Part 20

Madame Guyon's autobiography reveals the fact that Bossuet was enough interested in her case to have her removed to a nunnery near where he lived, and there he often called upon her. He read to her from his own writings, instead of analyzing hers, which proves priests to be simply men at the last. Bossuet needed the feminine mind to bolster his own, but Madame and he did not mix. In her autobiography she hesitates about actually condemning Bossuet, but describes him as short and fat, so it looks as if she were human, too, since what repelled her were his physical characteristics.

When a woman describes a man she always begins by telling how he looks.

Madame Guyon says: "The Bishop of Meaux wished me to change my name, so that, as he said, it should not be known I was in his diocese, and that people should not torment him on my account. The project was the finest in the world, if he could have kept a secret; but he told everybody he saw that I was in such a convent, under such a name. Immediately, from all sides, anonymous libels against me were sent to the Mother Superior and the nuns."

With Fenelon, it was very different. Her heart went out to him: he was the greatest man she had ever seen--greater even than Father La Combe.

Fenelon's first interview with Madame Guyon was simply in an official way, but her interest in him was very personal. This is evidenced from her brief, but very fervent, mention of the incident:

Having been visited by the Abbe de Fenelon, I was suddenly with extreme force and sweetness interested for him. It seemed to me our Lord united him to me very intimately, more so than any one else. It appeared to me that, as it were, a spiritual filiation took place between him and me. The next day, I had the opportunity of seeing him again. I felt interiorly this first interview did not satisfy him: that he did not relish me. I experienced a something which made me long to pour my heart into his; but I found nothing to correspond, and this made me suffer much. In the night I suffered extremely about him.

In the morning I saw him. We remained for some time in silence, and the cloud cleared off a little; but it was not yet as I wished it.

I suffered for eight whole days, after which I found myself united to him without obstacle, and from that time I find the union increasing in a pure and ineffable manner. It seems to me that my soul has a perfect rapport with his, and those words of David regarding Jonathan, that "his soul clave to that of David," appeared to me suitable for this union. Our Lord has made me understand the great designs He has for this person, and how dear he is to Him.

The justice of God causes suffering from time to time for certain souls until their entire purification. As soon as they have arrived where God wishes them, one suffers no longer for anything for them; and the union which had been often covered with clouds is cleared up in such a manner that it becomes like a very pure atmosphere, penetrated everywhere, without distinction, by the light of the sun. As Fenelon was given to me, in a more intimate manner than any other, what I have suffered, what I am suffering, and what I shall suffer for him, surpasses anything that can be told. The least

## partition between him and me, between him and God, is like a little

dirt in the eye, which causes it an extreme pain, and which would not inconvenience any other part of the body where it might be put. What I suffer for him is very different from what I suffer for others; but I am unable to discover the cause, unless it be God has united me to him more intimately than to any other, and that God has greater designs for him than for the others.

Fenelon the ascetic, he of the subtle intellect and high spiritual quality, had never met a woman on an absolute equality. Madame Guyon's religious fervor disarmed him. He saw her often, that he might comprehend the nature of her mission.

In the official investigation that followed, he naturally found himself the defender of her doctrines. She was condemned by the court, but Fenelon put in a minority report of explanation. The nature of the man was to defend the accused person; this was evidenced by his defense of the Huguenots, when he lifted up his voice for their liberty at a time when religious liberty was unknown. His words might have been the words of Thomas Jefferson, to whom Fenelon bore a strange resemblance in feature. Says Fenelon: "The right to be wrong in matters of religious belief must be accorded, otherwise we produce hypocrites instead of persons with an enlightened belief that is fully their own. If truth be mighty and God all-powerful, His children need not fear that disaster will follow freedom of thought."

After Madame Guyon was condemned she was allowed to go on suspended sentence, with a caution that silence was to be the price of her liberty, for before this she had attracted to herself, even in prison, congregations of several hundred to whom she preached, and among whom she distributed her writings.

