Complete Works of Gustave Flaubert

by Gustave Flaubert

  He stoops down and gazes over the precipice.

  “The man who falls over that will be killed. Nothing easier, by simply rolling over on the left side: it is necessary to take only one step! only one!”

  Then appears an old woman.

  Antony rises with a start of error. He imagines that he sees his mother risen from the dead.

  But this one is much older and excessively emaciated. A winding-sheet, fastened round her head, hangs with her white hair down to the very extremities of her legs, thin as sticks. The brilliancy of her teeth, which are like ivory, makes her clayey skin look darker. The sockets of her eyes are full of gloom, and in their depths flicker two flames, like lamps in a sepulchre.

  “Come forward,” she says; “what keeps you back?”

  Antony, stammering — ”I am afraid of committing a sin!”

  She resumes:

  “But King Saul was slain! Razias, a just man, was slain! Saint Pelagius of Antioch was slain! Dominius of Aleppo and his two daughters, three more saints, were slain; — and recall to your mind all the confessors who, in their eagerness to die, rushed to meet their executioners. In order to taste death the more speedily, the virgins of Miletus strangled themselves with their cords. The philosopher, Hegesias, at Syracuse preached so well on the subject, that people deserted the brothels to hang themselves in the fields. The Roman patricians sought for death as if it were a debauch.”

  Antony — ”Yes, it is a powerful passion! Many an anchorite has yielded to it.”

  The old woman — ”To do a thing which makes you equal to God — think of that! He created you; you are about to destroy His work, you, by your courage, freely. The enjoyment of Erostrates was not greater. And then, your body is thus mocked by your soul in order that you may avenge yourself in the end. You will have no pain. It will soon be over. What are you afraid of? A large black hole! It is empty, perhaps!”

  Antony listens without saying anything in reply; — and, on the other side, appears another woman, marvellously young and beautiful. At first, he takes her for Ammonaria. But she is taller, fair as honey, rather plump, with paint on her cheeks, and roses on her head. Her long robe, covered with spangles, is studded with metallic mirrors. Her fleshly lips have a look of blood, and her somewhat heavy eyelashes are so much bathed in languor that one would imagine she was blind. She murmurs:

  “Come, then, and enjoy yourself. Solomon recommends pleasure. Go where your heart leads you, and according to the desire of your eyes.”

  Antony — ”To find what pleasure? My heart is sick; my eyes are dim!”

  She replies:

  “Hasten to the suburb of Racotis; push open a door painted blue; and, when you are in the atrium, where a jet of water is gurgling, a woman will present herself — in a peplum of white silk edged with gold, her hair dishevelled, and her laugh like sounds made by rattlesnakes. She is clever. In her caress you will taste the pride of an initiation, and the satisfaction of a want. Have you pressed against your bosom a maiden who loved you? Recall to your mind her remorse, which vanished under a flood of sweet tears. You can imagine yourself — can you not? — walking through the woods beneath the light of the moon. At the pressure of your hands joined with hers a shudder runs through both of you; your eyes, brought close together, overflow from one to the other like immaterial waves, and your heart is full; it is bursting; it is a delicious whirlwind, an overpowering intoxication.”

  The old woman — ”You need not experience joys to feel their bitterness! You need only see them from afar, and disgust takes possession of you. You must needs be wearied with the monotony of the same actions, the duration of the days, the ugliness of the world, and the stupidity of the sun!”

  Antony — ”Oh! yes; all that it shines upon is displeasing to me.”

  The young woman — ”Hermit! hermit! you shall find diamonds among the pebbles, fountains beneath the sand, a delight in the dangers which you despise; and there are even places on the earth so beautiful that you are filled with a longing to embrace them.”

  The old woman — ”Every evening when you lie down to sleep on the earth, you hope that it may soon cover you.”

  The young woman — ”Nevertheless, you believe in the resurrection of the flesh, which is the transport of life into eternity.”

  The old woman, while speaking, has been growing more emaciated, and, above her skull, which has no hair upon it, a bat has been making circles in the air.

