Part 38 (2/2)

said Axel Regor languidly.

”True, my friend! But their thought may lead, while, they themselves remain pa.s.sive,” joined in Pasquin Leroy sotto-voce;--”It is not at all impossible that if Lotys bade these five thousand here a.s.sembled burn down the citadel, it would be done before daybreak!”

”I have no doubt at all of that,” said Graub. ”One cannot forget that the Bastille was taken while the poor King Louis XVI. was enjoying a supper-party and 'a little orange-flower-water refreshment' at Versailles!”

Leroy made an imperative sign of silence, for there was a faint stir and subdued hum of expectation in the crowd. Another moment,--and Lotys stepped quietly and alone on the bare platform. As she confronted her audience, a low pa.s.sionate sound, like the murmur of a rising storm, greeted her,--a sound that was not anything like the customary applause or encouragement offered to a public speaker, but that suggested extraordinary satisfaction and expectancy, which almost bordered on exultation. Pasquin Leroy, raising his eyes as she entered, was startled by an altogether new impression of her to that which he had received on the night he first saw her. Her personality was somehow different--her appearance more striking, brilliant and commanding. Attired in the same plain garment of dead white serge in which he had previously seen her, with the same deep blood-red scarf crossing her left shoulder and breast,--there was something to-night in this mere costume that seemed emblematic of a far deeper power than he had been at first inclined to give her. A curious sensation began to affect his nerves,--a sudden and overwhelming attraction, as though his very soul were being drawn out of him by the calm irresistible dominance of those slumbrous dark-blue iris-coloured eyes, which had the merit of appearing neither brilliant nor remarkable as eyes merely, but which held in their luminous depths that intellectual command which represents the active and pa.s.sionate life of the brain, beside which all other life is poor and colourless.

These eyes appeared to rest upon him now from under their drooping sleepy white eyelids with an inexpressible tenderness and fascination, and he was suddenly reminded of Heinrich Heine's quaint love-fancy; ”Behind her dreaming eyelids the sun has gone to rest; when she opens her eyes it will be day, and the birds will be heard singing!” He began to realise depths in his own nature which he had till now been almost unconscious of; he knew himself to a certain extent, but by no means thoroughly; and awakening as he was to the fact that other lives around him presented strange riddles for consideration, he wondered whether after all, his own life might not perhaps prove one of the most complex among human conundrums? He had often meditated on the inaccessibility of ideal virtues, the uselessness of persuasion, the commonplace absurdity, as he had thought, of trying to embody any lofty spiritual dream,--yet he was himself a man in whom spiritual forces were so strong that he was personally unaware of their overflow, because they were as much a part of him as his breathing capacity. True, he had never consciously tested them, but they were existent in him nevertheless.

He watched Lotys now, with an irritable, restless attention,--there was a thrill of vague expectation in his soul as of new things to be done,--changes to be made in the complex machinery of human nature,--and a great wonder, as well as a great calm, fell upon him as the first clear steady tones of her voice chimed through the deep hush which had prepared the way for her first words. Her voice was a remarkable one, vibrant, yet gentle,--ringing out forcefully, yet perfectly sweet. She began very simply,--without any attempt at a majestic choice of words, or an impressive flow of oratory. She faced her audience quietly,--one bare rounded arm resting easily on a small uncovered deal table in front of her;--she had no 'notes' but her words were plainly the result of deliberate and careful thinking-out of certain problems needful to be brought before the notice of the people. Her face was colourless,--the dead gold hair rippling thickly away in loose cl.u.s.ters from the white brows, fell into their accustomed serpentine twisted knot at the nape of her neck; and the scarlet sash she wore, alone relieved the statuesque white folds of her draperies; but as she spoke, something altogether superphysical seemed to exhale from her as heat exhales from fire--a strange essence of overpowering and compelling sweetness stole into the heavy heated air, and gave to the commonplace surroundings and the poorly clothed crowd of people an atmosphere of sacredness and beauty.

This influence deepened steadily under the rhythmic cadence of her voice, till every agitated soul, every resentful and troubled heart in the throng was conscious of a sudden ingathering of force and calm, of self-respect and self-reliance. The gist of her intention was plainly to set people thinking for themselves, and in this there could be no manner of doubt but that she succeeded. Of the 'Corruption of the State' she spoke as a thing thoroughly recognised by the ma.s.ses.

