Hypatia — or New Foes with an Old Face

by Charles Kingsley

  CHAPTER XIV: THE ROCKS OF THE SIRENS

  THESE four months had been busy and eventful enough to Hypatia andto Philammon; yet the events and the business were of so gradual anduniform a tenor, that it is as well to pass quickly over them, and showwhat had happened principally by its effects.

  The robust and fiery desert-lad was now metamorphosed into the pale andthoughtful student, oppressed with the weight of careful thought andweary memory. But those remembrances were all recent ones. With hisentrance into Hypatia's lecture-room, and into the fairy realms of Greekthought, a new life had begun for him; and the Laura, and Pambo, andArsenius, seemed dim phantoms from some antenatal existence, which fadedday by day before the inrush of new and startling knowledge.

  But though the friends and scenes of his childhood had fallen backso swiftly into the far horizon, he was not lonely. His heart found alovelier, if not a healthier home, than it had ever known before. Forduring those four peaceful and busy months of study there had sprungup between Hypatia and the beautiful boy one of those pure and yetpassionate friendships--call them rather, with St. Augustine, by thesacred name of love--which, fair and holy as they are when they linkyouth to youth, or girl to girl, reach their full perfection onlybetween man and woman. The unselfish adoration with which a maidenmay bow down before some strong and holy priest, or with which anenthusiastic boy may cling to the wise and tender matron, who, amidthe turmoil of the world, and the pride of beauty, and the cares ofwifehood, bends down to with counsel and encouragement--earth knowsno fairer bonds than these, save wedded love itself. And that secondrelation, motherly rather than sisterly, had bound Philammon with agolden chain to the wondrous maid of Alexandria.

  From the commencement of his attendance in her lecture-room she hadsuited her discourses to what she fancied were his especial spiritualneeds; and many a glance of the eye towards him, on any peculiarlyimportant sentence, set the poor boy's heart beating at that sign thatthe words were meant for him. But before a month was past, won by theintense attention with which he watched for every utterance of hers, shehad persuaded her father to give a place in the library as one of hispupils, among the youths who were employed there daily in transcribing,as well as in studying, the authors then in fashion.

  She saw him at first but seldom--more seldom than she would have wished;but she dreaded the tongue of scandal, heathen as well as Christian,and contented herself with inquiring daily from her father about theprogress of the boy. And when at times she entered for a moment thelibrary, where he sat writing, or passed him on her way to the Museum, alook was interchanged, on her part of most gracious approval, and on hisof adoring gratitude, which was enough for both. Her spell was workingsurely; and she was too confident in her own cause and her own powers towish to hurry that transformation for which she so fondly hoped.

  'He must begin at the beginning,' thought she to herself. 'Mathematicsand the Parmenides are enough for him as yet. Without a training in theliberal sciences be cannot gain a faith worthy of those gods to whomsome day I shall present him; and I should find his Christian ignoranceand fanaticism transferred, whole and rude, to the service of those godswhose shrine is unapproachable save to the spiritual man, who has passedthrough the successive vestibules of science and philosophy.'

  But soon, attracted herself, as much as wishing to attract him, sheemployed him in copying manuscripts for her own use. She sent back histhemes and declamations, corrected with her own hand; and Philammon laidthem by in his little garret at Eudaimon's house as precious badges ofhonour, after exhibiting them to the reverential and envious gaze of thelittle porter. So he toiled on, early and late, counting himselfwell paid for a week's intense exertion by a single smile or word ofapprobation, and went home to pour out his soul to his host on theone inexhaustible theme which they had in common--Hypatia and herperfections. He would have raved often enough on the same subject tohis fellow-pupils, but he shrank not only from their artificial citymanners, but also from their morality, for suspecting which he saw buttoo good cause. He longed to go out into the streets, to proclaim to thewhole world the treasure which he had found, and call on all to come andshare it with him. For there was no jealousy in that pure love of his.Could he have seen her lavishing on thousands far greater favours thanshe had conferred on him, he would have rejoiced in the thought thatthere were so many more blest beings upon earth, and have loved themall and every one as brothers, for having deserved her notice. Hervery beauty, when his first flush of wonder was past, he ceased tomention--ceased even to think of it. Of course she must be beautiful. Itwas her right; the natural complement of her other graces but it was tohim only what the mother's smile is to the infant, the sunlight to theskylark, the mountain-breeze to the hunter--an inspiring element, onwhich he fed unconsciously. Only when he doubted for a moment someespecially startling or fanciful assertion, did he become really awareof the great loveliness of her who made it; and then his heart silencedhis judgment with the thought--Could any but true words come out ofthose perfect lips?--any but royal thoughts take shape within thatqueenly head?.... Poor fool! Yet was it not natural enough?

