Zanoni — Edward Bulwer-Lytton
not the less determined never tamely to yield her to another.” Zanoni looked gravely at the young man, whose sparkling eyes and heightened color testified the spirit to support his words, and replied, “So bold! well; it becomes you. But take my advice; wait yet nine days, and tell me then if you will marry the fairest and the purest creature that ever crossed your path.” “ But if you love her, why — why —” “Why am I anxious that she should wed another? — to save her from myself! Listen to me. That girl, humble and uneducated though she be, has in her the seeds of the most lofty qualities and virtues. She can be all to the man she loves, —all that man can desire in wife. Her soul, developed by affection, will elevate your own; it will influence your fortunes, exalt your destiny; you will become a great and a prosperous man. If, on the contrary, she fall to me, I know not what may be her lot; but I know that there is an ordeal which few can pass, and which hitherto no woman has survived.” As Zanoni spoke, his face became colorless, and there was something in his voice that froze the warm blood of the listener. “What is this mystery which surrounds you? ” exclaimed Glyndon, unable to repress his emotion. “Are you, in truth, different from other men? Have you passed the boundary of lawful knowledge? Are you, as some declare, a sorcerer, or only a— ” “Hush!” interrupted Zanoni, gently, and with a smile of singular but melancholy sweetness; “ have you earned the right to ask me these questions? Though Italy still boast an Inquisition, its power is rivelled as a leaf which the first wind shall scatter. The days of
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torture and persecution are over; and a man may live as he pleases, and talk as it suits him, without fear of the stake and the rack. Since I can defy persecution, pardon me if I do not yield to curiosity.” Glyndon blushed, and rose. In spite of his love for Viola, and his natural terror of such a rival, he felt himself irresistibly drawn towards the very man he had most cause to suspect and dread. He held out his hand to Zanoni, saying, “ Well, then, if we are to be rivals, our swords must settle our rights; till then I would fain be friends.” “Friends! You know not what you ask.” “ Wnigmas again! ” “Enigmas!” cried Zanoni, passionately; “ay! can you dare to solve them? Not till then could I give you my right hand, and call you friend.” “J could dare everything and all things for the attainment of superhuman wisdom,” said Glyndon, and his countenance was lighted up with wild and intense enthusiasm. Zanoni observed him in thoughtful silence. “The seeds of the ancestor live in the son,” he muttered; “he may —yet—” He broke off abruptly; then, speaking aloud, “Go, Glyndon,” said he; “we shall meet again, but I will not ask your answer till the hour presses for decision.”
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CHAPTER VI.
*T is certain that this man has an estate of fifty thousand livres, and seems to be a person of very great accomplishments. But, then, if he’s a wizard, are wizards so devoutly given as this man seems to be? In short, I could make neither head nor tail on’t.— THe Count pe Gasatis, Translation affixed to the second edition of the “ Rape of the Lock.”
Or all the weaknesses which little men rail against, there is none that they are more apt to ridicule than the tendency to believe. And of all the signs of a corrupt heart and a feeble head, the tendency of incredulity is the surest. Real philosophy seeks rather to solve than to deny. While we hear, every day, the small pretenders to science talk of the absurdities of alchemy and the dream of the Philosopher’s Stone, a more erudite knowledge is aware that by alchemists the greatest discoveries in science have been made, and much which still seems abstruse, had we the key to the mystic phraseology they were compelled to adopt, might open the way to yet more noble acquisitions. The Philosopher’s Stone itself has seemed no visionary chimera to some of the soundest chemists that even the present century has produced.t Man can-
1 Mr. Disraeli, in his “Curiosities of Literature” (article “Alchem”’), after quoting the sanguine judgments of modern chemists as to the transmutation of metals, observes of one yet greater and more recent than those to which Glyndon’s thoughts could have referred, “Sir Humphry Davy told me that he did not consider this undiscovered art as impossible; but should it ever be discovered, it would certainly be useless.”
