The Royal Physician's Visit

by Per Olov Enquist

  For Christian the belief in Passauer Kunst became a secret treasure that he concealed deep within.

  He was constantly examining his hands and his stomach, to see whether he had made progress (“s’il avançait”) toward invulnerability. The cannibals surrounding him were enemies that were an ever present threat. If he became “strong”and his body was “invulnerable,” he would be insensitive to mistreatment by his enemies.

  Everyone was an enemy, but especially the absolute ruler Reventlow.

  The fact that he mentions “the Italian actors” as godlike models has to do with this dream. For young Christian,the actors of the theater seemed godlike. The gods were hard—and invulnerable.

  These gods also played their roles. Then they were elevated beyond reality.

  As a five-year-old he had seen a special performance by an Italian acting troupe. The impressive physical bearing of the actors, their imposing height and magnificently accoutered costumes had made such a strong impression on him that he ended up regarding them as creatures of a higher order. They were godlike. And if he, who was also said to be chosen by God, if he made progress, then surely he should be able to join these gods, become an actor, and in this way be freed from “the monarchy’s torments.”

  He steadfastly experienced his birthright as a torment.

  Over time he also developed the notion that he had been exchanged at birth. He was actually a peasant boy. This became a fixed idea in his mind. To be chosen was a torment. The “intense interrogations” were a torment. If he had been exchanged, shouldn’t he then be freed from this torment?

  God’s chosen was no ordinary human. That was why he searched, ever more feverishly, for proof that he was a human being. A sign! The word “sign” came up again and again. He was searching for a “sign.” If he could find proof that he was a human being, not the chosen one, then he would be freed from the role of King, from the torment,the uncertainty, and the intense interrogations. If, on the other hand, he could make himself invulnerable, like the Italian actors, then he might even be able to endure being chosen.

  That was how Reverdil perceived Christian’s thoughts. Though he wasn’t certain. What he was certain of was that he was looking at a ravaged child’s image of himself.

  That the theater was illusory and thus the only real life in existence became increasingly confirmed for Christian.

  His reasoning—and Reverdil tries to follow him here, although with difficulty, since the logic was not wholly apparent—his reasoning was that if the theater alone was real, then everything was comprehensible. The people on stage moved in a godlike fashion, reciting the lines they had memorized; that too was natural. The actors were what was real. He himself had been allotted the role of King by the grace of God. This had nothing to do with reality; it was artifice. And for that reason he need not feel any shame.

  Shame was otherwise his natural state.

  During one of the first lessons, which were conducted in French, Herr Reverdil had discovered that his pupil did not understand the term “corvée.” In an attempt to relate it to the boy’s experience he described the element of theater in the Prince’s own life. “I had to teach him that his travels resembled a military incursion, that advance scouts were dispatched to every district to mobilize the peasants to turn out, some with horses, others merely with small carts; that these peasants then had to wait for hours or even days beside their wagons at assembly places, that they wasted a great deal of time for no good purpose, that those he passed had been summoned forth, and that nothing of what he saw on these occasions was real.”

  When Lord Chancellor and Finance Minister Reventlow heard about this element in the lessons, he flew into a rage, bellowing that it was useless. Count Ditlev Reventlow often bellowed. His conduct as supervisor of the Prince’s education had in no way surprised the Jewish tutor from Switzerland, although for understandable reasons he never dared object to the Finance Minister’s principles.

  Nothing made any sense. The play was what was natural. The Prince had to learn his lines, not try to understand. He was God’s chosen one. He stood above everyone else, and yet he was the most miserable of all. The only constant was the flogging he regularly received.

