Kitabı oku: «Rejected of Men», sayfa 3

Either we falsify ourselves by saying that we believe these things, or else we benumb our reasoning so as not to think about them at all. Many of us would fain expurgate those miraculous narratives from the divine word, retaining only such spiritual and intangible ideas as are believable because they have no foundation in fact. Others of us give up the task as hopeless, and declare frankly that we do not know whether they are true or not, but that we are willing to give them the benefit of the doubt.

These things of divine truth are so preposterous to the common sense that only the ignorant can believe them. Wherefore the Scriptures are given into the hands of the ignorant for preservation, lest we, intelligent pharisees, should alter and amend them to fit our own ideas–in the which case they would inevitably perish.

For it is to be remembered that, while the divine Scriptures have lasted in their entirety through the ages, nearly every system of human philosophy–whether physical or metaphysical–has perished after a generation or two, to give place to another system. So would the Scriptures perish if it were left to us to amend them so as to fit the rational and intelligent science of the age.

We were born to crucify the truth; it is our mission in life, and we must not be blamed when we fulfil our destiny.

Shortly after that visit of the priests and Levites to the baptisms of John, the promised Messiah suddenly appeared in the midst of the motley crowd gathered to hear the truth.

A poor woman, the mother of two ordinary fishermen, thus described the divine miracle that thereupon happened. She told it somewhat thus: “I saw it. There was a great many people around; some saw it and some did not see it. I can’t tell just how it was, but it was after He went down into the water with John. There was a light as if it was sunshine up this way; then something came. It looked like a dove–they all said it was a dove. It looked like it came down upon Him. I don’t know how long it lasted–I saw it for a little and then it was gone. He was standing in the water along with John; then He came out close to where I stood. The folk were calling out ‘Hallelujah!’ all about us. They were crying ‘Hallelujah! Hallelujah!’They crowded so they pushed me into the water. I felt as though I were going crazy, and I, too, kept calling out ‘Hallelujah! Hallelujah!’”

Even in the recounting of such a reality it sounds shocking. How shocking, then, must it have been to those of us who were living when it really happened.

But with this, the mission of John came to an end. The crowds that had gathered about him departed hither and thither, and the earth was left bare and desolate where the growing things of the spring-time had been trampled into the dry and dusty soil by the treading of many feet–where the pure waters of the streams had been defiled by human contact.

V
THE BEGINNING OF THE WORKS

WITH the dispersion of the great crowd of poor ignorants who had gathered about John the Baptist, we thought that the agitation was ended.

We were mistaken.

For a time nothing more was heard of the Christ whom John had baptized. Then, suddenly, there came rumors, first from one side and then from another; fugitive words telling of a renewed excitement that had begun to ferment obscurely in that same nether class that had followed John to his baptism. Gradually these rumors became more and more dominant, and every day more people heard of and became interested in what was said. The interest was not very great with us, but it was sufficient to keep alive the observation of the daily papers.

The Messiah who had been baptized by John had reappeared, and many people of the poorer classes were gathering about Him in numbers to hear His teachings and to receive His word. These poor people asserted that He performed many miracles; that He could heal the sick and diseased by merely touching them with His hand; that He caused the lame to walk, the dumb to speak, and the blind to see. It was said that many miraculous cures had already been performed by Him.

It happened at this time that a party of men of the literary and artistic world had chartered a vessel and had fitted it up as a floating studio, adorning it with antique furniture, rugs, hangings, and bric-à-brac.

It was a very merry party–a party of sadducees who strenuously believed in no resurrection. There was Archibald Redfern, the writer-artist-man-about-town; Corry King, assistant editor and business manager of the Aurora; Marcey, the architect; Chillingham Norcott, the artist; Allington, of the publishing-house of Richard White & Co.; Dr. Ames, Pinwell, and others. During the cruise, Norcott, Pinwell, and Redfern had enriched the panels of the cabin with marines and landscapes and decorative pieces until the interior looked almost like a picture-gallery. Everything was as luxurious as possible. They had engaged Pierre Blanc to go with them and to cook for them, and they paid him six hundred dollars for the three or four weeks of the cruise. When it is said that Dr. Ames himself selected the wines and liquors, nothing more need be said concerning the provisioning of the expedition.