  The young woman has become plumper. Her robe changes colour; her nostrils swell; her eyes roll softly.

  The first says, opening her arms:

  “Come! I am consolation, rest, oblivion, eternal peace!”

  And the second offering her breast:

  “I am the soother, the joy, the life, the happiness inexhaustible!”

  Antony turns on his heel to fly. Each of them places a hand upon his shoulder.

  The winding-sheet flies open, and reveals the skeleton of Death. The robe bursts open, and presents to view the entire body of Lust, which has a slender figure, with an enormous development behind, and great, undulating masses of hair, disappearing towards the end.

  Antony remains motionless between the pair, contemplating them.

  Death says to him —

  “This moment, or a little later — what does it matter? You belong to me, like the suns, the nations, the cities, the kings, the snow on the mountains, and the grass in the fields. I fly higher than the sparrow-hawk, I run more quickly than the gazelle; I keep pace even with hope; I have conquered God!”

  Lust — ”Do not resist; I am omnipotent. The forests echo with my sighs; the waves are stirred by my agitations. Virtue, courage, piety, are dissolved in the perfume of my breath. I accompany man at every step he takes; and on the threshold of the tomb he comes back to me.”

  Death — ”I will reveal to you what you tried to grasp by the light of torches on the features of the dead — or when you rambled beyond the Pyramids in those vast sand-heaps composed of human remains. From time to time, a piece of skull rolled under your sandal. You took it out of the dust; you made it slip between your fingers; and your mind, becoming absorbed in it, was plunged into nothingness.”

  Lust — ”Mine is a deeper gulf! Marble slabs have inspired impure loves. People rush towards meetings that terrify them, and rivet the very chains which they curse. Whence comes the witchery of courtesans, the extravagance of dreams, the immensity of my sadness?”

  Death — ”My irony surpasses that of all other things. There are convulsions of joy at the funerals of kings and at the extermination of peoples; and they make war with music, plumes, flags, golden harnesses, and a display of ceremony to pay me the greater homage.”

  Lust — ”My anger is as strong as yours. I howl, I bite, I have sweats of agony, and corpse-like appearances.”

  Death — ”It is I who make you serious; let us embrace each other!”

  Death chuckles; Lust roars. They seize each other’s figures, and sing together:

  “I hasten the dissolution of matter.”

  “I facilitate the scattering of germs!”

  “Thou destroyest that I may renew!”

  “Thou engenderest that I may destroy!”

  “Active my power!”

  “Fruitful my decay!”

  And their voices, whose echoes, rolling forth, fill the horizon, become so powerful that Antony falls backward.

  A shock, from time to time, causes him to half open his eyes; and he perceives, in the midst of the darkness, a kind of monster before him.

  It is a death’s-head with a crown of roses. It rises above the torso of a woman white as mother-of-pearl. Beneath, a winding-sheet, starred with points of gold, makes a kind of train; — and the entire body undulates, like a gigantic worm holding itself erect.

  The vision grows fainter, and then fades away.

  Antony, rises again — ”This time, once more, it was the Devil, and under his two-fold aspect — the spirit of voluptuousness and the
spirit of destruction. Neither terrifies me. I thrust happiness aside, and feel that I am eternal.

  “Thus, death is only an illusion, a veil, masking at certain points the continuity of life. But substance, being one, why is there a variety of forms? There must be somewhere primordial figures, whose bodies are only images. If one could see, one would know the bond between mind and matter, wherein Being consists!

  “There are those figures which were painted at Babylon on the wall of the temple of Belus, and they covered a mosaic in the port of Carthage. I, myself, have sometimes seen in the sky what seemed like forms of spirits. Those who traverse the desert meet animals passing all conception ...”

  And, opposite him, on the other side of the Nile, lo! the Sphinx appears.

  It stretches out its feet, shakes the fillets on its forehead, and lies down upon its belly.

  Jumping, flying, spirting fire through its nostrils, and striking its wings with its dragon’s tail, the Chimera with its green eyes, winds round, and barks. The curls of its head, thrown back on one side, intermingle with the hair on its haunches; and on the other side they hang over the sand, and move to and fro with the swaying of its entire body.

