第 102 节
作者:寻找山吹      更新:2021-02-27 02:13      字数:9322
  years; the man I had ridiculed; despised and oppressed; but it seemed to
  me then that he had been my friend and intimate all my life: more than
  that; I had an odd feeling he had always been a part of me; and that now
  had begun to take place a merging of personality。  Nor could I feel that
  he was a dying man。  He would live on。。。。
  I could not as yet sort and appraise; reduce to order the possessions he
  had wished to turn over to me。
  It was noon; and people were walking past me in the watery; diluted
  sunlight; men in black coats and top hats and women in bizarre;
  complicated costumes bright with colour。  I had reached the more
  respectable portion of the city; where the churches were emptying。  These
  very people; whom not long ago I would have acknowledged as my own kind;
  now seemed mildly animated automatons; wax figures。  The day was like
  hundreds of Sundays I had known; the city familiar; yet passing strange。
  I walked like a ghost through it。。。。
  XXVI。
  Accompanied by young Dr。 Strafford; I went to California。  My physical
  illness had been brief。  Dr。 Brooke had taken matters in his own hands
  and ordered an absolute rest; after dwelling at some length on the
  vicious pace set by modern business and the lack of consideration and
  knowledge shown by men of affairs for their bodies。  There was a limit to
  the wrack and strain which the human organism could stand。  He must of
  course have suspected the presence of disturbing and disintegrating
  factors; but he confined himself to telling me that only an exceptional
  constitution had saved me from a serious illness; he must in a way have
  comprehended why I did not wish to go abroad; and have my family join me
  on the Riviera; as Tom Peters proposed。  California had been my choice;
  and Dr。 Brooke recommended the climate of Santa Barbara。
  High up on the Montecito hills I found a villa beside the gateway of one
  of the deep canons that furrow the mountain side; and day after day I lay
  in a chair on the sunny terrace; with a continually recurring amazement
  at the brilliancy of my surroundings。  In the early morning I looked down
  on a feathery mist hiding the world; a mist presently to be shot with
  silver and sapphire…blue; dissolved by slow enchantment until there lay
  revealed the plain and the shimmering ocean with its distant islands
  trembling in the haze。  At sunset my eyes sought the mountains; mountains
  unreal; like glorified scenery of grand opera; with violet shadows in the
  wooded canon clefts; and crags of pink tourmaline and ruby against the
  skies。  All day long in the tempered heat flowers blazed around me;
  insects hummed; lizards darted in and out of the terrace wall; birds
  flashed among the checkered shadows of the live oaks。  That grove of
  gnarled oaks summoned up before me visions of some classic villa poised
  above Grecian seas; shining amidst dark foliage; the refuge of forgotten
  kings。  Below me; on the slope; the spaced orange trees were heavy with
  golden fruit。
  After a while; as I grew stronger; I was driven down and allowed to walk
  on the wide beach that stretched in front of the gay houses facing the
  sea。  Cormorants dived under the long rollers that came crashing in from
  the Pacific; gulls wheeled and screamed in the soft wind; alert little
  birds darted here and there with incredible swiftness; leaving tiny
  footprints across the ribs and furrows of the wet sand。  Far to the
  southward a dark barrier of mountains rose out of the sea。  Sometimes I
  sat with my back against the dunes watching the drag of the outgoing
  water rolling the pebbles after it; making a gleaming floor for the light
  to dance。
  At first I could not bear to recall the events that had preceded and
  followed my visit to Krebs that Sunday morning。  My illness had begun
  that night; on the Monday Tom Peters had come to the Club and insisted
  upon my being taken to his house。。。。  When I had recovered sufficiently
  there had been rather a pathetic renewal of our friendship。  Perry came
  to see me。  Their attitude was one of apprehension not unmixed with
  wonder; and though they; knew of the existence of a mental crisis;
  suspected; in all probability; some of the causes of it; they refrained
  carefully from all comments; contenting themselves with telling me when I
  was well enough that Krebs had died quite suddenly that Sunday afternoon;
  that his deathoccurring at such a crucial momenthad been sufficient
  to turn the tide of the election and make Edgar Greenhalge mayor。
  Thousands who had failed to understand Hermann Krebs; but whom he had
