The Continental Monthly, Vol 6, No 5, November 1864

Rekindle in my wavering soul your blind, undoubting, earnest faith in Christ and in His church: at once the source of your noblest deeds on earth, your brightest hopes in heaven! Oh, let it open for me, as it was wont to do for you; and I will struggle with fire and sword against its enemies! Hear me, the son of countless generations, the sole heir of your thoughts, your courage, your virtues, and your faults!

The castle bell sounds twelve.

It is the appointed hour: I am prepared!

An old and faithful servant, Jacob, enters, fully armed.

Jacob. My lord, the person whom your excellency expects is in the castle.

The Man. Admit him here.

    Exit Jacob.

He reappears, announcing Pancratius, and again retires.

Pancratius. Count Henry, I salute you! The word 'count' sounds strangely on my lips.

He seats himself, throws off his cloak and liberty cap, and fastens his eyes on the pillar on which hang the arms and shield.

The Man. Thanks, guest, that you have confided in the honor of my house! Faithful to our ancient forms, I pledge you in a glass of wine. Your good health, guest!

He takes a goblet, fills, tastes, and hands it to Pancratius.

Pancratius. If I am not mistaken, this red and blue shield was called a coat of arms in the language of the Dead; but such trifles have vanished from the face of the earth.

He drinks.

The Man. Vanished? With the aid of God, you will soon look upon them by thousands!

Pancratius. Commend me to the old noble! always confident in himself, though without money, arms, or soldiers; proud, obstinate, and hoping against all hope; like the corpse in the fable, threatening the driver of the hearse at the very door of the charnel house, and confiding in God, or at least pretending to confide in Him, when confidence in himself is no longer even possible!

Pray, Count Henry, give me but one little glimpse of the lightning which is to be sent from heaven, for your especial benefit, to blast me and my millions; or show me at least one angel of the thousands of the heavenly hosts, who are to encamp on your side, and whose prowess is so speedily to decide the combat in your favor!

He empties the goblet.

The Man. You are pleased to jest, leader of the people; but atheism is quite an old formula, and I looked for something new from the new men!

Pancratius. Laugh, if you will, at your own wit, but my faith is wider, deeper, and more firmly based than your own. Its central dogma is the emancipation of humanity. It has its source in the cries of despair which rise unceasingly to heaven from the hearts of tortured millions, in the famine of the operatives, the grinding poverty of the peasants, the desecration of their wives and daughters, the degradation of the race through unjust laws and debasing and brutal prejudices—from all this agony spring my new formulas, the creed which I am determined to establish: 'Man has a birthright of happiness.' These thoughts are my god, a god which will give bread, rest, bliss, glory to man!

He fills, drinks, and casts and goblet from him.

The Man. I place my trust in that God who gave power and rule, into the hands of my forefathers!

Pancratius. You trust Him still, and yet through your whole life you have been but a plaything in the hands of the Devil!

But let us leave such discussions to the theologians, if any such still linger upon earth:—to business, Count Henry, to stern facts!

The Man. What do you seek from me, redeemer of the people, citizen-god?

Pancratius. I sought you, in the first place, because I wished to know you; in the second, because I desire to save you.

The Man. For the first, receive my thanks; for the second, trust my sword!

Pancratius. Your God! your sword! vain phantoms of the brain! Look at the dread realities of your situation! The curses of the millions are upon you; myriads of brawny arms are already raised to hurl you to destruction! Of all the vaunted Past nothing remains to you save a few feet of earth, scarcely enough to offer you a grave. Even your last fortress, the castle of the Holy Trinity, can hold out but a few days longer. Where is your artillery? Where are the arms and provisions for your soldiers? Where are your soldiers? and what dependence can you place on the few you still retain? You must surely know there is nothing left you on which to hang a single hope!

If I were in your place, Count Henry, I know what I would do!

The Man. Speak! you see how patiently I listen!

