Demian
had died away. We sat and watched the feeble light shine through the
high lancet window; the light seemed to lose itself in the body of the
church.
“It sounds funny,” said Pistorius, “that I once did theology and almost
became a parson. But it was only an error in form that I committed.
To be a priest, that is my vocation and my aim. Only I was too easily
satisfied, and gave myself to the service of Jehovah before ever I knew
Abraxas. Ah, every religion is beautiful! Religion is soul. It is all
one whether you take communion as a Christian or whether you make a
pilgrimage to Mecca.”
“Then really you might have been a clergyman,” I suggested.
“No, Sinclair, no. I should have had to have lied in that case. Our
religion is so practised, as if it were none. It is carried on as if it
were a work of the understanding. A Catholic I could well be, if need
were, but a Protestant clergyman--no! There are two kinds of genuine
believers--I know such--who hold gladly to the literal interpretation.
I could not say to them that for me Christ was not a mere person, but a
hero, a myth, a wonderful shadow-picture, in which mankind sees itself
painted on the wall of eternity. And what should I find to say to the
other sort, those who go to church to hear wise words, to fulfill a
duty, in order to leave nothing undone, etc.? Convert them, you think,
perhaps? But that is not at all my idea. The priest does not wish to
convert. He only wants to live among the believers, among those of his
own kind, so that through him they may find expression for that feeling
out of which we make our gods.”
He broke off. Then he continued: “Our new faith, for which we have now
chosen the name of Abraxas, is beautiful, my friend. It is the best we
have. But it is still a nestling. Its wings have not yet grown. Alas, a
lonely religion, that is not yet the true one. It must become an affair
of many, it must have cult and orgy, feasts and mysteries....”
He was sunk in reflection.
“Can one not celebrate mysteries alone, or in a very small circle?” I
asked hesitatingly.
“Yes, one can,” he nodded. “I have been celebrating them for a long
time past. I have celebrated cults for which I should have been
imprisoned for years in a convict station, if they had been found out.
But I know it is not the right thing.”
He suddenly clapped me on the shoulder, making me jump. “Young friend,”
he said impressively, “you also have mysteries. I know that you must
have dreams of which you make no mention to me. I don’t wish to know
them. But I tell you: Live them, these dreams, play your destined
part, build altars to them! It is not yet the perfect religion, but
it is a way. Whether you and I and a few other people will one day
renew the world remains to be seen. But we must renew it daily within
us, otherwise we are of no account. Think over it! You are eighteen,
Sinclair, you don’t go with loose women, you must have love-dreams,
desires. Perhaps they are such that you are frightened by them! They
are the best you have! Believe me! I have lost a great deal by doing
violence to these love-dreams when I was your age. One should not do
that. When one knows of Abraxas, one should do that no more. We should
fear nothing. We should hold nothing forbidden which the soul in us
desires.”
Frightened, I objected: “But you can’t do everything which comes into
your mind! You can’t murder a man because you can’t tolerate him.”
He pressed closer to me.
“There are cases where you can. Only, generally it’s a mistake. I don’t
mean that you can simply do everything which comes into your mind. No,
but you shouldn’t do injury to those ideas in which there is sense, you
shouldn’t banish them from your mind or moralize about them. Instead of
getting oneself crucified or crucifying others, one can solemnly drink
wine out of a cup, thinking the while on the mystery of sacrifice. One
can, without such actions, treat one’s impulses and one’s so-called
temptations with esteem and love. Then you discover their meaning, and
they all have meaning. Next time the idea takes you to do something
really mad and sinful, Sinclair, if you would like to murder someone
or to do something dreadfully obscene, then think a moment, that it is
Abraxas who is indulging in a play of fancy. The man you would like to
kill is never really Mr. So and So, that is really only a disguise.
When we hate a man, we hate in him something which resides in us
ourselves. What is not in us does not move us.”
Never had Pistorius said anything to me which went home so deeply as
this. I could not reply. But what moved me most singularly and most
powerfully was that Pistorius in this conversation had struck the same
note as Demian, whose words I had carried in my mind for years and
years past. They knew nothing of one another, and both said to me the
same thing.
“The things we see,” said Pistorius softly, “are the same things which
are in us. There is no reality except that which we have in ourselves.
For that reason most people live so unreally, because they hold the
impressions of the outside world for real, and their own world in
themselves never enters into their consideration. You can be happy like
that. But if once you know of the other, then you no longer have the
choice to go the way most people go. Sinclair, the road for most people
is easy, ours is hard. Let us go.”
A few days later, after I had on two occasions waited for him in vain,
I met him late one evening in the street. He came stumbling round a
corner, blown along by the cold night wind. He was very drunk. I did
not like to call him. He passed by without noticing me, staring in
front of him with strange, glowing eyes, as though he were moving in
obedience to a dark call from the unknown. I followed him down one
street. He drifted along as if drawn by an invisible wire, with the
swaying gait of a fanatic, or like a ghost. Sadly I went home, to the
unsolved problems of my dreams.
