Edification, renunciation, profundity, pity, a vision at once deeper and higher of life and of humanity—such were the lessons Alexis learned from his exile in Asia. What a long way he had come from his boyhood expeditions in the distant forests of Balkh! And yet there was a continuity between the lad of those days and the man newly tempered by remorse and hardship. He who had been thoughtless and a dreamer was now indifferent to his own fate, and thirsted after a truth of universal dimensions. He had crushed in himself the love of pleasure and ease. He had kept a restless curiosity and that intoxication with the world that urged him, urged him ever onward and away. He had seen strange men, fabulous countries, curious manners, new religions: yet those years of wandering in Asia, mingled with suffering and remorse, had led him not to skepticism and disintegration, but to a conception of the universe, always to remain fundamental for him, in which diversity ended in unity. What remained in him, after his experiences in the East, of the sun worship to which he had been dedicated? It is difficult, of course, to answer with certainty. We may say that beneath the variety of doctrines and experiences he preserved a need for a unifying principle in which the contradictions of the universe are resolved and reconciled. The remarkable thing is that he resisted mysticism as he had resisted pleasure. Perhaps we should see here, and give credit to, the influence of Philocrates’ teaching. Just as Alexis had not, finally, succumbed to sensual pleasure, so he emerged unscathed from the incomparable fascination of spiritual annihilation. Buddhism and Taoism would never make him lose his love of action, personal adventure, physical risk, creative courage—or even violence. Individual psychology is not in great favor these days, but what are these traits in Alexis to be attributed to if not to a specific character, temperament, or personal coefficient reacting to the situations in which it found itself, in which it seemed to be swallowed up, and yet which it surmounted in a way that constitutes, historically speaking, a destiny? There were also, of course, environment, the moment, chance, luck, circumstance. But he dominated and made use of them. He transformed them into fate.
We can now arrive at not too inaccurate a portrait of Alexis after those years of exile, eclipse, withdrawal. He was still handsome. The flame that had burned in the youth who threw himself into pleasure, debauchery, and folly was still there. It might be so well controlled that it seemed extinguished, but it still burned on, deep beneath the scars of remorse and sleepless nights. It was not that he wore a mask or tried to hide anything, but that his very feelings, nerves, and over-lively blood were ruled and mastered by a will whose strength might never be suspected in a body so elegant as to seem frail to a superficial eye. Nothing was left to impulse or caprice. Nor did Alexis, like Basil the Great, for example, fabricate endless plans and long-term plots. Ulterior motives were as foreign to his nature as acting on the spur of the moment. Much has been said of gifts, intuition, a mixture of genius and good fortune—but that tells us little. Perhaps the word “inspiration” is nearer the mark. One of the clues to Alexis is a long patience, comprehensive information, openness to everyone and everything, followed by irrevocable decision, with something dazzling as lightning in the execution and the victory. Then he seems really inspired by the gods, and to derive from some other dimension a wisdom and strength that in fact come from power of intellect and the very rare combination of concentration and dream. Some have said that Alexis brought the same qualities to the feasts in Alexandria, the temples of Arabia and Persia, the wars of conquest, and the exercise of power: patience combined with energy, friendship with violence, realism with imagination, soundest intellect with the promptest and even the most brutal action.
Neither the luxury of Alexandria, nor the rigor of the temples, nor the even more formidable doctrines of China and India had succeeded in destroying in Alexis the influence and memory of the great northern forests of the Empire. Though he passed whole nights with perverts and prostitutes; though he shared the life of priests and fanatics, submitting mind and body to the most extreme mortifications; though with the sages of China and India, in silence and passion, he plumbed the depths of consciousness and annihilation—he never really forgot what he had learned in the forests of the north: action, the struggle for power, violence, ambition. By an astonishing combination that is the mark of his greatness, he united a respect for life derived from the Buddhists with an awareness of the harsh laws of the forest requiring that man should kill. The child was father to the man.
His eyes were green or blue, but so dark and, above all, so slitted that to anyone expecting to see a rather strange Chinaman that is what he may well have seemed. He had fair hair growing quite low on his brow, but probably dyed black all the time he was in Asia; a nose that was straight and slim and much more Greek than Chinese; strong but slender hands; and broad shoulders. Some have maintained that during some years of his life he suffered from attacks of epilepsy; but this may just be legend, the sources and significance of which have been extensively studied. The same theme recurs in inverted form later on in the life of Alexis, when he was credited with the power to heal certain diseases.[6] But all the reliable evidence concerning the Asian period shows an athletic figure with an iron constitution all the more surprising because it went with elegance and a misleading appearance of slimness and frailty. It was this basic robustness, probably inherited from Helen and the Porphyries, that ensured the survival of the debauchee, the ascetic, and the traveler. Suffering and hardship were rarely absent, from the frontiers of China to the Indus and the Euphrates. A man had to be made of steel to survive. Legend having naturally improved on fact, it is a hard task now to separate history from myth. The popular picture of the Fool of God and the Chinaman with Green Eyes doubtless owes more to Alexandre Dumas, Paul d’Ivoi, and Michel Zévaco than to Armand Bourdaille or Sir Allan Carter-Bennett. Nevertheless, the adventures of Ha Lee-chiang and the story of how he came to be identified with the son of Helen and Fabrician, and perhaps with the Teacher of Goodness, constitute one of the most vivid and lively pages both of past history and of modern historical science. And for the scholar, as for the writer of romantic fiction, Alexis’s courage and energy, his whole stature, make him the equal of such real or fabulous heroes as Achilles, Alexander, Charles de Foucauld, and Lawrence of Arabia.
