UMBERTO ECO : THE PRAGUE CEMETERY

by Eco, Umberto

  "So far as we know," said Lagrange, "he's about to finish a book on the Jews and the Judaization of Christian nations, if you follow my meaning. You may find it helpful to meet him, to gather any information you need for our Russian friends. And it would be useful for us to know more about what he's up to — we wouldn't wish any harm to come to the fine relations among our government, the Church and the Jewish financial world. You could describe yourself as an expert on Jewish affairs who admires his work. There is someone who could introduce you, a cleric, Abbé Dalla Piccola, who has performed quite a few services for us."

  "But I don't know a word of Hebrew," I said.

  "Who says Gougenot does? To hate someone, you don't have to speak his language."

  And now (suddenly!) I remember my first meeting with Abbé Dalla Piccola. I see him as if he were standing here in front of me. And in seeing him, I realize that he is not my double, in fact he is nothing like me, because he looks at least sixty and is almost hunchbacked, squint-eyed and has protruding teeth (Abbé Quasimodo, I thought, seeing him now). What is more, he had a German accent. I remember Dalla Piccola whispering to me that it would be a good idea to keep an eye on not just the Jews but also the Freemasons, since they are all part of the same conspiracy. I felt it would be better not to open up two fronts at the same time, but from the abbé's various comments I realized the Jesuits were interested in information on the Masonic sects, as the Church was preparing a very violent attack on the Masonic plague.

  "In any event," Dalla Piccola had said, "when the time comes to make contact with such groups, let me know. I'm a brother in a Paris lodge and well connected in such circles."

  "You, a priest?" I had said.

  Dalla Piccola had smiled. "If you only knew how many priests are Masons . . ."

  I had, in the meantime, arranged an interview with Chevalier Gougenot des Mousseaux. He was about seventy, already weak in spirit, sure of the few ideas he had, and interested only in proving the existence of the devil and in magicians, sorcerers, spiritualists, hypnotists, Jews, idolatrous priests and "electricians," who believed in some kind of vital force.

  He spoke in torrents, and began at the very beginning. I listened patiently to the old man's ideas about Moses, the Pharisees, the Grand Sanhedrin and the Talmud. As he spoke, Gougenot offered me an excellent cognac, inadvertently leaving the bottle on a small table in front of him, and I listened patiently.

  He told me the proportion of women of ill repute was higher among Jews than among Christians (and don't we know it, I thought, from the Gospels, where Jesus meets fallen women wherever he goes), and went on to demonstrate how in Talmudic teaching there is no mention of neighbors, nor any suggestion of duties toward them, which explains and justifies in its own way the ruthlessness of Jews in ruining families, seducing young girls and putting widows and old people on the streets after bleeding them of all their money. The number of criminals, as well as prostitutes, was also higher among Jews than Christians. "Did you know," said Gougenot, "that eleven out of twelve cases of thef tbrought before the courts in Leipzig were committed by Jews? In fact," he added with a malicious smile, "on Calvary there were two criminals for a single just man. And generally speaking, the crimes committed by Jews are the more heinous, such as deception, forgery, usury, fraudulent bankruptcy, smuggling, producing counterfeit money, extortion, commercial fraud . . . I need hardly continue."

  After almost an hour of details about usury, he reached the more lurid part, on infanticide and cannibalism, before ending, almost by way of contrast to such dark practices, with the description of a matter that was clear and visible in the light of day: the harmful effects of Jewish finance on the public economy, and the weakness of French governments in combating and punishing it.

  Most interesting of all, though hardly of any use to me, was when Gougenot recalled the intellectual superiority of the Jews over Christians, almost as if he too were Jewish, quoting those assertions by Disraeli which I had heard from Toussenel. And here it was clear that socialists, Fourierists and Catholic monarchists shared the same view of Judaism and seemed to reject the popular view of the runtish, sickly Jew. It is true that Jews had weak, fragile constitutions, never having trained their bodies or practiced military arts (unlike, say, the Greeks, who valued physical competition), but they lived long, were remarkably fertile (an effect of their insatiable sexual appetite) and were immune from many illnesses that afflicted the rest of humanity, thus making them more dangerous as invaders of the world.

