CHAPTER X

TORN TO PIECES

John's entrance into the boarding-house secured for him intercourse with a large and varied circle,--perhaps too varied. There were students of all ages, of all subjects, and from all districts, from clergymen who were reading for their last examination to young medical and law students. There were also ladies in the house, and John was for the eighth time in love. Again the object of his affections was unattainable, being engaged to another. The variety of this social intercourse overloaded his brain with impressions from all circles; his personality became relaxed and distracted through the self-adaptation and compromises with other people's views which are necessary in society. Besides this a great deal of drinking went on nearly every evening. On one of the first days after his arrival appeared a criticism of his play in one of the evening papers. It was very sharp but just, and therefore hit John hard. He felt stripped and seen through. The critic said that the author had concealed his insignificant personality behind a great name--Thorwaldsen--but that the disguise did not avail him and so on. John felt altogether bankrupt. In such cases one tries to defend oneself, and he compared his own with other bad plays, which the same severe critic had praised. He felt treated unjustly, and indeed when compared with others it was so, but not when he was regarded by himself alone. The fact that the critic was worse did not make his piece better.

John became shy and averse to company. This was increased by the students' club starting a paper in which they made merry over him and his play. He fancied he saw grimaces and contempt everywhere, and went preferably by back streets on his walks.

Then there came a yet severer blow. A friend had, on his own account, published one of John's first plays,--the _Free-thinker_. While he was spending an evening with Rejd an acquaintance brought in the hated evening paper. It contained a scathing article on the play, which was mocked at and cut to pieces. John was obliged to read the article in the presence of his friends. He had, against his will, to admit that the critic was not unjust, but it upset him terribly.

Why is it so hard to hear the truth from others, while at the same time one can be so severe against oneself? Probably because the social masquerade in which we all take part makes every one fear being unmasked, probably also because responsibility and unpleasantness are involved in it. One feels oneself overreached and cheated. The critic who sits at ease and unmasks others would feel himself equally scourged and exposed if his secrets were betrayed. Social life is honeycombed with falsity, but who likes to be discovered? That is why at times of solitude, when the past rises up unescapably, we do not feel remorse for our faults, but for our follies and necessary cruelties. Mistakes were necessary and had some use, but follies were merely injurious and should have been avoided. It is for this reason that men pay greater honour to intelligence than to morality, for the former is a reality, the latter an idea.

Meanwhile John felt the same pains which he imagined a criminal must feel. He felt impelled to obliterate as soon as possible the impression made by his stupidity. But he felt also that a kind of injustice had been done him since he had been criticised simply and solely as a writer, although his production was a year old, and he himself, therefore, maturer than it, by a year. But it was not the fault of the critic that there was an incongruity between the criticism and the _corpus delicti_.

He began to compose another tragedy, _The Assistant at the Sacrifice_. This was intended to deal with Christendom in artistic form, and to handle the same problem and the same questions as his former play. By "artistic form" at that period was meant the laying of the scene of the play in a past epoch. John wrote the piece under the influence of Oehlenschläger and the Icelandic sagas which he had lately read in the original.

He had, however, a severe struggle with his conscience, for his father had exacted a promise from him not to write for the stage till he had passed his examination. It was, therefore, an act of deceit to take help from his father and not to fulfil the conditions on which it was granted. But he silenced his scruples by saying to himself, "Father will be pleased enough if I have a speedy and great success." In that he was not far wrong.

But another element now entered into his life, and had a decided influence both on his views of things and his work. This was his acquaintance with two men,--an author and a remarkable personality. Unfortunately they were both abnormal and therefore had only a disturbing effect upon his development.

The author was Kierkegaard,[1] whose book, _Either--Or_, John had borrowed from a member of the Song Club, and read with fear and trembling. His friends had also read it as a work of genius, had admired the style, but not been specialty influenced by it,--a proof that books have little effect, when they do not find readers in sympathy with the author. But upon John the book made the impression intended by the author. He read the first part containing "The Confessions of an Æsthete." He felt sometimes carried away by it, but always had an uncomfortable feeling as though present at a sick-bed. The perusal of the first part left a feeling of emptiness and despair behind it. The book agitated him. "The Diary of a Seducer" he regarded as the fancies of an unclean imagination. Things were not like that in real life. Moreover John was no sybarite, but on the contrary inclined to asceticism and self-torment. Such egotistic sensuality as that of the hero of Kierkegaard's work was absurd because the suffering he caused by the satisfaction of his desires necessarily involved him in suffering and, therefore, defeated his object.

