The Count of Monte Cristo, Illustrated by Alexandre Dumas
Chapter 48. Ideology
If the Count of Monte Cristo had been for a long time familiar with theways of Parisian society, he would have appreciated better thesignificance of the step which M. de Villefort had taken. Standing wellat court, whether the king regnant was of the older or younger branch,whether the government was doctrinaire liberal, or conservative; lookedupon by all as a man of talent, since those who have never experienced apolitical check are generally so regarded; hated by many, but warmlysupported by others, without being really liked by anybody, M. deVillefort held a high position in the magistracy, and maintained hiseminence like a Harlay or a Molé. His drawing-room, under theregenerating influence of a young wife and a daughter by his firstmarriage, scarcely eighteen, was still one of the well-regulated Parissalons where the worship of traditional customs and the observance ofrigid etiquette were carefully maintained. A freezing politeness, astrict fidelity to government principles, a profound contempt fortheories and theorists, a deep-seated hatred of ideality,—these were theelements of private and public life displayed by M. de Villefort.
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M. de Villefort was not only a magistrate, he was almost a diplomatist.His relations with the former court, of which he always spoke withdignity and respect, made him respected by the new one, and he knew somany things, that not only was he always carefully considered, butsometimes consulted. Perhaps this would not have been so had it beenpossible to get rid of M. de Villefort; but, like the feudal barons whorebelled against their sovereign, he dwelt in an impregnable fortress.This fortress was his post as king’s attorney, all the advantages ofwhich he exploited with marvellous skill, and which he would not haveresigned but to be made deputy, and thus to replace neutrality byopposition.
Ordinarily M. de Villefort made and returned very few visits. His wifevisited for him, and this was the received thing in the world, where theweighty and multifarious occupations of the magistrate were accepted asan excuse for what was really only calculated pride, a manifestation ofprofessed superiority—in fact, the application of the axiom, Pretend tothink well of yourself, and the world will think well of you, an axiom ahundred times more useful in society nowadays than that of the Greeks,“Know thyself,” a knowledge for which, in our days, we have substitutedthe less difficult and more advantageous science of knowing others.
To his friends M. de Villefort was a powerful protector; to his enemies,he was a silent, but bitter opponent; for those who were neither the onenor the other, he was a statue of the law-made man. He had a haughtybearing, a look either steady and impenetrable or insolently piercingand inquisitorial. Four successive revolutions had built and cementedthe pedestal upon which his fortune was based.
M. de Villefort had the reputation of being the least curious and theleast wearisome man in France. He gave a ball every year, at which heappeared for a quarter of an hour only,—that is to say, five-and-fortyminutes less than the king is visible at his balls. He was never seen atthe theatres, at concerts, or in any place of public resort.Occasionally, but seldom, he played at whist, and then care was taken toselect partners worthy of him—sometimes they were ambassadors, sometimesarchbishops, or sometimes a prince, or a president, or some dowagerduchess.
Such was the man whose carriage had just now stopped before the Count ofMonte Cristo’s door. The valet de chambre announced M. de Villefort atthe moment when the count, leaning over a large table, was tracing on amap the route from St. Petersburg to China.
The procureur entered with the same grave and measured step he wouldhave employed in entering a court of justice. He was the same man, orrather the development of the same man, whom we have heretofore seen asassistant attorney at Marseilles. Nature, according to her way, had madeno deviation in the path he had marked out for himself. From beingslender he had now become meagre; once pale, he was now yellow; hisdeep-set eyes were hollow, and the gold spectacles shielding his eyesseemed to be an integral portion of his face. He dressed entirely inblack, with the exception of his white tie, and his funeral appearancewas only mitigated by the slight line of red ribbon which passed almostimperceptibly through his button-hole, and appeared like a streak ofblood traced with a delicate brush.
Although master of himself, Monte Cristo, scrutinized with irrepressiblecuriosity the magistrate whose salute he returned, and who, distrustfulby habit, and especially incredulous as to social prodigies, was muchmore despised to look upon “the noble stranger,” as Monte Cristo wasalready called, as an adventurer in search of new fields, or an escapedcriminal, rather than as a prince of the Holy See, or a sultan of theThousand and One Nights.
