The Collected Stories of Machado De Assis

by Machado De Assis

  The following day, as agreed, we went to the abode of the aforementioned bonze, who went by the curious name of Pomada, which in our language means “charlatan.” He was an old man of a hundred and eight, well read in letters both divine and human, and widely revered by the pagan masses; for this very reason he was distrusted by the other bonzes, who were consumed with jealousy. And so, having learned from Titané who we were and what we wanted, the aforementioned bonze first of all initiated us into the various rituals and ceremonies necessary for the reception of his doctrine, and only then did he raise his voice to reveal and explain it to us.

  “You must understand,” he began, “that virtue and knowledge have two parallel existences, one in the man who possesses them, and the other in the minds of those who hear or observe him. If you were to put the most sublime virtues and the most profound knowledge into a solitary individual, removed from all contact with other men, it would be as if such things did not exist. If no one tastes the fruits of an orange tree, it is worth no more than wild gorse and scrub, and if nobody sees such fruits, they are worth nothing at all. Or, to put it more succinctly, there is no spectacle without a spectator. One day, while pondering such matters, I realized that achieving this small crumb of self-enlightenment had entirely consumed my life, and, moreover, it would all be in vain without the presence of other men to witness and honor me; I then wondered whether there might be some means of achieving the same effect with less effort, and that day, I can tell you now, was the day of mankind’s rebirth, for it gave me my new doctrine.”

  At this point, we pricked up our ears and hung upon the lips of the bonze, who, since Diogo had told him I was unfamiliar with the local language, was speaking very slowly so that I would miss nothing. And on he went: “You will never guess what gave me the idea of this new doctrine: it was neither more nor less than the moonstone, that famous stone so luminous that, when placed on a mountaintop or on the pinnacle of a tower, it gives light to the whole countryside around, no matter how extensive. Such a stone, so rich in light, has never existed and no one has ever seen it, but many people believe it exists and more than one will tell you that he has seen it with his own eyes. I considered the matter and realized that if a thing can exist in someone’s opinion without existing in reality, or exist in reality without existing in someone’s opinion, the conclusion must be that of the two parallel existences, the only one necessary is that of opinion, not of reality, which is merely an additional convenience. No sooner had I made this discovery, however speculative, than I gave thanks to God for bestowing on me such special favor, and I resolved to verify it by experimentation. This I achieved on more than one occasion, but I will not bore you by going into the details. In order to understand the efficacy of my system, it is enough to tell you that crickets cannot be born out of thin air and the leaves of the coconut tree during the conjunction of the new moon, and the font of future life does not lie in a single drop of cow’s blood; and yet Patimau and Languru, who are both clever men, were able to plant both these ideas into the minds of the masses so artfully that they now enjoy reputations as great physicians and even greater philosophers, and have followers who would willingly give their lives for them.”

  We did not know how best to express to the bonze our intense appreciation and admiration. He continued to question us, in detail, for quite some time about his doctrine and its founding principles, and once he was satisfied that we had fully understood it, he encouraged us to put it into practice, revealing it very cautiously, not because it contained anything that was contrary to divine or human laws, but because a misunderstanding could cause the doctrine irreparable damage before it had even taken its first steps. Finally, he bade us farewell in the certainty (and these were his very words) that we were “departing with your souls transformed into those of true Pomadists,” a term which pleased him enormously, based as it was on his own name.

  Indeed, before evening fell, the three of us had agreed to set to work on an idea that would prove as lucrative as it was judicious, for profit cannot be measured only in money, but according to the respect and praise one receives, for both are an alternative and perhaps better currency, even if they are of no use when buying silk damasks and gold plate. So we agreed, by way of an experiment, that each of us would plant a certain belief in the minds of the people of Fucheo, as a result of which we would reap the same reward as Patimau and Languru. But man does not easily lose sight of his own best interests, and so Titané took it upon himself to earn twice the profit by charging for the experiment with both currencies, that is by selling sandals and, at the same time, earning men’s esteem; we did not object to this, since it seemed to us to have no bearing on the essential teachings of our doctrine.

  I’m not quite sure how best to explain Titané’s experiment in order for you to understand. Here in the kingdom of Bungo, as in other realms of these distant parts, they use a paper made from ground cinnamon bark and glue, a paper of the finest quality, which they then cut into pieces two palms long and half a palm wide. On these sheets, in a variety of bright colors and using the symbols of their own language, they inscribe the weekly news—items of a political, religious, or mercantile nature, about the new laws of the kingdom, and the names of all the fustas, lancharas, balões, and other types of vessels that ply these seas, either in warfare, which is frequent, or in trade. And I say weekly because these sheets of news are indeed prepared once a week, in great quantities, and distributed to the local populace for a small token, which everyone gives willingly so that they can read the news before anyone else hears about it. Now, our Titané could have wished for no better street corner than this paper, whose title translates into our language as The Life and Clarity of Mundane and Celestial Things, which is certainly expressive, if somewhat overblown. And so he arranged for it to be reported in the aforesaid paper that the news coming in from the coasts of Malabar and China was full of nothing but talk of Titané’s famous sandals: that they were being acclaimed as the best in the world, on account of their robustness and elegance; that, given the splendor of Titané’s famous sandals, the finest in the universe, no fewer than twenty-four mandarins were going to ask the Great Emperor to create the honorific title of “Sandal of State” as a reward to those who had distinguished themselves in any field of learning; that very large orders were flooding in from every region, orders that Titané was determined to fulfill less for love of profit than for the glory it would bring to his beloved homeland; that, nevertheless, he would not resile from his humble intention, which he had already declared to the king and hereby repeated, to donate fifty score such sandals to the kingdom’s poor; and, finally, that, despite being acknowledged as the finest sandal-maker anywhere in the world, he knew the obligations of moderation, and would never consider himself anything more than a diligent artisan working tirelessly for the glory of the kingdom of Bungo.

