It was the mental malady of the time reduced to a system by Fichte, who taught that everything took place in the ego and through the ego, without which there was no reality. It was the formula for romanticism and for subjective idealism.
"I stood on the shore under the king's castle," "I dwell in the cave of the mountain," "I, small boy, watch the door," "I think of the beautiful times,"—all these phrases struck the same note. Was this "I" really so proud. Was not the poet's "I" more modest than the editor's royal "we"?
This absorption in self, or the new malady of culture, of which much is written nowadays, has been common with all men who have not worked with their bodies. The brain is only an organ for imparting movement to the muscles. Now when in a civilised man the brain cannot act upon the muscles, nor bring its power into play, there results a disturbance of equilibrium. The brain begins to dream; too full of juices which cannot be absorbed by muscular activity, it converts them involuntarily into systems, into thought-combinations, into the hallucinations which haunt painters, sculptors and poets. If no outlet can be found, there follows stagnation, violent outbreaks, depression, and at last madness. Schools which are often vestibules for asylums, have recourse to gymnastics, but with what result? There is no connection between the pupil's cerebral activity and the muscular activity called into play by gymnastics; the latter is only directed by another's will through the word of command.
All studious youths are aware of this tendency to congestion of the brain. It is a good thing that they often go out to improve or to beautify society, but it would be better if the equilibrium were restored, and a sound mind dwelt in a sound body. It has been sought to introduce physical work into schools as a remedy. It would be better to let elementary knowledge be acquired at home, to make the school a day-school, and to let every one look after himself. For the rest the emancipation of the lower classes will compel the higher classes to undertake some of the physical labour now carried on by domestics and so the equilibrium will be restored. That such labour does not blunt the intelligence can be easily seen by observing that some of the strongest minds of the time have had such daily contact with reality,e.g.Mill the civil service official, Spencer, the civil engineer, Edison the telegraphist. The student period of life, the most unwholesome because not under discipline, is also the most dangerous. The brain continually takes in, without producing anything, not even anything intellectual, while the whole muscular system is unoccupied.
John at this time was suffering from an over-production of thought and imagination. The mechanical school-work continually revolving in the same circle with the same questions and answers afforded no relief. It increased on the other hand his stock of observations of children and teachers. There lay and fermented in his mind a quantity of experiences, perceptions, criticisms and thoughts without any order. He therefore sought for society in order to speak his mind out. But it was not sufficient, and as he did not find any one who was willing to act as a sounding-board, he took to declaiming poetry.
In the early sixties declamation was much the fashion. In families they used to read aloud "The Kings of Salamis." In the numerous volunteer concerts the same pieces were declaimed over and over again. These declamations were what the quartette singing had been, an outlet for all the hope and enthusiasm called forth by the awakening of 1865. Since Swedes are neither born nor trained orators, they became singers and reciters, perhaps because their want of originality sought a ready-made means of expression. They could execute but not create. The same want of originality showed itself in the bachelor's gatherings where reciters of anecdotes were much in request. This feeble and tedious form of amusement was superseded when the new questions of the day provided food for conversation and discussion.
One day John came to his friend the elementary school-teacher whom he found together with another young colleague. When the conversation began to slacken, his friend produced a volume of Schiller, whose poems had just then appeared in a cheap edition and were bought mostly for that reason. They opened "The Robbers" and read round in turn, John taking the part of Karl Moor. The first scene of the first act took place between old Moor and Franz. Then came the second scene: John read, "I am sick of this quill-driving age when I read of great men in Plutarch." He did not know the play and had never seen bandits. At first he read absent-mindedly, but his interest was soon aroused. The play struck a new note. He found his obscure dreams expressed in words; his rebellious criticisms printed. Here then was another, a great and famous author who felt the same disgust at the whole course of education in school and university as he did, who would rather be Robinson Crusoe or a bandit than be enrolled in this army which is called society. He read on; his voice shook, his cheeks glowed, his breast heaved: "They bar out healthy nature with tasteless conventionalities."... There it stood all in black and white. "And that is Schiller!" he exclaimed, "the same Schiller who wrote the tedious history of the Thirty Years' War, and the tame drama "Wallenstein" which is read in schools!" Yes, it was the same man. Here (in "The Robbers") he preached revolt, revolt against law, society, morals and religion. That was in the revolt of 1781 eight years before the great revolution. That was the anarchists' programme a hundred years before its time, and Karl Moor was a nihilist. The drama came out with a lion on the title-page and with the inscription "In Tyrannos." The author then (1781) aged two-and-twenty had to fly. There was no doubt therefore about the intention of the piece. There was also another motto from Hippocrates which showed this intention as plainly; "What is not cured by medicine must be cured by iron; what is not cured by iron must be cured by fire."
That was clear enough! But in the preface the author apologised and recanted. He disclaimed all sympathy with Franz Moor's sophisms and said that he wished to exhibit the punishment of wickedness in Karl Moor. Regarding religion he said, "Just now it is the fashion to make religion a subject for one's wit to play upon as Voltaire and Frederick the Great did, and a man is scarcely reckoned a genius unless he can make the holiest truths the object of his godless satire...." I hope I have exacted no ordinary revenge for religion and sound morality in handing over these obstinate despisers of Scripture in the person of this scoundrelly bandit, to public contumely. Was then Schiller true when he wrote the drama, and false when he wrote the preface? True in both cases, for man is a complex creature, and sometimes appears in his natural sometimes in his artificial character. At his writing-table in loneliness, when the silent letters were being written down on paper, Schiller seems like other young authors to have worked under the influence of a blind natural impulse without regard to mens' opinion, without thinking of the public, or laws, or constitutions. The veil was lifted for a moment and the falsity of society seen through in its whole extent. The silence of the night when literary work—especially in youth,—is carried on, causes one to forget the noisy artificial life outside, and darkness hides the heaps of stones over which animals which are ill-adapted to their environment stumble. Then comes the morning, the light of day, the street noises, men, friends, police, clocks striking, and the seer is afraid of his own thoughts. Public opinion raises its cry, newspapers sound the alarm, friends drop off, it becomes lonely round one, and an irresistible terror seizes the attacker of society. "If you will not be with us," society says, "then go into the woods. If you are an animal ill-adapted to its environment, or a savage, we will deport you to a lower state of society which you will suit." And from its own point of view society is right and always will be right. But the society of the future will celebrate the revolter, the individual, who has brought about social improvement, and the revolter is justified long after his death.
