Temporal Power: A Study in Supremacy

he gusts of wind and rain which swept over the city, and which lashed the fair southern sea into a

et cross, which,-grey and crumbling at the summit,-bent over the streets like a withered finger, crook'd as it were, in feeble remonstrance at the passing of time,-while glimpses of young faces beneath the snowy veils, and chatter of young voices, made brightness and music around its frowning and iron-bound base. Shortly before three o'clock the Cathedral bells began to chime, and crowds of people made their way towards the sacred edifice in the laughing, pushing, gesticulating fashion of southerners, to whom a special service at the Church is like a new comedy at the theatre,-women with coloured kerchiefs knotted over their hair or across their bosoms-men, more or less roughly clad, yet all paying compliment to

ually the air grew full of melody, rising and falling on the capricious gusts of wind which tore at the gilded and emblazoned banners, and tossed the white veils of the maidens about like wreaths of drifting snow. Two men standing on the Cathedral hill, watched the procession gradually ascending-one tall and heavily-built, with a dark leonine head made more massive-looking by its profusion of thick and unmanageable hair-the other lean and narrow-shouldered, with a peaked reddish-auburn beard, which he continually pulled and twitch

of suspicion against all mankind?" He who was named Sergius Thord, lifted himself slowly from the shoulders upwards, the action

ld I believe what I hear, since it is the fashion to lie? Why should I accept what I read, since it is the business of the press to de

and that these howling hypocrites,-" this with an angry gesture of his hand towards the open square where the chanti

d one hand heavil

upon to govern, that he sacrificed his own money, as well as his own time, to remedy their wrongs?-to save them from unjust government, to defend them from cruel taxation?-to see that their bread was not taken from their mouths by foreign competition?-and to make it possible for them to live in the co

Zegota, with a more than usua

ng to hell! Look! Here come the future traitresses of men-girls trained by priests to deceive their nearest and dearest! Poor children! They know nothing

, a flash of lightning gleamed, followed almost instantaneously by a loud clap of thunder, which shook the square with a mighty reverberation like that of a bursting bomb. The children screamed,-and ran towards the Cathedral pellmell; and for a few moments there ensued indescribable confusion, the priests, the people, and the white-veiled girls getting mixed together in a

your reason, your intelligence, and leave mere lip-service and mockery to priests; and to these poor children, who, as yet, know no better than to obey tyrants! Would you find out God? He is here-with me,-with you!-in the earth, in

scaped his lips, he gave the signal for the sacred chanting to be resumed, and in another moment the 'Litany of the Virgin' was started in stentorian tones by the leaders of the procession. Intimidated by the looks, as well as by the commands of the priests, the girls and children joined in the chanting with tremulous voices, as they began to file through the Cathedral doors and enter the great nave. But a magnetic spell, stronger than any invocation of

Genitrix, Or

ed with the figures of forgotten saints and bishops, whose stone counte

and must return to God! And every woman who gives birth to one such, true, brave man, has given a God-incarnated being to the world! 'Sancta Dei Genitrix!' Be all as mothers of gods, O women! Be as gods, O men! Be as gods in courage, in truth, in wisdom, in freedom! Suffer not devils to have command of you! For devils there are, as there are gods;-evil there is, as there is good. Fiends are born of women as go

e Cathedral, and the doors still stood wide open. But the people remained o

and a great altar raised up by the gifts of wicked dead kings, who by money sought to atone for their sins to the people. There are priests who fast and pray in public, and gratify all the lusts

of an angry sea, rose from the crowd, b

wn,-down, always down in a state of wretched ignorance. Learn, learn all you can, my brothers-take the only good thing modern government gives you-Education! Education is thrown at us like a bone thrown to a dog, half picked by others and barely nourishing-but take it, take it, friends, for in it you shall find the marrow of vengeance on your tyrants and oppressors! The education of the masses means the downfall of false creeds,-the ruin of all false priests! For it is only through the ignorance of the many

this suggestion had gone

King is afraid! He fears the people will revolt against the Church, and so takes part with them lest there should be trouble in the land, but he never seems to think there may be

rom the people gave emphatic test

ficker in secret with Jew speculators? It is for you to decide! It is for you to work out your own salvation! It is for you to throw off tyranny, and show yourselves free men of reason and capacity! Just as the priests chant long prayers to cover their own iniquity, so do the men of government make long speeches to disguise their own corruption. You know you cannot believe their promises. Neither can you believe the press, for if this is not actually bought by Pérousse, it is bribed. And you cannot trust the King; for he is as a house divided against itself which must fall! Slave of his own passions, and duped by women, what is he but a burden to t

