|
Main
- books.jibble.org
My Books
- IRC Hacks
Misc. Articles
- Meaning of Jibble
- M4 Su Doku
- Computer Scrapbooking
- Setting up Java
- Bootable Java
- Cookies in Java
- Dynamic Graphs
- Social Shakespeare
External Links
- Paul Mutton
- Jibble Photo Gallery
- Jibble Forums
- Google Landmarks
- Jibble Shop
- Free Books
- Intershot Ltd
|
books.jibble.org
Previous Page
| Next Page
Page 100
TEMPTER. What a question! I've never really thought about it. Hm!
STRANGER. And have you ever thought of this: we may be born in
guilt?
TEMPTER. That's nothing to do with me: I concern myself with the
present.
STRANGER. Good! Don't you think we're sometimes punished wrongly,
so that we fail to see the logical connection, though it exists?
TEMPTER. Logic's not missing; but all life's a tissue of offences,
mistakes, errors, that are comparatively blameless owing to human
weakness, but that are punished by the most consistent revenge.
Everything's revenged, even our injudicious actions. Who forgives?
A magnanimous man-sometimes; heavenly justice, never! (A PILGRIM
appears in the background.) See! A penitent! I'd like to know what
wrong he's done. We'll ask him. Welcome to our quiet meadows,
peaceful wanderer! Take your place at the simple table of the
ascetic, at which there are no more temptations.
PILGRIM. Thank you, fellow traveller in the vale of woe.
TEMPTER. What kind of woe is yours?
PILGRIM. None in particular; on the contrary, the hour of
liberation's struck, and I'm going up there to receive absolution.
STRANGER. Listen, haven't we two met before?
PILGRIM. I think so, certainly.
STRANGER. Caesar! You're Caesar!
PILGRIM. I used to be; but I am no longer.
TEMPTER. Ha ha! Imperial acquaintance. Really! But tell us, tell us!
PILGRIM. You shall hear. Now I've a right to speak, for my penance
is at an end. When we met at a certain doctor's house, I was shut
up there as a madman and supposed to be suffering from the illusion
that I was Caesar. Now the Stranger shall hear the truth of the
matter: I never believed it, but I was forced by scruples of
conscience to put a good face on it. ... A friend of mine, a bad
friend, had written proof that I was the victim of a misunderstanding;
but he didn't speak when he should have, and I took his silence as
a request not to speak either-and to suffer. Why did I? Well, in my
youth I was once in great need. I was received as a guest in a
house on an island far out to sea by a man who, in spite of unusual
gifts, had been passed over for promotion--owing to his senseless
pride. This man, by solitary brooding on his lot, had come to hold
quite extraordinary views about himself. I noticed it, but I said
nothing. One day this man's wife told me that he was sometimes
mentally unbalanced; and then thought he was Julius Caesar. For
many years I kept this secret conscientiously, for I'm not
ungrateful by nature. But life's tricky. It happened a few years
later that this Caesar laid rough hands on my most intimate fate.
In anger at this I betrayed the secret of his Caesar mania and made
my erstwhile benefactor such a laughing stock, that his existence
became unbearable to him. And now listen how Nemesis overtakes one!
A year later I wrote a book-I am, you must know, an author who's
not made his name. ... And in this book I described incidents of
family life: how I played with my daughter--she was called Julia,
as Caesar's daughter was--and with my wife, whom we called Caesar's
wife because no one spoke evil of her. ... Well, this recreation,
in which my mother-in-law joined too, cost me dear. When I was
looking through the proofs of my book, I saw the danger and said to
myself: you'll trip yourself up. I wanted to cut it out but, if
you'll believe it, the pen refused, and an inner voice said to me:
let it stand! It did stand! And I fell.
STRANGER. Why didn't you publish the letter from your friend that
would have explained everything?
PILGRIM. When the disaster had happened I felt at once that it was
the finger of God, and that I must suffer for my ingratitude.
STRANGER. And you did suffer?
PILGRIM. Not at all! I smiled to myself and wouldn't let myself be
put out. And because I accepted my punishment with calmness and
humility God lightened my burden; and I didn't feel myself
ridiculous.
Previous Page
| Next Page
|
|