The earnest, the sincere, the spiritual Fenelon never suspected where this friendship was to lead. Even when Madame Guyon slipped into his simple, little household as a servant under an assumed name, he was inwardly guileless. This proud woman with the domineering personality now wore wooden shoes and the garb of a scullion. She scrubbed the floors, did laundry-work, cooked, even worked in the garden looking after the vegetables and the flowers, that she might be near him.

Fenelon accepted this servile devotion, regarding it as a part of the woman's penance for sins done in the past. Most certainly love is blind, at least myopic, for Fenelon of the strong and subtle mind could not see that service for the beloved is the highest joy, and the more menial the service the better. Madame sought to deceive herself by making her person unsightly to her lord, and so she wore coarse and ragged dresses, calloused her hands, and allowed the sun to tan and freckle her face.

Of course then the inevitable happened: the intimacy slipped off into the most divine of human loves--or the most human of divine loves, if you prefer to express it so.

To prevent the scandal, the other servants were sent away. Nothing can be kept secret except for a day.

A person of Madame Guyon's worth could not be lost or secreted. For Fenelon to defend her and then secrete her was unpardonable to the arrogant Bossuet.

Fenelon had now to defend himself. How much of political rivalry as well as ecclesiastic has been made by the favor of women, who shall say!

Of her intimate relationship with Fenelon, Madame Guyon says nothing. The bond was of too sacred a nature to discuss, and here her frankness falters, as it should. She does not even defend it.

Fenelon and Madame Guyon were plotting against the Church and State--how very natural! The Madame was fifty; Fenelon was forty-seven--they certainly were old enough to know better, but they did not.

They parted of their own accord, solemnly and in tearful prayer, for

## parting is such sweet sorrow. And then, in a few weeks, they met again

to consult as to the future.

Soon Bossuet stepped in and induced the Vatican to do for them what they could not do alone. Fenelon was stripped of his official robes, reduced to the rank of a parish priest, and sent to minister to an obscure and stricken church in the south of France. The country was battle-scarred, and poverty, ignorance and want stalked through the streets of the little village. Here Fenelon lived, as did the exiled Copernicus, forbidden to travel more than six miles from his church, or to speak to any but his own flock. Here he gave his life as a teacher of children, a nurse, a doctor and a spiritual guide to a people almost devoid of spirituality.

Madame Guyon was sent to a nunnery, where she was actually a prisoner, working as a menial. Fenelon and Madame Guyon never met again, but once a month they sent each other a love-letter on spiritual themes in which love wrote between the lines. Time had tamed the passions of Madame Guyon, otherwise no convent-walls would have been high enough to keep her captive. Sweet, sad memories fed her declining days, and within a few weeks of her death she declared that her life had been a success, "for I have been loved by Fenelon, the greatest and most saintly man of his time."

And as for the Abbe Fenelon, the verdict of the world seems to be that he was ruined by Madame Guyon; but if he ever thought so, no sign of recrimination ever escaped his lips.

FERDINAND LASSALLE AND HELENE VON DONNIGES

DRAMATIS PERSONAE

FERDINAND LASSALLE PRINCE YANKO RACOWITZA HERR VON DONNIGES KARL MARX DOCTOR HAENLE JACQUES HELENE VON DONNIGES FRAU VON DONNIGES FRAU HOLTHOFF HILDA VON DONNIGES Servants, maids, butler, landlord, ladies and gentlemen.

A wise man has said that there is a difference between fact and truth. He has also told us that things may be true and still not be so. The truth as to the love-story of Ferdinand Lassalle and Helene von Donniges can only be told by adhering strictly to the facts. Facts are not only stubborn things, but often very inconvenient; yet in this instance the simple facts fall easily into dramatic form, and the only way to tell the story seems to be to let it tell itself. Dramas are made up of incidents that have happened to somebody sometime, but in no instance that I ever heard of have all the situations pictured in a play happened to the persons who played the parts. The business of the playwright is selection and rejection, and usually the dramatic situations revealed have been culled from very many lives over a long course of years. Here the author need but reveal the tangled skein woven by Fate, Meddling Parents, Pride, Prejudice, Caprice, Ambition, Passion. In other words it is human nature in a tornado, and human nature is a vagrant ship, with a spurious chart, an uncertain compass, a drunken pilot, a mutinous crew and a crazy captain.