loud roar of voices yet echoed aloft, a band of armed police came into view, marching ste

of other occupation! Before they come any nearer, disperse yourselves, my friends, and so save them trouble! Go all to your homes and think on my words;-or enter the C

s speed. Before the police could reach the centre of the square, there were only some thirty or forty people left, and these were qu

aking a rapid sign to each other with the left hand, they as quickly separated,-Zegota to enter the Cathedral, T

rs of the poor, where men and women dwelt all huddled miserably in overcrowded tenements, and sin and starvation kept hideous company together, the streets presented as dark and forbidding an aspect as the heavy skies blackly brooding above. Here and there a gas-lamp flared its light upon the drawn little face of some child crouching asleep in a doorway, or on the pinched and painted features of some wretched outcast wending her way to the den she called 'home.' The loud brutal laughter of drunken men was mingled with the wailing of half-starved and fretful infants, and the mean, squalid houses swarmed with the living spawn of ev

vernment and the Throne! Even were all these wretched multitudes to rise with me, and make havoc of the whol

leaders in the political government,-but this one leader of the massed poor could, had he chosen, have burned down the city. But he did not choose. He had a far-sighted, clear brain,-and though he had sworn to destroy abuses wherever he could find them, he moved always with caution; and his plans were guided, not by impulse alone, but by earnest consideration for the future. He was marked out by the police as a dangerous Socialist; and his movements

h you, Matsin?"

n called Matsin,-"better than

d Thord,-"And

m to save her from madness. She was hungry,

maciated as to be almost a skeleton; and across it, holding it close with one arm, was stretched a woman, half clot

ok upon a sight like this! If I were God, I s

the ways of man either. I have done no harm. I married the woman-and we had that one child. I worked hard for both. I could not get sufficient money to keep us going; I did metal work-very well, so I was t

tied a small purse of silver coins into the man's hand. "Bury the poor little innocent one;-and comfo

tsin remained at his door turn

ered. "Yet that is the man they say the King would hang if ever h

f, and under this stood a man reading, or trying to read, a newspaper by its flickering glare. Thord glanced at him with some suspicion-the stranger was too near his own lodging for his pleasure, for he was always on his guard against spies. Ap

eading by lamplight,

oked up, a

But I have only just

pecial

nted to a bold headline-"T

s and bearing of the stranger with increa

y I ask, without off

"that the King has for once

stranger dubiously-"Then I presume yo

ject of his-" beg

and manners. I read books, and I write them too,-this will perhaps explain the

istibly pleasant. Something about him at

erer and a stranger in this tow

ilthy habitations here, to see what they can do for a suddenly bereaved family. The husband and father fell dead in the street before our eyes,-and those who picked him up said he was drunk, but it turned out that he was merely starved,-merely!-you understand? Merely starved! We foun

owing what it is to have one hour of free fresh air, one day of rest and joy! Yet this is a great city,-and we live in a civilized country!" He smiled bitterly, then added-"You h

ou a little longer, if you have no objection. Is there not some place ne

lute,-gazing at him, half

and you do not know me. If I told you my na

ully-"Mine is at your service-Pasquin Leroy. I fe

hook hi

nd probably you have never heard

uld have met to-night. I have just seen your name in this very paper which you caught me reading-see!-the

edral that afternoon, and set him down as a crazy Socialist, and disturber of the peace, "And the 'rabble' as this scribbling fool calls it, is the g

man with his fine heroic head and eagle-like glance of eye,-and h

a great multitude outside the Cathedral this afternoon, and interfered with the religious procession; they also say you a

e?" echoed Thord as

e been expelled from my native home and surroundings. I have a little money-and som

and, and looked at him with

thrilling tones-"You mea

ving to destroy rank abuses, I ask nothing better than to employ my pen in your service. I will get work on the press here-I will do all I can to aid your purposes a

e scene of the continual misery that is going on here daily. To belong to our Committee means much more than you at

selves," this, as two men emerged from a dark street on the left, and came full into the lamplight's flare-"Axel Regor, Max Graub-co

ches of suspicion here and there lurking in his mind. But he was brave; and having once proceeded in a given

, "and I think you will not betray my trust

re respectively called Axel Regor and Max Graub, exchanged anx

-"I pledge you my word with my friendship-and my word is my

in silent recognitio

yet time to go in another direction, and to see me no more; but if you

the tall, narrow house, where the light in the highest window gleamed like a signal, he opened it with a small key and entered, holding it back courteously for his three new companions to enter wit