Delphi Complete Works of George Eliot (Illustrated) (653 page)

A sanctioned liberty .... your pardon, father,

I need not teach you what the Church decrees.

But facts may weaken texts, and so dry up

The fount of eloquence. The Church relaxed

Our Order’s rule before I took the vows.

PRIOR.

Ignoble liberty ! you snatch your rule

From what God tolerates, not what he loves ? —

Inquire what lowest offering may suffice,

Cheapen it meanly to an obolus,

Then buy and count the coin left in your purse

For your debauch ? — Measure obedience

By scantest powers of feeble brethren

Whom Holy Church indulges ? — Ask great Law,

The rightful Sovereign of the human soul,

For what it pardons, not what it commands ?

O fallen knighthood, penitent of high vows,

Asking a charter to degrade itself !

Such poor apology of rules relaxed

Blunts not suspicion of that doubleness

Your enemies tax you with.

DON SILVA,

Oh, for the rest,

Conscience is harder than our enemies,

Knows more, accuses with more nicety,

Nor needs to question Rumour if we fall

Below the perfect model of our thought.

I fear no outward arbiter. — You smile ?

PRIOR.

Ay, at the contrast ‘twixt your portraiture

And the true image of your conscience, shown

As now I see it in your acts. I see

A drunken sentinel who gives alarm

At his own shadow, but when scalers snatch

His weapon from his hand smiles idiot-like

At games he’s dreaming of.

DON SILVA.

A parable !

The husk is rough, — holds something bitter, doubtless.

PRIOR.

O, the husk gapes with meaning over-ripe.

You boast a conscience that controls your deeds,

Watches your knightly armor, guards your rank

From stain of treachery, — you, helpless slave,

Whose will lies nerveless in the clutch of lust, —

Of blind mad passion, — passion itself most helpless,

Storm-driven, like the monsters of the sea.

O famous conscience !

DON SILVA.

Pause there ! Leave unsaid

Aught that will match that text. More were too much,

Even from holy lips. I own no love

But such as guards my honor, since it guards

Hers whom I love ! I suffer no foul words

To stain the gift I lay before her feet ;

And, being hers, my honor is more safe.

PRIOR.

Verse-makers’ talk ! fit for a world of rhymes,

Where facts are feigned to tickle idle ears,

Where good and evil play at tournament

And end in amity, — a world of lies, —

A carnival of words where every year

Stale falsehoods serve fresh men. Your honor safe ?

What honor has a man with double bonds ?

Honor is shifting as the shadows are

To souls that turn their passions into laws.

A Christian knight who weds an infidel ....

DON SILVA (fiercely).

Infidel !

PRIOR.

May one day spurn the Cross,

And call that honor ! — one day find his sword

Stained with his brother’s blood, and call that honor !

Apostates’ honour ? — harlots’ chastity !

Renegades’ faithfulness ? — Iscariot’s !

DON SILVA.

Strong words and burning ; but they scorch not me.

Fedalma is a daughter of the Church, —

Has been baptised and nurtured in the faith.

PRIOR.

Ay, as a thousand Jewesses, who yet

Are brides of Satan in a robe of flames.

DON SILVA.

Fedalma is no Jewess, bears no marks

That tell of Hebrew blood.

PRIOR.

She bears the marks

Of races unbaptized, that never bowed

Before the holy signs, were never moved

By stirrings of the sacramental gifts.

DON SILVA (scornfully).

Holy accusers practise palmistry,

And, other witness lacking, read the skin.

PRIOR.

I read a record deeper than the skin.

What ! Shall the trick of nostrils and of lips

Descend through generations, and the soul

That moves within our frame like God in worlds-

Convulsing, urging, melting, withering —

Imprint no record, leave no documents,

Of her great history ? Shall men bequeath

The fancies of their palate to their sons,

And shall the shudder of restraining awe,

The slow-wept tears of contrite memory,

Faith’s prayerful labor, and the food divine

Of fasts ecstatic, — shall these pass away

Like wind upon the waters, tracklessly ?

Shall the mere curl of eyelashes remain

And god-enshrining symbols leave no trace

Of tremors reverent? — That maiden’s blood

Is as unchristian as the leopard’s.

DON SILVA.

Say,

Unchristian as the Blessed Virgin’s blood

Before the angel spoke the word, “ All hail !”

PRIOR (smiling bitterly)

Said I not truly? See, your passion weaves

Already blasphemies !

DON SILVA.

‘T is you provoke them.

PRIOR.

I strive, as still the Holy Spirit strives,

To move the will perverse. But failing this,

God commands other means to save our blood,

To save Castilian glory, — nay, to save

The name of Christ from blot of traitorous deeds.

DON SILVA.

Of traitorous deeds ! Age, kindred, and your cowl,

Give an ignoble licence to your tongue.

As for your threats, fulfil them at your peril.

‘T is you, not I, will gibbet our great name

To rot in infamy. If I am strong

In patience now, trust me, I can be strong

Then in defiance.