The moral seems to be that the tragedy of existence lies in interposing that newly discovered thing called intellect into the delicate affairs of life, instead of having faith in God, and moving serenely with the eternal tide.

Moses struck the rock, and the waters gushed forth; but if Moses had found a spring in the desert and then toiled mightily to smother it with a mountain of arid sand, I doubt me much whether the name of Moses would now live as one of the saviors of the world.

## Parties with an eczema for management would do well to butt their heads

three times against the wall and take note that the wall falls not. Then and then only are they safe from Megalocephalia. There are temptations in life that require all of one's will to succumb to; and he who resists not the current of his being, nor attempts to dam the fountain of life for another, shall be crowned with bay and be fed on ambrosia in Elysium.

[Illustration: LASSALLE]

* * * * *

ACT ONE

_Scene:_ Parlors of Herr and Frau Holthoff at their home in Berlin.

[An informal conference of the leading members of the Allied Workingmen's Clubs. Present various ladies and gentlemen, some seated, others standing, talking.]

_Enter DOCTOR HAENLE_

HERR HOLTHOFF. Hello, Comrade Haenle! I am very glad to see you here.

DOCTOR HAENLE. Not more glad than I am to be here.

[They shake hands cordially, all around.]

HERR HOLTHOFF. [_To his wife_] My dear, you see Doctor Haenle has come--I win my bet!

DOCTOR HAENLE. I hope you two have not been gambling!

FRAU HOLTHOFF. Yes, Doctor, we made a bet, and I am delighted to lose!

DOCTOR HAENLE. You mystify me!

HERR HOLTHOFF. Well, the fact is that Madame had a dream in which you played a part; she thought you had been--what is that word, my dear?

FRAU HOLTHOFF. Expatriated.

HERR HOLTHOFF. Yes, expatriated--sent out of the country for the country's good.

DOCTOR HAENLE. It would be a great compliment!

HERR HOLTHOFF. Very true; you could then join our own Richard Wagner in Switzerland!

DOCTOR HAENLE. Could I but write such songs as he does, I would relish the fate!

FRAU HOLTHOFF. But the people who sent him into exile never guessed that they were giving him the leisure to write immortal music.

DOCTOR HAENLE. People who persecute other people never know what they do.

HERR HOLTHOFF. It isn't so bad to be persecuted, but it is a terrible thing to persecute.

DOCTOR HAENLE. It is often a good thing for the persecuted, provided he can spare the time--how does that strike you, Herr Marx?

KARL MARX. I fully agree in the sentiment. There seems to be an Eternal Spirit of Wisdom that guides man and things, and this Spirit cares only for the end.

FRAU HOLTHOFF. Nature's solicitude is for the race, not the individual.

KARL MARX. Exactly so!

HERR HOLTHOFF. Get that in your forthcoming book, Brother Marx, and give credit to the Madame.

KARL MARX. I surely will. Most of my original thoughts I get from my friends.

HERR HOLTHOFF. You may not be so grateful when the book is published.

KARL MARX. You mean I may sing the Pilgrims' Chorus with Richard across the border?

HERR HOLTHOFF. Yes; the government is growing very sensitive.

DOCTOR HAENLE. Which has nothing to do with the publication of _Das Kapital_--eh, Herr Marx?

KARL MARX. Not the slightest. The book will live, regardless of the fate of the author.

FRAU HOLTHOFF. You do not seem very sanguine of immediate success of the workingmen's party!

KARL MARX. We will succeed when the ditches are even full of our dead--then progress can pass.

FRAU HOLTHOFF. And that time has not come?

KARL MARX. I hope we are great enough not to deceive ourselves. We work for truth: whether this truth will be accepted by the many this year, or next, or the next century, we can not say, but that should not deter us from our best endeavors.

HELENE VON DONNIGES. [_Golden-haired, enthusiastic, needlessly pink and gorgeously twenty_] Men fight for a thing and lose, and the men they fought fight for the same thing under another name, and win! [_All turn and listen_] Life is in the fight, not the achievement. Oh, I think it would be glorious to suffer, to be misunderstood, and fail; and yet know in our hearts that we were right--absolutely right--and that the wisdom of the ages will endorse our acts and on the tombs of some of us carve the word "Savior"!