In every intelligent youth's life there comes a moment when he is in the transition stage between family life and that of society, when he feels disgusted at artificial civilisation and breaks out. If he remains in society, he is soon suppressed by the united wet-blankets of sentiment and anxiety about living; he becomes tired, dazzled, drops off and leaves other young men to continue the fight. This unsophisticated glance into things, this outbreak of a healthy nature which must of necessity take place in an unspoilt youth, has been stigmatised by a name which is intended to depreciate the idealistic impulses of youth. It is called "spring fever" by which is meant that it is only a temporary illness of childhood, a rising of the vernal sap, which produces stoppage of the circulation and giddiness. But who knows whether the youth did not see right before society put out his eyes? And why do they despise him afterwards?
Schiller had to creep into a public post for the sake of a living and even eat the bread of charity from a duke's hand. Therefore his writing degenerated, though perhaps not from an æsthetic or subordinate point of view. But his hatred of tyrants is everywhere manifest. It declares itself against Philip II of Spain, Dorea of Genoa, Gessler of Austria, but therefore ceases to be effective. Schiller's rebellion which was in the first instance directed against society, was afterwards directed against the monarchy alone. He closes his career with the following advice to a world reformer (not, however, till he had seen the reaction which followed the French Revolution). "For rain and dew and for the welfare of mankind, let heaven care to-day, my friend, as it has always done." Heaven, the unfortunate old heaven will care for it, just as well as it has done before.
Just as a man once does his militia duty at the age of twenty-one, so Schiller did his. How many have shirked it!
John did not take the preface to "The Robbers" very seriously or rather ignored it; but he took Karl Moor literally for he was congenial. He did not imitate him, for he was so like him that he had no need to do so. He was just as mutinous, just as wavering, and just as ready at an alarm to go and deliver himself into the hands of justice.
His disgust at everything continually increased and he began to make plans for flight from organised society. Once it occurred to him to journey to Algiers and enlist in the Foreign Legion. That would be fine he thought to live in the desert in a tent, to shoot at half-wild men or perhaps be shot by them. But circumstances occurred at the right moment, to reconcile him again with his environment. Through the recommendation of a friend he was offered the post of tutor to two girls in a rich and cultured family. The children were to be educated in a new and liberal-minded method and neither to go to a girls' school nor have a governess. That was an important task to which he was called and John did not feel himself adequate to it; besides which he objected that he was only an elementary school-teacher. He was answered that his future employers knew that, but were liberal-minded. How liberal-minded people were at that time!
Now there commenced a new double life for him. From the penal institution of the elementary school with its compulsory catechism and Bible, its poverty, wretchedness, and cruelty, he went to dinner at one o'clock, which he swallowed in a quarter of an hour, and then by two o'clock was at his post as private tutor. The house was one of the finest at that time in Stockholm with a porter, Pompeian stair-cases and painted windows in the hall. In a handsome, large, well-lighted corner room with flowers, bird-cages and an aquarium he was to give lessons to two well-dressed, washed and combed little girls, who looked cheerful and satisfied after their dinner. Here he could give expression to his own thoughts. The catechism was banished, and only select Bible stories were to be read together with broad-minded explanations of the life and teachings of the Ideal Man, for the children were not to be confirmed, but brought up after a new model. They read Schiller and were enthusiastic for William Tell and the fortunate little land of freedom. John taught them all that he knew and spent more time in talking than in asking questions; he roused in them the hopes of a better future which he shared himself.
Here he obtained an insight into a social circle hitherto unknown to him, that of the rich and cultured. Here he found liberal-mindedness, courage and the desire for truth. Down below in the elementary school they were cowardly, conservative and untruthful. Would the parents of the children be willing to have religious teaching done away with, even if the school authorities recommended it? Probably not. Must then illumination come from the upper classes? Certainly, though not from the highest class of all, but from the republic of truth-seeking scientists. John saw that one must get an upper place in order to be heard; therefore he must strive upwards or pull culture down and cast the sparks of it among all. One needed to be economically independent in order to be liberally minded; a position was necessary in order to give one's words weight; thus aristocracy ruled in this sphere also.
There was at that time a group of young doctors, men of science and letters, and members of parliament who formed a liberal league without constituting themselves a formal society. They gave popular lectures, engaged not to receive any honorary decorations, cherished liberal views on the subject of the State Church and wrote in the papers. Among them were Axel Key, Nordenskiöld, Christian Loven, Harald Wieselgren, Hedlund, Victor Rydberg, Meijerberg, Jolin, and many less-known names. These, with one or two exceptions, worked quietly without creating excitement. After the reaction of 1872 they fell off and became tired; they could not join any political party which was rather an advantage than otherwise for the country party had already begun to be corrupted by yearly visiting Stockholm and attendance at the court. They now all belong to the moderate or respectable liberal party, except those of them who have joined the indifferents, a fact not to be wondered at, after they had for so many years fought uselessly for nothing.
Through the family of his pupils John came into external touch with this group, obtained a closer view of them, and heard their speeches at dinners and suppers. To John they sometimes seemed the very men whom the time needed, who would first spread enlightenment and then work for reform. Here he met the superintendent of the elementary school and was surprised at finding him among the liberals. But he had the school authorities over him and was as good as powerless. At a cheerful dinner, when John had plucked up heart, he wished to have an intimate talk with him and to come to an understanding. "Here," he thought, "we can play the part of augurs and laugh with each other over our champagne." But the superintendent did not want to laugh and asked him to postpone the conversation till they met in the school. No, John did not want to do that, for in the school both would have other views, and speak of something else.
John's debts increased and so did his work. He was in the school from eight till one; then he ate his dinner and went to give his private lessons within half-an-hour, arriving out of breath, with food half digested, and sleepy; then he taught till four o'clock going out afterwards to give more lessons in the Nordtullsgata; he returned to his girl pupils in the evening, and then read far into the night for his examination after ten hours' teaching. That was over-work. The pupil thinks his work hard, but he is only the carriage while the teacher is the horse. Teaching is decidedly harder than standing by a screw or the crane of a machine, and equally monotonous.
His brain, dulled by work and disturbed digestion, needed to be roused, and his strength needed replenishing. He chose the shortest and best method by going into a café, drinking a glass of wine, and sitting for a while. It was good that there were such places of recreation, where young men could meet and fathers of families recruit themselves over a newspaper and talk of something else than business.