The second part of the work containing the philosopher's "Discourse on Life as a Duty," made a deeper impression on John. It showed him that he himself was an "æsthete" who had conceived of authorship as a form of enjoyment. Kierkegaard said that it should be regarded as a calling. Why? The proof was wanting, and John, who did not know that Kierkegaard was a Christian, but thought the contrary, not having seen his _Edifying Discourses_, imbibed unaware the Christian system of ethics with its doctrine of self-sacrifice and duty Along with these the idea of sin returned. Enjoyment was a sin, and one had to do one's duty. Why? Was it for the sake of society to which one was under obligations? No! merely because it was duty. That was simply Kant's categorical imperative. When he reached the end of the work _Either--Or_ and found the moral philosopher also in despair, and that all this teaching about duty had only produced a Philistine, he felt broken in two. "Then," he thought, "better be an æsthete." But one cannot be an æsthete if one has been a Christian for five-sixths of one's life, and one cannot be moral without Christ. Thus he was tossed to and fro like a ball between the two, and ended in sheer despair.

Had he now read Kierkegaard's discourses, he might possibly have come a step nearer to Christianity--possibly--for it is difficult to decide that now, but to receive Christianity again seemed to him like replacing a tooth which had been torn out, and joyfully thrown into the fire, along with the accompanying toothache. It was also possible that if he had known that the book _Either--Or_ was intended to scourge one to the Cross he might have thrown it away as a jesuitical writing and been saved from his embarrassment. All that he felt now, however, was a terrible discord. He had to choose and make the jump between ethics and æsthetics, but choose how? and jump whither? He could not jump out in space to embrace a paradox or Christ,--that would have been self-destruction or madness. But Kierkegaard preached madness? Was it the despair of the over-self-conscious at finding himself always self-conscious? Was it the longing of one who sees too deeply for the unconsciousness of intoxication?

John knew well what the battle between his own will and the will of others meant. He had given his father trouble enough when he crossed his plans; but the trouble was mutual; the whole of life consisted of a web of wills crossing one another. The death of one was life-breath to another; no one could gain an advantage without hurting the one he passed by. Life was a perpetual interchange and struggle between pleasure and pain. His sensuality or desire for enjoyment had not injured others nor caused them trouble. He had never seduced the innocent, and had never enjoyed himself without paying the price. He was moral from habit; from instinct, from fear of the consequences, from good taste or from education, but the very fact that he did not feel himself immoral, was a defect and a sin. After reading _Either--Or_ he felt sinful. The categorical imperative stole on him under a Latin name and without a cross on its back, and he let himself be beguiled by it. He did not see that it was a two-thousand-years-old Christianity in disguise.

Kierkegaard would not have made so deep an impression on him, if a number of concurrent circumstances had not contributed to that result. In the letters of the æsthete, Kierkegaard expounded suffering as enjoyment. John suffered from public contumely; he suffered from his hard work; he suffered from unrequited affection; he suffered from unsatisfied desires; he suffered from drink, for he was intoxicated nearly every evening; he suffered as an artist from mental struggles and doubts; he suffered from the ugly scenery of Upsala; he suffered from the discomfort of his rooms; he suffered from examination-books; he suffered from a bad conscience because he did not study but wrote plays. But something else lay at the bottom of all this. He had been brought up to fulfil hard tasks and duties. Now he lived well amid ease and enjoyment. Study was an enjoyment; authorship, in spite of all its pains, was a wonderful enjoyment; the life with his comrades was sheer festivity and jollity. But his plebeian consciousness awoke and told him that it was not right to enjoy while others worked; _his_ work was an enjoyment, for it brought him a good deal of honour, and perhaps money. This accounted for his persistently uneasy conscience which persecuted him without a cause. Was it that he felt already the signs of this awakening consciousness of tremendous guilt as regards the lower classes, the slaves who toiled, while he enjoyed? Did he already have a foreboding of that sense of justice, which in our days has laid so strong a hold on many of the upper classes that they have restored capital which was not quite honestly earned, have expended time and toil for the liberation of the lower classes, and have worked from impulse and instinct against their own interests, in order to do right? Possibly.

But Kierkegaard was not the man to resolve the discord. It was reserved for the evolutionary philosophers to make peace between passion and reason, between enjoyment and duty. They cancelled the deceptive _Either_--_Or_, and substituted _Both--And,_ giving both flesh and spirit their due. The real significance of Kierkegaard became clear to John many years later. Then he saw in him the simple pietist, the ultra-Christian who wished to realise in modern society oriental ideals of two thousand years ago. But Kierkegaard was right in one point: if we were to have Christianity, we ought to have it thoroughly; but his _Either--Or_ was only valid for the priests of the church who called themselves Christians.