  The Sphinx is motionless, and gazes at the Chimera:

  “Here, Chimera; stop!”

  The Chimera — ”No, never!”

  The Sphinx — ”Do not run so quickly; do not fly so high; do not bark so loud!”

  The Chimera — ”Do not address me, do not address me any more, since you remain forever silent!”

  The Sphinx — ”Cease casting your flames in my face and flinging your yells in my ears; you shall not melt my granite!”

  The Chimera — ”You will not get hold of me, terrible Sphinx!”

  The Sphinx — ”You are too foolish to live with me!”

  The Chimera — ”You are too clumsy to follow me!”

  The Sphinx — ”And where are you going that you run so quickly?”

  The Chimera — ”I gallop into the corridors of the labyrinth; I hover over the mountains; I skim along the waves; I yelp at the bottoms of precipices; I hang by my jaws on the skirts of the clouds. With my trailing tail I scratch the coasts, and the hills have taken their curb according to the form of my shoulders. But as for you, I find you perpetually motionless; or, rather, with the end of your claw tracing letters on the sand.”

  The Sphinx — ”That is because I keep my secret! I reflect and I calculate. The sea returns to its bed; the blades of corn balance themselves in the wind; the caravans pass; the dust flies off; the cities crumble; — but my glance, which nothing can turn aside, remains concentrated on the objects which cover an inaccessible horizon.”

  The Chimera — ”As for me, I am light and joyous! I discover in men dazzling perspectives, with Paradises in the clouds and distant felicities. I pour into their souls the eternal insanities, projects of happiness, plans for the future, dreams of glory, and oaths of love, as well as virtuous resolutions. I drive them on perilous voyages and on mighty enterprises. I have carved with my claws the marvels of architecture. It is I that hung the little bells on the tomb of Porsenna, and surrounded with a wall of Corinthian brass the quays of the Atlantides.

  “I seek fresh perfumes, larger flowers, pleasures hitherto unknown. If anywhere I find a man whose soul reposes in wisdom, I fall upon him and strangle him.”

  The Sphinx — ”All those whom the desire of God torments, I have devoured.

  “The strongest, in order to climb to my royal forehead, mount upon the stripes of my fillets as on the steps of a staircase. Weariness takes possession of them, and they fall back of their own accord.”

  Antony begins to tremble. He is not before his cell, but in the desert, having at either side of him those two monstrous animals, whose jaws graze his shoulders.

  The Sphinx — ”O Fantasy, bear me on thy wings to enliven thy sadness!”

  The Chimera — ”O Unknown One, I am in love with thine eyes! I turn round thee, soliciting allayment of that which devours me!”

  The Sphinx — ”My feet cannot raise themselves. The lichen, like a ringworm, has grown over my mouth. By dint of thinking, I have no longer anything to say.”

  The Chimera — ”You lie, hypocritical Sphinx! How is it that you are always addressing me and abjuring me?”

  The Sphinx — ”It is you, unmanageable caprice, who pass and whirl about.”

  The Chimera — ”Is that my fault? Come, now, just let me be!”

  It barks.

  The Sphinx — ”You move away; you avoid me!”

  The Sphinx grumbles.

  The Chimera — ”Let us make the attempt! You crush me!”

  The Sphinx — ”No; impossible!”

  And sinking, little by little, it disappears in the sand, while the Chimera, crawling, with its tongue out, departs with a winding movement.

  The breath issuing from its mouth has produced a fog.

  In this fog Antony traces masses of clouds and imperfect curves. Finally, he distinguishes what appear to be human bodies.

  And first advances the group of Astomi, like air-balls passing across the sun.

  “Don’t puff too strongly! The drops of rain bruise us; the false sounds excoriate us; the darkness blinds us. Composed of breezes and of perfumes, we roll, we float — a little more than dreams, not entirely beings.”