The following summer he went out to a summer settlement outside the city. There he read daily for a couple of hours with his girl pupils and a whole number of children besides them. The summer settlement afforded rich and varied opportunities of social intercourse. It was divided into three camps,—the learned, the æsthetic and the civic. John belonged to all three. It has been asserted that loneliness injures the development of character (into an automaton), and if has been also asserted that much social intercourse is bad for the development of character. Everything can be said and can be true; it all depends upon the point of view. But no doubt for the development of the soul into a rich and free life much social intercourse is necessary. The more men one sees and talks with, the more points of view and experiences one gains. Every one conceals a grain of originality in himself, every individual has his own history. John got on equally well with all; he spoke on learned matters with the learned, discussed art and literature with the æsthetes, sang quartettes and danced with the young people, taught the children and botanised, sailed, rode and swam with them. But after he had spent some time in the rush, he withdrew into solitude for a day or two to digest his impressions. Those who were really happy were the townsmen. They came from their work in the town, shook off their cares and played in the evening. Old wholesale merchants played in the ring and sang and danced like children. The learned and the æsthetic on the other hand sat on chairs, spoke of their work, were worried by their thoughts as by nightmares and never seemed to be really happy. They could not free themselves from the tyranny of thought. The tradesmen, however, had preserved a little green spot in their hearts which neither the thirst for gain nor speculation nor competition had been able to parch up. There was something emotional and hearty about them which John was inclined to call "nature." They could laugh like lunatics, scream like savages, and be swayed by the emotions of the moment. They wept over a friend's misfortune or death, embraced each other when delighted and could be carried out of themselves by a beautiful sunset. The professors sat in chairs and could not see the landscape because of their eye-glasses, their looks were directed inwards, and they never showed their feelings. They talked in syllogisms and formulas; their laughter was bitter, and all their learning seemed like a puppet play. Is that then the highest point of view? It is not a defect to have let a whole region of the soul's life lie fallow?
It was the third camp with which John was on the most intimate terms. This was a little clique consisting of a doctor's family and their friends. There sang the renowned tenor W. while Professor M. accompanied him; there played and sang the composer J.; there the old Professor P. talked about his journeys to Rome in the company of painters of high birth. Here the emotions had full play, but were under the control of good taste. They enjoyed the sunsets, but analysed the lights and shades and talked of lines and "values." The more noisy enjoyments of the tradesmen were regarded as disturbing and unæsthetic. They were enthusiasts for art. John spent some hours pleasantly with these amiable people, but when he heard the sound of quartette singing and dance-music from the villa close by, he longed to be there. That was certainly more lively.
In hours of solitude he read, and now for the first time, became really acquainted with Byron. "Don Juan," which he already knew, he had found merely frivolous. It really dealt with nothing and the descriptions of scenery were intolerably long. The work seemed merely a string of adventures and anecdotes. In "Manfred" he renewed acquaintance with Karl Moor in another dress. Manfred was no hater of men; he hated himself more, and went to the Alps in order to fly himself, but always found his guilty self beside him, for John guessed at once that he had been guilty of incest. Nowadays it is generally believed that Byron hinted at this crime, which was purely imaginary, in order to make himself appear interesting. To become interesting as a romanticist at whatever price would at the present time be called "differentiating oneself, going beyond and above the others." Crime was regarded as a sign of strength, therefore it was considered desirable to have a crime to boast about, but not such a one as could be punished. They did not want to have anything to do with the police and penal servitude. There was certainly a spirit of opposition to law and morality in this boasting of crime.
Manfred's discontent with heaven and the government of Providence pleased John. Manfred's denunciations of men were really levelled at society, though society as we now understand it, had not then been discovered. Rousseau, Byron and the rest were by no means discontented misogynists. It was only primitive Christianity which demanded that men should love men. To say that one was interested in them would be more modest and truthful. One who has been overreached and thrust aside in the battle of life may well fear men, but one cannot hate them when one realises one's solidarity with humanity and that human intercourse is the greatest pleasure in life. Byron was a spirit who awoke before the others and might have been expected to hate his contemporaries, but none the less strove and suffered for the good of all.
When John saw that the poem was written in blank verse he tried to translate it, but had not got far, before he discovered that he could not write verse. He was not "called." Sometimes melancholy, sometimes frisky, John felt at times an uncontrollable desire to quench the burning fire of thought in intoxication and bring the working of his brain to a standstill. Though he was shy, he felt occasionally impelled to step forward, to make himself impressive, to collect hearers and appear on a stage. When he had drunk a good deal, he wanted to declaim poetry in the grand style. But in the middle of the piece, when his ecstasy was at its highest, he heard his own voice, became nervous and embarrassed, found himself ridiculous, suddenly dropped into a prosaic and comic tone and ended with a grimace; he could be pathetic, but only for a while; then came self-criticism and he laughed at his own overwrought feelings. The romantic was in his blood, but the realistic side of him was about to wake up.
He was also liable to attacks of caprice and self-punishment. Thus he remained away from a dinner to which he had been invited and lay in his room hungry till the evening. He excused himself by saying that he had overslept.
The summer approached its end and he looked forward to the beginning of the autumn term in the elementary school with dread. He had now been in circles where poverty never showed its emaciated face; he had tasted the enticing wine of culture and did not wish to become sober again.
His depression increased; he retired into himself and withdrew from the circle of his friends. But one evening, there was a knock at his door; the old doctor who had been his most intimate friend and lived in the same villa, stepped in.
"How are the moods?" he asked, and sat down with the air of an old fatherly friend.
John did not wish to confess. How was he to say that he was discontented with his position, and acknowledge that he was ambitious and wished to advance in life? But the doctor had seen and understood all. "You must be a doctor," he said. "That is a practical vocation which will suit you, and bring you into touch with real life. You have a lively imagination which you must hold in check, or it will do harm. Now are you inclined to this? Have I guessed right?"
He had. Through his intercourse from afar with these new prophets who succeeded the priests and confessors, John had come to see in their practical knowledge of men's lives, the highest pitch of human wisdom. To become a wise man who could solve the riddles of life,—that was for a while his dream. For a while, for he did not really wish to enter any career in which he could be enrolled as a regular member of society. It was not from dislike of work, for he worked strenuously and was unhappy when unoccupied, but he had a strong objection to be enrolled. He did not wish to be a cypher, a cog-wheel, or a screw in the social machine. He wished to stand outside and contemplate, learn and preach. A doctor was in a certain sense free; he was not an official, had no superiors, set in no public office, was not tied by the clock. That was a fairly enticing prospect, and John was enticed. But how was he to take a medical degree, which required eight years' study? His friend, however, had seen a way out of this difficulty. "Live with us and teach my boys," he said.
This was certainly a business-like offer which carried with it no sense of accepting a humiliating favour. But what about his place in the school? Should he give it up?
"That is not your place!" the doctor cut him short. "Every one should work where his talents can have free scope, and yours cannot in the elementary school, where you have to teach, as prescribed by the school authorities."
John found this reasonable, but he had been so imbued with ascetic teaching that he felt a pang of conscience. He wanted to leave the school, but a strange feeling of duty and obligation held him back. He felt quite ashamed of being suspected of such a natural weakness as ambition. And his place, as the son of a servant, had been assigned to him below. But his father had literally pulled him up, why should he sink and strike his roots down there again?
He fought a short bloody conflict, then accepted the offer thankfully, and sent in his resignation as a school-teacher.