Seven years, or twelve, after the flight from Alexandria, Alexis emerged again into the light of day somewhere between Bamian, Samarkand, and Bukhara. He then proceeded to live a double life, trading in cereals and arms and at the same time surrounding himself with a crowd of young men whom he instructed in ethics, mathematics, poetry, and a mixture of astronomy and astrology. He was said to be skilled both in poisons and in their antidotes, and to be able to charm snakes, predict eclipses of the sun and moon, cure wounds and diseases, tame wild horses, and expound the Holy Books of the Jews, the teachings of Hermenides and Paraclitus, the Rig-Veda, the Upanishads, and the works of Master K’ung. He was himself the author of odes and hymns that ensure him a high position among the poets of his time. Some suspected him of practicing magic or witchcraft, and he was not immune to rivalry, resentment, mistrust, and jealousy. At the age of twenty-eight or twenty-nine, after so much privation and self-imposed suffering, he was still outstanding at wrestling, running, swimming, and every other exercise of strength or skill. It is as if there were different dimensions in him. Behind his elegance, behind what might even be called—despite his sufferings and ordeals—a certain nonchalance, there was power and strength. But, again, behind that strength, there was wisdom and generosity. And deeper still, behind that wisdom, a mystery, an expectation, a secret. Perhaps even a promise. But when, out of the darkness of the tombs and the caravans, Alexis reappeared in Asia, apparently with the intention of settling and spending the rest of his life there, he did not emerge into the dazzle of notoriety and pleasure that had surrounded him in Alexandria. He lived modestly, in retirement, struggling against the obstinate blessing, or curse, which was always winning him new popularity and new groups of admirers, alway
s different, always the same, now attracted by his lavishness, now by his asceticism, now by austerity, now by prodigality, in any case won over by his incredible power to charm and please, persuade and convince. In Bamian, Samarkand, and Isfahan, rumors sprang up whenever he passed. Pilgrims, wandering minstrels, young admirers would recite his poems in the evening in encampment or village square. Did these good people know then what our scholars took centuries to learn, thanks to Armand Bourdaille, an Arab who became a Jesuit, and a shepherd boy from Petra—namely, that Alexis had buried himself under the earth for a sin against love and had traveled the roads of Asia to expiate the murders he had committed? Some say another woman came into his life at this point, a Yemenite,[7] tall and very beautiful, whose name is unknown,[8] as dark as Vanessa was fair. It is alleged that she became, almost despite himself, the exile’s second great love, the subject of poems in praise of her form and hair and especially her very lovely arms. The authenticity of some of these poems is still hotly debated. Whether Alexis really wrote the original or not, this inspired rendering of one of them seems to capture something of the anguish and the power in the voice of the Fool of God, Vanessa’s murderer.
So
I hold you in my grasp! I clasp your body
In my arms, and you offer no resistance, and I hear your heart beat within you!
True, you are but a woman. I am but a man.
And I can bear it no longer, I am like one dying of hunger who cannot hold back his tears at the sight of food!
O column, O strength of my beloved! Unjust that I should have met you!
What should you be called?—a mother,
So good it is to have you.
A sister, whose plump, womanly arm I hold between my fingers.
A prey, the smoke of whose life, breathed in, intoxicates me, and I tremble to feel you the weaker, like a quarry that shrinks as one holds it by the scruff!
I must away, I can bear no more, and you are in my arms like one who draws back,
Like one who sleeps, under the pressure of my hands. Tell me, power as of one who sleeps,
If you are her I love.
Too much, I can bear no more, I should not have met you, and yet you love me, you are mine, and my poor heart gives and breaks.
O, I am not strong! Who has said I am strong? But I was a man of desire,
Desperately toward happiness, desperately toward happiness yearning, and loving, and deep, and unsealed![9]
Who has said you are happiness? No, you are not happiness!
You are that which takes the place of happiness!
I trembled when I recognized you; my whole soul crumbled.
I am like one who falls on his face, and I love you, and I say that I love you, and I can bear no more,
And I wed you with an impious love and a doomed promise,
Beloved thing which is not happiness.[10]
Is not this dark woman with rounded arms the double and converse of the fair Vanessa; is not this ardor and fear, this tenderness and violence, this happiness which is not happiness, the true voice of Alexis? What matter the facts of history, chronology, documentation: let us leave attributions and sources, stylistics and arguments to the exegesists and the erudite. For us, these words from the depths of poetry and time are the words of Alexis—Alexis transformed into himself for eternity by his passion and remorse. Ordeals over, Isolde of the White Hands succeeds Isolde the Fair. The years in the wilderness are over at last.