  Then, gradually, as she passed the boy, poring over his book, in somealcove of the Museum Gardens, she would invite him by a glance to jointhe knot of loungers and questioners who dangled about her and herfather, and fancied themselves to be reproducing the days of theAthenian sages amid the groves of another Academus. Sometimes, even, shehad beckoned him to her side as she sat in some retired arbour, attendedonly by her father; and there some passing observation, earnest andpersonal, however lofty and measured, made him aware, as it was intendedto do, that she had a deeper interest in him, a livelier sympathy forhim, than for the many; that he was in her eyes not merely a pupil to beinstructed, but a soul whom she desired to educate. And those deliciousgleams of sunlight grew more frequent and more protracted; for by eachshe satisfied herself more and more that she had not mistaken eitherhis powers or his susceptibilities: and in each, whether in public orprivate, Philammon seemed to bear himself more worthily. For over andabove the natural ease and dignity which accompanies physical beauty,and the modesty, self-restraint, and deep earnestness which he hadacquired under the discipline of the Laura, his Greek character wasdeveloping itself in all its quickness, subtlety, and versatility, untilhe seemed to Hypatia some young Titan, by the side of the flippant,hasty, and insincere talkers who made up her chosen circle.

  But man can no more live upon Platonic love than on the more prolificspecies of that common ailment; and for the first month Philammon wouldhave gone hungry to his couch full many a night, to lie awake from basercauses than philosophic meditation, had it not been for his magnanimoushost, who never lost heart for a moment, either about himself, or anyother human being. As for Philammon's going out with him to earn hisbread, he would not hear of it. Did he suppose that he could meet anyof those monkish rascals in the street, without being knocked down andcarried off by main force? And besides there was a sort of impiety inallowing so hopeful a student to neglect the 'Divine Ineffable' in orderto supply the base necessities of the teeth. So he should pay no rentfor his lodgings--positively none; and as for eatables--why, he musthimself work a little harder in order to cater for both. Had not all hisneighbours their litters of children to provide for, while he, thanksto the immortals, had been far too wise to burden the earth with animalswho would add to the ugliness of their father the Tartarean hue of theirmother? And after all, Philammon could pay him back when he became agreat sophist, and made money, as of course he would some day or other;and in the meantime, something might turn up--things were alwaysturning up for those whom the gods favoured; and besides, he had fullyascertained that on the day on which he first met Philammon, the planetswere favourable, the Mercury being in something or other, he forgotwhat, with Helios, which portended for Philammon, in his opinion, asimilar career with that of the glorious and devout Emperor Julian.

  Philammon winced somewhat at the hint; which seemed to have an uglyverisimilitude in it
: but still, philosophy he must learn, and bread hemust eat; so he submitted.

  But one evening, a few days after he had been admitted as Theon's pupil,he found, much to his astonishment, lying on the table in his garret, anundeniable glittering gold piece. He took it down to the porter thenext morning, and begged him to discover the owner of the lost coin,and return it duly. But what was his surprise, when the little man, amidendless capers and gesticulations, informed him with an air of mystery,that it was anything but lost; that his arrears of rent had been paidfor him; and that by the bounty of the upper powers, a fresh piece ofcoin would be forthcoming every month! In vain Philammon demanded toknow who was his benefactor. Eudaimon resolutely kept the secret andimprecated a whole Tartarus of unnecessary curses on his wife if sheallowed her female garrulity--though the poor creature seemed never toopen her lips from morning till night--to betray so great a mystery.

  Who was the unknown friend? There was but one person who could have doneit.... And yet he dared not--the thought was too delightful--think itwas she. It must have been her father. The old man had asked him morethan once about the state of his purse. True, he had always returnedevasive answers; but the kind old man must have divined the truth. Oughthe not--must he not--go and thank him? No; perhaps it was more courteousto say nothing. If he--she--for of course she had permitted, perhapsadvised, the gift--had intended him to thank them, would they have socarefully concealed their own generosity?.... Be it so, then. But howwould he not repay them for it! How delightful to be in her debt foranything--for everything! Would that he could have the enjoyment ofowing her existence itself!