The cruise had been a complete success, and now they were about returning to the metropolis again. They had run short of ice, and had put in at a small coast town for a fresh supply.

Redfern, who had arrogated to himself the position of head-steward, had gone ashore in the boat with the steward de facto. There he heard strange and wonderful reports of miracles that were being performed in the neighborhood.

As the boat, returning from the shore, touched the side of the schooner, Redfern came scrambling aboard, and almost immediately his loud, brassy voice was heard from end to end of the vessel, telling of wonders performed and of miracles wrought.

Some of the party were mildly gambling at poker under the awning, waiting Redfern’s return with the ice. Corry King lay stretched out upon a couch in his shirt-sleeves reading a magazine, a tall glass of brandy-and-soda at his elbow. Norcott was sketching listlessly; the others were talking together. They all looked up at the sound of Redfern’s loud voice. There was nothing funny in what he said, but they all laughed.

“And you have returned cured of body and sound of soul, I suppose,” said Ames.

“It isn’t of myself I’m thinking,” said Redfern, in his strident, insistent voice, a voice that almost stunned the hearer if he were near by and not used to it. “It’s not of myself I’m thinking. I’m thinking of you. I tell you, boys, this is the chance of your life. I’m going to take you all ashore this afternoon. Your souls have run down during this cruise, and what you want is to get a good brace of salvation before you get back home again.”

They all went ashore in the afternoon. The town appeared to be singularly deserted. A few guests hung about the third-class summer hotel porch, sitting uncomfortably on the hard, wooden chairs in the shade. An occasional inhabitant appeared here and there on the hot, sandy stretch of street, but everywhere there was a feeling of dull and silent depletion. The party inquired at the hotel office and found that He whom they sought was then supposed to be at a certain place about six miles below the town where there was a high and rocky hill. They found that they could obtain a conveyance, and, after a good deal of jocular chaffing with the fat and grinning hackman, the vehicle was ordered, and a team of four horses. It was a dusty, rattletrap affair, and the party piled in with much noisy confusion, struggling for seats, and sitting in one another’s laps. The hotel guests sat looking on with a sort of outside interest and amusement. Then the hack drove away with a volley of cheers and a chorus of mimic coach-horns.

“Look here, boys,” called out Corry King, “what I want to know is whether Redfern’s taking us down here for our sakes or for his own? Either he has got to take this thing seriously or else we have.”

“It’s all for your sake, my boy! For your sake!” cried out Redfern’s brazen, dominant voice. “I made up my mind last night when I saw the way you bucked up against Marcy’s luck in that last jack-pot that you needed some sort of salvation to pull you through till we get you home again.”

It was three o’clock before they approached their destination. As they drew near they found that everywhere vehicles of all sorts were standing along the road, the horses hitched to the fence at the road-sides. They could see from a distance as they approached that the hill was covered with a restless, swaying mass of people, and then they saw that the crowd was moving voluminously all in one direction–away from the crest.

“I’m afraid you’re too late to hear Him, gentlemen,” said the driver, and he urged the horses forward with greater speed.

It was true; they were just too late to hear that sermon which voiced the sublimest code of ethics the world has ever heard–sublime, but, in our opinion, impracticable.

Presently they were met, almost suddenly, by the broken, ragged outskirts of the moving crowd that was beginning to pour away from the hill. They had not, until then, any idea how great was the agitation centring around this strange being.

Then, almost in a moment, the crowd became so dense that the hack could make no further progress. “I reckon we’ll have to pull out of the way,” said the driver.

“All right,” said Redfern; “pull away.”