Pancratius. Were I Count Henry, I would say to Pancratius: 'I will dismiss my troops, my few retainers; I will not go to the relief of the Holy Trinity—and for this I will retain my title and my estates; and you, Pancratius, will pledge your own honor to guarantee me the possession of the things I require.'

How old are you, Count Henry?

The Man. I am thirty-six years old, citizen.

Pancratius. Then you have but about fifteen years of life to expect, for men of your temperament die young; your son is nearer to the grave than to maturity. A single exception, such as yours, can do no harm to the great whole. Remain, then, where you are, the last of the counts. Rule, as long as you shall live, in the house of your fathers; have your family portraits retouched, your armorial bearings renewed, and think no more of the wretched remnant of your fallen order. Let the justice of the long-injured people be fulfilled upon them! (He fills for himself another cup.) Your good health, Henry, the last of the counts!

The Man. Every word you utter is a new insult to me! Do you really believe that, to save a dishonored life, I would suffer myself to be enslaved and dragged about, chained to your car of triumph?

Cease! cease! I can endure no longer! I cannot answer as my spirit dictates, for you are my guest, sheltered from all insult while under my roof by my plighted honor!

Pancratius. Plighted honor and knightly faith have, ere this, swung from a gallows! You unfurl a tattered banner whose faded rags seem strangely out of place among the brilliant flags and joyous symbols of universal humanitarian progress. Oh, I know you, and protest against your course! Full of life and generous vigor, you bind to your heart a putrefying corpse! You court your own destruction, clinging to a vain belief in privileged orders, in worn-out relics, in the bones of dead men, in mouldering escutcheons and forgotten coats of arms—and yet in your inmost heart you are forced to acknowledge that your brother nobles have deserved their punishment, that forgetfulness were mercy for them!

The Man. You, Pancratius, and your followers, what do you deserve?

Pancratius. Victory and life! I acknowledge but one right, I bow to but one law, the law of perpetual progress, and this law is your death warrant. It cries to you through my lips: 'Worm-eaten, mouldering aristocracy! full of rottenness, crammed with meat and wine, satiated with luxury—give place to the young, the strong, the hungry!'

But I will save you, and you alone!

The Man. Cease! I will not brook your arrogant pity!

I know you, and your new world; I have visited your camp at night, and looked upon the restless swarms upon whose necks you ride to power! I saw all: I detected the old crimes peering through the thin veils of new draperies, shining under new shams, whirling to new tunes, circling in new dances—but the end was ever the same which it has been for centuries, which it will forever be: adultery, license, theft, gold, blood!

But I saw you not there; you were not with your guilty children; you know you despise them in the depths of your soul; and if you do not go mad yourself in the mad dances of the blood-thirsty and blood-drunken people, you will soon scorn and despise yourself!

Torture me no more!

He rises, moves hurriedly to and fro, then seats himself under his escutcheon.

Pancratius. It is true my world is in its infancy, unformed and undeveloped; it requires food, ease, material gratifications; but it is growing, and the time will come—(He rises from his chair, approaches the count, and leans against the pillar supporting the escutcheons)—the time will come when my world will arrive at maturity, will attain the consciousness of its own strength, when it will say, I am; and there will be no other voice on earth able to reply, 'I also am!'

The Man. And then?

Pancratius. A race will spring from the generation I am now quickening and elevating, stronger, higher, and nobler than any the world has yet produced; the earth has never yet seen such men upon her bosom. They will be free, lords of the globe from pole to pole; the earth will be a blooming garden, every part of her surface under the highest culture; the sea will be covered with floating palaces and argosies of wealth and commerce; a universal exchange of commodities will carry civilization, mutual recognition, and comfort to every clime; prosperous cities will crown every height, and expand their blessings of refinement and culture o'er every plain; earth will then offer happy and tranquil homes to all her children, she will be one vast and united house of blissful industry and highest art!

The Man. Your words and voice dissemble well, but your pale and rigid features in vain struggle to assume the generous glow of a noble enthusiasm, which your soul cannot feel.

Pancratius. Interrupt me not! Men have begged on bended knees before me for such prophecies.