“Sir,” said Villefort, in the squeaky tone assumed by magistrates intheir oratorical periods, and of which they cannot, or will not, divestthemselves in society, “sir, the signal service which you yesterdayrendered to my wife and son has made it a duty for me to offer you mythanks. I have come, therefore, to discharge this duty, and to expressto you my overwhelming gratitude.”
And as he said this, the “eye severe” of the magistrate had lost nothingof its habitual arrogance. He spoke in a voice of the procureur-general,with the rigid inflexibility of neck and shoulders which caused hisflatterers to say (as we have before observed) that he was the livingstatue of the law.
“Monsieur,” replied the count, with a chilling air, “I am very happy tohave been the means of preserving a son to his mother, for they say thatthe sentiment of maternity is the most holy of all; and the good fortunewhich occurred to me, monsieur, might have enabled you to dispense witha duty which, in its discharge, confers an undoubtedly great honor; forI am aware that M. de Villefort is not usually lavish of the favor whichhe now bestows on me,—a favor which, however estimable, is unequal tothe satisfaction which I have in my own consciousness.”
Villefort, astonished at this reply, which he by no means expected,started like a soldier who feels the blow levelled at him over the armorhe wears, and a curl of his disdainful lip indicated that from thatmoment he noted in the tablets of his brain that the Count of MonteCristo was by no means a highly bred gentleman.
He glanced around, in order to seize on something on which theconversation might turn, and seemed to fall easily on a topic. He sawthe map which Monte Cristo had been examining when he entered, and said:
“You seem geographically engaged, sir? It is a rich study for you, who,as I learn, have seen as many lands as are delineated on this map.”
“Yes, sir,” replied the count; “I have sought to make of the human race,taken in the mass, what you practice every day on individuals—aphysiological study. I have believed it was much easier to descend fromthe whole to a part than to ascend from a part to the whole. It is analgebraic axiom, which makes us proceed from a known to an unknownquantity, and not from an unknown to a known; but sit down, sir, I begof you.”
Monte Cristo pointed to a chair, which the procureur was obliged to takethe trouble to move forwards himself, while the count merely fell backinto his own, on which he had been kneeling when M. Villefort entered.Thus the count was halfway turned towards his visitor, having his backtowards the window, his elbow resting on the geographical chart whichfurnished the theme of conversation for the moment,—a conversation whichassumed, as in the case of the interviews with Danglars and Morcerf, aturn analogous to the persons, if not to the situation.
“Ah, you philosophize,” replied Villefort, after a moment’s silence,during which, like a wrestler who encounters a powerful opponent, hetook breath; “well, sir, really, if, like you, I had nothing else to do,I should seek a more amusing occupation.”
“Why, in truth, sir,” was Monte Cristo’s reply, “man is but an uglycaterpillar for him who studies him through a solar microscope; but yousaid, I think, that I had nothing else to do. Now, really, let me ask,sir, have you?—do you believe you have anything to do? or to speak inplain terms, do you really think that what you do deserves being calledanything?”
Villefort’s astonishment redoubled at this second thrust so forciblymade b
“Sir,” he responded, “you are a stranger, and I believe you say yourselfthat a portion of your life has been spent in Oriental countries, so youare not aware how human justice, so expeditious in barbarous countries,takes with us a prudent and well-studied course.”
“Oh, yes—yes, I do, sir; it is the pede claudo of the ancients. I knowall that, for it is with the justice of all countries especially that Ihave occupied myself—it is with the criminal procedure of all nationsthat I have compared natural justice, and I must say, sir, that it isthe law of primitive nations, that is, the law of retaliation, that Ihave most frequently found to be according to the law of God.”
“If this law were adopted, sir,” said the procureur, “it would greatlysimplify our legal codes, and in that case the magistrates would not (asyou just observed) have much to do.”
“It may, perhaps, come to this in time,” observed Monte Cristo; “youknow that human inventions march from the complex to the simple, andsimplicity is always perfection.”
“In the meanwhile,” continued the magistrate, “our codes are in fullforce, with all their contradictory enactments derived from Galliccustoms, Roman laws, and Frank usages; the knowledge of all which, youwill agree, is not to be acquired without extended labor; it needstedious study to acquire this knowledge, and, when acquired, a strongpower of brain to retain it.”