  Herr Reventlow had a reputation for “integrity.” Since he considered rote learning to be more important than knowledge, he strongly emphasized that the Prince should memorize theories and assertions, just like in a play. On the other hand, it was not important for the Prince to understand what he was learning. The primary aim of the instruction, using the theater as a model, was to learn the lines by heart. Despite his integrity and harsh nature, Herr Reventlow procured for this purpose costumes for the heir to the throne, sewn in Paris. Then whenever the boy was displayed and he could speak his lines from memory, the Finance Minister would be pleased; before each recital by the heir to the throne, he would exclaim:

  “Look! Now my puppet is about to perform!”

  These performances, Reverdil writes, were often a torment for Christian. One day when he was supposed to display his skill in dancing, he was misled by his own ignorance as to what was about to happen.”That was a trying day for the Prince. He was cursed and beaten, and he wept right up until the moment when the ball was about to begin. In his mind what was about to take place became intertwined with his fixed ideas: he imagined that they were leading him off to prison. The military honors that heralded him at the entrance, the drumrolls, and the guards who surrounded his carriage all confirmed his suspicions and aroused in him a great anxiety. All of his perceptions were badly jolted, sleep deserted him for many nights, and he wept constantly.”

  Herr Reventlow intervened in the lessons—and he did so “constantly”—especially when the nature of the rote learning slipped into what he called “conversation.”

  “Whenever he noticed that the lessons had ‘degenerated’ intoconversation, that they were taking place quietly, without commotion, and that they interested my pupil, he would shout from his side of the room in his thunderous voice and in German: ‘ Your Royal Highness, if I don’t supervise everything, nothing will get done!’ And with that he would come over to us and make the Prince start the lesson over, adding his own comments, pinching him hard, squeezing his hands together, and striking him roughly with his fists. The boy would then grow confused and fearful and perform worse and worse. The reproaches would increase and the a buse intensify, either because he was saying the lessons verbatim or he was being too free, or because he had omitted some detail or he had given the correct answer, since it was often the case that histormentor didn’t know what the correct answer should be. The Lord Chancellor would often become more and more enraged, until in the end he would shout through the hall for the cane (‘ rod’) he used on the child, and would continue to use for a long time. These desperate outbursts were familiar to everyone, since they could be heard out in the palace courtyard where the court had assembled. The crowds that had gathered there to hail the Rising Sun, meaning the screaming child who was now being punished and whom I grew to know as a noble and lova ble child, these people listened to it all as the boy, his eyes wide and filled with tears, tried to read in his tyrant’s face what the man wanted and what the proper words might be. At dinner his Mentor would continue to monopolize his attention, plying the boy with questions and greeting his answers with epithets. In this way the child was exposed to ridicule before his servants and became accustomed to shame.

  “Even Sunday was not a day of rest; twice during the day Herr Reventlow would escort his pupil to church, repeating in his thunderous voice the pastor’s most important points in the Prince’s ear, pinching and poking him again and again to emphasize certain lines of particular significance. Afterward the Prince would be forced to repeat what he had heard, and if he forgot or misunderstood anything, he was abused as fiercely as the individual topic warranted.”

  This was the “intense interrogation.” Reverdil notes that Reventlow often mistreated the Crown Prince so severely that �
��froth would appear on the Count’s lips.” Later all power, without intermediary, would be transferred to the boy by God, the One who had chosen him.

  For this reason he was seeking a “benefactor.” He had not yet found a benefactor.

  Their walks together were the only occasions when Reverdil was able to explain things without supervision. But the boy seemed more and more uncertain and confused.

  Nothing seemed to make sense. During these walks, which they sometimes took alone, sometimes accompanied by chamberlains “at a suitable distance of thirty paces,” the boy’s confusion was more openly expressed.

  One might say that his language began to be decoded. Reverdil also began to note that everything related to “integrity”in the boy’s linguistic consciousness was associated with abuse and the fornication at court.

  Christian explained, in a stubborn attempt to make sense of things, that he understood the court to be a theater, that he had to learn his lines, and that he would be punished if he didn’t know them by heart.

  But was he one person or two?

