University of Virginia Library

Chapter XVI.

Scene—A mountainous pass; the path rugged and dangerous; a huge trunk of pine thrown, as a bridge, over a torrent.
Enter Falkner.
FALKNER.

Enter Jurus, hastily, whose interruption seems to ruffle Falkner.
JURUS.
Leave him unscathed to an offended God!
His death could nothing grace thy sister's grave;
Her griefs are wept away! Think better on't;
The Lady Bertha loves thee, fame reports;
Think less of him, more of thine interest.
If all the wicked must be hurled to death,
The world would lack inhabitants ere long;
I'd have thee to thine interest more alert
Than cast thy life upon a ruffian's sword!

FALKNER,
contemptuously.
Interest! Self-interest! 'Tis the common cant,
The mean in mind call wisdom of the world;
'Tis that which leads the shallow stream of life,
Arrays the hypocrite in virtue's guise,
Calls over-reaching, knowledge of mankind!
Dull Honesty the workhouse slave, whose rags
Lend jests to those whose finer cunning thrives.
Self-interest! 'Tis a thing whose heart is coin!
And yet the higher virtues of the soul
Find in its mouth an hourly currency;
None speak of reputation, honour, worth,
Frank liberality, and generous faith,
None, like self-interest; so expert the cheat,
It half deceives itself with its own vaunts!
Self-interest! 'tis the dastard's ready shield,
The tyrant's plea, the swindler's crafty creed,
Who, honouring law, stops short of legal crime;
'Tis—mark me, sir! a boaster in success;
A mean and abject driveller in that hour
Adversity's sharp whip cracks at its heels!
Self-interest! name it not! there is no sound
So sickening, so perfidious to mine ears:
If e'er my stay offend thee, there's the word
Shall rid thee of my presence! Interest!
Self-interest!

JURUS.
Too hot, and over nice!
But 'tis thy humour to behold things thus,
With a most jaundiced and distemper'd view;
If each man studied his true interest
His fellow-men were better'd by that study.
Exaggeration is not argument,
Nor hard words facts. But be that as thou wilt,
Another's happiness is in thy keeping!
Thou hast no right to peril her young life
In perilling thine own: avoid this man!
His sins, like bloodhounds, hunt him to a death
More sure, more keen, than stab of any steel!
When broken, friendless, old before his time,
Revenge could seek no fiercer punishment.
Less abject, less debased, might claim thy sword.
Oh, I implore thee give this venture pause!
Instead of the corrosion of thy conscience,
Reap the enjoyment of a godlike act,
And learn forgiveness!

FALKNER.
Jurus!
Thou'st heard of one, a pilgrim to some shrine,
Who travelled weeks and months, nor food, nor sleep,
For the dry crust could scarce deserve that name,
And the few snatches of outwearied nature
Might scarcely claim the title of repose.
What wouldst thou think, after all toil and fasting,
All conquering of the rough impediments
Mountain, flood, rock, might cast upon his way,
To count not elemental harassings—
If, when his eye beheld the shrine he sought,
His foot pressed—ay, within few steps of all
For which he'd welcomed pain, fatigue, and fasting,
Thou crossedst his path, and saidst, “Proceed no further,
Religion points to thy neglected home!
'Tis Superstition, and not Sanctity,
Which mocks thee here! Get to thy vineyard back!”
Thinkst thou he'd turn his staff from east to west,
And easily, as the blown thistle-down,
Go, at thy breath, the way thou marshall'dst him?
No! Feelings time hath rooted change not thus:
Granting his theme Devotion, mine Revenge!
His Love, mine Hate! Why human hate is fixed
As Herculean rock when love's a reed!
Thus 'tis with me, each hour that intervenes
Between Resolve and my assured Revenge
Is cursed as barren! Let me hence!

JURUS.
A moment and I quit thee; yet beware
Lest Passion urge thee down a gulf so deep
That Honour ne'er again may snatch thee back;
Stain not thy sword but in accepted challenge,
And Heaven shield well the right! [Falkner impatient.]

Be calm!

FALKNER.
Thou seest I'm calm!

JURUS.
Calm? Yes, that calm which follows when we hurl
A rock from some high cliff that fronts the sea;
That calm which intervenes between its fall
And its hoarse thunder in the deep below!
Thus calm art thou! For now is thy descent;
The thunder is to come! [Falkner still more impatient.]

Soon, thou shalt go soon!

FALKNER.
Shall? Nay, I will!

JURUS.
Thou shalt!

FALKNER.
[Exit Falkner.]

JURUS.
Counsel unloved is vain: alas, for Man,
Who lifts his evil Passions on a throne,
Crowns it with curses, swears allegiance to it,
Bends, like a slave, to minister its wish,
And steep'd in sin, cries out, “'Tis Destiny!”
Call it by any name, 'tis Passion still:
Whereon—
If there's, indeed, that thing called “Destiny,”
It rides as with a whirlwind to destruction:
I follow; but to what? Oh, dreadful thought!
May Pity hide the page that tells the deed,
Or blot it out for ever!

[Exit Jurus.]