Kierkegaard saw no further, and from him who wrote his book in 1843, and had a clerical education, one could not expect that he should say: "Either a Christianity like this, or none!" In that case people would probably have chosen none. Instead of that Kierkegaard said: "Whether you are æsthetical or ethical you must cast yourself into the arms of Christ." His mistake was to oppose ethics and æsthetics to each other, for they can go very well together. But John did not succeed in harmonising them till, after endless struggles, at the age of thirty-seven, he attempted a compromise when he discovered that work and duty are forms of enjoyment, and that enjoyment itself, well-used, is a duty.

But at that time, the book weighed on him like a nightmare. He was angry when his friends wished to regard it as mere literature. He was not pacified by their regarding it superior in richness, depth and style to Goethe's _Faust_, which it certainly did surpass by far. John could not at that time understand that the pillar-saint Kierkegaard had himself known what enjoyment was when he wrote the first part, and that the seducer and Don Juan were the author himself, who satisfied his desires in imagination. No, he thought it was poetry.

John had been already predisposed to receive Kierkegaard's influence, and now came the other acquaintance, which would not have played a great rôle in his life if circumstances had not prepared him for that also. His companions merely regarded the person in question as ludicrous.

It came about in the following way. Thurs the Jew came one day and told John that he had made the acquaintance of a genius who wished to join their Song Club.

"Ah, a genius!"

None of the members of the club believed that they were geniuses, not even John, and it is doubtful whether any poet has really believed or felt that he was one. One can, when one makes comparisons, find that one has produced better work than others, and a clever man will naturally feel that he understands better than others, but genius,--that is something else. This title is not generally bestowed on any one till after death and is now dropping out of common use, since the secret of the evolution of genius has been discovered.

The novelty aroused attention, and the stranger was elected to the club under the name of Is. He was not a poet, they were told, but very learned and a powerful critic.

One evening when the club-meeting was at Thurs' rooms he came--a little thin person, without an overcoat, dressed like a labourer on his holiday. His clothes looked as though they were borrowed, for their elbows and knees were not in the right places. John, who used to succeed to his elder brother's clothes, noticed this at once. In his hand he held a dirty beer-soup-coloured hat, such as is only worn by organ-grinders. His face looked like that of a southern rat-trap seller. His black hair hung on his shoulders and a black beard fell on his breast.

"Is it possible?" they asked themselves. "Can he be a student?" He looked forty, but was only thirty. He stood with his hat in his hand at the door like a beggar, and hardly ventured to come forward. After Thurs had drawn him into the room and introduced him, the meeting was declared open. Is began to speak and they listened. His voice was like a woman's and sank sometimes, without apology, to a whisper, as though the speaker demanded perfect silence or spoke for his own satisfaction. It would be difficult to repeat what he spoke of, for his speech ranged over everything that he had read, and since he had read for ten years more than the youths of twenty, they found his learning wonderful.

After that, another member of the club read a poem. Is had to deliver an opinion on it. He began with Kant, quoted Schopenhauer and Thackeray, and finished with a lecture on George Sand. No one noticed that he said nothing about the poem.

Then they went into a restaurant to eat. Is talked philosophy, æsthetics and history. He spoke sometimes with a melancholy expression in his dark unfathomable eyes, which never rested on those present, as though he sought an unseen audience far in the distance, in unknown space. The club listened reverently with absorbed attention.

John was to hear this man's opinion on his work. He, as well as one of the most poetical members of the club, began to have serious doubts as to their vocation. Often, when they had drunk a good deal, they asked whether they still believed--meaning whether each thought the Other called to be a poet. It was just the same sort of doubt which John had felt when he had wondered whether he was a child of God. Is was to read John's drama, _The Assistant at the Sacrifice_, and to give his opinion.

One morning John went up to his room to hear his verdict. Is spoke till noon. About what? About everything. But he had now taken hold of John's soul. Through conversations with Thurs, he know which strings to pull, and did so, as he chose. He burrowed in John's mind, not out of sympathy, but from a spider-like curiosity. He did not speak directly of John's play but suggested the plan of a new one after his own ideas. He had the effect of a mesmeriser, and John was magnetised. But he felt in a state of despair when he left him, as though his friend had taken his soul, picked it to pieces and thrown them away after he had satisfied his curiosity.

