67:—
Ahasuerus, rise!
‘Ahasuerus the Jew crept forth from the dark cave of Mount Carmel. Near
two thousand years have elapsed since he was first goaded by
never-ending restlessness to rove the globe from pole to pole. When our
Lord was wearied with the burthen of His ponderous cross, and wanted to
rest before the door of Ahasuerus, the unfeeling wretch drove Him away
with brutality. The Saviour of mankind staggered, sinking under the
heavy load, but uttered no complaint. An angel of death appeared before
Ahasuerus, and exclaimed indignantly, “Barbarian! thou hast denied rest
to the Son of man: be it denied thee also, until He comes to judge the
world.”
‘A black demon, let loose from hell upon Ahasuerus, goads him now from
country to country; he is denied the consolation which death affords,
and precluded from the rest of the peaceful grave.
‘Ahasuerus crept forth from the dark cave of Mount Carmel—he shook the
dust from his beard—and taking up one of the skulls heaped there,
hurled it down the eminence: it rebounded from the earth in shivered
atoms. “This was my father!” roared Ahasuerus. Seven more skulls rolled
down from rock to rock; while the infuriate Jew, following them with
ghastly looks, exclaimed—“And these were my wives!” He still continued
to hurl down skull after skull, roaring in dreadful accents—“And these,
and these, and these were my children! They COULD DIE; but I! reprobate
wretch! alas! I cannot die! Dreadful beyond conception is the judgement
that hangs over me. Jerusalem fell—I crushed the sucking babe, and
precipitated myself into the destructive flames. I cursed the
Romans—but, alas! alas! the restless curse held me by the hair,—and I
could not die!
‘“Rome the giantess fell—I placed myself before the falling statue—she
fell and did not crush me. Nations sprang up and disappeared before
me;—but I remained and did not die. From cloud-encircled cliffs did I
precipitate myself into the ocean; but the foaming billows cast me upon
the shore, and the burning arrow of existence pierced my cold heart
again. I leaped into Etna’s flaming abyss, and roared with the giants
for ten long months, polluting with my groans the Mount’s sulphureous
mouth—ah! ten long months. The volcano fermented, and in a fiery stream
of lava cast me up. I lay torn by the torture-snakes of hell amid the
glowing cinders, and yet continued to exist.—A forest was on fire: I
darted on wings of fury and despair into the crackling wood. Fire
dropped upon me from the trees, but the flames only singed my limbs;
alas! it could not consume them.—I now mixed with the butchers of
mankind, and plunged in the tempest of the raging battle. I roared
defiance to the infuriate Gaul, defiance to the victorious German; but
arrows and spears rebounded in shivers from my body. The Saracen’s
flaming sword broke upon my skull: balls in vain hissed upon me: the
lightnings of battle glared harmless around my loins: in vain did the
elephant trample on me, in vain the iron hoof of the wrathful steed! The
mine, big with destructive power, burst upon me, and hurled me high in
the air—I fell on heaps of smoking limbs, but was only singed. The
giant’s steel club rebounded from my body; the executioner’s hand could
not strangle me, the tiger’s tooth could not pierce me, nor would the
hungry lion in the circus devour me. I cohabited with poisonous snakes,
and pinched the red crest of the dragon.—The serpent stung, but could
not destroy me. The dragon tormented, but dared not to devour me.—I now
provoked the fury of tyrants: I said to Nero, ‘Thou art a bloodhound!’ I
said to Christiern, ‘Thou art a bloodhound!, I said to Muley Ismail,
‘Thou art a bloodhound!’—The tyrants invented cruel torments, but did
not kill me. Ha! not to be able to die—not to be able to die—not to be
permitted to rest after the toils of life—to be doomed to be imprisoned
for ever in the clay-formed dungeon—to be for ever clogged with this
worthless body, its lead of diseases and infirmities—to be condemned to
[be]hold for millenniums that yawning monster Sameness, and Time, that
hungry hyaena, ever bearing children, and ever devouring again her
offspring!—Ha! not to be permitted to die! Awful Avenger in Heaven,
hast Thou in Thine armoury of wrath a punishment more dreadful? then let
it thunder upon me, command a hurricane to sweep me down to the foot of
Carmel, that I there may lie extended; may pant, and writhe, and die.!”’
This fragment is the translation of part of some German work, whose
title I have vainly endeavoured to discover. I picked it up, dirty and
torn, some years ago, in Lincoln’s-Inn Fields.