  So he took the coin, bought unto himself a cloak of the most philosophicfashion, and went his way, such as it was, rejoicing.

  But his faith in Christianity? What had become of that?

  What usually happens in such cases. It was not dead; but nevertheless ithad fallen fast asleep for the time being. He did not disbelieve it;he would have been shocked to hear such a thing asserted of him: but hehappened to be busy believing something else--geometry, conic sections,cosmogonies, psychologies, and what not. And so it befell that he hadnot just then time to believe in Christianity. He recollected at timesits existence; but even then he neither affirmed nor denied it. Whenhe had solved the great questions--those which Hypatia set forth as theroots of all knowledge--how the world was made, and what was theorigin of evil, and what his own personality was, and--that beingsettled--whether he had one, with a few other preliminary matters, thenit would be time to return, with his enlarged light, to the study ofChristianity; and if, of course, Christianity should be found to be atvariance with that enlarged light, as Hypatia seemed to think ....Why, then--What then?.... He would not think about such disagreeablepossibilities. Sufficient for the day was the evil thereof.

  Possibilities? It was impossible.... Philosophy could not mislead. Hadnot Hypatia defined it, as man's search after the unseen? And if hefound the unseen by it, did it not come to just the same thing as if theunseen had revealed itself to him? And he must find it--for logic andmathematics could not err. If every step was correct, the conclusionmust be correct also; so he must end, after all, in the right path--thatis, of course, supposing Christianity to be the right path--and returnto fight the Church's battles, with the sword which he had wrested fromGoliath the Philistine....But he had not won the sword yet.; and in themeanwhile, learning was weary work; and sufficient for the day was thegood, as well as the evil, thereof.

  So, enabled by his gold coin each month to devote himself entirelyto study, he became very much what Peter would have coarsely termed aheathen. At first, indeed, he slipped into the Christian churches,from a habit of conscience. But habits soon grow sleepy; the fear ofdiscovery and recapture made his attendance more and more of a labour.And keeping himself apart as much as possible from the congregation, asa lonely and secret worshipper, he soon found himself as separate fromthem in heart as in daily life. He felt that they, and even more thanthey, those flowery and bombastic pulpit rhetoricians, who were paid fortheir sermons by the clapping and cheering of the congregation, werenot thinking of, longing after, the same things as himself. Besides, henever spoke to a Christian; for the negress at his lodgings seemed toavoid him--whether from modesty or terror, he could not tell; and cutoff thus from the outward 'communion of saints,' he found himself fastparting away from the inward one. So he went no more to church, andlooked the other way, he hardly knew why, whenever he passed theCaesareum; and Cyril, and all his mighty organisation, became to himanother world, with which he had even less to do than with thoseplanets over his head, whose mysterious movements, and symbolisms, andinfluences Hypatia's lectures on astronomy were just opening before hisbewildered imagination.

  Hypatia watched all this with growing self-satisfaction, and fed herselfwith the dream that through Philammon she might see her wildest hopesrealised. After the manner of women, she crowned him, in her ownimagination, with all powers and excellences which she would have wishedhim to possess, as well as with those which he actually manifested, tillPhilammon would have been as much astonished as self-glorified could hehave seen the idealised caricature of himself which the sweet enthusiasthad painted for her private enjoyment. They were blissful months thoseto poor Hypatia. Orestes, for some reason or other, had neglected tourge his suit, and the Iphigenia-sacrifice had retired mercifully intothe background. Perhaps she should be able now to accomplish all withoutit. And yet--it was so long to wait! Years might pass before Philammon'seducation was matured, and with them golden opportunities which mightnever recur again.

  'Ah!' she sighed at times, 'that Julian had lived a generation later!That I could have brought all my hard-earned treasures to the feet ofthe Poet of the Sun, and cried, "Take me!--Hero, warrior, statesman,sage, priest of the God of Light! Take thy slave! Command her--sendher--to martyrdom, if thou wilt!" A pretty price would that have beenwherewith to buy the honour of being the meanest of thy apostles, thefellow-labourer of Iamblichus, Maximus, Libanius, and the choir of sageswho upheld the throne of the last true Caesar!'