And now the crowd was so thick about them that it was with some difficulty that the driver could edge his horses over to the side of the road. And every instant the mass of men and women grew more and more dense. “Look out where you’re going! Look out there!” cried a chorus of voices, as the crowd melted and dissolved before the horses, closing again around the hack. And now the road was suddenly filling with a great press of people moving all in one direction; the air was made dense and darkened with clouds of dust. Then the party in the hack saw approaching along the road the nucleus of this denser crowd which so centred about a single point. “Yonder He is,” cried the driver, standing up and pointing with his whip. “That’s Him, there.”

The men were all standing up in the hack.

“Where?” said Redfern.

“That’s Him–that tall man,” said the driver.

The crowd were surging all about them, pushing against the wheels of the hack. The air was full of the tumult of many voices. The horses shrank to one side as the moving mass eddied around them. Then there came a little group of rough men, apparently fishermen. In the midst of them was a tall man. His face was wet with sweat, and drops of sweat ran down His cheeks. He gazed straight before Him and seemed oblivious to everything about Him. The men in the hack all knew that that must be He, and they stood up looking at Him.

Then they saw a miracle.

Suddenly, almost alongside them, there was a commotion and an outcry of voices. The crowd parted, and as those in the hack looked down, they saw a man struggling out of it and panting and gasping. It was a dreadful sight. He was covered over with hideous, scrofulous sores. No wonder the crowd parted to make way for him. Through his panting he was shouting, hoarsely, “Make me clean! Make me clean!” The crowd surged and swayed with an echoing outcry of voices, and for a moment the man was shut out from the sight of those sadducees. Then they could see that the diseased man was kneeling in the road.

“I will,” said a loud, clear voice that dominated the disturbance. “Be clean!” They could see that He upon whom they were looking had reached out His hand. They could not see what He did, but He appeared to touch the kneeling man. Instantly there was a great shout, and the crowd surged and swept and heaved more tumultuously than ever. They could not see what had happened.

“My God!” cried out the driver, “did you see that?”

“See what?” said Corry King, who stood next him. In spite of himself he felt thrilled with a sympathetic excitement.

“Didn’t you see it? He cured him.”

“Cured him?” said King. “Who? Where is he?”

“Now–don’t you see him? There he is.”

Had they really beheld a miracle? No; they had not. Archibald Redfern burst out laughing. “Didn’t you see it, King?” he jeered. “Where are your eyes?”

That evening it was said that He would heal the sick who would come to Him. The boat party, interested in what they had already heard, went ashore again after dark. The town that had seemed to be dead and empty when they were there before, was now full of people. There were crowds everywhere. The night was hot and oppressive. The sadducees followed whither the crowd seemed to move, the press growing ever thicker and thicker, until, by-and-by, they reached a street densely packed with the throng.

It was a dark and narrow street in the suburbs. It was packed full of people, and it was only after much difficulty they were able to reach a point of vantage–a broad flight of wooden steps that led up to the door of a frame church. Thence they could see over the heads of the mob of men and women who filled the street beyond. They could see that the people were bringing the sick through the crowd. Near them was a man carrying a little child in his arms. Its poor little legs were twisted into a steel frame. A woman followed close behind the man. The child lay with its head upon the man’s shoulder and appeared to be crying, though it was too dark to see clearly. The man moved, step by step, forward, and presently was swallowed into the dark mass of humanity beyond. In the distance was a doorway in which stood a figure of a man, black against the dull light of the lamp behind. There appeared to be a number of other figures crowded in the passageway behind Him. People were looking out of the windows of the neighboring houses. They could not see from the church-steps where they stood what He was doing, but He was constantly moving and stooping forward. The tumult and din were dreadful. It appeared a pandemonium of wild, unmeaning excitement. As in the afternoon, it was an excitement that was contagious. “Do you suppose He really is curing them?” said Norcott, and again Archibald Redfern burst out laughing.

“Why, of course He is,” said he.