John now found his new home with the homeless, the Israelites. He was immediately surrounded by a new atmosphere. Here there was no recollection of Christianity; one neither plagued oneself or others; there was no grace at meals, no going to church, no catechism.
"It is good to be here," thought John. "These are liberal-minded men who have brought the best of foreign culture home, without being obliged to take what is bad." Here for the first time, he encountered foreign influences. The family had journeyed much, had relatives abroad, spoke all languages, and received foreign guests. Both the small and great affairs of the country were spoken about, and light thrown on them by comparison with their originals abroad. By this means John's mental horizon was widened and he was enabled to estimate his native country better.
The patriarchal constitution of the family had not assumed the form of domestic tyranny. On the contrary the children treated their parents more as their equals, and the parents were gentle with them without losing their dignity. Placed in an unfriendly part of the world, surrounded by half-enemies, the members of the family helped each other and held together. To be without a native country, which is regarded as such a hard-ship, has this advantage that it keeps the intelligence alive and vigorous. Men who are wanderers have to watch unceasingly, observe continually, and gain new and rich experiences, while those who sit at home become lazy and lean upon others.
The children of Israel occupy a peculiar and exceptional position from a social point of view. They have forgotten the Messianic promise and do not believe in it. In most European countries they have remained among the middle classes; to join the lower classes was for the most part denied them, though not so widely as is generally believed. Nor could they join the upper classes; therefore they feel related to neither of the latter. They are aristocrats from habit and inclination, but have the same interests as the lower classes,i.e. they wish to roll away the stone which lies upon and presses them. But they fear the proletariat who have no religious sense and who do not love the rich. Therefore the children of Abraham rather aspire to those above them, than seek sympathy from those below.
About this time (1868) the question of Jewish emancipation began to be raised. All liberals supported it and it was practically a discarding of Christianity. Baptism, ecclesiastical marriage, confirmation, church attendance were all declared to be unnecessary conditions for membership in a Christian community. Such apparently small reforms make an impression on the state, like the dropping of water on a rock.
At that time a cheerful tone prevailed in the family, the sons having a brighter future in prospect than their fathers, whose academic course had been hindered by State regulations.
A liberal table was kept in the house; everything was of the best quality, and there was plenty of it. The servants managed the house and were allowed a free hand in everything; they were not regarded as servants. The housemaid was a pietist and allowed to be so, as much as she pleased. She was good-natured and humorous, and, illogically enough, adopted the jesting tone of the cheerful paganism which reigned in the house. On the other hand, no one laughed at her belief. John himself was treated as an intimate friend and a child alternately and lived with the boys. His work was easy and he was rather required to keep the boys company than to give them lessons. Meanwhile he became somewhat "spoiled" as people, who have the usual idea of keeping youth in the background, call it. Though only nineteen, he was received on an equal footing among well-known and mature artists, doctors,littérateursand officials. He became accustomed to regard himself as grown up, and therefore the set-backs he encountered afterwards, were the harder to bear.
His medical career began with chemical experiments in the technological institute. There he obtained a closer view of some of the glories he had dreamed of in his childhood. But how dry and tedious were the rudiments of science! To stand and pour acids on salts and to watch the solution change colour, was not pleasant; to produce salts from two or more solutions was not very interesting. But later on, when the time came for analysis, the mysterious part began. To fill a glass about the size of a punch-bowl with a liquid as clear as water and then to exhibit in the filter the possibly twenty elements it contained,—this really seemed like penetrating into nature's secrets. When he was alone in the laboratory he made small experiments on his own account, and it was not long before with some danger he had prepared a little phial of prussic acid. To have death enclosed in a few drops under a glass stopper was a curiously pleasant feeling.
At the same time he studied zoology, anatomy, botany, physic and Latin,—still more Latin! To read and master a subject was congenial to him, but to learn by heart he hated. His head was already filled with so many subjects, that it was hard for anything more to enter, but it was obliged to.
A worse drawback was that so many other interests began to vie in his mind with his medical studies. The theatre was only a stone's throw from the doctor's house and he went there twice a week. He had a standing place at the end of the third row. From thence he saw elegant and cheerful French comedies played on a Brussels carpet. The light Gallic humour, admired by the melancholy Swedes as their missing complement, completely captivated him. What a mental equilibrium, what a power of resistance to the blows of fate were possessed by this race of a southern sunnier land! His thoughts became still more gloomy as he grew conscious of his Germanic "Weltschmerz" lying like a veil over everything, which a hundred years of French education could not have lifted. But he did not know that Parisian theatrical life differs widely from that of the industrious and thrifty Parisian at the desk and the counter. French comedies were written for the parvenus of the Second Empire; politics and religion were subject to the censor, but not morals. French comedy was aristocratic in tone, but had a liberating effect on the mind as it was in touch with reality, though it did not interfere in social questions. It accustomed the public to sympathise with and feel at home in this superfine world; one came to forget the lower everyday world, and when one left the theatre it felt as though one had been at supper with a friendly duke.
As chance fell out, the doctor's wife possessed a good library in which all the best literature of the world was represented. It was indeed a treasure to have all these at one's elbow! Moreover the doctor possessed a number of pictures by Swedish masters and a valuable collection of engravings. There was an efflorescence of æstheticism on all sides, even in the schools, where lectures on literature were delivered. The conversation in the family circle mostly turned on pictures, dramas, actors, books, authors, and the doctor felt from time to time impelled to flavour it with details of his practice.
Now and then John began to read the papers. Political and social life with their various questions opened up before him, but at first with a repelling effect, as he was an æsthete and domestic egoist. Politics did not seem to touch him at all; he considered it a special branch of knowledge like any other.
He continued his lessons to the girls and his intercourse with their family. Outside the house he met grown up relatives, who were tradesmen, and their acquaintances. His circle was therefore widened, and he saw life from more than one point of view. But this constant occupation with children had a hampering effect on his development. He never felt himself older, and he could not treat the young with an air of superiority. He already noticed that they were in advance of him, that they were born with new thoughts, and that they built on, where he had ceased. When later on in life, he met grown-up pupils, he looked up to them as though they were the older.
The autumn of 1865 had commenced. There had been so much miscalculation as to the effects of the new State constitution that there was widespread discontent. Society was turned topsy-turvy. The peasant threatened the civilised town-dwellers and there was a general feeling of bitterness.
Has the last word regarding the agrarian party yet been said? Probably not. It began with a democratic and reforming programme and its attack on the Civil List was the boldest stroke which had yet been seen. It was a legal attempt to overthrow the monarchy. If the vote of supply was screwed down to the lowest possible, the king would go. It was a simple and at the same time a clever stroke.
