Part 35 (1/2)
Ar what had been told him Were his emotions those of pleasure or of pain? At first, the foroodness of his disposition made him instinctively rejoice in the happiness of his friend For a few etfulness lasted, was happy in the participation of the other's hopes But this frame of mind was only momentary We have seen how an answer of Holden was sufficient to restore his gloohts chased each other in wild confusion, over which he had no control, which he reproached hi--which he would have excluded, if he could The connection between him and the Solitary was one of ament that united them For years had he known Holden, but it was only within a short tied, himself) had revealed to him his own hideousness, that he had been attracted to the Solitary Should Holden recover his son, should his heart expand once more to admit worldly joys, would it not be closed to him? As he once felt indifference towards Holden, so would not Holden, by a change of circu of new desires and new hopes, by the occupancy of e unexperienced, stand to him in other and colder relations? These reflections were not clear, distinct, sharply defined They drove through his ed and torn, like stors struggling with one another in his of his nature, and drive ahatever was inconsistent with truth and reason--the other whispering doubt, and selfishness, and despair He rose and paced, with rapid steps, the room
”Has it co at his condition ”A in the happiness of others? A mass of selfishness? O! once it was not so
I will resist these thoughts which come from the bottomless pit They shall not master me They are the terieved away the spirit? Is there place for repentance? Aht it in vain with race of God, why not I? Why not I, that I o to my own place? Already I feel and know hbor If I did, would I not sympathize in his happiness? Would this wretched self for ever interpose? I never knew myself before I no the unutterable vileness of my heart I would hide it froels--fro stirred not fro as the sun reolden sunshi+ne deepened his olden It was a coppery, unnatural light It looked poisonous It seelare
He heard the laugh of aIt sounded like the h directed at hier, to see who it was that was triu over his misery
He looked up and down the street, but could see no one The disappointment still further irritated hi who had wounded him? Was the assassin to be permitted to stab him in the back? Was he not to be allowed to defend hi all over
Faith's canary bird was singing, at the top of its voice Ar, with fluttering wings and elevated head, andtirated on his feelings He rose and removed it into another room
He folded his arms, his head fell upon his chest, and he shut his eyes to exclude the light ”I am out of harmony with all creation,”
he said ”I as This is the evidence of my doom Only the blessed can be in harmony with God's works Heaven is harmony--the music of his laws Evil is discord--myself am discord”
Faith had still soh even at her entrance he started ”like a guilty thing surprised” Her presence was a charm to abate the violence of the hurricane He could not resist the gentle tones of her voice, and at the spell his cal acknowledged it to hiood
I cannot be wholly evil, he thought, if the approach of a pure angel gives me pleasure The touch of Ithuriel's spear reveals deformity where it exists; in me it discloses beauty
With her he could talk over the ordinary affairs of the day with cal the perfect confidence between them, that he never adverted to the co he kneould possess the highest interest for her
It betrays, perhaps, the weakened and diseased condition of alike an inflamed limb at the apprehension of a touch
As the father listened and looked at his child, he felt transported into a region whither the demons could not come They could not endure her purity; they could not abide her brightness Her influence was a barrier htier than the wall that encircled Paradise, and over which no evil thing could leap He therefore kept her by him as much as possible He manifested uneasiness when she ay His consolation and hope was Faith As the Roman prisoner drank life fro drew strength froelic spirit his own had kindled
Yet was his daughter unconscious of the whole influence she exerted, nor had she even a distant apprehension of the chaos of his mind
Hoould she have been startled could she have beheld the seething cauldron! But into that, only the Eye that surveys all things could look
Thus several days passed by An ordinary observer would have noticed no change in Ar, except that his appetite diminished, and he seemed restless Doctor Elmer and Faith both remarked these syrieved the latter
Accustomed to repose unlimited confidence in the medical skill of the physician, and too modest to have an opinion adverse to that of another older than herself, and in a departe except as colored by filial fears and affection, and, perhaps, distorted by them out of its reasonable proportions, Faith went on froe would take place, and that she should have the happiness of seeing her dear father restored to his former cheerfulness
It is painful to follow the sad moods of a noble mind, conscious of its aberrations, and yet unable to control the it through all its windings, and exhibiting it naked to the view, and if we had,unnecessary pain, both on the writer and the reader It is our object only so far to sketch the state of Arible
His restlessness has been alluded to He found hi to rest he would lie wide awake, vainly courting the gentle influence that see sun would sometimes stream into thebefore sleep had visited his eyelids, and he would rise haggard, and weary, and desponding And if he did sink into sluetfulness, but into a confused hts The difficulty of obtaining sleep had lately induced a habit of reading late into the night, and not unfrequently even into the ht her chamber, and when she supposed he was in bed, he was seated in his solitary roo to fasten his attention on a book, and to produce the condition favorable to repose
The darkness of his looracious proy of the New Testament, or to those visions of a future state of beatitude, which occasionally light up the soates of Paradise were for a moment opened, to let out a radiance on a darkness that would else be too disheartening and distracting; but to the wailings of the prophets and denunciations of punishment These he fastened on with a fatal tenacity, and by a perverted ingenuity, in some way or other connected with hiht could pass through his iination or memory, but, by some diabolical alchemy, was stripped of its sanative and healthful properties, and converted into harhts” was a book that possessed peculiar attractions For hours would he hang over its distressful pages, and many were the leaves blotted by his tears Yet those tears relieved him not Still, from time to time, would he recur to the book, as if te to find, if possible, in the wretchedness of another, a lower deep than his own
Especially in the soleht, when the silence was so profound, he could fancy he heard the flickering of the candles, he read the book Then hanging upon i all their ination, he would sink from one depth of wretchedness to another, till he seeht could ever penetrate, or pluht late, until as if unable to endure the ies of woe it conjured up, he pushed the book away fro in torrents He walked to theand looked out He could see nothing, except as the landscape was revealed for an instant by a flash of lightning He could hear nothing, except the peals of thunder rolling through the valleys He took a candle, and walked cautiously to the door of Faith's chamber, to see if she were asleep The door was ajar, for the purpose of ventilation, and, shading the light with his hand, Arhter without waking her She lay in the profound slumber of health and youth, undisturbed by the noise of the thunder, as one conscious of a protecting Providence Her left hand was under her cheek, the black hair co was scarcely perceptible, but soft and quiet as an infant's An expression of happiness rested on her features, and the color was a little kindled in her cheek, looking brighter in contrast with the linen sheet
”She sleeps,” he thought, ”as if there were no sin and misery in the world And why should she not? What has she to do with the angels in shi+ning garments around her bed, unless my approach has driven them away
Heaven takes care of its own So I could sleep once Will the tiuilty she cannot sleep? Alrave They are fortunate who die young They are taken from the evil to come The heart ceases to beat before it becoht her salvation would be assured What infinite gain! The murderer could inflict no injury, but would confer a benefit”
Why did he start? Why did he shudder all over? Why did he hastily turn round, and shut the door, and hasten to his own roo fro the , threw it violently into the dark? But aout the candles, and noiselessly descending the stairs, he as quietly opened and shut the front door, and stood in the open air