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a mortal antipathy-第40章

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should have grown to mature manhood。



How shall I describe the conflicts of those dreamy; bewildering;

dreadful years?  Visions of loveliness haunted me sleeping and

waking。  Sometimes a graceful girlish figure would so draw my eyes

towards it that I lost sight of all else; and was ready to forget all

my fears and find myself at her side; like other youths by the side

of young maidens;happy in their cheerful companionship; while I;

I; under the curse of one blighting moment; looked on; hopeless。

Sometimes the glimpse of a fair face or the tone of a sweet voice

stirred within me all the instincts that make the morning of life

beautiful to adolescence。  I reasoned with myself:



Why should I not have outgrown that idle apprehension which had been

the nightmare of my earlier years?  Why should not the rising tide of

life have drowned out the feeble growths that infested the shallows

of childhood?  How many children there are who tremble at being left

alone in the dark; but who; a few years later; will smile at their

foolish terrors and brave all the ghosts of a haunted chamber!  Why

should I any longer be the slave of a foolish fancy that has grown

into a half insane habit of mind?  I was familiarly acquainted with

all the stories of the strange antipathies and invincible repugnances

to which others; some of them famous men; had been subject。  I said

to myself; Why should not I overcome this dread of woman as Peter the

Great fought down his dread of wheels rolling over a bridge?  Was I;

alone of all mankind; to be doomed to perpetual exclusion from the

society which; as it seemed to me; was all that rendered existence

worth the trouble and fatigue of slavery to the vulgar need of

supplying the waste of the system and working at the task of

respiration like the daughters of Danaus;toiling day and night as

the worn…out sailor labors at the pump of his sinking vessel?



Why did I not brave the risk of meeting squarely; and without regard

to any possible danger; some one of those fair maidens whose far…off

smile; whose graceful movements; at once attracted and agitated me?

I can only answer this question to the satisfaction of any really

inquiring reader by giving him the true interpretation of the

singular phenomenon of which I was the subject。  For this I shall

have to refer to a paper of which I have made a copy; and which will

be found included with this manuscript。  It is enough to say here;

without entering into the explanation of the fact; which will be

found simple enough as seen by the light of modern physiological

science; that the 〃nervous disturbance〃 which the presence of a woman

in the flower of her age produced in my system was a sense of

impending death; sudden; overwhelming; unconquerable; appalling。  It

was a reversed action of the nervous centres;the opposite of that

which flushes the young lover's cheek and hurries his bounding pulses

as he comes into the presence of the object of his passion。  No one

who has ever felt the sensation can have failed to recognize it as an

imperative summons; which commands instant and terrified submission。



It was at this period of my life that my father determined to try the

effect of travel and residence in different localities upon my bodily

and mental condition。  I say bodily as well as mental; for I was too

slender for my height and subject to some nervous symptoms which were

a cause of anxiety。  That the mind was largely concerned in these

there was no doubt; but the mutual interactions of mind and body are

often too complex to admit of satisfactory analysis。  Each is in part

cause and each also in part effect。



We passed some years in Italy; chiefly in Rome; where I was placed in

a school conducted by priests; and where of course I met only those

of my own sex。  There I had the opportunity of seeing the influences

under which certain young Catholics; destined for the priesthood; are

led to separate themselves from all communion with the sex associated

in their minds with the most subtle dangers to which the human soul

can be exposed。  I became in some degree reconciled to the thought of

exclusion from the society of women by seeing around me so many who

were self…devoted to celibacy。  The thought sometimes occurred to me

whether I should not find the best and the only natural solution of

the problem of existence; as submitted to myself; in taking upon me

the vows which settle the whole question and raise an impassable

barrier between the devotee and the object of his dangerous

attraction。



How often I talked this whole matter over with the young priest who

was at once my special instructor and my favorite companion!  But

accustomed as I had become to the forms of the Roman Church; and

impressed as I was with the purity and excellence of many of its

young members with whom I was acquainted; my early training rendered

it impossible for me to accept the credentials which it offered me as

authoritative。  My friend and instructor had to set me down as a case

of 〃invincible ignorance。〃  This was the loop…hole through which he

crept out of the prison…house of his creed; and was enabled to look

upon me without the feeling of absolute despair with which his

sterner brethren would; I fear; have regarded me。



I have said that accident exposed me at times to the influence which

I had such reasons for dreading。  Here is one example of such an

occurrence; which I relate as simply as possible; vividly as it is

impressed upon my memory。  A young friend whose acquaintance I had

made in Rome asked me one day to come to his rooms and look at a

cabinet of gems and medals which he had collected。  I had been but a

short time in his library when a vague sense of uneasiness came over

me。  My heart became restless;I could feel it stirring irregularly;

as if it were some frightened creature caged in my breast。  There was

nothing that I could see to account for it。  A door was partly open;

but not so that I could see into the next room。  The feeling grew

upon me of some influence which was paralyzing my circulation。  I

begged my friend to open a window。  As be did so; the door swung in

the draught; and I saw a blooming young woman;it was my friend's

sister; who had been sitting with a book in her hand; and who rose at

the opening of the door。  Something had warned me of the presence of

a woman; that occult and potent aura of individuality; call it

personal magnetism; spiritual effluence; or reduce it to a simpler

expression if you will; whatever it was; it had warned me of the

nearness of the dread attraction which allured at a distance and

revealed itself with all the terrors of the Lorelei if approached too

recklessly。  A sign from her brother caused her to withdraw at once;

but not before I had felt the impression which betrayed itself in my

change of color; anxiety about the region of the heart; and sudden

failure as if about to fall in a deadly fainting…fit。



Does all this seem strange and incredible to the reader of my

manuscript?  Nothing in the history of life is so strange or

exceptional as it seems to those who have not made a long study of

its mysteries。  I have never known just such a case as my own; and

yet there must have been such; and if the whole history of mankind

were unfolded I cannot doubt that there have been many like it。  Let

my reader suspend his judgment until he has read the paper I have

referred to; which was drawn up by a Committee of the Royal Academy

of the Biological Sciences。  In this paper the mechanism of the

series of nervous derangements to which I have been subject since the

fatal shock experienced in my infancy is explained in language not

hard to understand。  It will be seen that such a change of polarity

in the nervous centres is only a permanent form and an extreme degree

of an emotional disturbance; which as a temporary and comparatively

unimportant personal accident is far from being uncommon;is so

frequent; in fact; that every one must have known instances of it;

and not a few must have had more or less serious experiences of it in

their own private history。



It must not be supposed that my imagination dealt with me as I am now

dealing with the reader。  I was full of strange fancies and wild

superstitions。  One of my Catholic friends gave me a silver medal

which had been blessed by the Pope; and which I was to wear next my

body。  I was told that this would turn black after a time; in virtue

of a power which it possessed of drawing out original sin; or certain

portions of it; together with the evil and morbid tendencies which

had been engrafted on the corrupt nature。  I wore the medal

faithfully; as directed; and watched it carefully。  It became

tarnished and after a time darkened; but it wrought no change in my

unnatural condition。



There was an old gypsy who had the reputation of knowing more of

futurity than she had any right to know。  The s
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