At a period which proclaims the right of the majority, one would not have expected the peasants' cause would encounter resistance. Sweden was a kingdom of peasants, for the country population numbered four millions, which in a population of four and a half millions, is certainly the majority. Should then the half million rule the four or vice versa? The latter course seemed the fairer. Now naturally the townsmen talk of the egotism and tyranny of the peasants, but have the labour party in the town a single item in their programme to improve the condition of the peasants and cottagers? It is so stupid to talk of egotism when every one now sees that he profits the whole, in proportion as he profits himself.
Meanwhile, in 1868, the malcontents discovered a party which could be opposed to the constitutional majority and whose programme contained all kinds of thorough-going reforms. That was the new liberal party, consisting for the most part of authors, some artisans, a professor, etc. By means of this handful of people who had none of the weighty interests which landed property involves, and whose social position was so insecure that a single unfavourable harvest could turn them into members of the proletariat, it was proposed to remodel society. What did the artisans know about society? How did they wish it to be constituted? Did they wish it to be remodelled in their interest, although the peasantry should be ruined? But that meant cutting off their own legs, for Sweden is not a land of exporting industries. Therefore the four million consumers in the land, as soon as their purchasing power was diminished, would involuntarily ruin the industries and leave the artisans stranded. That the artisans should advance is a necessity, but to wish to make all men industrial workers as the industrial socialists do, is much more unreasonable than to make them all peasants as the agrarian socialists purpose doing. Capital, which the labour party now attack, is the foundation of industry and if that is touched, industry is overthrown, and then the workmen must go back whence they came and still daily come,—to the country.
Meanwhile, the agrarian party was not yet corrupted by intercourse with aristocrats; it was neither conservative nor did it make compromises. The war seemed to be between the country and the town. The atmosphere was electric and the smallest cause might produce a thunderstorm.
In the capital there prevailed a general desire to erect a statue to Charles XII. Why? Was this last knight of the Middle Ages the ideal of the age? Bid the character of the idol of Gustav IV, Adolf, and Charles XV suitably express the spirit of the new peaceful period which now commenced? Or did the idea originate, as so often is the case in the sculptor's studio? Who knows? The statue was ready and the unveiling was to take place. Stands were erected for the spectators, but so unskilfully that the ceremony could not be witnessed by the general public, and the space railed off could only contain the invited guests, the singers and those who paid for their seats. But the subscription had been national and all believed they had a right to see. The arrangements were obnoxious to the people. Petitions were made to have the stands removed, but without success. The crowd began to make attempts to tear them down, but the military intervened. The doctor that day was giving a dinner to the Italian Opera Company. They had just risen from dessert when a noise was heard from the street; it was at first like rain falling on an iron roof, but then cries were distinctly audible. John listened, but for the moment nothing more was to be heard. The wine-glasses clinked amid Italian and French phrases which flew hither and thither over the table; there was such a noise of jests and laughter that those at the table could hardly hear themselves speak. But now there came a roar from the street, followed immediately by the tramp of horses, the rattle of weapons and harness. There was silence in the room for a moment, and one and another turned pale.
"What is it?" asked the prima donna.
"The mob making a noise," answered a professor.
John stood up from the table, went into his room, took his hat and stick and hurried out. "The mob!"—the words rang in his ear while he went down the street. "The mob!" They were his mother's former associates, his own school-mates and afterwards his pupils; they formed the dark background against which the society he had just quitted, stood out like a brilliant picture. He felt again as though he were a deserter, and had done wrong in working his way up. But he must get above if he was to do anything for those below. Yes many had said that, but when once they did get above, they found it so pleasant, that they forgot those below. These cavalrymen, for instance, whose origin was of the humblest, what airs they gave themselves! With what unmixed pleasure they cut down their former comrades, though it must be confessed they would have even more enjoyed cutting down the "black hats."
He went on and came to the market-place. The stands for the spectators stood out against the November sky like gigantic market booths, and the space below swarmed with men. From the opening of the Arsenal street the tramp of horses was heard only a short way off. Then they came riding forth, the blue guardsmen, the support of society, on whom the upper class relied. John was seized with a wild desire to dash against this mass of horses, men and sabres, as though he saw in them oppression incarnate. That was the enemy! very well—at them! The troop rode on and John stationed himself in the middle of the street. Whence had he derived this hatred against the supporters of law and order, who some day would protect him and his rights after he had clambered up, and was in a position to oppress others? If the mob with whom he now felt his solidarity had had their hands free, they would probably have thrown the first stone through the window, behind which he had sat with four wine-glasses in front of him. Certainly, but that did not prevent his taking their side just as the upper class often, inconsistently enough, takes sides against the police. This mania for freedom in the abstract is probably the natural man's small revolt against society.
He was going against the cavalry with a vague idea of striking them all to the ground or something of the sort, when fortunately some one seized him by the arm firmly but in a friendly way. He was brought back to the doctor's who had sent out to seek for him. After he had given his word of honour not to go out again he sank on a sofa, and lay all the evening in fever.
On the day of the unveiling of Charles XII's statue, he was one of the student singers, therefore among the elect, the "upper ten thousand," and had no reason to be discontented with his lot. When the ceremony was over, the people rushed forward. The police forced them back, and then they began to throw stones. The mounted police drew their sabres and struck, arresting some and assaulting others.
John had entered the market in front of the Jakob's church when he saw a policeman lay hold of a man, under a shower of stones which knocked off the constables' helmets. Without hesitation he sprang on the policeman, seized him by the collar, shook him and shouted, "Let the fellow go!"
The policeman looked at his assailant in astonishment.
"Who are you?" he asked irresolutely.
"I am Satan, and I will take you, if you don't let him go."
He actually did let him go and tried to seize John. At the same instant a stone knocked off his three-cornered hat. John tore himself loose; the crowd were now driven back by bayonets towards the guard-house in the Gustaf Adolf market. After them followed a swarm of well-dressed men, obviously members of the upper classes, shouting wildly, and as it seemed, resolved to free the prisoners. John ran with them; it was as though they were all impelled by a storm-wind. Men who had not been molested or oppressed at all, who had high positions in society, rushed blindly forward, risking their position, their domestic happiness, their living, everything. John felt a hand grasp his. He returned the pressure, and saw close beside him a middle-aged man, well-dressed, with distorted features. They did not know each other, nor did they speak together, but ran hand in hand, as if seized by one impulse. They came across a third in whom John recognised an old school-fellow, subsequently a civil service official, son of the head of a department. This young man had never sided with the opposition party in school, but on the contrary, was looked upon as a re-actionary with a future in front of him. He was now as white as a corpse, his cheeks were bloodless, the muscles of his forehead swollen, and his face resembled a skull in which two eyes were burning. They could not speak, but took each other's hands and ran on against the guards whom they were attacking. The human waves advanced till they were met by the bayonets, and then as always, dispersed in foam. Half-an-hour later John was discussing a beefsteak with some students in the Opera restaurant. He spoke of his adventure as though it were something which had happened independently of him and his will. Nay, he even jested at it. That may have been fear of public opinion, but also it may have been the case that he regarded his outbreak objectively and now quietly judged it as a member of society. The trap-door had opened for a moment, the prisoner had put his head out, and then it had closed again.