“Thus he renews the world in himself!” I thought, and felt instantly
that my thought was base and moral. What did I know of his dreams?
Perhaps in his intoxication he was going a surer way than in my anxiety.
* * * * *
In the intervals between lessons it struck me once or twice that a
boy who had never before attracted my notice was hovering about in
my proximity. It was a little, weak-looking, slim youngster with
reddish-blond thin hair, who had something peculiar in his look and
behavior. One evening as I came home he was on the watch for me in the
street. He let me pass by, then walked behind me; and remained standing
in front of the door of the house.
“Can I do anything for you?” I asked.
“I only want to speak to you,” he said timidly. “Be good enough to come
a few steps with me.”
I followed him, observing that he was deeply excited and full of
expectation. His hands trembled.
“Are you a Spiritualist?” he asked quite suddenly.
“No, Knauer,” I said, laughing. “Not a bit. How did you get hold of
that idea?”
“But you are a Theosophist?”
“No again.”
“Oh, please don’t be so reserved. I feel with absolute certitude there
is something singular about you. It is in your eyes. I thought it
certain you communed with spirits. I am not asking out of curiosity,
Sinclair, no! I am myself a seeker, you know, and I am so lonely.”
“Tell me, then!” I encouraged him. “I know absolutely nothing of
ghosts. I live in my dreams: that is what you have felt about me.
Other people live in dreams as well, but not in their own, that is the
difference.”
“Yes, perhaps so,” he whispered. “Only it depends on the sort of dreams
you live in. Have you ever heard of white magic?”
I had to admit my ignorance.
“It’s when you learn to get the mastery over yourself. You can be
immortal, and have magical powers as well. Have you never practised
such experiments?”
On my evincing curiosity with regard to those practices, he was
mysteriously silent, but when I turned to go he burst out in
explanation.
“For example, when I go to sleep or when I wish to concentrate my
thoughts I do such exercises. I think of something or other, a word
for instance, or a name, or a geometrical figure. Then I think it into
myself, as strongly as I can. I try to get it into my head, until I
feel it is there. Then I think it in my neck, and so on, until I am
quite full of it. Then my thoughts are concentrated and nothing more
can disturb my repose.”
I understood to a certain degree what he meant. Yet I felt he had
something else in his mind, he was oddly excited and hasty. I tried to
make the questions easy for him, and he soon gave me an indication of
what immediately concerned him.
“You are also continent?” he asked me anxiously.
“What do you mean by that? Do you mean it from the sex point of view?”
“Yes, yes. I have been continent for two years, since I knew of what I
have told you. Before that I practised a vice, you know what. You have
never been with a woman, then?”
“No,” I said. “I haven’t found the right one.”
“But if you should find her, the one you consider the right one, then
would you sleep with her?”
“Yes, naturally. If she had nothing against it,” I said with some scorn.
“Oh, then you are on a false track! One can only perfect one’s inner
forces if one remains entirely continent. I have done it, for two whole
years. Two years and a little more than a month! It’s so hard. Often I
can scarcely hold out any longer.”
“Listen, Knauer, I don’t believe that continency is so terribly
important.”
“I know,” he parried, “they all say that. But I did not expect to hear
it from you. Whoever will go the higher spiritual way must remain pure,
unconditionally!”
“Well, then, do so! But I don’t understand why one man should be purer
than another, because he represses his sex instincts. Or can you switch
off all sexual matters from your thoughts and dreams?”
He looked despairingly at me.
“No, that’s just it. God! and yet it must be. At night I have dreams
which I couldn’t relate even to myself. Terrible dreams, terrible!”
I recollected what Pistorius had said to me. But however much I felt
his words to be right I could not pass them on. I could not give advice
which did not result from my own experience, advice the observance
of which I did not yet feel myself equal to. I was silent and felt
humiliated that someone should come to me for counsel when I had none
to give.
“I have tried everything!” wailed Knauer beside me. “I have done all
that a man can do, with cold water, with snow, with gymnastic exercises
and running, but all that doesn’t help a bit. Each night I wake up out
of dreams on which I dare not think. And most dreadful of all, I am by
degrees losing everything that I had gained spiritually. It is almost
impossible for me any longer to concentrate my thoughts or to lull
myself to sleep. Often I lie awake the whole night through. I shall
not be able to bear that much longer. Finally, when I can carry on the
struggle no further, when I give in and make myself impure again, then
I shall be worse than all the others who have never struggled against
it. You understand that, don’t you?”
I nodded, but could say nothing to the point. He began to bore me, and
I was horrified at myself, because his obvious need and despair made
no deep impression on me. My only sentiment was: I can’t help you.
“Then you know nothing that would help me?” he asked at last, exhausted
and sad. “Nothing at all? There must be some way! How do you manage?”
“I cannot tell you anything, Knauer. People can’t help one another in
this case. No one has helped me, either. You must think of something
yourself, and you must obey the prompting which really comes from your
own nature. There is nothing else. If you cannot find yourself, you