  nevertheless stirred and troubled; suddenly awoke to the fact that he had
  had elements of greatness。。。。
  My feelings in those first days at Santa Barbara may be likened; indeed;
  to those of a man who has passed through a terrible accident that has
  deprived him of sight or hearing; and which he wishes to forget。  What I
  was most conscious of then was an aching sense of lossan ache that by
  degrees became a throbbing pain as life flowed back into me; re…inflaming
  once more my being with protest and passion; arousing me to revolt
  against the fate that had overtaken me。  I even began at moments to feel
  a fierce desire to go back and take up again the fight from which I had
  been so strangely removedremoved by the agency of things still obscure。
  I might get Nancy yet; beat down her resistance; overcome her; if only I
  could be near her and see her。  But even in the midst of these surges of
  passion I was conscious of the birth of a new force I did not understand;
  and which I resented; that had arisen to give battle to my passions and
  desires。  This struggle was not mentally reflected as a debate between
  right and wrong; as to whether I should or should not be justified in
  taking Nancy if I could get her: it seemed as though some new and small
  yet dogged intruder had forced an entrance into me; an insignificant
  pigmy who did not hesitate to bar the pathway of the reviving giant of my
  desires。  These contests sapped my strength。  It seemed as though in my
  isolation I loved Nancy; I missed her more than ever; and the flavour she
  gave to life。
  Then Hermann Krebs began to press himself on me。  I use the word as
  expressive of those early resentful feelings;I rather pictured him then
  as the personification of an hostile element in the universe that had
  brought about my miseries and accomplished my downfall; I attributed the
  disagreeable thwarting of my impulses to his agency; I did not wish to
  think of him; for he stood somehow for a vague future I feared to
  contemplate。  Yet the illusion of his presence; once begun; continued to
  grow upon me; and I find myself utterly unable to describe that struggle
  in which he seemed to be fighting as against myself for my confidence;
  that process whereby he gradually grew as real to me as though he still
  liveduntil I could almost hear his voice and see his smile。  At moments
  I resisted wildly; as though my survival depended on it; at other moments
  he seemed to bring me peace。  One day I recalled as vividly as though it
  were taking place again that last time I had been with him; I seemed once
  more to be listening to the calm yet earnest talk ranging over so many
  topics; politics and government; economics and science and religion。  I
  did not yet grasp the synthesis he had made of them all; but I saw them
  now all focussed in him elements he had drawn from human lives and human
  experiences。  I think it was then I first felt the quickenings of a new
  life to be born in travail and pain。。。。  Wearied; yet exalted; I sank
  down on a stone bench and gazed out at the little island of Santa Cruz
  afloat on the shimmering sea。
  I have mentioned my inability to depict the terrible struggle that went
  on in my soul。  It seems strange that Nietzschethat most ruthless of
  philosophers to the romantic mind!should express it for me。  〃The
  genius of the heart; from contact with which every man goes away richer;
  not 'blessed' and overcome;。。。。but richer himself; fresher to himself
  than before; opened up; breathed upon and sounded by a thawing wind; more
  uncertain; perhaps; more delicate; more bruised; but full of hopes which
  as yet lack names; full of a new will and striving; full of a new
  unwillingness and counterstriving。〃。。。。
  Such was my experience with Hermann Krebs。  How keenly I remember that
  new unwillingness and counter…striving!  In spite of the years it has not
  wholly died down; even to…day。。。。
  Almost coincident with these quickenings of which I have spoken was the
  consciousness of a hunger stronger than the craving for bread and meat;
  and I began to meditate on my ignorance; on the utter inadequacy and
  insufficiency of my early education; on my neglect of the new learning
  during the years that had passed since I left Harvard。  And I remembered
  Krebs's wordsthat we must 〃reeducate ourselves。〃  What did I know?  A
  system of law; inherited from another social order; that was utterly
  unable to cope with the complexities and miseries and injustices of a
  modern industrial world。  I had spent my days in mastering an inadequate
  and archaic codewhy? in order that I might learn how to evade it?  This
  in itself condemned it。  What did I know of