  "Explain to me," said Gougenot, "why the Jews are almost always spared from cholera epidemics, even when they live in the most dank and insalubrious parts of the city. Referring to the plague in 1346, a historian of that period said that for some mysterious reason the Jews had not been stricken in any country; Frascator tells us the Jews alone were saved from the typhoid epidemic of 1505; Daguer shows how the Jews were the only survivors of the dysentery epidemic in Nijmegen in 1736; Wawruch proves that the tapeworm is not found in the Jewish population in Germany. What do you say? How is it possible, if these are the filthiest people in the world, who marry only among members of their own race? It's against all the laws of nature. Is it their diet, whose rules remain obscure? Or is it circumcision? What secret makes them stronger than us even when they seem weaker? Such a treacherous and powerful enemy, I say, has to be destroyed by whatever means. You realize when they arrived in the Promised Land there were only six hundred thousand men. If you count four people for each adult male, that makes a total population of two and a half million. By the time of Solomon they had one million three hundred thousand soldiers, and therefore five million people, and that's double. And today? It's hard to calculate how many there are, spread throughout every continent, but the more prudent estimates talk of ten million. And they're growing, growing . . ."

  He seemed so racked by resentment I felt tempted to offer him a glass of his own cognac. But he recovered, and by the time he had reached messianism and the Kabbalah (and was about to embark on a description of his books on magic and Satanism), I had fallen into a gentle slumber and only managed by some miracle to rouse myself, whereupon I thanked him and took my leave.

  Too much of a good thing, I thought. If I put all this into one document for people like Lagrange, I'd be in danger of ending up (courtesy of the secret service) in a dungeon, maybe in the Château d'If, as would befit a devotee of Dumas. Perhaps I should have taken Gougenot's book more seriously, because now, as I write, I recall that Le Juif: Le judaïsme et la judaïsation des peuples chrétiens was published in 1869—almost six hundred pages of small print — and received the blessing of Pope Pius IX and great public acclaim. But it was the fact that so many books and pamphlets against the Jews were being published in every corner of the world that encouraged me to be selective.

  In my Prague cemetery the rabbis had to say something easily understood, which would capture the popular imagination and would in some way be new. Not like the ritual child killing that people had been talking about for centuries; they believed in that as much as they believed in witches, and it was enough to prevent their children from playing around the ghettos.

  And so I went back to writing my report on the dark dealings of that fateful night. The thirteenth voice spoke first: "Our forefathers ordained that the elders of Israel should gather together once each century around the tomb of our blessed rabbi, Simeon ben Yehuda. Eighteen centuries have passed since the power pledged to Abraham was snatched from us by the Cross. The people of Israel, downtrodden, humiliated by their enemies, under constant threat of death and rape, have resisted. If they are spread across the whole earth, that means the whole earth must belong to them. The Golden Calf has been ours since the days of Aaron."

  "Yes," said Rabbi Isascher, "when we are the sole possessors of all the earth's gold, true power will pass into our hands."

  "This is the tenth occasion," continued the thirteenth voice, "after a thousand years of fierce and endless battling with our foes, that th
e elders of each generation of the people of Israel have gathered together in this cemetery, around the tomb of our rabbi, Simeon ben Yehuda. But in none of the previous centuries were our forefathers able to concentrate in our hands so much gold, and therefore so much power. In Paris, London, Vienna, Berlin, Amsterdam, Hamburg, Rome and Naples, and through the Rothschilds, the Israelites have control over all financial affairs. Speak, Rabbi Reuben. You know the position in Paris."