”We know,--all of us,”--she said, in the concluding portion of her address, ”that we have Ministers who personally care nothing for the prosperity or welfare of the country. We know--all of us,--that we have a bribed Press; whose business it is to say nothing that shall run counter to Ministerial views. We know,--all of us,--that it is this bribed Ministerial press which leads the ignorant, (who are not behind the scenes,) to wrong and false conclusions;--and that it is solely upon these wrong and false conclusions of the wilfully misled million, that the Ministry itself rests for support. On one side the Press is manipulated by the Jews; on the other by the Jesuits. There is no journal in this country that will, or dare, publish the true reflex of popular opinion. Therefore the word 'free' cannot be applied to that recording-force of nations which we call Journalism; inasmuch as it is now a merely purchased Chattle. We should remember, when we read 'opinions of the Press,'--on any great movement or important change in policy, that we are merely accepting the opinions of the bound and paid Slave of Capitalists;--and we should take care to form our judgment for ourselves, rather than from the Capitalist point of view. Were there a strong man to lead,--the s.h.i.+ftiness, treachery, and deliberate neglect practised on the million by those who are now in office, could not possibly last;--but where there is no strength, there must be weakness,--and where a long career of deceit has been followed, instead of a course of plain dealing, failure in the end is inevitable.

With failure comes disaster; and often something which augments disaster--Revolt. The people, weary of constant imposition,--of incessant delays of the justice due to them,--as well as the unscrupulous breaking of promises solemnly pledged,--will--in the long run, take their own way, as they have done before in history, of securing instant amelioration of those wrongs which their paid rulers fail to redress. Who will dare to say that, under such circ.u.mstances, it is ill for the people to act? Sometimes it is a greater Consciousness than their own that moves them; and the wronged and half-forgotten Cause of all worlds makes His command known through His creatures, who obey His impulse,--even as the atoms gathering in s.p.a.ce cl.u.s.ter at His will into solar systems, and bring forth their burden of life!”

She paused, and leaning forward a little, her eyes poured out their flas.h.i.+ng searchlight as it seemed into the very souls of her hearers.

”Dear friends!--dear children!” she said, and in her tone there was the tenderness of a great compa.s.sion, almost bordering on tears,--”What is it, think you all, that makes the age in which we live so sad, so colourless, so restless and devoid of hope and peace? It is not that we are the inhabitants of a less wonderful or less beautiful world,--it is not as if the sun had ceased to s.h.i.+ne, or the birds had forgotten how to sing! Triumphs of science,--triumphs of learning and discovery, these are all on the increase for our help and furtherance. With so much gain in evident advancement, what is it we have lost?--what is it we miss?--whence come the dreariness and emptiness and satiety,--the intolerable sense of the futility of life, even when life has most to offer? Dear children, you are all so sad!--many of you so broken-hearted!--why is it?--how is it? Poverty alone is not the cause,--for it is quite possible to be poor, yet happy! True enough it is that in these days you are ground down by the imposition of taxes, which try all the strength of your earnings to pay; but even this is an evil you could mitigate for yourselves, by strong and united public protest. How is it that you do not realise your own strength? You are not like the poor brutes of the field and forest, who lack the reason which would show them how superior in physical force alone they are to the insignificant biped who commands them. Could the ox understand his own strength, he would never be led to the slaughter-house;--he and his kind would become a terror instead of a provision. You are not oxen,--yet often you are as patient, as dull, as blind and reasonless as they! You form clubs, societies, and trades-unions;--but in how many cases do you not enter upon small and querulous differences which so weaken your unity that presently it falls to pieces and has no more power in it? This is what your tyrants in trade rely on and hope for; the constant recurrence of quarrels and dissensions among yourselves.

No Society lasts which tolerates conflicting argument or differing sentiments in itself. Why is it that the Jesuits,--whom you are all unanimous in hating,--are still the strongest political Brotherhood on the face of the earth? Because they are bound to maintain in every particular the tenets of their Order. No matter how vile, or how reprehensibly false their theories, they are compelled to carry on the work and propaganda of their Union, despite all loss and sacrifice to themselves. This is the secret of their force. Expelled from one land, they take root in another. Suppressed entirely by Pope Clement XIV., in 1773, they virtually ignored suppression, and took up their headquarters in Russia. The influence they exerted there still lies on the serf population, like one of the many chains fastened to a Siberian exile's body. Yet they were driven from Russia in 1820,--from Holland in 1816,--from Switzerland in 1847, and from Germany in 1872. Latterly they have been expelled from France. Nevertheless, in spite of these numerous expulsions, and the universal odium in which they are held,--they still flourish; still are they able to maintain their twenty-two generals and their four Vicars;--and still all countries have, in their turn, to deal with their impending or fulfilled invasion. Why is it that a Society so criminal in historic annals, should yet remain as a force in our advanced era of civilization? Simply, because it is of One Mind! Bent on evil, or good,--self-renunciation or self-aggrandis.e.m.e.nt,--it is still of One Mind! Friends,--were you like them, also of One Mind, your injuries, your oppressions, your taxations would not last long! The remedy for all is easy, and rests with yourselves,--only yourselves! But some of you have lost heart--and other some have lost patience. You look round upon the squalid corners of this great city--you shudder at the cruelty of the daily life with which you have to contend,--you enter poor rooms, which you are compelled to call 'home,' where the sick and dying, the newly-born and the dead are huddled all together,--ten, and sometimes fifteen in one small den of four whitewashed walls;--and sickened and tired, you cry out 'Is life worth no more than this? Is G.o.d's scheme for the human race no more than this? Then why were we born at all? Or, being born, why may we not die at once, self-slain?' Ah, yes, dear friends!--you often feel like this; we all of us often feel like this! But--it is not G.o.d who has made life thus hard for you,--it is yourselves! It is you who consent to be down-trodden,--it is you who resign your freewill, your thought, your originality of character, into the dominating power of others. True,--wealth controls affairs to a vast extent nowadays,--but there is a stronger power than wealth, and that is Soul! It is not the possession of gold that has given the greatest men their position. This is a commercial age, we own,--and certainly,--because of the base and degrading love of acc.u.mulation,--Intellectuality is for the moment often set aside as something valueless--but whenever Intellectuality truly a.s.serts itself, there is at once made visible an acting force of the Divine, which is practically limitless and irresistible. Think for yourselves, friends!--do not let a hired Press think for you! Think for yourselves--judge for yourselves, and act for yourselves! By your observation of a statesman's life, you shall know his capabilities. If he has once been a turncoat, he will be a turncoat again. If he has been known to speculate privately in a forthcoming political crisis, which he alone knows of in advance----”