  The Italian actors, whom he admired, had a role in a play as well as a role “outside” when the play was over. But as the boy said, his role never ended, did it? When was he ever “outside”? Did he constantly have to strive to be “hard” and to make “progress,” and simultaneously find himself “inside”? If it was all nothing but lines that had to be learned, and Reverdil said that everything was directed, that his life merely had to be memorized and “performed,” then could he ever hope to get out of this play?

  And yet the actors, the Italian ones he had seen, were two separate beings: one on stage and one outside. What about him?

  There was no logic to his reasoning, and yet in some ways it made sense. He had asked Reverdil what a human being was. And in that case, was he one? God had sent His only son to earth, but God had also chosen him, Christian, to be the absolute ruler. Had God also written the lines that he was now learning? Was it God’s will that those peasants who were summoned to appear along his travel route should become his fellow actors? Or what was his role? Was he God’s son? If so, then who was his father Frederik?

  Had God also chosen his father and made him almost as much a man of “integrity” as Herr Reventlow? Did a supreme God, a Universal Benefactor, exist who might take mercy on him at moments of dire need?

  Herr Reverdil sternly told him that he was not the Lord’s anointed, nor was he Christ, that as a matter of fact Reverdil didn’t even believe in Christ because he was a Jew; that under no circumstances should he ever hint that he was God’s son.

  That was blasphemy.

  But the heir to the throne had then objected that the Dowager Queen, who was a Pietist of the Moravian persuasion, had said true Christians bathed in the blood of the Lamb, that the wounds were grottoes where sinners could hide, and that this was salvation. How did all of this fit together?

  Reverdil told him to wipe these thoughts from his mind at once.

  Christian said he feared that he would be punished since his guilt was so great; primo for not knowing his lines, secundo for claiming to be God’s Chosen when in actual fact he was a changeling peasant boy. And then the spasms would come back, his fingers plucking at his stomach, his legs twitching, and then his hand pointing upward and a word uttered, repeated, like a cry for help or a prayer.

  Yes, perhaps this was how he prayed: the word repeated, like the hand pointing upward at something or someone in the universe that seemed so confusing and terrifying and lacking all sense to the boy.

  “A sign!!! A sign!!!”

  Christian’s stubborn monologues continued. He seemed to refuse to give up. If a person was punished, was he then free of guilt? Did a Benefactor exist? Since he realized that his shame was so great and his faults so numerous, what was then the relationship between guilt and punishment? In what way should he be punished? Were all those around him who whored and drank and were so full of integrity, were they too part of God’s play? Jesus was born in a manger, after all. Why was it then so unlikely that he himself might be a changeling who could have lived a much different life with loving parents, among the peasants and beasts?

  Jesus was the son of a carpenter. Then who was Christian?

  Herr Reverdil was seized by an ever-growing alarm but did his best to answer calmly and sensibly. And yet he had a feeling that the boy’s confusion was increasing, becoming more and more disturbing.

  Hadn’t Jesus, Christian asked during one of their walks, driven the moneylenders and hawkers from the temple? Those who were whoring and sinning!!! He had driven those people out, meaning those of integrity, and who was this Jesus?

  “A revolutionary,” Herr Reverdil replied.

  Was it then Christian’s mission, he stubbornly persisted in asking, his mission as God’s chosen absolute ruler, in this court where people whored and drank and sinned, to smash and crush them all? And to drive out, to smash … crush … those of integrity? Reventlow was a man of integrity, wasn’t he? Could a Benefactor, who might be the ruler of the whole universe, have pity and take time for this? To crush those of integrity? Would Reverdil perhaps help him find a Benefactor who could crush them all?

  “Why do you want to do this?” Reverdil asked.

  With that the boy began to cry.

  “To achieve purity,” he said at last.

  They walked for a long time in silence.

  “No,” Herr Reverdil said finally,“it is not your mission to crush.”

  But he knew that he had not given him an answer.

  3.

  Young Christian began talking more often about guilt and punishment.