“I agree with you entirely, sir; but all that even you know with respectto the French code, I know, not only in reference to that code, but asregards the codes of all nations. The English, Turkish, Japanese, Hindulaws, are as familiar to me as the French laws, and thus I was right,when I said to you, that relatively (you know that everything isrelative, sir)—that relatively to what I have done, you have very littleto do; but that relatively to all I have learned, you have yet a greatdeal to learn.”
“But with what motive have you learned all this?” inquired Villefort, inastonishment.
Monte Cristo smiled.
“Really, sir,” he observed, “I see that in spite of the reputation whichyou have acquired as a superior man, you look at everything from thematerial and vulgar view of society, beginning with man, and ending withman—that is to say, in the most restricted, most narrow view which it ispossible for human understanding to embrace.”
“Pray, sir, explain yourself,” said Villefort, more and more astonished,“I really do—not—understand you—perfectly.”
“I say, sir, that with the eyes fixed on the social organization ofnations, you see only the springs of the machine, and lose sight of thesublime workman who makes them act; I say that you do not recognizebefore you and around you any but those office-holders whose commissionshave been signed by a minister or king; and that the men whom God hasput above those office-holders, ministers, and kings, by giving them amission to follow out, instead of a post to fill—I say that they escapeyour narrow, limited field of observation. It is thus that humanweakness fails, from its debilitated and imperfect organs. Tobias tookthe angel who restored him to light for an ordinary young man. Thenations took Attila, who was doomed to destroy them, for a conquerorsimilar to other conquerors, and it was necessary for both to revealtheir missions, that they might be known and acknowledged; one wascompelled to say, ‘I am the angel of the Lord’; and the other, ‘I am thehammer of God,’ in order that the divine essence in both might berevealed.”
“Then,” said Villefort, more and more amazed, and really supposing hewas speaking to a mystic or a madman, “you consider yourself as one ofthose extraordinary beings whom you have mentioned?”
“And why not?” said Monte Cristo coldly.
“Your pardon, sir,” replied Villefort, quite astounded, “but you willexcuse me if, when I presented myself to you, I was unaware that Ishould meet with a person whose knowledge and understanding so farsurpass the usual knowledge and understanding of men. It is not usualwith us corrupted wretches of civilization to find gentlemen likeyourself, possessors, as you are, of immense fortune—at least, so it issaid—and I beg you to observe that I do not inquire, I merely repeat;—itis not usual, I say, for such privileged and wealthy beings to wastetheir time in speculations on the state of society, in philosophicalreveries, intended at best to console those whom fate has disinheritedfrom the goods of this world.”
“Really, sir,” retorted the count, “have you attained the eminentsituation in which you are, without having admitted, or even withouthaving met with exceptions? and do you never use your eyes, which musthave acquired so much finesse and certainty, to divine, at a glance, thekind of man by whom you are confronted? Should not a magistrate be notmerely the best administrator of the law, but the most crafty expounderof the chicanery of his profession, a steel probe to search hearts, atouchstone to try the gold which in each soul is mingled with more orless of alloy?”
“Sir,” said Villefort, “upon my word, you overcome me. I really neverheard a person speak as you do.”
“Because you remain eternally encircled in a round of generalconditions, and have never dared to raise your wings into those upperspheres which God has peopled with invisible or exceptional beings.”
“And you allow then, sir, that spheres exist, and that these marked andinvisible beings mingle amongst us?”
“Why should they not? Can you see the air you breathe, and yet withoutwhich you could not for a moment exist?”
“Then we do not see those beings to whom you allude?”
“Yes, we do; you see them whenever God pleases to allow them to assume amaterial form. You touch them, come in contact with them, speak to them,and they reply to you.”
“Ah,” said Villefort, smiling, “I confess I should like to be warnedwhen one of these beings is in contact with me.”
“You have been served as you desire, monsieur, for you were warned justnow, and I now again warn you.”
“Then you yourself are one of these marked beings?”