  "All reigning emperors, kings and princes," said Reuben, "are overwhelmed by debts they have incurred with us to maintain their armies and shore up their tottering thrones. We must therefore encourage more lending, and as security for the capital we supply to countries, we must take control of their railways, their mines, their forests, their foundries and factories and other property, as well as tax collection."

  * * *

  He seemed so racked by resentment I felt tempted to offer him a glass of his own cognac.

  * * *

  "Do not forget agriculture," said Simeon from Rome. "It is the great wealth of every country. The ownership of vast estates still seems unattainable, but if we manage to persuade governments to break up these landholdings, they can then be more easily acquired."

  Rabbi Judah from Amsterdam then said, "But many of our brothers in Israel are converting and accepting Christian baptism."

  "That's no matter!" replied the thirteenth voice. "Those who are baptized can serve us just as well. Despite the baptism of their bodies, their spirits and their souls remain faithful to Israel. In a hundred years' time no child of Israel will want to become Christian, but many Christians will seek to join our holy faith. Then Israel will turn them away with contempt."

  "But most of all," said Rabbi Levi, "let us regard the Christian Church as our most dangerous enemy. We must spread ideas of free thought, of skepticism, among Christians. We must bring down the ministers of this religion."

  "Let us spread the idea of progress, which leads to equality for all religions," said Rabbi Manasse. "Let us fight to stop lessons about the Christian religion in school syllabuses. Israelites, through their skill and education, will have no difficulty in finding teaching posts in Christian schools. Religious education will then be relegated to the family, and since most families have little time to concern themselves with this branch of learning, religious feeling will gradually fade."

  It was now the turn of Rabbi Dan from Constantinople: "And above all, business and speculation must never slip out of Israelite hands. We must take over trade in alcohol, butter, bread and wine. In this way we will have complete control over agriculture and over the rural economy."

  And Naphtali from Prague said: "We must set our sights on the judiciary and the legal profession. And why should Israelites not become government ministers of education when they have so often held such roles in finance?"

  And finally, Rabbi Benjamin from Toledo spoke: "We must not be strangers to any important profession: philosophy, medicine, law, music, economics . . . in short, all branches of science, the arts and literature are a vast field in which we must prove ourselves and show our abilities. And above all medicine! A doctor is privy to a family's most intimate secrets, and is responsible for a Christian's life and health. And we must encourage marriages between Israelites and Christians —the introduction of a tiny quantity of impure blood into our race, elected by God, cannot taint it, and our sons and daughters will acquire relatives in Christian families who hold positions of power."

  "Let us conclude our assembly," said the thirteenth voice. "If gold is the first power in this world, the second is the press. We must take over the running of all daily newspapers in every country. Once we are in absolute control of the press, we can change public ideas about honor, virtue and integrity, and carry out our first attack on the family as an institution. Let us appear to be concerned about social questions of current interest. We have to maintain control over the proletariat, plant our agitators in social movements so we can stir up trouble when we want to, driving workers to the barricades, to revolution. Each of these catastrophes brings us closer to our purpose, that of ruling the earth, as was promised to our forefather Abraham. Our power will increase like a gigantic tree, whose branches will bear the fruits of wealth, pleasure, happiness and power, as compensation for that vile condition which was the sole destiny of the people of Israel over long centuries."

  If I remember rightly, that was how the report from the Prague cemetery ended.

  At the end of my reconstruction I feel exhausted, perhaps because I've taken some libation to accompany these hours of feverish writing, to give me physical strength and raise my spirits. But since yesterday I've had no appetite, and eating sickens me. I wake up and vomit. Perhaps I'm working too hard. Or perhaps I'm being throttled by a hatred that is consuming me. At this distance in time, looking back over the pages I wrote about the Prague cemetery, I understand how that experience, the powerful, convincing reconstruction of the Jewish conspiracy, the repugnance that through my childhood and early youth had been no more than (how can I say?) imaginary, all in my head, like voices of a catechism instilled by my grandfather, had now become flesh and blood. And only when I had succeeded in reliving that terrible night was my resentment, my aversion to Jewish perfidy, transformed from an abstract idea into a deep, irrepressible passion. By God, it must indeed have been that night at the Prague cemetery — or at least through reading my account of the event — that had made me understand how that accursed race could no longer be allowed to corrupt our lives!