KARL MARX. Grand, magnificent! That sounds just like Lassalle.

HELENE. There; that is the third time I have been told I talk just like Lassalle--a person I have never seen.

DOCTOR HAENLE. Then you have something to live for.

HELENE. Perhaps, but I echo no man. When one speaks from one's heart it is not complimentary to have people suavely smile and say, "Goethe," "Voltaire," "Shakespeare," "Rousseau," "Lassalle"!

FRAU HOLTHOFF. Just see the company in which she places our Ferdinand!

HELENE. [_Wearily_] Oh, I am not trying to compliment Lassalle. The fact is, I dislike the man. His literary style is explosive; about all he seems to do is to paraphrase dear Karl Marx. Besides, he is a Jew----

KARL MARX. Gently--I am a Jew!

HELENE. But you are different. Lassalle is aggressive, pushing, grasping--he has ego plus, and [_With relaxing tension_] all I want to say is that I am aweary of being accused of quoting Lassalle--that I do not know Lassalle, and what is more, I----

FRAU HOLTHOFF. Oh, you'll talk differently when you see him!

HELENE. But surely you, too, do not make genius exempt from the moral code?

DOCTOR HAENLE. Oh, some one has been telling you about Madame Hatzfeldt----

HELENE. I know the undisputed facts.

KARL MARX. Which are that at nineteen years of age Ferdinand Lassalle became the legal counsel for Madame Hatzfeldt; that he fought her case through the courts for nine years; that he lost three times and finally won.

HELENE. And then became a member of the Madame's household.

KARL MARX. If so, with the Madame's permission.

HELENE. [_Sarcastically_] Certainly.

FRAU HOLTHOFF. That thirty years' difference in their ages ought to absolve him.

DOCTOR HAENLE. To say nothing of the fee he received!

KARL MARX. The fee?

DOCTOR HAENLE. One hundred thousand thalers.

FRAU HOLTHOFF. Capital; also, _Das Kapital_!

KARL MARX. I have made a note of it. A lawyer gets a single fee of one hundred thousand thalers--this under the competitive system--a hundred years of labor for the average workingman!

FRAU HOLTHOFF. A lawyer at nineteen--studying on one case, knowing its every aspect and phase, pursuing the case for nine years, and opposed by six of the ablest, oldest and most influential legal lights in Germany, and gaining a complete victory!

KARL MARX. I've heard of successful authors of a single book, but I never before heard of a great lawyer with but one case!

FRAU HOLTHOFF. Oh, Lassalle has had many cases offered him, but he refused them all so as to devote himself to the People _versus_ Entailed Nobility.

KARL MARX. You mean Entrenched Alleged Royalty.

FRAU HOLTHOFF. Yes. I accept the correction--and this case he will win, just as he did the other.

HELENE. You had better say his body will go to fill up the sunken roadway!

DOCTOR HAENLE. Good! that was your idea of success a few moments ago.

HELENE. I see--more of Lassalle.

FRAU HOLTHOFF. Oh, you two were just made for each other!

DOCTOR HAENLE. You both have the fire, the dash, the enthusiasm, the personality, the beautiful unreasonableness, the----

HELENE. Go on!

KARL MARX. He is the greatest orator in Europe!

FRAU HOLTHOFF. And the handsomest man!

HELENE. Nonsense!

DOCTOR HAENLE. You shall see!

HELENE. Shall I?

DOCTOR HAENLE. You certainly shall. Indeed, Lassalle may be here this evening. He spoke in Dresden last night, and was to leave at once, after the address. His train was due--let me see--[_consults watch_] half an hour ago. I told him if he came to drive straight here.

HELENE. [_Slightly agitated_] I must go--I promised papa I would be home at ten.

KARL MARX. And your papa would never allow you to stay out after ten, any more than he would forgive you if he knew you visited with people who harbored Ferdinand Lassalle?