“Yes, monsieur, I believe so; for until now, no man has found himself ina position similar to mine. The dominions of kings are limited either bymountains or rivers, or a change of manners, or an alteration oflanguage. My kingdom is bounded only by the world, for I am not anItalian, or a Frenchman, or a Hindu, or an American, or a Spaniard—I ama cosmopolite. No country can say it saw my birth. God alone knows whatcountry will see me die. I adopt all customs, speak all languages. Youbelieve me to be a Frenchman, for I speak French with the same facilityand purity as yourself. Well, Ali, my Nubian, believes me to be an Arab;Bertuccio, my steward, takes me for a Roman; Haydée, my slave, thinks mea Greek. You may, therefore, comprehend, that being of no country,asking no protection from any government, acknowledging no man as mybrother, not one of the scruples that arrest the powerful, or theobstacles which paralyze the weak, paralyzes or arrests me. I have onlytwo adversaries—I will not say two conquerors, for with perseverance Isubdue even them,—they are time and distance. There is a third, and themost terrible—that is my condition as a mortal being. This alone canstop me in my onward career, before I have attained the goal at which Iaim, for all the rest I have reduced to mathematical terms. What mencall the chances of fate—namely, ruin, change, circumstances—I havefully anticipated, and if any of these should overtake me, yet it willnot overwhelm me. Unless I die, I shall always be what I am, andtherefore it is that I utter the things you have never heard, even fromthe mouths of kings—for kings have need, and other persons have fear ofyou. For who is there who does not say to himself, in a society asincongruously organized as ours, ‘Perhaps some day I shall have to dowith the king’s attorney’?”
“But can you not say that, sir? The moment you become an inhabitant ofFrance, you are naturally subjected to the French law.”
“I know it sir,” replied Monte Cristo; “but when I visit a country Ibegin to study, by all th
“That is to say,” replied Villefort with hesitation, “that human naturebeing weak, every man, according to your creed, has committed faults.”
“Faults or crimes,” responded Monte Cristo with a negligent air.
“And that you alone, amongst the men whom you do not recognize as yourbrothers—for you have said so,” observed Villefort in a tone thatfaltered somewhat—“you alone are perfect.”
“No, not perfect,” was the count’s reply; “only impenetrable, that’sall. But let us leave off this strain, sir, if the tone of it isdispleasing to you; I am no more disturbed by your justice than are youby my second-sight.”
“No, no,—by no means,” said Villefort, who was afraid of seeming toabandon his ground. “No; by your brilliant and almost sublimeconversation you have elevated me above the ordinary level; we no longertalk, we rise to dissertation. But you know how the theologians in theircollegiate chairs, and philosophers in their controversies, occasionallysay cruel truths; let us suppose for the moment that we are theologizingin a social way, or even philosophically, and I will say to you, rude asit may seem, ‘My brother, you sacrifice greatly to pride; you may beabove others, but above you there is God.’”
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“Above us all, sir,” was Monte Cristo’s response, in a tone and with anemphasis so deep that Villefort involuntarily shuddered. “I have mypride for men—serpents always ready to threaten everyone who would passwithout crushing them under foot. But I lay aside that pride before God,who has taken me from nothing to make me what I am.”
“Then, count, I admire you,” said Villefort, who, for the first time inthis strange conversation, used the aristocratic form to the unknownpersonage, whom, until now, he had only called monsieur. “Yes, and I sayto you, if you are really strong, really superior, really pious, orimpenetrable, which you were right in saying amounts to the samething—then be proud, sir, for that is the characteristic ofpredominance. Yet you have unquestionably some ambition.”
“I have, sir.”
“And what may it be?”
“I too, as happens to every man once in his life, have been taken bySatan into the highest mountain in the earth, and when there he showedme all the kingdoms of the world, and as he said before, so said he tome, ‘Child of earth, what wouldst thou have to make thee adore me?’ Ireflected long, for a gnawing ambition had long preyed upon me, and thenI replied, ‘Listen,—I have always heard of Providence, and yet I havenever seen him, or anything that resembles him, or which can make mebelieve that he exists. I wish to be Providence myself, for I feel thatthe most beautiful, noblest, most sublime thing in the world, is torecompense and punish.’ Satan bowed his head, and groaned. ‘Youmistake,’ he said, ‘Providence does exist, only you have never seen him,because the child of God is as invisible as the parent. You have seennothing that resembles him, because he works by secret springs, andmoves by hidden ways. All I can do for you is to make you one of theagents of that Providence.’ The bargain was concluded. I may sacrificemy soul, but what matters it?” added Monte Cristo. “If the thing were todo again, I would again do it.”
Villefort looked at Monte Cristo with extreme amazement.
