The Catholic World Volume Iii Part 56

It was about this stage, also, that the master insisted on a special training in natural history and mathematics. In his youth Origen had been educated, as we have seen, by his father in the whole circle of the sciences of the day. Such an education was possible then, though impossible now, and the spirit of Alexandrian teaching was especially attached to the sciences that regarded numbers, the figure of the earth, and nature. The schools of the Greek philosophers had always tolerated these sciences in their own precincts; nay, most of the schools themselves had arisen from attempts made in the direction of those very sciences, and few of them had attempted to distinguish accurately between physics and metaphysics. Moreover, geography, astronomy, and geometry, were the peculiar property of the Museum, for Eratosthenes, Euclid, Ilipparchus, and Ptolemy himself, had observed and taught within its walls. Origen, therefore, would not be likely to undervalue those interesting sciences which he had studied with his father, and which nine out of ten of his educated catechumens were more or less {365} acquainted, and puzzled, or delighted, with. Happy days when mathematics was little and chemistry in its infancy, when astronomy lived shut up in a tower, clad in mystic vesture, and when geology was yet in the womb of its mother earth! Enviable times, when they all (such at least as were born) could be sufficiently attended to and provided for in a casual paragraph of a theological instruction, or brought into a philosophical discussion to be admired and dismissed! Origen, however, had, as usual, a deeper motive for bringing physics and mathematics into his system. We need not remind the reader that, if Plato can be considered to have a weak part, that part is where he goes into Pythagorean speculations about bodies, numbers, and regular solids. His revivers, about the time we are speaking of, had with the usual instinct of revivers found out his weak part, and made the most of it, as if it had been the sublimest evolution of his genius. We may guess what was taking place from what afterward did take place, when even Porphyry fluctuated all his life between pretensions to philosophy and what Saint Augustine calls "sacrilegious curiosity," and when the whimsical triads of poor old Proclus were powerless to stop the deluge of theurgy, incantations, and all superst.i.tions that finally swamped Neo-Platonism for ever.

With this view present to our minds the words of the scholar in this place are very significant "By these two studies, geometry and astronomy, he made us _a path toward heaven_," The three words that Saint Gregory uses in the description of this part of the master's teaching are worth noticing. The first is Geometry, which is taken to mean everything that relates to the earth's surface. The second is astronomy, which treats of the face of the heavens. The third is physiology, which is the science of nature, or of all that comes between heaven and earth. So that Origen's scientific teaching was truly encyclopaedic. He was, moreover, an experimental philosopher, and did not merely retail the theories of others. He a.n.a.lyzed things and resolved them into their elements (their "very first" elements, says the scholar); he descanted on the multiform changes and conversions of things, partly from his own discoveries, and gave his hearers a rational admiration for the sacredness and perfection of nature, instead of a blind and stupid bewilderment; he "carved on their minds geometry the unquestionable, so dear to all, and astronomy that searches the upper air." What were the precise details of his teachings on these subjects it would be unfair to ask, even if it were possible to answer. We know that he thought diamonds and precious stones were formed from dew, but this is no proof he was behind his age; and his acquaintance with the literature of the subject proves he was, if anything, before it. With regard to naphtha, the magnet, and the looking-gla.s.s, it will be pleasing to know he was substantially right. He was, perhaps, the first to make a spiritual use of the accepted notion that the serpent was powerless against the stag; the reason is, he says, that the stag is the type of Christ warring against Anti-Christ. That he believed in griffins is unfortunate, but natural in an Alexandrian, who had lived in an atmosphere d stories brought down from the upper Nile by the ingenious sailors. As to his "denying the existence of _the Tragelaphus_" we must remain ignorant whether it redounds to his credit or otherwise, until modern researches have exhausted the African continent.

TO BE CONTINUED.

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Translated from the Revue Contemporaine.

EVE DE LA TOUR-D'ADAM.

BY G. DE LA LANDELLE.

I hate those pretentious and high-sounding Christian names which certain upstarts inflict as a label of ridicule on their children; but, though I should be accused of having two weights and two measures, I should be pleased to see perpetuated in the descendants of a n.o.ble race the most fantastic of those chosen by their ancestors. My antipathy gives way before the religion of remembrance, before heroic or knightly traditions. I love then even their oddity. I can pardon even their triviality. I perceive only the old glory, the reflection of which is preserved by these consecrated names.

Among the Roqueforts, who claim to have sprung from the Merovingians, they have, even to our days, the names of Clodimir, Chilperie, or Bathilde. Since the time of the Crusades, the youngest son of the Du Maistres is always an Amaury. The Canluries of Gonneville owe their names of Arosca and Essomerie to the discoveries of the celebrated navigator, their ancestor, who brought from southern lands, in 1503, the Prince Essomerie, son of the King Arosca, whom he adopted and married later, in Normandy, to one of his relations. There is a family in Brittany who never part with the names of Audren, Salomon, Grallow, or Conau. The Correas, originally from Portugal, pride themselves on seeing on their genealogical tree those of Caramuru and of Paragua.s.sus, which signify the _Man of Fire_ and _Great River_.