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not the less determined never tamely to yield her to another.” Zanoni looked gravely at the young man, whose sparkling eyes and heightened color testified the spirit to support his words, and replied, “So bold! well; it becomes you. But take my advice; wait yet nine days, and tell me then if you will marry the fairest and the purest creature that ever crossed your path.” “ But if you love her, why — why —” “Why am I anxious that she should wed another? — to save her from myself! Listen to me. That girl, humble and uneducated though she be, has in her the seeds of the most lofty qualities and virtues. She can be all to the man she loves, —all that man can desire in wife. Her soul, developed by affection, will elevate your own; it will influence your fortunes, exalt your destiny; you will become a great and a prosperous man. If, on the contrary, she fall to me, I know not what may be her lot; but I know that there is an ordeal which few can pass, and which hitherto no woman has survived.” As Zanoni spoke, his face became colorless, and there was something in his voice that froze the warm blood of the listener. “What is this mystery which surrounds you? ” exclaimed Glyndon, unable to repress his emotion. “Are you, in truth, different from other men? Have you passed the boundary of lawful knowledge? Are you, as some declare, a sorcerer, or only a— ” “Hush!” interrupted Zanoni, gently, and with a smile of singular but melancholy sweetness; “ have you earned the right to ask me these questions? Though Italy still boast an Inquisition, its power is rivelled as a leaf which the first wind shall scatter. The days of
p. 105
torture and persecution are over; and a man may live as he pleases, and talk as it suits him, without fear of the stake and the rack. Since I can defy persecution, pardon me if I do not yield to curiosity.” Glyndon blushed, and rose. In spite of his love for Viola, and his natural terror of such a rival, he felt himself irresistibly drawn towards the very man he had most cause to suspect and dread. He held out his hand to Zanoni, saying, “ Well, then, if we are to be rivals, our swords must settle our rights; till then I would fain be friends.” “Friends! You know not what you ask.” “ Wnigmas again! ” “Enigmas!” cried Zanoni, passionately; “ay! can you dare to solve them? Not till then could I give you my right hand, and call you friend.” “J could dare everything and all things for the attainment of superhuman wisdom,” said Glyndon, and his countenance was lighted up with wild and intense enthusiasm. Zanoni observed him in thoughtful silence. “The seeds of the ancestor live in the son,” he muttered; “he may —yet—” He broke off abruptly; then, speaking aloud, “Go, Glyndon,” said he; “we shall meet again, but I will not ask your answer till the hour presses for decision.”
p. 106
CHAPTER VI.
*T is certain that this man has an estate of fifty thousand livres, and seems to be a person of very great accomplishments. But, then, if he’s a wizard, are wizards so devoutly given as this man seems to be? In short, I could make neither head nor tail on’t.— THe Count pe Gasatis, Translation affixed to the second edition of the “ Rape of the Lock.”
Or all the weaknesses which little men rail against, there is none that they are more apt to ridicule than the tendency to believe. And of all the signs of a corrupt heart and a feeble head, the tendency of incredulity is the surest. Real philosophy seeks rather to solve than to deny. While we hear, every day, the small pretenders to science talk of the absurdities of alchemy and the dream of the Philosopher’s Stone, a more erudite knowledge is aware that by alchemists the greatest discoveries in science have been made, and much which still seems abstruse, had we the key to the mystic phraseology they were compelled to adopt, might open the way to yet more noble acquisitions. The Philosopher’s Stone itself has seemed no visionary chimera to some of the soundest chemists that even the present century has produced.t Man can-
1 Mr. Disraeli, in his “Curiosities of Literature” (article “Alchem”’), after quoting the sanguine judgments of modern chemists as to the transmutation of metals, observes of one yet greater and more recent than those to which Glyndon’s thoughts could have referred, “Sir Humphry Davy told me that he did not consider this undiscovered are as impossible; but should it ever be discovered, it would certainly be useless.”
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