His unknown fellow-criminal, as he discovered later, was a pronounced conservative, a wholesale tradesman. He always avoided meeting John's eye, when they met after this. One time they met on a narrow pavement, and had to look at each other, but did not smile.
While they were sitting in the restaurant, came the news of the death of Blanche. The students took it fairly coolly, the artists and middle class citizens more warmly, but the lower classes talked of murder. They knew that he had personally besought Charles XV to have the spectators' stands taken down; they knew also, that though he was very prosperous himself, he had always thought of them and they were thankful. Stupid people objected, as is usual in such cases, that it required no great skill on his part to speak on behalf of the poor, when he was rich and celebrated. Did it not? It required the greatest.
It is remarkable that the chief outbreak of discontent was directed, not as elsewhere against the King, but against the governor and the police. Charles XV was apersona grata; he could do as he liked without becoming unpopular. He was neither condescending nor democratic in his tastes, but rather proud. Stories were told of some of his favourites having fallen into disgrace for want of respect on some mirthful occasion. He could put tobacco into his soldiers' mouths, but he scolded officers who did not at once fall in with his moods. He could box people's ears at a fire, and did not laugh when he was caricatured in a comic paper, as was supposed. He was a ruler and believed he was also a warrior and a statesman; he interfered in the government and could snub specialists with a "You don't understand that!" But he was popular and remained so. Swedes, who do not like to see a man's will slackening, admired this will and bowed before it. It was also strange, that they forgave his irregular life; perhaps it was because he made no secret of it. He had laid down a standard of morality for himself and lived according to it. Therefore he lived at harmony with himself, and harmony is always pleasant to contemplate.
People might be revolters by instinct, but they did not believe in the transition form to a better social constitution,i.e. a republic. They had seen how two French republics had been followed by new monarchies. There were secret anarchists, but no republicans, and they had persuaded themselves that the monarchy offered no barrier to the progress of liberty.
These were the ideas of the younger men. The elder men with Blanche thought a republic the only means of social salvation and therefore in our days the old liberal school has become conservative-republican.
When the doctor saw that his wife's literary books threatened to encroach upon John's medical studies, he resolved to give him a glimpse into the secrets of his profession, and to allow him such a foretaste of real work as should entice him to overcome the tedious preliminary studies which he himself thought too extensive. John now knew more chemistry and physics than the doctor, and the latter thought it was merely malicious to hinder a rival's course by imposing too hard preliminary studies. Why should he not, as in America, commence dissection, which was a special branch of study? Now after the theoretical study of anatomy, he could begin practice as an assistant. That was a new life full of variety and reality. One went for instance into a dark alley and came into a porter's room, where a woman lay, sick of fever, surrounded by poor children, the grandmother and other relations, who stole about on tip-toe, awaiting the doctor's verdict. The malodorous ragged bed-cover would be lifted, a sunken heaving chest exposed to view, and a prescription written. Then one went to the Tvädgårdsgatan and was conducted over soft carpets through splendid rooms into a bed-chamber which looked liked a temple; one lifted a blue silk coverlet and put in splints the leg of an angelic-looking child, dressed in lace. On the way out one looked at a collection of paintings, and talked about artists. This was something novel and interesting, but what connection had it with Titus Livius and the history of philosophy?
But then came the details of surgery. One was roused at seven o'clock in the morning, came into the doctor's dark room, and manually assisted at the cauterising of a syphilitic sore. The room reeked of human flesh, and was repugnant to an empty stomach. Or he had to hold a patient's head and felt it twitch with pain while the doctor with a fork extracted glands from his throat.
"One soon gets accustomed to that," said the doctor, and that was true, but John's thoughts were busy with Goethe's Faust, Wieland's Epicurean romances, George Sand's social phantasies, Chateaubriand's soliloquies with nature, and Lessing's common-sense theories. His imagination was set in motion and his memory refused to work; the reality of cauterisations and flowing blood was ugly; æstheticism had laid hold of him, and actual life seemed to him tedious and repulsive. His intercourse with artists had opened his eyes to a new world, a free society within Society. They would come to a well-spread table where cultivated people were sitting with badly-fitting clothes, black nails, and dirty linen, as if they were not merely equal, but superior to the rest,—in what?
They could scarcely write their names, they borrowed money without repaying it, and their talk was coarse. Everything was permitted to them, which was not permitted to others. Why? They could paint. They studied at the Academy, and the Academy did not ask whether all who enrolled themselves as students were geniuses. How was it known that they were geniuses? Was painting greater than knowledge and science?
They also had, as was well recognised, a peculiar morality of their own. They opened studios, hired models, and boasted of their paramours, while other men were ashamed of theirs and incurred disapproval on account of them. They laughed at what were very serious matters for other men, nay, it seemed to be part of an artist's equipment to be a "scoundrel," as any one else would be called for similar conduct.
"That was a glad free world," thought John, and one in which he could thrive, without conventional fetters or social obligations, and above all, without contact with banal realities. But he was not a genius? How should he get the entrée to it? Should he learn to paint and so be initiated? No! that would not do; he had never thought of painting; that demanded a special vocation, he thought, and painting would not express all he had to say, when once he began to speak. If hehadto find a medium for self-expression it would be the theatre. An actor could step forward, and say all kinds of truths, however bitter they might be, without being brought to book for them. That was certainly a tempting career.
John's proposal to transfer the university from Upsala to Stockholm was destined to have consequences, and his comrades had warned him of them. When he went up early in spring in order to write the obligatory Latin essay he had sent the professor by post the three test-essays and the 15 krona fee. So he could carry out his purpose unhindered and enrolled himself.
But now in May he wished to go and pass the preliminary examination in chemistry. In order to be well prepared, he had himself tested by the assistant-professor at the technological institute. The latter did so and declared that he already knew more than was needed for the medical examination. Thus prepared, he went up to Upsala. His first visit was to a comrade, who had already passed the preliminary examination in chemistry, and knew the "tips" for it.
John began: "I can do synthesis and analysis, and have studied organic chemistry."
"That is very well, for we only need synthesis; however, it is no use for you have not studied in the professor's laboratory."
"That is true; but the course at the Institute is much better."
"No matter,—it is not his."
"We shall see," said John, "whether knowledge does not tell in any ease."
"If you are so sure, then try, but consider first what I say. You must first go to the assistant-professor and get a 'tip'."
"What do you mean?"