He had seen no miracle and could see none. How was it possible for a sadducee, who believed in no resurrection, to see a miracle? The wisest sadducee that ever lived, had he seen a miracle, would not have believed it. Had the Almighty blotted out the sun and the moon and written the sign of His Truth in letters of fire all across the blackened canopy of the heavens, Redfern or Corry King would not have believed–they would have misdoubted their own eyesight.

After they had satisfied their curiosity, the party went back to the boat and played poker until nearly two o’clock in the morning.

VI
THE YOUNG MAN WITH GREAT POSSESSIONS

DR. AND MRS. CAIAPHAS were spending the latter part of the summer at the sea-side with their son-in-law, Mr. Henry Herbert Gilderman.

Mrs. Gilderman was Dr. and Mrs. Caiaphas’s daughter Florence–their eldest girl, and perhaps the best-beloved by the doctor of all the children. She had been married now a little over a year, during nearly all of which time she and her husband had lived abroad.

Gilderman was one of the richest men in the world. His grandfather had laid the foundation of that great Gilderman estate of the present generation, and his father had built well upon the foundation that the first Gilderman had laid. Gilderman had been born into all this great wealth–so great that, perhaps, no man could realize how vast it was. To be born into such a fortune is almost as to be born into royalty. It shuts the inheritor into a shell of circumstances from which there is no escape. Such a man as Gilderman must live his life after a certain routine and in a certain way from which there is no escape. There was no privacy in his life, for all the world looked on and saw what he did. His business of life was to spend money and to enjoy himself. For that purpose, and for that purpose alone, he was born into the world. He had a house in the metropolis, another at the nation’s capital, and still another where the Romans of his class spent the torrid weather of summer. Each of these was a palace, and each was filled with gems of art and rare pieces of china, plate, tapestries, and bric-à-brac that his agents had collected for him from all parts of the world. He had given a hundred and sixty thousand dollars for a single painting, and after it was hung he had, perhaps, hardly looked at it. When he travelled he had a valet to look after him, and to foresee and to fulfil his wishes. He hardly did anything for himself–not even to order a cab or to purchase a railroad-ticket. Other attendants looked after the heaps of luggage which he took with him when he travelled. He had his avant-courier to prepare soft places for him in which to lodge, and others remained behind to close the places which he left. Now that he was married, his wife–who had fallen very pliantly into her new life, as women do–must also have a maid to accompany her wherever she went. They would almost fill the private car in which they nearly always travelled if they had any distance to go, especially if they travelled upon any of the railroads which Gilderman controlled. There was no escape from this routine. Even when Gilderman would seek to change the monotonous smoothness of his existence with a taste of something rougher–say of the mountains–it was only a pretended roughness covering over the same perpetual smoothness and softness of life. His log-hut in the wilderness was a palace masquerading as a hut of logs. Everything was really soft and warm; the furniture was an artificial reproduction of something rough; the floors were spread with skins of wild beasts that cost three or four or five hundred dollars apiece; there was an open fireplace that was designed and built by Marcy, the architect, and a picture of this pretence of roughness was published in the voluminous Sunday issue of some daily paper for all the world to behold.

Such were the surroundings of Henry Herbert Gilderman. Into these circumstances the mysterious paradox of divine wisdom had placed a selfhood, eager, alertly intelligent, receptive, warm, affectionate. A nature which, perhaps, lacked the gritty strenuosity in which a character grows strong and fibrous and hard, but a nature soft, rich, and lovable–a nature into which the seeds of truth fell easily and struck quick roots and thrust forth a rapid growth. The garden of his soul was rather luxuriant than well tilled, but it was fruitful and beautiful.

As said before, the business of Gilderman’s life was its enjoyments–and the spending of money; the dream of his life was of religious faith, of social reform, of an equitable readjustment of the classes. He read intermittently of advanced socialistic and theological literature. In these readings he would soon grow tired, presently find himself becoming dull and drowsy; but each time he read a few seeds would fall scatteringly in the soft, warm loam of his soul, and would there spring up into the quick, rank growth of which he was very proud.