  The whole city of Fucheo was naturally deeply moved upon reading this news, and spoke of nothing else for the whole of that week. Titané’s sandals, until then considered merely adequate, began to be sought out with great curiosity and enthusiasm, and even more so in the weeks that followed, since he continued for some time to entertain the city with many extraordinary tales about his merchandise. And he said to us, very cheerily:

  “You can see that I have obeyed the fundamental principles of our doctrine, for I have made the people believe in the superiority of these sandals even though I am not persuaded of it myself, indeed I find them rather ordinary; and now everyone rushes to buy them, for whatever price I choose to charge.”

  “It doesn’t seem to me,” I interrupted, “that you have followed the doctrine in all its rigor and substance, for it is not our task to instill in others an opinion that we do not ourselves hold, but rather to convince them of a quality in us that we do not actually possess; that surely is the essence of the doctrine.”

  The other two then agreed that it was now my turn to attempt the experiment, and I did so immediately. I wil
l not, however, relate every aspect of my own experiment, so as not to delay my account of Diogo Meireles’s experiment, which was the most decisive of the three and provided the best proof of the bonze’s delightful invention. I will say only that, having a smattering of music and a mediocre talent on the flute, I had the idea of gathering the leading citizens of Fucheo to hear me play the instrument. They duly came, listened, and went away saying that they had never heard anything quite so extraordinary. I confess that I achieved this result solely by virtue of airs and affectations: the elegant arch of my arms when I played the flute, which was brought to me on a silver salver, the firmness of my chest, the unctuous devotion with which I raised my eyes to heaven, and the contemptuous disdain with which I looked down at the audience, which promptly burst into such a concert of voices and cries of enthusiasm that I was almost persuaded of my own merit.

  But, as I said, of all our experiments, Diego Miereles’s was the most ingenious. At the time, a most peculiar disease was spreading through the city, one that caused a patient’s nose to swell up so much that it covered half his or her face. This not only made them look utterly hideous, it also proved a very heavy burden to carry around. Although the local physicians proposed removing the swollen noses, for the relief and cure of those afflicted, no one would consent to succumb to such treatment, preferring excess to absence, and holding that the lack of that organ would be more bothersome than any other outcome. In such a predicament, several resorted to voluntary death as a remedy, to the great sadness of the whole city. Diogo Meireles, who, as mentioned earlier, had been practicing medicine for some time, studied the illness and agreed that there was no danger in relieving the sufferers of their noses; indeed it would be beneficial to remove the problem, and cause no further ugliness, since a heavy, misshapen nose was just as bad as none at all. He did not, however, manage to persuade the unfortunate sufferers to make the necessary sacrifice. Then a cunning plan occurred to him. And so it was that, having gathered together many physicians, philosophers, bonzes, representatives of authority and the people, he informed them that he held the secret to solving the problem. This secret was nothing less than replacing the diseased nose with one that was healthy, but of a purely metaphysical nature—that is, imperceptible to the human eye, but just as, or even more, real than the one that had been removed. It was a cure he had performed in many different places, and one that was widely accepted by the physicians of Malabar. The crowd was greatly astonished, and some were quite incredulous; I don’t say all of them, for the majority did not know what to believe, repelled as they were by the metaphysics of noses. Gradually, however, they succumbed to the force of Diogo Meireles’s words and the convincing tone with which he expounded his remedy. It was then that several philosophers, ashamed to appear any less knowledgeable than Diogo Meireles, declared that there was indeed a sound basis for such a discovery, given that mankind itself was nothing more than the product of transcendental ideals, from which they concluded that one could, in all likelihood, wear a metaphysical nose, and thus solemnly assured the crowd that it would be just as effective.

  The assembled throng cheered Diogo Meireles to the rafters, and patients began to come to him in such numbers that he could scarcely keep up. Diogo Meireles relieved them of their noses with the greatest of skill, his fingers then reaching delicately toward a box in which he pretended to keep the substitute noses, picking up one and applying it to the empty space. The patients, thus cured and made whole again, looked at each other and could see nothing where the removed organ had been; however, convinced that the substitute organ was indeed there, albeit imperceptible to the human eye, they did not consider themselves cheated, and returned to their daily occupations. I could wish for no better proof of the efficacy of the doctrine, and the success of this experiment, than the fact that all those who were relieved of their noses by Diogo Meireles continued to make use of their handkerchiefs just as before. All of which I have set down here to the glory of the bonze and for the benefit of the world.