It was in Samarkand or Bukhara that a Greek traveler already middle-aged, who also had seen many years and many sorrows, met one winter evening, in a modest booth, amidst a group of enthusiastic admirers, a poet who kept body and soul together by selling cereals and arms. The almost white-haired traveler was Philocrates, friend and teacher, who embraced with tears in his eyes his long-lost Alexis. He had crossed the world to tell Alexis of the great misfortunes come upon the Empire, once more beset by hatred, unrest, famine, torture, civil war. Once more, blood, fire, suffering; but once more hope. Isidore, his eyes put out, was appealing for help to those not afraid to die. Alexis was not afraid of death; it was what he was waiting for, what he was hoping for. He made Philocrates come over to the great log fire in a corner of the room, and the two men sat and talked about the Empire.
XIII
THE CALL, AND THE END OF EXILE
WITH THE DEATH OF INGEBURGH AND THAUMAS, Basil and Gandolphus, a whole generation of power and glory disappeared from the scene of history, and the Empire entered again, and for years, into the pangs of decadence. History is never about anything but the folly of men. Peoples and states oscillate between peace and war, freedom and slavery, order and disorder. They tire easily. Even happiness soon grows wearisome. No sooner do they begin to enjoy the benefits of wise and just government than they demand more wisdom and a different kind of justice. Factions spring up. Everyone is on the lookout for new privileges. The equilibrium that was so hard to strike crumbles. Wild hopes are embraced. The system collapses. Everything has to be built up anew on the ruins of the past. But such an oversimplified political Manichaeanism never represents the real state of affairs. Peoples are fickle, but rulers are cruel. There is something intolerable about stability and order, something stimulating in the thrill of disorder. And the dignity of man consists in waiting and hoping and fighting for his hopes. Neglect, exploitation, denial of justice on the part of those in power drives those as yet powerless into revolt. The oppressed rise up, and to the thirst for novelty is added all the force of aspiration and legitimate resentment. Even just governments do not last—and governments are not often just. Perhaps it is impossible they should be—time passes and things change. Attrition and hope form the web of history, moving toward a happiness forever receding.
Basil the Great built his power on wickedness and guile, and provides one of the most perfect examples of political realism. But cleverness, too, can fail. Neither the priests nor the barbarians ever forgave him for the episode of the fox of Amphibolus. The supporters of the Porphyries only paid lip service to the descendant of the Eagle and the Venostae. The edifice he created was kept intact by his iron fist, Thaumas’s prudence, Ingeburgh’s popularity, and the artfulness of Gandolphus. But with the emperor dead, the empress dead, and the two rival ministers dead, one through the other and one after the other, the whole structure was thrown out of balance, and ferocity fought with discord among the wreckage.
Thaumas’s predictions came true—the victory at Amphibolus was only apparent, the peace only a lull, and a tidal wave of barbarians flooded into the Empire, now largely defended by other barbarians. A few years after Basil’s death the whole Empire was one vast chaos. Sir Allan Carter-Bennett aptly describes this period as “the Empire’s third Middle Age.” The first came between the (very dubiously) idyllic origins and the golden age of the City; the second came between the conquests of Arsaphes and Basil’s period of power; the third came after Basil, and heralded the glory of Alexis.
The characteristic feature of the anarchy bequeathed by Basil was that there seemed no way out of it. The Venostae and the Porphyries were equally exhausted; the priests had been decimated by Basil; the barbarians were divided among themselves and soon came to be hated by the people. It will be remembered that the absence of a son was one of the reasons why Basil divorced Adelaide. Ingeburgh also gave the emperor nothing but daughters. Finally a son was born to Irene. He was now a poor infant of few years, without any influence, entirely under the control of advisers among whom it was impossible for him to choose, and who quarreled among themselves for power. The Empire was really ruled by a succession of rival sets of barbarians. But even their authority was illusory. Onessa, the City, Amphibolus, Evcharisto, Mezzopotamo, Parapoli, and all the other towns were each ruled over by some petty king or local or regional council that had seized power and had fought against the central government, which in theory still had its seat in Aquileus. The whole northern part of the Empire relapsed into anarchy pure and simple. In theor
y there were frontiers still in the east and the south, but they were broken through by armed bands that carved out spheres of influence where, as in the dark days between Arsaphes and Basil, they acknowledged no mastery but their own. Groups of twenty or thirty or several hundred, and sometimes even several thousand, families would fight among themselves; and the depleted armies of the emperor dared not venture farther than the edges of the forests and the mountains. Usually they ended by just staying in their cantonments. In the valleys of the Amphyses and the Nephta, on the plains at the foot of the volcanoes, and along the northwest coast, order was maintained after a fashion by detachments of barbarians who ignored one another when they were not fighting and got together only at the expense of the local farmers, shepherds and herdsmen, craftsmen, and fishermen. It was an order of things, a disorder, more heavy and cruel with every year. And there was no hope. Not a gleam anywhere in the darkness that covered the Empire.
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