HELENE. My father is a busy man--a Monarchist of course--and he has no time for the New Thought.

DOCTOR HAENLE. He leaves that to you?

HELENE. Yes, he indulges me--he says the New Thought does him no harm and amuses me! See if my carriage is waiting, please. Thank you----

[Frau Holthoff starts to help Helene on with her wraps. Knocking is heard at the door. Herr Holthoff goes into the hall to answer knock.]

HERR HOLTHOFF. [_Outside_] Well, well, Ferdinand the First, Ferdinand himself!

[Commotion--all move toward door]

_Enter HERR HOLTHOFF with LASSALLE_

[Lassalle is tall, slender, nervous, active, intelligent, commanding. All shake hands, and he and Karl Marx embrace and kiss each other on the cheek. Helene stares, slips down behind the sofa, and seated on an ottoman reads intently with her nose in a book. The rest talk and move toward the center of the stage, gathering around Lassalle, who affectionately half-embraces all--with remarks from everybody: "How well you look!" "And the news from Dresden!" "Did the police molest you?" "Was it a big audience?" etc. Lassalle seats himself on sofa with back to Helene, who is immediately behind him.]

LASSALLE. We will win when fifty-one per cent of the voters declare themselves. You see Nature never intended that ninety per cent of the people should slave for the other ten per cent. The world must see that we all should work--that to succeed we must work for each other. We have thought that educated men should not work, and that men who work should not be educated. We have congested work and congested education and congested wealth. The good things of the world are for all, and if there were an even distribution there would be no want, no wretchedness. The rich for the most part waste and destroy, and of course the many have to toil in order to make good this waste. When we can convince fifty-one per cent of the people that righteousness is only a form of self-preservation, that mankind is an organism and that we are all parts of the whole, the battle will be won. [_Rises and paces the floor, still talking_] I spoke last night to five thousand people, and the way they listened and applauded and applauded and listened, revealed how hungry the people are for truth. The hope of the world lies in the middle class--the rich are as ignorant as the poverty-stricken. A way must be devised to reach the rich--I can do it. Inaction, idleness, that is the curse. Life is fluid, and only running water is pure. Stagnation is death. Turbulent Rome was healthy, but quiescent Rome was soft, feverish, morbid, pathological. Now, take Hamlet--what man ever had more opportunities? Heir to the throne--beauty, power, youth, intellect--all were his! What wrecked him? Why, inaction; he sat down to muse, instead of being up and doing. He wrangled, dawdled, dreamed, followed soothsayers, and consulted mediums until his mind was mush----

HELENE. [_Rising quickly_] Mad from the beginning!

[Lassalle and the two men to whom he was talking jump, turn, stare.]

HELENE. Mad from the beginning, I say!

[The two friends at once quit Lassalle and move off arm in arm talking, leaving Lassalle and Helene eyeing each other across the sofa. Her eyes flash defiance; he relaxes, smiles, paying no attention to her contradiction concerning Hamlet. He kneels on the sofa and leans toward her.]

LASSALLE. Ah, this is how you look! This is you! Yes, yes, it is as I thought. It is all right!

FRAU HOLTHOFF. [_Bustling forward_] Oh, I forgot you had not met--allow me to introduce----

LASSALLE. [_Waving the Frau away, walks around the sofa taking Helene by the arm_] What is the necessity of introducing us! People who know each other do not have to be introduced. You know who I am, and you are Brunhilde, the Red Fox.

[Leads her around and seats her on the sofa and takes his place beside her, with one arm along the back of the sofa. Helene leans toward him, and flicks an imaginary particle of dust from his coat-collar.]

HELENE. You were talking about your success in Dresden!

[Lassalle proceeds to talk to her most earnestly. She listens, nods approval, sighs, and clasps her hands. The others in the room gather at opposite sides of the room and talk, but with eyes furtively turned now and then toward the couple, who are lost to the world, interested but in each other, and the great themes they are discussing.]

LASSALLE. I knew we must meet. Fate decreed it so. You are the Goddess of the Morning and I am the Sun-God.

HELENE. You are sure then about your divinity?

LASSALLE. Yes, through a belief in yours.