  * Author’s Note: As will be seen, what follows is not a pastiche, nor was it intended merely as a test of literary talent; if it were, it would be of very little value. In order to give my invention a certain realism, I needed to place it at a great distance in both space and time, and, to make the narrative ring true, there seemed to me to be nobetter solution than to attribute it to that famous travel writer who told so many wondrous tales. For the more curious reader, I will add that the words “I have set out above the events that occurred in the city of Fucheo” were written with the purpose of imagining this chapter to be inserted between chapters CCXIII and CCXIV of Mendes Pinto’s Peregrinacão.

  POLYCRATES’S RING

  A: Oh, there goes Xavier.

  Z: You know Xavier?

  A: Yes, I’ve known him for years! He used to be a real nabob—rich, stinking rich, but a spendthrift with it . . .

  Z: What do you mean, “rich”? What do you mean, “spendthrift”?

  A: As I said, rich and a spendthrift too. He would drink pearls dissolved in nectar. He would dine on nightingales’ tongues. He never used blotting paper because he thought this worthy only of tradesmen; he would sprinkle sand on his letters, but only a very special kind of sand made from powdered diamonds. And then there were the women! Ah, not even all of Solomon’s splendors could match Xavier in that domain. He kept a whole seraglio: Grecian curves, Roman complexions, Turkish exuberance, all the perfections of every race, all the favors of every climate, all were welcome in Xavier’s harem. One day, he fell madly in love with a lady from the highest society and sent her a gift of three stars from the Southern Cross, which, at the time, had seven, and don’t go thinking that the gift-bearer was any old pauper. No, sirree. The gift-bearer was one of Milton’s archangels, whom Xavier summoned as he winged his way across the ethereal sky carrying man’s eternal praise and admiration to his aged English father. Xavier was like that. He rolled his cigarettes using the very finest silk paper, and to light them, he carried with him a little box of sunrays. The quilts on his bed were purple clouds, as were the upholstery of the sofa he reclined upon, the armchair in his study, and the hammock on his veranda. Do you know who made his coffee in the mornings? Aurora herself, with the rosy fingers given her by Homer. Poor Xavier! Everything that wealth and whim could provide: the rare, the odd, the marvelous, the indescribable, the unimaginable, all of this he had and deserved to have, because he was a gracious and generous young man, and a kind soul. Ah, but fortune, fortune! Where are they now, the pearls, the diamonds, the stars, the purple clouds? He lost everything, let it all slip through his fingers; the nectar turned to vinegar, his cushions now are the cobbles in the street; he no longer sends ladies gifts of stars, or has archangels at his beck and call . . .

  Z: You must be mistaken. Xavier? It must be another Xavier entirely. Xavier, a nabob! The Xavier you see over there never had more than two hundred mil-réis a month: he’s a sober, thrifty man, early to bed and early to rise, and he doesn’t write letters to sweethearts, because he has none. If he sends anything at all to his friends it’s by the post. He may not be a beggar, but he was certainly never a nabob.

  A: Ah, that’s the outer Xavier. But man does not live by bread alone. You’re talking about Martha, I’m telling you about Mary; I’m talking about the imagined Xavier . . .

  Z: Ah! But even so, you still haven’t explained. It doesn’t sound like the Xavier I know. What book, what poem, what painting—

  A: How long have you known him?

  Z: Fifteen years or so.

  A: Ouf! I’ve known him for much longer, ever since he made his social debut on the Rua do Ouvidor, back when the Marquis of Paraná was in government. He was unstoppable, like a man possessed; he had schemes for everything under the sun, and even some that weren’t: a book, a speech, a remedy, a newspaper, a poem, a novel, a history, a political diatribe, a trip to Europe, another to the backlands of Minas Gerais, another to the moon, traveling in a special balloon he�
��d invented, a career in politics, not to mention archaeology, philosophy, and the theater, etc., etc., etc. He was a sackful of surprises. Just having a conversation with him made you dizzy. Imagine a torrent of ideas and images, each more original and beautiful than the last, sometimes extravagant, sometimes sublime. And he believed in his own inventions too. One day, for example, he woke up with the idea of entirely flattening the Castelo hill, in return for all the riches that the Jesuits had buried there, as people widely believed. He calculated that there must be a thousand contos in gold coin, and made a careful inventory of everything, separating out the coins—a thousand contos—from the jewelry and the works of art; he meticulously described every object, and gave me two golden torch-holders . . .

  Z: Really . . .

  A: Ah, yes! Priceless. Do you want to know something else? Having read the letters of Canon Benigno, he decided there and then to go to the backlands of Bahia in search of the mysterious city chronicled therein. He showed me the plan, described to me the likely architecture of the city, its temples and palaces built in the Etruscan style, the rites, vases, clothes, costumes—

  Z: So he was mad, then?

  A: No, one of a kind, more like. I hate sheep, he would say, quoting Rabelais: “As you know, it is the nature of sheep to follow the first, wherever it goes.” He compared triviality to the communal table at an inn, and swore that he’d rather eat a bad steak at a separate table.