  He was familiar with the little punishment, of course. That was the “rod” that the Lord Chancellor wielded. The little punishment also meant the shame and the laughter of the pages and the “favorites” whenever he made a mistake. The big punishment must be for sinners who were even worse.

  The boy’s development took an alarming turn in connection with the torture and execution of Sergeant Mörl.

  This is what happened.

  A sergeant by the name of Mörl, who in a deplorable breach of trust had murdered the benefactor in whose house he resided in order to steal the regiment’s payroll, was, in accordance with a royal decree signed by King Frederik, condemned to a gruesome means of execution which made use of certain methods that were employed only for murder of a particular kind.

  Many regarded this as a display of inhuman barbarism. The sentence was a document of a particularly abhorrent type; but Crown Prince Christian was informed of the event,and he showed a peculiar interest in it. This took place during the next to last year of King Frederik’s reign. Christian was then fifteen years old. To Reverdil he mentioned that he wished to witness the execution. Reverdil was greatly troubled by this and urged his pupil not to do so.

  But the boy—Reverdil still calls him the boy—had read the sentence and felt it held an extraordinary attraction. In fact, before his execution Sergeant Mörl had spent three months in prison, which had given him ample time for religious instruction.

  By great fortune he had there fallen into the hands of a pastor who shared the beliefs of Count Zinzendorf, namely the faith commonly known as Moravianism, of which the Dowager Queen was also an adherent. In conversation with Christian—such conversations occurred but were of a thoroughly pious nature—she had discussed the sentence and the imminent means of execution in detail as well as informed him that the prisoner had become a Moravian. The prisoner Mörl had come to believe that the gruesome torments before life ended would unite him in a special way with the wounds of Jesus; yes,that even the torture, pain, and wounds would allow him to be engulfed in the bosom of Jesus, to be drowned in the wounds of Jesus, and to be warmed by His blood.

  The blood and wounds—all of this, in the Dowager Queen’s descriptions—had been given a character that Christian found “delightful,” and they had filled his dreams at night.

  The executioner’s cart woul
d be a triumphant conveyance. The glowing tongs that would grip him, the whips, the nails, and finally the wheel—all of these things would be the cross on which he would be united with the blood of Jesus. In prison Mörl had also written hymns that were printed up and distributed for the edification of the public.

  During these months the Dowager Queen and the boy became united in what was to Reverdil a repugnant fashion by their interest in this execution. He could not prevent Christian from watching it in secrecy.

  Here the expression “in secrecy” has a particular significance in a legal sense. According to custom, if the King or Crown Prince happened to pass the site of the execution, it would mean that the prisoner had to be pardoned.

  Nevertheless, Christian had witnessed the execution from a closed coach that had been hired. No one noticed him.

  Sergeant Mörl had sung hymns; in a loud voice he declared his burning faith and desire to drown in the wounds of Jesus. But when the lengthy torture on the scaffold began, he could not endure it without breaking out into desperate screams, particularly when the nails punctured “those parts of his body and abdomen that were the center of the greatest desire and the source of the greatest pain.” His desperation was then so devoid of piety and so wild that the hymns and prayers of the public were silenced; yes, the pious desire to see the martyr’s departure from this life had dissolve d, and many had left the area at a run.

  But Christian had remained seated in his carriage until Sergeant Mörl at last gave up the ghost. He then returned to the palace, sought out Reverdil, fell to his knees before him, clasped his hands, and with anguish and bewilderment but in utter silence stared at his teacher’s face.

  Not a word was said on that evening.

  Here is what occurred the following night.

  Reverdil happened to come by Christian’s suite to tell him of a change in the next day’s lessons. He stopped in the doorway and witnessed a scene that he says “paralyzed” him. Christian was lying on the floor, stretched out on something meant to resemble a torture wheel. Two of his pages were in the process of “crushing his joints”— they were carrying out the execution by using rolled-up paper while the criminal on the wheel begged and moaned and wept.