“Count,” he inquired, “have you any relations?”
“No, sir, I am alone in the world.”
“So much the worse.”
“Why?” asked Monte Cristo.
“Because then you might witness a spectacle calculated to break downyour pride. You say you fear nothing but death?”
“I did not say that I feared it; I only said that death alone couldcheck the execution of my plans.”
“And old age?”
“My end will be achieved before I grow old.”
“And madness?”
“I have been nearly mad; and you know the axiom,—non bis in idem. It isan axiom of criminal law, and, consequently, you understand its fullapplication.”
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“Sir,” continued Villefort, “there is something to fear besides death,old age, and madness. For instance, there is apoplexy—that lightning-stroke which strikes but does not destroy you, and yet which bringseverything to an end. You are still yourself as now, and yet you areyourself no longer; you who, like Ariel, verge on the angelic, are butan inert mass, which, like Caliban, verges on the brutal; and this iscalled in human tongues, as I tell you, neither more nor less thanapoplexy. Come, if so you will, count, and continue this conversation atmy house, any day you may be willing to see an adversary capable ofunderstanding and anxious to refute you, and I will show you my father,M. Noirtier de Villefort, one of the most fiery Jacobins of the FrenchRevolution; that is to say, he had the most remarkable audacity,seconded by a most powerful organization—a man who has not, perhaps,like yourself seen all the kingdoms of the earth, but who has helped tooverturn one of the greatest; in fact, a man who believed himself, likeyou, one of the envoys, not of God, but of a supreme being; not ofProvidence, but of fate. Well, sir, the rupture of a blood-vessel on thelobe of the brain has destroyed all this, not in a day, not in an hour,but in a second. M. Noirtier, who, on the previous night, was the oldJacobin, the old senator, the old Carbonaro, laughing at the guillotine,the cannon, and the dagger—M. Noirtier, playing with revolutions—M.Noirtier, for whom France was a vast chess-board, from which pawns,rooks, knights, and queens were to disappear, so that the king wascheckmated—M. Noirtier, the redoubtable, was the next morning poor M.Noirtier, the helpless old man, at the tender mercies of the weakestcreature in the household, that is, his grandchild, Valentine; a dumband frozen carcass, in fact, living painlessly on, that time may begiven for his frame to decompose without his consciousness of itsdecay.”
“Alas, sir,” said Monte Cristo “this spectacle is neither strange to myeye nor my thought. I am something of a physician, and have, like myfellows, sought more than once for the soul in living and in deadmatter; yet, like Providence, it has remained invisible to my eyes,although present to my heart. A hundred writers since Socrates, Seneca,St. Augustine, and Gall, have made, in verse and prose, the comparisonyou have made, and yet I can well understand that a father’s sufferingsmay effect great changes in the mind of a son. I will call on you, sir,since you bid me contemplate, for the advantage of my pride, thisterrible spectacle, which must have been so great a source of sorrow toyour family.”
“It would have been so unquestionably, had not God given me so large acompensation. In contrast with the old man, who is dragging his way tothe tomb, are two children just entering into life—Valentine, thedaughter by my first wife—Mademoiselle Renée de Saint-Méran—and Edward,the boy whose life you have this day saved.”
“And what is your deduction from this compensation, sir?” inquired MonteCristo.
“My deduction is,” replied Villefort, “that my father, led away by hispassions, has committed some fault unknown to human justice, but markedby the justice of God. That God, desirous in his mercy to punish but oneperson, has visited this justice on him alone.”
Monte Cristo with a smile on his lips, uttered in the depths of his soula groan which would have made Villefort fly had he but heard it.
“Adieu, sir,” said the magistrate, who had risen from his seat; “I leaveyou, bearing a remembrance of you—a remembrance of esteem, which I hopewill not be disagreeable to you when you know me better; for I am not aman to bore my friends, as you will learn. Besides, you have made aneternal friend of Madame de Villefort.”
The count bowed, and contented himself with seeing Villefort to the doorof his cabinet, the procureur being escorted to his carriage by twofootmen, who, on a signal from their master, followed him with everymark of attention. When he had gone, Monte Cristo breathed a profoundsigh, and said:
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Then sounding his bell, he said to Ali, who entered:
“I am going to madame’s chamber—have the carriage ready at one o’clock.”