Chivalry, the Crusades, some semi-fabulous legend, some marvellous chronicle, the grand adventures of a Tancred or a Bohemond, the exploits of a Tannegry, finally, the great alliances, explain and justify in certain families the privileged use of first names too rare, or too commonplace, fantastic, romantic, strange, or old, to be suitable except for them.

Now, it was thus that, in virtue of an old custom, the grand-daughter of the Marquis de La Tour-d'Adam had received that of Eve at the baptismal fonts of St. Sulpice.

In pa.s.sing the Gorge d'Enfer, not far from the famous valley of Roncevaux, you have perhaps remarked the ruins, still majestic, of a tower which leans above a frightful precipice. The shepherds of the country maintain that it was built by the fathers of the human race; were I the most profound of archaeologists I should be very careful not to contradict them. Who can prove that the Pyrenees did not rise on the limits of Eden? In the fourteenth century was not all Europe convinced that the terrestrial paradise, engulfed in the Atlantic, rises partly above the water in the form of Saint Brandan's Isle, the promised land of the saints, where Enoch and Elias await the last day?

In the same manner that the erudite La Tour d'Auvergne, as simple as he was brave, has demonstrated in his "Origines Gauloises" that Adam and Eve spoke Bas-Breton, in the same manner the Basque tongue furnishes unexceptionable proofs of the antiquity {367} of the times of Adam which the waters of the deluge respected.

Be this as it may, antediluvian or not, Punic or Roman, Gothic, Saracen, or Spanish, the old tower was the cradle of an ill.u.s.trious family--ill.u.s.trious on both sides of the Pyrenees. From time immemorial the first-born was given the name of Adam or of Eve.

At the beginning of this simple history we have not the leisure to recount how a royal Moorish prisoner, who, it is said, was called Adam, escaped from the tower, carrying with him the heiress of the castle. Nor can we stop from the wars in Palestine one of the warlike ancestors of our Parisian heroine, a proud Crusader, who brought to his domains an Oriental Eve, the beloved daughter of we know not what Saladin.

These different traditions, which were not the only ones, made the customs of their ancestors very dear to the family of La Tour-d'Adam; but the young and merry companions of the grand-daughter of the last marquis did not care to inquire into the cause of her unusual name.

They kept themselves in bounds in finding it tolerably ridiculous that she should be called just like the ancestors of the human species.

"Really, I do not know who could have served as G.o.d-mother to our beautiful friend," said Clarisse Dufresnois, biting her lips. "In my days I would not consent to give so dangerous a name. When one hears it one seems to have a too decided fancy for forbidden fruit."

"Oh! Clarisse, that is mean," murmured Leonore.

This charitable and timid observation received no response. Albertine, Valerie, Suzanne, and several other young girls, who were chattering together while waiting the opening of the ball, seemed by their smiles to encourage the mocking spirit of Clarisse Dufresnois. They made a charming group. Blondes and brunettes, red and white, adorned with flowers and ribbons with delicate taste, they presented to the view an adorable reunion of smiles and graces, as they said in the last century. Youth, gaiety, freshness, beautiful black eyes, large blue eyes, lovely figures, wilful airs, piquant countenances, enjoyment, vivacity, delicacy--what then did they lack that the gentlemen cavaliers should make them wait? Truly, we cannot say; but their habitual delay contradicted the olden fame of French gallantry. These gentlemen, without doubt, were a thousand times culpable for Clarisse's little sarcasms.

"With the fortunate name of Eve," she continued, "should one not always be the first to show herself?"

"If you would say, at least the first to arrive," interrupted Leonore.

"But it has a grand air to appear late; it produces a sensation; one seats by her entrance all the most elegant dancers; one would be watched for, desired, impatiently waited for."

"For that matter, I am sure," said Leonore quickly, "Eve thinks little about all that; she is as simple as she is good."

"You see, girls," replied Clarisse, with equal vivacity, "that I have said something evil of our dear Eve! Goodness! I love her with all my heart. She is languid, cool, and sentimental; she has her little eccentricities. Who of us has not? I said simply that she is always the last to arrive; but, however, I do not think she is so much occupied in varying her toilette. She is inevitably crowned with artificial jasmine."

"Nothing becomes her better," said Leonore. "Beside, Eve is sufficiently pretty to be charming in anything."

"Doubtless," replied Clarisse, a little piqued; "only I ask, how can you tell what becomes her best when she has never worn anything else for at least four years."

"Four!" cried nearly all the girls. "Four years! Why, that is an age!"

"Four years of jasmine!" said Valerie; "what constancy!"

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"Bouquet, garland, crown, and I don't know what else," continued Clarisse, "Eve always has jasmine in some shape."

"For me," said Suzanne, "I would not, for anything on earth, show myself three times in succession with a branch or wreath of jasmine."

The word jasmine, repeated four or five times, made a young girl tremble as she entered, and, not knowing any of the young ladies, seat herself at a distance; but, as if drawn by the word which affected her so singularly, Louise de Mirefont took her place nearest to Clarisse.