Here the speaker was interrupted by what sounded more like a snarl than a shout. ”Perousse! Perousse!”

The name was hissed out, and tossed from one rank to another of the audience, and one or two of the police present glanced enquiringly towards Bernhoff their chief,--but he sat with folded arms and inscrutable demeanour, making no sign. Lotys raised her small, beautifully-shaped white hand to enjoin silence. She was obeyed instantly.

”I speak of no one man,” she said with deliberate emphasis; ”I accuse no one man,--or any man! I say 'if' any man gambles with State policy, he is a traitor to the country! But such gambling is not a novelty in the history of nations. It has been practised over and over again. Only mark you all this one G.o.d's truth!--that whenever it _has_ occurred--whenever the rulers of a State _are_ corrupt,--whenever society sinks into such moral defilement that it sees nothing better, nothing higher than the love of money,--then comes the downfall!--then Ruin and Anarchy set up their dominion,--and Heaven's rage rolls out upon the offenders, till their offence be cleansed away in rivers of blood and tears!”

She waited a moment,--and changing her att.i.tude, seemed as it were, to project her thought into her audience, by the sudden pa.s.sion of her commanding gesture, and the flash of her deep luminous eyes.

”We have heard of the Great Renunciation!” she said; ”How G.o.d Himself took human form, and came to this low little earth to prove how n.o.bly we should live and die! But in our day,--we with our preachers and teachers, our press and our parliamentary orators,--our atheistical statesmen on all hands, have come upon the Great Obliteration!--the Obliteration of G.o.d altogether in our ways of life! We push Him out, as if He were not. He is not in our Churches--He is not in our Laws--He is not in our Commerce. Only when we are brought low by pain and sickness--when we are confronted by death itself--then we call out 'G.o.d!

G.o.d!' like cowards, praying for help from the Power we have negatived all our lives! Here is the evil, O children all!--we have forgotten Our Father! We arrange all our affairs in life without giving Him a thought!

Our pleasures, our gains, our advantages,--are calculated without consulting His good pleasure. He is last, or not at all,--when He should be first, and in everything! The end of this is misery;--it must be so; it cannot by law be anything else. For what is G.o.d? Who is G.o.d? G.o.d is a name merely,--but we give it to that Unseen, but ever working Force which rules the Universe! The coldest atheist that ever breathed must own that somehow,--by some means or other,--the Universe _is_ ruled,--for if it were not, we should know nothing of it. Therefore, when we set aside, or leave out the consciousness and acknowledgment of the Ruler, the ruling of our affairs must, of necessity, go wrong!

”I cannot preach to you--I cannot out of my own conscience recommend to you one or the other form of faith as the way to peace and wisdom;--but I can and do Beseech you to remember the Note Dominant of this great Universe--the Note that sounds through high and low,--through small and great alike!--and that must and will in due course absorb all our discords into Everlasting Harmony! Try not to put this fact out of your lives,--that Justice and Order are the rule of the spheres; and that whenever we depart from these, even in the smallest contingency, confusion reigns. How hard it is to believe in Justice and Order, you will tell me,--when the poor are not treated with the same consideration as the rich,--and when money will buy place and position! True! It is hard to believe,--but it is believable nevertheless. As the lungs and the heart are the life of the human body, so are Justice and Order the life of the Universe,--and when these are pushed out of place, or become diseased in the composition of a human state or community, then the life of that state or community is threatened;--and unless remedies are quickly to hand, it must end. You all know the position of things among yourselves to-day;--you all know that there is no trust to be placed in Churches, Kings or Parliaments;--that the world is in a state of ferment and unrest,--moving towards Change;--change imminent--change, possibly, disastrous! And if it is You who know, it is likewise You who must seize the hour as it approaches!--seize it as you would seize a robber by the throat, and demand its business;--search its heart;--deprive it of its weapons;--and learn from it its message! A message it may be of wild alarm--of tearing up old conventions;--of thrusting forth old abuses; a message full of clamour and outcry--but whatever the uproar, doubt not that we shall hear the voice of the Forgotten G.o.d thundering in our ears at the close! We shall have found our way closer to Him--and with penitence and prayer, we shall ask to be forgiven for having wandered away from Him so long!