"For a krona he will give you an hour's polishing, and ask you all the important questions which the professor has put during the past year. Just now he is in the habit of asking whether matches can be made out of his carcase and ammonia from your old boots. But that you will learn from the assistant. Secondly, you must not go to be examined in a frock coat and white tie; least of all, dressed as well as you are now. Therefore you must borrow my riding-coat, which is green in the shoulders and red in the seams, and my top-boots, for he does not like elastic boots."
John followed his friend's instructions and went first to the assistant-professor who gave him the questions which had been last asked. In return John promised that under all circumstances he would return and tell him the questions which he himself had been asked, as a means of enlarging his catechism.
The next day John went to his friend to array himself. His trousers were drawn up so that the tops of the boots should be seen and his loose collar turned on one side, so that the skin should show between the tie and the collar. Thus equipped, he went up for his first trial.
The professor of chemistry had formerly been a fortification officer, and had received in his time a not very cordial welcome from the learned staff in Upsala. He was a soldier, not academically cultivated, and thus a kind of "Philistine." This had galled him and made him bilious. In order to efface the effect of his laymen-like exterior, he affected the airs of an over-read and blunt professor. He went about ill-dressed and behaved eccentrically. Though many hundreds besides himself had been pupils of Berzelius, he was fond of mentioning the fact; it was his trump card. Berzelius, among other things, went about in shabby trousers, therefore a hole in one's clothes was the sign of a learned chemist, and so on. Hence all these peculiarities.
John presented himself, was regarded with suspicion and bidden to come again in a week. He replied that he had come from Stockholm and was too poor to support himself for a week in the town. He managed to get permission to present himself the next day. "It would be soon over," said the old man.
The next day he sat on a seat opposite the professor. It was a sunny afternoon in May, and the old man seemed to have digested his dinner badly. He looked grim as he threw out his first question from his rocking-chair. The answers were correct at the beginning. Then the questions became more tortuous like snakes.
"If I have an estate, where I suspect the presence of saltpetre, how shall I begin to construct a saltpetre factory?"
John suggested a saltpetre analysis.
"No."
"Well, then, I don't know anything else."
There was silence and the flies buzzed,—a long and terrible silence. "Now will come the question about the boots or the matches," thought John, "and there I shall shine." He coughed by way of rousing the professor, but the silence continued. John wondered whether he had been seen through and whether the old man recognised the "examination coat."
Then came a new question which was unanswered, and then another.
"You have come too soon," said the old man, and rose up.
"Yes, but I have worked a whole year in the laboratory, and can do chemical analysis."
"Yes, you know how to make up prescriptions, but you have not digested your knowledge. In the Institute only manual dexterity is necessary, but here scientific knowledge is required."
As a matter of fact the case was exactly the reverse for the medical students in Upsala complained that they had to stand like cooks and make up mixtures and salts, without having time to look at an analysis, which last was just what a doctor ought to do while synthesis was the apothecary's work. But now the proposal made some years before whether the university had not better be transferred to Stockholm had roused a feeling in Upsala against the capital. Moreover the laboratory of the newly-built technological institute was as famous for its excellent equipment, as that of Upsala was notorious for its poor one. Here, therefore, petty prejudices were at work and John felt the unfairness of it. "I do not then get a certificate?" he asked.
"No, sir, not this year; but come again next year."
The professor was ashamed to say, "Go to my only soul-saving laboratory."
John went out furious. Here then again neither diligence nor knowledge prevailed, but only cash and cringing! Had he tried short cuts? No, on the contrary, he had been obliged to travel by painful circuitous paths, while others had gone the direct road, and the directest is the shortest.
He went to the Carolina Park, as angry as an irritated bee. He did not wish to return at once to the town, but sat down on a seat. If he could only set this devil's hole on fire! Another year? No, never! Why read so much unnecessary stuff, which would only be forgotten, and be of no practical use? And slave in order to enter this dirty profession where one had to analyse urine, pick about in vomit, poke about in all the recesses of the body? Faugh! Just as he was sitting there, a group of cheerful-looking people came by, and stood laughing outside the Carolina library. They looked up to the window's, through which long rows of books were visible, shelf after shelf. They laughed,—the men and women laughed at the books. He thought he recognised them. Yes, they were Levasseur's French actors, whom he had seen in Stockholm and who were now visiting Upsala. They laughed at the books! Lucky people who could be importers of genius and culture without books. Perhaps every soul had something to give which was not in books, but would be there some day. Yes, certainly it was so. He himself possessed stories of experience and thoughts, which could enrich anthropology, and were ready to be throw out.
Again there stole upon him the thought of entering this privileged profession, which stood outside and above petty social conventions which ignored distinctions of rank, and in which one need never be conscious of belonging to the lower classes. There one could appeal to the universal judgment, and work in full publicity instead of being hung up here in a remote dark hole, without a verdict, examination, or witnesses.
Strengthened by this new idea, he stood up, east a glance at the books above, and went down to the town resolved to go home and seek for an engagement in the Theatre Royal.
Every townsman has probably felt once in his life the wish to appear as an actor. This is probably due to the impulse of the cultivated man to magnify and make himself something, to identify himself with great and celebrated personalities. John, who was a romanticist, had also the desire to step forward and harangue the public. He believed that he could choose his proper rôle, and he knew beforehand which it would be. The fact that he, like all others, believed that he had the capacity to become an actor, sprang from the superfluity of unused force, produced by a want of sufficient physical exercise, and from the tendency to megalomania connected with mental over-exertion. He saw no difficulties in the profession itself, but expected opposition from another quarter.
To attribute his being stage-struck to hereditary tendencies would perhaps be hasty, since we have just remarked that it is an almost universal impulse. But his paternal grandfather, a Stockholm citizen, had written dramatic pieces for an amateur theatre, and a young distant relative still lived as a warning example. The latter had been an engineer, had been through a course of instruction in the Motala iron-works, and had a post on the Köping-Hult railway. He therefore had fine prospects in front of him, but suddenly threw them up, and became an actor. This step of his was an incessant trouble to his family. Up to this time the young man had become nothing but was still travelling about with an obscure theatrical company. The danger of becoming like him was the difficult point. "Yes," said John to himself, "but I shall have luck." Why? Because he believed it; and he believed it because he wished it.
Some might be inclined to derive this strong impulse on John's part from the fact that he loved to play, as a child, with a toy theatre, but that is not sufficient, as all children do the same and he had got the taste from seeing them do it. The theatre was an unreal better world which enticed one out of the tedious real one. The latter would not have seemed so tedious if his education had been more harmonious and realistic and not given him such a strong tendency to romance. Enough; his resolution was taken; and without saying anything to any one, he went to the director of the Theatrical Academy the dramaturgist of the Theatre Royal.
When he heard the sound of his own words "I want to be an actor," he shuddered. He felt as though he tore down the veil of his inborn modesty, and did violence to his own nature.