Louise was nineteen; she did not yield in natural grace to Suzanne nor to Valerie; her color was equal in freshness to the charming Albertine's; Lucienne had not such brilliant black hair, Leonore an expression of gentleness not more sympathetic. A timidity acquired, perhaps, by a sudden trouble veiled the looks of the new rival who now disputed with all the palm of beauty; a lively carnation spread itself over her features, which had a faultless purity. With her blushes and her embarra.s.sment was mingled a vague sentiment of sadness; but what physiognomist would have been sufficiently skilful to explain the impression which affected her?

Of all the merry young girls collected at the ball, Louise was the simplest attired. She was beautiful enough to carry off any costume; a simple white dress, a light, rose-colored ribbon around her waist, that was all. All her companions had either flowers or pearls in their hair; she alone had no other coiffure than her waving curls, which rolled round her white shoulders. Each young girl had some rarity in her toilette. Clarisse, for example, had admirable bracelets and ear-rings, Lucienne, had a valuable cameo, Suzanne was distinguished by a spencer of an original pattern, even Leonore by knots of ribbons of exquisite taste, Albertine by bands of coral interwoven in the tresses of her fair hair.

No borrowed ornament could have increased the value of Louise's charms, whom if one could not without hesitation discern as the prize of the concourse, at least as the most faithful lover of the Greek type the model of which she presented in her cla.s.sic perfection.

At the moment she approached, Leonore had said, indulgently: "Four years! four winters!--without doubt Clarisse exaggerates."

"No, Miss Leonore, I do not exaggerate; I repeat that for four years Eve has worn only jasmine."

Clarisse alone could call up the memories of four years; she was the oldest of all her friends. Some of these had been only a few months out of the convent, others had made their entrance into society only the winter preceding. She was not even of the same age as Eve, who had come out much earlier than any of them.

Clarisse had just pa.s.sed the age of twenty-five. Having dreamed of six or seven superb marriages, she had the grief of aspiring to a seventh dream, and this was why her indulgence, at all times mediocre enough, went decreasing in hope as hope deceived, or in inverse ratio to the square of her age, to help ourselves for once, by chance, by the algebraic style. Clarisse could have said, but she did not, that she had seen Eve de La Tour-d'Adam, crowned with roses, the first time she appeared at the house of the Comtesse de Peyrolles.

Four or five springs, at most, made a second crown of roses for the brow of that maiden, who conducted an old septuagenary whose ideas and decorations recounted the exploits of a generation almost extinct. Eve advanced on the arm of the Marquis de La Tour-d'Adam, who had not been seen for several years. Man of the world as he had been in his youth, and was no longer, the marquis reserved to himself to introduce her into society. {369} Eve was very young, but the weight of years was heavy on the old man. The hour was advanced because he wished it so.

Their entrance made a great sensation; Clarisse remembered that it made too much.

Fair, delicately pale, frail and slender as a wasp, the only and last heiress of the Lords de La Tour-d'Adam, Eve, the child yet unknown, attracted all eyes. Give life to one of those aerial vignettes to which the English sculptors deny nothing, unless it is a soul; render motion to those images of the saints which the simple and pious workmen sculpture and _animate_ in some sort with their faith, for the front of our temples; spread an expression of angelic sweetness and infinite tenderness over the countenance of a virgin purer than the azure of the sky; around this creation of your least profane thought let there reign an atmosphere of generous sympathies, that hearts may be touched, that souls may he captive, that men and women shall be equally attracted by this undefined sentiment, commonly called of interest, that this interest shall extend to every harmonious gesture, to every movement, to every word of the fair young girl; take into account the veneration inspired by the presence of the old gentleman, her grandfather--and you will understand at once what was Eve, and the effect of her first appearance at Madame de Peyrolles'.

Four years had pa.s.sed since then. Eve now had entered her nineteenth year. Had she grown old in one day, had she grown young again, or some slow suffering, unknown phenomenon, some mysterious illness, was it, that, without wasting the young girl, abruptly arrested her development, up to that time so precocious? But, such as she was seen at Madame de Peyrolles' four winters before, as such Eve reappeared in the same drawing-room; only Clarisse Dufresnois had said enough about it--the crown of roses was replaced by a branch of jasmine entwined in her golden hair.

And, indeed, a branch of jasmine was placed on the front of the girl's dress, when dressed for the ball, and, accompanied by Madame du Castellet, her governess, she presented herself to her grandfather, who awaited her in the west parlor of the mansion of La Tour-d'Adam and welcomed her with a tender smile.

Eve came forward raising to him her sweet blue eyes, and, in melodious accents:

"My father," she said, "I have obeyed you; you see I am ready; but why will you oblige me to leave you again alone for all one long evening?'

"Child, I shall not be alone; I shall think that my Eve is amusing herself, I shall see her as if I were there! Youth should have innocent distractions. Oh! thou hast n.o.bly loved me with all thy heart, but the society of an old man like me does not suffice at thy age."

"G.o.d knows I would renounce this ball with happiness, in order to give you your evening reading."