancient records your city of
Al-Kyris is mentioned as a great and populous place, which was
suddenly destroyed by the bursting out of a volcano beneath its
foundations--Yes!"--this as Alwyn uttered an eager exclamation,--
"Your vision was a perfectly faithful reflection of the manner in
which it perished. I must tell you, however, that nothing
concerning its kings or great men has been preserved,--only a few
allusions to one Hyspiros, a writer of tragedies, whose genius
seems to have corresponded to that of our Shakespeare of to-day.
The name of Sah-luma is nowhere extant."

A burning wave of color flushed Alwyn's face, but he was silent.
Heliobas went on gently:

"At a very early period of their formation, these Fraternities I
tell you of were in possession of most of the MATERIAL scientific
facts of the present day,--such things as the electric wire and
battery, the phonograph, the telephone, and other 'new'
discoveries, being perfectly familiar to them. The SPIRITUAL
manifestations of Nature were more intricate and difficult to
penetrate,--and though they knew that material effects could only
be produced by spiritual causes, they worked in the dark, as it
were, only groping toward the light. However, the wisdom and
purity of the lives they led was not without its effect,--emperors
and kings sought their advice, and gave them great stores of
wealth, which they divided, according to rule, into equal
portions, and used for the benefit of those in need, willing the
remainder to their successors; so that, at the present time, the
few brotherhoods that are left hold immense treasures accumulated
through many centuries,--treasures which are theirs to share with
one another in prosecution of discoveries and the carrying on of
good works in secret. Ages before the coming of Christ, one
Aselzion, a man of austere and strict life, belonging to a
Fraternity stationed in Syria, was engaged in working out a
calculation of the average quantity of heat and light provided per
minute by the sun's rays, when, glancing upward at the sky, the
hour being clear noonday, he beheld a Cross of crimson hue
suspended in the sky, whereon hung the cloudy semblance of a human
figure. Believing himself to be the victim of some optical
delusion, he hastened to fetch some of his brethren, who at a
glance perceived the self-same marvel,--which presently was viewed
with reverent wonder by the whole assembled community. For one
entire hour the Symbol stayed--then vanished suddenly, a noise
like thunder accompanying its departure. Within a few months of
its appearance, messages came from all the other Fraternities
stationed in Egypt, in Spain, in Greece, in Etruria, stating that
they also had seen this singular sight, and suggesting that from
henceforth the Cross should be adopted by the united Brotherhoods
as a holy sign of some Deity unrevealed,--a proposition that was
at once agreed to. This happened some five thousand years before
Christ,--and hence the Sign of the Cross became known in all, or
nearly all, the ancient rites of worship, the multitude
considering that because it was the emblem of the Philosophical
Fraternities, it must have some sacred meaning. So it was used in
the service of Serapis and the adoration of the Nile-god,--it has
been found carved on Egyptian disks and obelisks, and it was
included among the numerous symbols of Saturn."