”And will He not pardon? Yes,--He will, because He must! To Him we owe our existence;--He alone is responsible for our life, our probation, our progress, our striving through many errors towards Perfection! He, who sees all, must needs have pity for His creature Man! Out of the evolutions of a blind Time, He has made the poor weak human being, who in the first days of his sojourn on earth had neither covering nor home.

Less protected than the beasts of the forest, he found himself compelled to Think!--to think out his own means of shelter,--to contrive his own weapons of defence. Slowly, and by painful degrees, from Savagery he has emerged to Civilization;--wherefore it is evident that his Maker meant Thought to be his first principle, and Action his second. He who does not work, shall not eat;--he who does not use all his faculties for improvement, shall by and by have none to use. Injustice and corruption are amongst us, merely because we ourselves have failed to resist their first inroads. Who is it that complains of wrong? Let him hasten to his own amending,--and he will find a thousand hands, a thousand hearts ready to work with him! All Nature is on the side of health in the body, as of health in the State. All Nature fights against disease,--physical and moral. Therefore do not,--dear friends and children!--sit idle and pa.s.sive, submitting yourselves to be deceived, as if you had no force to withstand deception! Show that you hate lies, and will have none of them,--show that you will not be imposed upon--and decline to be led or governed by party agents, who persuade you to your own and your country's destruction! The voice of the People can no longer be heard in a purchased Press;--let it echo forth then, in stronger form than ephemeral print, which to-day is glanced at, and to-morrow is forgotten;--wherever and whenever you are given the chance to meet, and to speak, let your authority as the workers, the ratepayers, and supporters of the State be heard; and do not You, without whom even the King could not keep his throne, consent to be set aside as the Unvalued Majority! Prove, by your own firm att.i.tude that without You, nothing can be done! It is time, oh people of my heart!--it is time you spoke clearly! G.o.d is moving His thought through your souls--G.o.d stirs in you the fear, the discontent, the suspicion that all is not well with your country;--and it is the Spirit of G.o.d which breathes in the warning note of the time--

”'Hark to the voice of the time!

The mult.i.tude think forthemselves, And weigh their condition each one; The drudge has a spirit sublime, And whether he hammers or delves, He reads when his labour is done; And learns, though he groan under poverty's ban, That freedom to Think, is the birthright of man!'

”Learn,” she continued,--as a low deep murmur of agreement ran through the room; ”Learn to what strange uses G.o.d puts even such men of this world, whose sole existence has been for the cause of ama.s.sing money! They have acted as the merest machines, gathering in the millions;--gathering, gathering them in! For what purpose? Lo, they are smitten down in the prime of their lives, and the gold they have piled up is at once scattered! Much of it becomes used for educational purposes;--and some of these dead millionaires have, as it were thrown Education at the heads of the people, and almost pauperised it. Far away in Great Britain, a millionaire has recently made the Scottish University education 'free' to all students,--instead of, as it used to be, hard to get, and well worth working to win. Now,--through the wealth of one man, it is turned into a pauper's allowance;--like offering the smallest silver coin to a reduced gentleman. The pride,--the skill,--the self-renunciation,--the strong determination to succeed, which form fine character, and which taught the struggling student to win his own University education, are all wiped out;--there is no longer any necessity for the practice of these manly and self-sustaining virtues.

The harm that will be done is probably not yet perceivable; but it will be incalculable. Education, turned into a kind of pauper's monopoly, will have widely different results to those just now imagined! But with all the contemptuous throwing out of the unneeded kitchen-waste of millionaires,--still Education is the thing to take at any price, and under any circ.u.mstances;--because it alone is capable of giving power!

It alone will 'put down the mighty from their seats, and exalt the humble and the meek.' It alone will give us the force to fight our taskmasters with their own weapons, and to place them where they should be, coequal with us, but not superior,--considerate of us, but not commanding us,--and above all things, bound to make their records of such work as they do for the State--clean!”

A hurricane of applause interrupted her,--she waited till it subsided, then went on quietly.

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