He loved nothing better than to talk to some intimate friend of his dreams and of his religious and socialistic views. He would talk on such an occasion until his cheeks glowed and his breath came hot and thick. He would, sometimes, afterwards wonder dimly whether he had not been a little foolish–whether he had not talked too much and said too much nonsense. But he enjoyed the intensity of the excitement while it lasted.

His friends loved him.

He was, unless crossed in his desires, kind to every one whom he met; but he never forgot that he was Henry Herbert Gilderman and the grandson of James Quincy Gilderman.

Gilderman was singularly attracted by the popular interest that centred about John the Baptist, and now about the Christ who taught and healed the poor. He used to talk about these things to his father-in-law when he could get Dr. Caiaphas to discuss the matter. The subject was one not very pleasant to the rector of the Church of the Advent, and he was not often willing to discuss it.

When September arrived, Mrs. Caiaphas did not immediately return to town. Mrs. Gilderman was not at that time feeling at all well, and her mother continued with her for a while. Dr. Caiaphas, however, used to go down on a Saturday morning–generally in Gilderman’s yacht–preach on Sunday, attend to his more pressing parish work on Monday and possibly on Tuesday, and then return directly to his summer home again.

One day Gilderman went down to the metropolis with his father-in-law, having business in town with his manager. They started late in the afternoon, and took their dinner aboard the yacht, which they had to themselves. They sat smoking on the deck after dinner, each in a great rattan chair. The day had been very hot, and they enjoyed to the full the swift motion and the chill of the night air. It was a beautiful night, soft and mild–the sky dusted over with a myriad stars. The yacht sped forward, with a ceaseless rushing of the water alongside. The cigar-points alternately glowed and paled as they smoked. Dr. Caiaphas buttoned up his coat close to his chin. Every now and then the voice of the sailors forward broke the stillness of the night, or the clinking of dishes and tumblers sounded loud as the steward put away the glass and the china in the saloon.

There was a distant light over across the dark water. It led Gilderman’s thoughts to the subject which had occupied them much of late.

“By-the-way,” he said, “has it never occurred to you, sir, to question whether, after all, the Messiah whom the people are proclaiming over yonder is not really the Divine Truth incarnated?”

“No,” said Dr. Caiaphas, “it has not. And, to tell you the truth, Henry, I would a great deal rather not discuss that phase of the question.”

“Why not?”

“Well, because it is unpleasant to me–because it is distressful to me.” Gilderman was silent, and, by-and-by, Dr. Caiaphas voluntarily continued: “The Divine Word leads us to understand that God is a spirit, and they that worship Him must worship Him in spirit and in truth. It is revolting to me to even listen to the supposition that the God of Heaven could have a human son–a carpenter by trade–and that the mother should be the wife of a common carpenter.”

“I think I enter perfectly into your feelings,” said Gilderman, after another little space of silence; “but–I don’t want to force the conversation upon you, you understand, sir–but I must say that it seems to me that you think only of God’s acting according to your own ideas of fitness. I do not believe that He ever acts according to man’s ideas, and maybe He may not have done so in this instance. How do you know, sir, that we may not be mistaken? And, if we are mistaken, what a great wrong are we doing!”

“In that case,” said Dr. Caiaphas, “and, if I am mistaken, speaking for myself, I see nothing for it but to suffer for my own short-sightedness. Every man must exercise his own judgment, and if his judgment is wrong he must suffer for it. I cannot believe that this poor journeyman carpenter is the son of the Almighty God whom I worship. If I am mistaken, I must suffer for it, for I cannot change my mind. And I am so sure in my disbelief,” he added, as though to close the discussion, “that I am willing to stand my chances upon it at the day of judgment, even if that day were to-morrow.”

After that, Gilderman did not say anything more. But in the few words he had said he had begun almost to convince himself that the miracles of which the world was beginning to talk were really worthy of attention.