PRIOR.

Miserable man !

Your strength will turn to anguish, like the strength

Of fallen angels. Can you change your blood ?

You are a Christian, with the Christian awe

In every vein. A Spanish noble, born

To serve your people and your people’s faith.

Strong, are you ? Turn your back upon the Cross, —

Its shadow is before you. Leave your place :

Quit the great ranks of knighthood : you will walk

Forever with a tortured double self,

A self that will be hungry while yon feast,

Will blush with shame while you are glorified,

Will feel the ache and chill of desolation,

Even in the very bosom of your love.

Mate yourself with this woman, fit for what ?

To make the sport of Moorish palaces,

A lewd Herodias ....

DON SILVA.

Stop ! no other man,

Priest though he were had had his throat left free

For passage of those words. I would have clutched

His serpent’s neck, and flung him out to hell !

A monk must needs defile the name of love :

He knows it but as tempting devils paint it.

You think to scare my love from its resolve

With arbitrary consequences, strained

By rancorous effort from the thinnest motes

Of possibility ? — cite hideous lists

Of sins irrelevant, to frighten me

With bugbears’ names, as women fright a child ?

Poor pallid wisdom, taught by inference

From blood-drained life, where phantom terrors rule,

And all achievement is to leave undone !

Paint the day dark, make sunshine cold to me,

Abolish the earth’s fairness, prove it all

A fiction of my eyes, — then, after that,

Profane Fedalma.

PRIOR.

O, there is no need :

She has profaned herself. Go, raving man,

And see her dancing now. Go, see your bride

Flaunting her beauties grossly in the gaze

Of vulgar idlers, — eking out the show

Made in the Pla9a by a mountebank.

I hinder you no farther.

DON SILVA.

It is false !

PRIOR.

Go, prove it false, then.

[Father Isidor

Drew on his cowl and turned away. The face

That flashed anathemas, in swift eclipse

Seemed Silva’s vanished confidence. In haste

He rushed. unsignalled through the corridor

To where the Duchess once, Fedalma now,

Had residence retired from din of arms, —

Knocked, opened, found all empty, — said

With muffled voice, “ Fedalma ! “ — called more loud,

More oft on Inez, the old trusted nurse, —

Then searched the terrace-garden, calling still,

But heard no answering sound, and saw no face

Save painted faces staring all unmoved

By agitated tones. He hurried back,

Giving half-conscious orders as he went

To page and usher, that they straight should seek

Lady Fedalma ; then with stinging shame

Wished himself silent ; reached again the room

Where still the Father’s menace seemed to hang

Thickening the air ; snatched cloak and plumed hat,

And grasped, not knowing why, his poniard’s hilt ;

Then checked himself and said : — ]

If he spoke truth !

To know were wound enough, — to see the truth

Were fire upon the wound. It must be false !

His hatred saw amiss, or snatched mistake

In other men’s report. I am a fool !

But where can she be gone ? gone secretly ?

And in my absence ? O, she meant no wrong !

I am a fool ! — But, where can she be gone ?

With only Inez ? O, she meant no wrong !

I swear she never meant it. There’s no wrong

But she would make it momentary right

By innocence in doing it ....

And yet,

What is our certainty ? Why, knowing all

That is not secret. Mighty confidence !

One pulse of Time makes the base hollow, — sends

The towering certainty we built so high

Toppling in fragments meaningless. What is —

What will be — must be — pooh ! they wait the key

Of that which is not yet ; all other keys

Are made of our conjectures, take their sense

From humors fooled by hope, or by despair.

Know what is good ? O God, we know not yet

If bliss itself is not young misery

With fangs swift growing ..

But some outward harm

May even now be hurting, grieving her.

O, I must search, — face shame — if shame be there.

Here, Perez ! hasten to Don Alvar, — tell him

Lady Fedalma must be sought, — is lost, —

Has met, I fear, some mischance. He must send

Towards divers points. I go myself to seek

First in the town ..

[As Perez oped the door,

Then moved aside for passage of the Duke,

Fedalma entered, cast away the cloud

Of serge and linen, and outbeaming bright,

Advanced a pace towards Silva, — but then paused,

For he had started and retreated ; she,

Quick and responsive as the subtle air

To change in him, divined that she must wait

Until they were alone : they stood and looked.

Within the Duke was struggling confluence

Of feelings manifold, — pride, anger, dread,

Meeting in stormy rush with sense secure

That she was present, with the satisfied thirst

Of gazing love, with trust inevitable

As in beneficent virtues of the light

And all earth’s sweetness, that Fedalma’s soul

Was free from blemishing purpose. Yet proud wrath

Leaped in dark flood above the purer stream

That strove to drown it : Anger seeks its prey, —

Something to tear with sharp-edged tooth and claw,

Likes not to go off hungry, leaving Love

To feast on milk and honeycomb at will.

Silva’s heart said, he must be happy soon,

She being there ; but to be happy, — first