  The Nisnas have but one eye, one cheek, one hand, one leg, half a body, and half a heart. And they say, in a very loud tone:

  “We live quite at our ease in our halves of houses with our halves of wives and our halves of children.”

  The Blemmyes, absolutely bereft of heads —

  “Our shoulders are the largest; — and there is not an ox, a rhinoceros, or an elephant that is capable of carrying what we carry.

  “Arrows, and a sort of vague outline are imprinted on our breasts — that is all! We reduce digestion to thought; we subtilise secretions. For us God floats peacefully in the internal chyle.

  “We proceed straight on our way, passing through every mire, running along the verge of every abyss; and we are the most industrious, happy, and virtuous people.”

  The Pygmies — ”Little good-fellows, we swarm over the world, like vermin on the hump of a dromedary.

  “We are burnt, drowned, or run over; but we always reappear more full of life and more numerous — terrible from the multitude of us that exists!”

  The Sciapodes — ”Kept on the ground by our flowing locks, long as creeping plants, we vegetate under the shelter of our feet, which are as large as parasols; and the light reaches us through the spaces between our wide heels. No disorder and no toil! To keep the head as low as possible — that is the secret of happiness!”

  Their lifted thighs, resembling trunks of trees, increase in number. And now a forest appears in which huge apes rush along on four paws. They are men with dogs’ heads.

  The Cynocephali — ”We leap from branch to branch to suck the eggs, and we pluck the little birds; then we put their nests upon our heads after the fashion of caps.

  “We do not fail to snatch away the worst of the cows, and we destroy the lynxes’ eyes. Tearing the flowers, crushing the fruits, agitating the springs, we are the masters — by the strength of our arms and the fierceness of our hearts.

  “Be bold, comrades, and snap your jaws!”

  Blood and milk flow from their lips. The rain streams over their hairy backs.

  Antony inhales the freshness of green leaves which are agitated as the branches of the trees dash against each other. All at once appears a large black stag with a bull’s head, carrying between his two ears a mass of white horns.

  The Sadhuzag — ”My seventy-four antlers are hollow like flutes. When I turn myself towards the south wind, sounds go forth from them that draw around me the ravished beasts. The serpents come winding to my feet; the wasps stick in my nostrils; and the parrots, the doves, and the ibises alight upon my branches. Listen!”

  He bends back his horns, from which is
sues an unutterably sweet music.

  Antony presses both his hands above his heart. It seems to him as if this melody were about to carry off his soul.

  The Sadhuzag — ”But, when I turn towards the north wind, my horns, more bushy than a battalion of spears, emit a howling noise. The forests thrill; the rivers swell; the husks of the fruit burst, and blades of grass stand erect like a coward’s hair. Listen!”

  He bows down his branches, from which now come forth discordant cries. Antony feels as if he were torn asunder, and his horror is increased on seeing the Mantichor, a gigantic red lion with a human figure and three rows of teeth:

  “The silky texture of my scarlet hair mingles with the yellowness of the sands. I breathe through my nostrils the terror of solitudes. I spit forth the plague. I devour armies when they venture into the desert. My nails are twisted like gimlets; my teeth are cut like a saw; and my hair, wriggled out of shape, bristles with darts which I scatter, right and left, behind me. Hold! hold!”

  The Mantichor casts thorns from his tail, which radiate, like arrows, in all directions. Drops of blood flow, spattering over the foliage.

  The Catoblepas appears, a black buffalo, with a pig’s head hanging to the earth, and connected with his shoulders by a slender neck, long and flabby as an empty gut. He is wallowing on the ground; and his feet disappear under the enormous mane of hard hairs that descend over his face:

  “Fat, melancholy, savage, I remain continually feeling the mire under my stomach. My skull is so heavy that it is impossible for me to carry it. I roll it around slowly; and, opening my jaws, I snatch with my tongue the poisonous herbs that are moistened with my breath. I once devoured my paws without noticing it.

  “No one, Antony, has ever seen my eyes, or those who have seen them are dead. If I but raised my eyelids — my eyelids red and swollen — that instant you would die.”