The next morning, after an eleven-o’clock breakfast aboard the yacht, Gilderman had himself driven down to his office. After the freshness of the open air at the sea-side, the city felt like a steaming oven. Gilderman sat leaning back in the brougham smoking and looking out upon the hot bustle of the street. The ceaselessly streaming crowds on the sidewalk hurried and jostled and pushed, paying no attention to the heat or to their fellow-men or to heaven or to hell, or to anything but the business they were just then so intent upon–each man a little life in himself shut out from all the other little lives around him.

A bulletin was posted on a board in front of a newspaper-office–a square of brownish paper covered with ink-drawn characters. Half a dozen men stood looking at it, but the stream of humanity flowed by, neither thinking of nor caring for the words posted above their heads.

In large letters it proclaimed that John the Baptist had been executed the night before.

It brought a singular shock to Gilderman, who was still impressed by the recollection of the brief talk that he had had with his father-in-law. He said to himself, as he sat leaning back in the carriage, “It’s a confounded shame!”

He thought about it intermittently all the way down to the office and until the brougham stopped at the sidewalk and he got out.

The office was on the first floor of an imposing brown-stone building. Over the great, glazed doors were carved in relief the words:

“Gilderman Building.”

On both sides of the plate-glass windows that looked out into the busy street were gilt letters:

“Office of the Gilderman Estate.”

Now the windows were open, and through them he could see the clerks busy over the books. They looked warm, and wore linen or madras jackets. Mr. Wright, the manager, was standing with the cashier looking over a book. They neither of them saw him.

“You may come for me at three o’clock,” Gilderman said to the man, who stood holding open the door of the brougham. And then he turned and went up the steps and through the swinging-door. The electric-fans were whirring, and the air felt cool after the hot street outside.

He went directly through to the manager’s room beyond. Those whom he passed turned and looked after him; he was used to having men look after him in that way. He felt that the fact of his presence became almost instantly known throughout the entire office. There was a silent, indescribable movement among the clerks. He saw the cashier speak to Mr. Wright, the manager, who looked up sharply.

Gilderman went directly into his private office. He laid his hat on the table among the newspapers. There was a brass electric-fan on the mantel, and he turned the switch and started it moving, standing before the refreshing coolness. As he did so the other door opened and Mr. Wright came in. The manager bowed and Gilderman acknowledged his presence with a nod. He did not move away from the cooling breezes of the fan.

“I am sorry to have called you away from the sea in such weather as this, Mr. Gilderman,” said the manager.

“I’m sorry to come, Wright. It seems to me we’ve had nothing but hot weather ever since February.”

“How’s Mrs. Gilderman?” asked the manager.

“Not very well,” said Gilderman, briefly. “I suppose you wanted me about those copper-mines?”

“Yes, sir; the transfers will have to be signed this week. I’ve made arrangements with Mr. Pengrist and Walton, of Walton & Boone, to be here. Shall I send word to Mr. Pengrist now?”

“You might as well,” said Mr. Gilderman. As Mr. Wright touched the electric-bell he remembered the bulletin he had just seen posted at the newspaper office. “By-the-way,” said he, “I saw it posted on the bulletin-board as I came down that John the Baptist had been executed.”

“Yes; so I was told awhile ago,” said Mr. Wright. “I think it’s a pity that there should have been any dilly-dallying about it. Herod might as well have acted sharply in the first instance. He has gained nothing by all this delay.”

“I don’t think the Baptist ought to have been executed at all,” said Gilderman, briefly.

Mr. Wright smiled, and then looked quickly sober. He had for the moment forgotten Gilderman’s radical and socialistic proclivities. He thought that they were very foolish, but he was too practical a man and had too much good sense to argue the point.

The messenger-boy appeared at the open door. “Go down to Pengrist & Ball’s,” said Mr. Wright, “and tell Mr. Pengrist that Mr. Gilderman is here.”

“Yes, sir,” said the boy and disappeared.