The director asked what he was doing at present.
"Studying medicine."
"And you want to give up such a career, for one that is the hardest and the worst of all?"
"Yes."
All actors called their profession the "hardest and the worst" though they had such a good time of it. That was in order to frighten away aspirants.
John asked for private lessons in order that he might make his début. The director replied that he was now going to the country for the theatrical season was at an end, but he told John to come again on the 1st of September when the theatre opened, and the board of management came again to the town. That was a definite appointment and he saw his way clear.
When he went down the street, he walked with his eyes wide open, as though he gazed into a brilliant future; victory was already his; he felt its intoxicating eating fumes, and hurried, though with unsteady steps, down the street.
He said nothing to the doctor nor to any one else. He had still three months in front of him in which to train and prepare himself, but in secret, for he was shy and timid. He was afraid of annoying his father and the doctor, afraid of the whole town knowing that he thought himself capable of being an actor, afraid of his relatives' scorn, his friends' grimaces and efforts to dissuade him. This was the fruit of his education, the fear,—"What will people say?" His imagination made the act seem like a crime. It was certainly an interference with other people's peace of mind for relations and friends feel a shock, when they see a link torn out of the social chain. He felt it himself, and had to shake off the scruples of conscience.
For his début he had chosen the rôles of Karl Moor and Wijkander's Lucidor. This was no mere chance but perfectly logical. In both of these characters he had found the expression of his inner experience, and therefore he wished to speak with their tongues. He conceived of Lucidor as a higher nature undermined and ruined by poverty. A higher nature of course! In his enthusiasm for the theatre he felt again what he had felt when he had preached, and when he had revolted against the school prayers,[1]something of the proclaimer, the prophet, and the soothsayer.
What most of all elevated his ideas of the great significance of the theatre was the perusal of Schiller's essay, "The theatre regarded as an instrument of moral education." Sentences like the following show how lofty was the goal at which Schiller aimed. "The stage is the chief channel through which the light of wisdom descends from the better, thinking portion of the populace in order to spread its beneficent light over the whole state." "In this world of art we dream ourselves away from the real one, we find ourselves again, our feelings are roused, wholesome emotions stir our slumbering nature and drive our blood in swift currents. The unhappy here forget their own sorrows in watching those of others, the happy become sober, and the self-confident, reflective. The effeminate weakling is hardened into a man, the coarse and callous here begin to feel. And then finally,—what a triumph for thee O Nature, so often trodden down and so often re-arisen,—when men of all climates and conditions, casting away all fetters of convention and fashion, set free from the iron hand of fate, fraternising in one all-embracing sympathy, dissolved intoonerace, forget themselves and the world, and approach their heavenly origin. Each individual enjoys the delight of all, which is mirrored back to him strengthened and beautified from a hundred eyes, and his breast has only room for one aspiration,—to be a man!"
Thus wrote the young Schiller at twenty-five, and the youth of twenty subscribed it.
The theatre is certainly still a means of culture for young people and the middle class who can still feel the illusion of actors and painted canvas. For older and cultivated people it is a recreation in which the actor's art is the chief object of attention. Therefore old critics are almost invariably discontent and crabbed. They have lost their illusions and do not pass over any mistake in the acting.
Modern times have overprised the theatre, especially the actor's art in an exaggerated degree, and a re-action has followed. Actors have tried to ply their art independently of the dramatist, believing that they could stand on their own legs. Therefore particular "stars" become the objects of homage and therefore also opposition has been aroused. In Paris, where people had gone to the greatest lengths, a reaction first showed itself. TheFigarocalled the heroes of the Théâtre-Français to order, and reminded them that they were only the author's puppets.
The decay of all the great European theatres shows that the actor's art has lost its interest. Cultivated people no more go to the theatre because their sense for reality has been developed, and their imagination which is a relic of the savage has diminished; the uncultivated lack the time, and the money to go. The future seems to belong to the variety theatre, which amuses without instructing, for it is mere play and recreation. All important writers choose another, more suitable form in which to handle important questions. Ibsen's dramas have always produced their effect in book form before they were played; and when they are played, the spectators' interest is generally concentrated on themannerof their performance; consequently it is a secondary interest.
John committed the usual mistake of youth,i.e.of confusing the actor with the author; the actor is the mere enunciator of the sentiments for which the author who stands behind him, is responsible.
In the spring John resigned his post as tutor to the two girls, and now he had leisure during the summer to study his art in secret, and on his own responsibility. He had scoffed at books, and now the first things he sought were books. They contained the thoughts and experiences of men with whom, though most of them were dead, he could converse familiarly, without being betrayed. He had heard that in the castle there was a library which belonged to the State, and from which one could borrow books. He obtained a surety and went there. It was a solemn place with small rooms full of books where grey-haired silent old men sat and read. He got his books and went shyly and happily home.
He wished to study the matter thoroughly in all its aspects, as was his custom. In Schiller he found the assurance that the theatre was of deep significance; in Goethe he found a whole treatise on the histrionic art with directions how one should walk and stand, behave oneself, sit down, come in and go out; in Lessing'sHamburgische Dramaturgiehe found a whole volume of theatrical critiques filled with the closest observations. Lessing especially roused his hopes, for he went so far as to declare that the theatre had come down owing to the inferiority of the actors, and said that it would be better to employ amateurs from the cultivated classes who would play better than the drilled and often uncultured actors. He also read Raymond de St. Albin, whose often quoted observations on the actor's art are of great value.
At the same time he exercised himself practically. At the doctor's he arranged a stage when the boys were out. He practised entrances and exits; he arranged the stage for "The Robbers," dressed himself like Karl Moor, and played that part. He went to the National Museum and studied gestures of antique sculptures and gave up using his walking stick in order to accustom himself to walk freely. He did violence to his shyness, which had almost produced in him "agoraphobia," or the dread of crossing open places, and accustomed himself to walk across Karl XIII's square where great crowds used to be found. He did gymnastics every day at home, and fenced with his pupils. He gave attention to every movement of the muscles; practised walking with head erect and chest expanded, with arms hanging free and hands loosely clenched, as Goethe directs.
The chief difficulty he found was in the cultivation of his voice, for he was overheard when he declaimed in the house. Then it occurred to him to go outside the town. The only place where he could be undisturbed was the Ladugårdsgärdet. There he could look over the plain for a great distance and see whether any one was coming; there sounds died away so quickly that it cost him an effort to hear himself. This strengthened his voice.
Every day he went out there, and declaimed against heaven and earth. The town whose church tower rose opposite Ladugårdsgärdet symbolised society, while he stood out here alone with Nature. He shook his fist at the castle, the churches, and the barracks, and stormed at the troops who during their manoeuvres often came too close to him. There was something fanatical in his work and he spared himself no pains in order to make his unwilling muscles obedient.