  Only after I had read and reread the document did I fully understand that this was my mission. I had to sell my report to someone, but only if he paid its weight in gold would he believe it, and help in making it credible.

  But it's better for me to stop writing for the evening. This hatred (or just the memory of it) is twisting my mind. My hands are trembling. I must go and sleep, sleep, sleep.

  13

  DALLA PICCOLA SAYS HE IS

  NOT DALLA PICCOLA

  5th April 1897

  This morning I awoke in my own bed and dressed myself, adding that touch of makeup my character requires. Then I went to read your diary, where you say you met Abbé Dalla Piccola, and you describe him as certainly being older than me and, what is more, hunchbacked. I went to look at myself in the mirror of your room — in mine there is no mirror, as is appropriate for a priest — and, without wishing to indulge in vanity, I can only say that my features are regular, I am surely not squint-eyed, and my teeth do not protrude. And I have a fine French accent with, if anything, a bit of an Italian inflection.

  So who then is the abbé with my name whom you met? And at this point, who am I?

  14

  BIARRITZ

  5th April 1897, late morning

  I awoke late and found your brief note on my diary. You're an early riser. Good God, Monsieur Abbé—assuming, that is, you'll read these lines in the next few days (or nights)—who then are you? Because I recall, at this very moment, having killed you back before the war! How can I be talking to a ghost?

  Did I kill you? Why am I so sure of it now? Let us try to remember. But first I have to eat. Strange, yesterday the very thought of food disgusted me. Now I'll devour anything I can find. If I were free to go out, I would see a doctor.

  Having finished my report on the gathering in the Prague cemetery, I was ready to meet Colonel Dimitri. I remembered how much Brafmann enjoyed French food and invited Dimitri to the same place, Rocher de Cancale, but he didn't seem interested in food and picked at what I had ordered. He had slightly slanted eyes, with small piercing pupils that made me think of the eyes of a weasel, though I admit I have never seen one (I hate weasels as much as I hate Jews). Dimitri, it seemed, had the peculiar virtue of making the person he was talking to feel uncomfortable.

  He had read my report with care. "Very interesting," he said. "How much?"

  It was a pleasure to deal with people like him, and I named a figure that was perhaps excessive — fift
y thousand francs — explaining how costly my informants had been.

  "Too expensive," said Dimitri. "Or should I say, too expensive for me. Let us try to divide the cost. We are on good terms with the Prussian secret service. They also have a problem with Jews. I'll pay you twenty-five thousand francs in gold and authorize you to pass a copy of the document to the Prussians, who will give you the other half. I will inform them. They'll want the original, of course — the same as you have given me — but from what Lagrange tells me you are perfectly capable of duplicating originals. The name of the person who will contact you is Stieber."

  That was all he said. He courteously refused a cognac, bowed formally, in the German rather than the Russian way, with his body straight and head bent at almost a right angle, and went. I was left to pay the bill.

  I asked for a meeting with Lagrange, who had already spoken to me about Stieber, the chief of Prussian intelligence. He specialized in gathering material beyond the frontier, but was also able to infiltrate sects and movements who compromised the peace of the state. Ten years earlier he had played a valuable part in obtaining information on that man Marx, who had been causing concern to both the Germans and the English. It seems that Lagrange or his agent Krause, who worked under the assumed name of Fleury, had managed to get into Marx's house in London disguised as a doctor, and made off with a list of names of all the supporters of the Communist League. It was quite a coup, Lagrange told me, and led to the arrest of many dangerous individuals. A useless precaution, I suggested; those communists must have been pretty stupid to be duped like that and wouldn't have got very far. But Lagrange said you never know. Prevention is best — it's better to punish first, before any crimes are committed.