But John came again, sat on the wise man's sofa, listened to his words as though they were an oracle, and felt himself completely under his power. Sometimes he thought it was a ghost who walked on the carpet when his body disappeared in clouds of tobacco-smoke. The man exercised what is called a "demonic" influence, _i.e_. inexplicable at first sight. He had no blood in his veins, no feelings, no will, no desires. He was a talking head. His standpoint was nothing and all at the same time. He was a decoction of books, and the type of a book-worm who had never lived.

Often when the other members of the club were alone, they talked about Is. Thurs was already tired of him and wondered whether he had committed some crime, for he seemed driven about by a constant restlessness. Then it was reported that he was a poet, but never would show his poems, for he had such a high idea of the poetic art. They also wondered why no one ever saw a book in the learned man's rooms. It was also strange that he should seek the company of these youths, to whom he was so superior, and whose poetry he must despise. They who were themselves in the full bloom of romanticism did not detect the anæmic romantic who had lost his footing on firm ground. They did not see in his long hair and shabby hat the copy of Murger's Bohemian; they did not know that this dilapidated condition was a Parisian fashion; that this hollow wisdom was a web woven out of German metaphysics; that this experimental psychology was derived from a peep into Kierkegaard; and that that interesting air of hinting at uncommitted crimes and secret griefs was Byronic in origin. All this they did not understand. Therefore Is could play with John's soul and catch him in his snare. Yes, John was so thoroughly taken by him that in a speech he called himself Gamaliel, who sat at Paul's Is's feet to learn wisdom.

The upshot of it all was that Julm, one fine evening, burnt his new play. It was the work of three months which went up in flames. As he collected the ashes, he wept. Is, without saying so directly, had shown him that he was no poet. So everything was a mistake, this also! Then he felt in despair, because he had deceived his father and could take no work home to justify his neglect of his wishes. In a fit of remorse, and in order to be able to point to some definite result, he entered his name for the written examination in Latin, without, however, having written any of the requisite preliminary exercises or essays. The Latin professor saw his name in the list and did not know it. One Sunday evening, when John had returned to his rooms in good spirits after a supper, the university bedell appeared to summon him. John went boldly to the professor and asked what he wanted.

"You wish to take the written examination in Latin?"

"Yes."

"But I do not see your name on my list."

"I entered myself before for the medical examination."

"That has nothing to do with this. You must go by the rules."

"I know no rules about the three essays."

"I think you are impertinent, sir."

"It may seem so----"

"Out with you, sir!--or----"

The door was opened, and John was ejected. He swore to himself he would still go up for the written examination, but the next morning he overslept himself.

So even that last straw failed.

Shortly afterwards one morning a friend came and woke him.

"Do you know that W. is dead?" (W. sat at the same table in the boarding-house.)

"No!"

"Yes! he has cut his throat."

John started up, dressed himself, and hurried with his friend to the Jernbrogatan where W. lived. They rushed up the stairs and came to a dark attic.

"Is it here?"

"No, here!"

John felt for a door; the door gave way and fell upon him. At the same moment he saw a pool of blood on the ground. He turned round, let go of the door, and was at the bottom of the stairs before the door fell on the ground. This scene shook him terribly and woke his memory. Some days previously John had gone into the Carolina Park to work at his play in solitude. W. came up, greeted him, and asked whether he might bear him company or whether he disturbed him. John answered sincerely that he did disturb him, and W. went away with a melancholy air. Was it a case of a lonely drowning man who sought a companion and was repulsed? John felt almost guilty of his death. But he was not intended for a comforter. Now the dead man seemed to haunt him; he dared not go to his room, but slept with his friend. One night he slept with Rejd. The latter had to keep a light burning and was woken several times in the night by John, who could not sleep.

One day Rejd found John with a bottle of prussic acid. He apparently approved the idea of suicide, but first asked him to take a farewell drink with him. They went to the restaurant and ordered eight glasses of whisky, which were brought in on a tray. Each of them drank four glasses in four pulls, with the desired result that John became dead drunk. He was carried home, but since the house door was locked, he was carried over an empty piece of ground and thrown over a fence. There he remained lying in a snow-drift, till he recovered his senses, and crept up into his room.

The last night which he spent in Upsala some days later he slept on a sofa in Thurs' rooms; his friends kept watch over him, and the room was lighted up. They watched good-naturedly till morning, then they accompanied him to the station, and put him in the coupé. When the train had passed Bergsbrunna, John breathed again. He felt as though he had left something dreadful and weird, like a northern winter night with thirty degrees of cold, behind him, and registered a vow never again to settle in this town, where men's souls, banished from life and society, grew rotten from over-production of thought, were corroded by stagnant waters which had no outlet, and took fire like millstones which revolved without having anything to grind.

[1] Danish theologian.