L
Platonic Love
“But is this Zaide an unique? Mirzoza is no ways inferior to her in charms, and I have a thousand proofs of her affection. I desire to be loved, I am, and who has told me that Zuleiman is more so than I? I was a fool to envy another’s happiness. No, there is no man under the heavens happier than Mangogul.” Thus began the remonstrances, which the Sultan made to himself. The author has surpressed the rest, and contents himself with apprizing us, that the prince paid more regard to them, than to those which his ministers presented him with, and that Zaide never after returned on his mind.
One of those evenings, that he was entirely satisfied with his mistress or with himself, he proposed sending for Selim, to walk in the groves of the Seraglio. These were verdant closets, where many things may be said and done without witnesses. In their way thither, Mangogul turn’d the conversation on the reasons people have for loving. Mirzoza, mounted on grand principles, and fill’d with ideas of virtue, which certainly did not suit with her rank, person, or age, maintain’d that people very frequently loved for the sake of loving; and that connections begun by a likeness of characters, supported by esteem, and cemented by mutual confidence, were very lasting and constant; without any pretensions to favors on the man’s side, or on the woman’s any temptation to grant them.
“Thus it is, Madam,” replied the Sultan, “that you have been spoil’d by romances. In them you have seen heroes respectuous, and princesses virtuous even to folly; without reflecting that those Beings never existed but in the brains of authors. If you ask Selim, who thoroughly well knows the catechism of Cythera, ‘what is love?’ I would lay a wager that he would answer you, that love, is nothing else but—”
“Would you lay a wager,” interrupted the Sultana, “that delicacy of sentiments is but a chimaera, and that without hopes of enjoyment, there would not be a grain of love in the world? If so, you must certainly entertain a very bad opinion of the human heart.”
“So I do,” replied Mangogul, “our virtues are not more disinterested than our vices. The brave pursues glory by exposing himself to dangers; the coward loves tranquility and life; and the lover desires enjoyment.”
Selim declaring himself of the Sultan’s party, added, that if two things happened, love would be banished from society, never more to make its appearance again.
“And which are those two things?” says the favorite.
“They are,” replied Mangogul, “if you and I, madam, and all the race of mankind, chanced to lose what Tanzai and Neadarne found in a dream.”
“What! You believe,” interrupted Mirzoza, “that without those pitiful things, there would be neither esteem nor confidence between two persons of different sexes? A woman adorn’d with talents, wit and beauty, would not touch? A man bless’d with an amiable person, a fine genius, and excellent character, would not be heeded?”
“No, madam,” replies Mangogul; “for pray tell me what he would say?”
“A number of pretty things, which I think would always afford much pleasure to hear,” answers the favorite.
“Observe, madam,” says Selim, “that those things are said every day without love. No, no, madam, I have complete proofs, that without a well organised body, there is no love. Agenor, the handsomest young man of Congo, and the most refined wit of the court, would, if I had been a woman, in vain show me his genteel leg, turn his large blue eyes on me, squander on me the most artful praise, and set himself off with every other advantage of which he is master; I would say but one word, and if he did not give an express answer to this word, I might have all possible esteem for him, but I should not love him.”
“That is positive,” added the Sultan, “and you yourself will allow the justness and utility of this mysterious word, when one loves. You ought indeed, for your instruction, to cause the conversation of a wit of Banza with a schoolmaster to be related to you. You could comprehend in an instant, how the wit, who sustained your thesis, confessed in the end that he was in the wrong, and that his antagonist reasoned like a Toy. But Selim, of whom I had it, will you tell the story.”
The favorite imagined, that a story, which Mangogul would not relate to her, must be very mortifying: and therefore she went into one of the arbors, without asking it of Selim, and happy it was for him; for with all his wit, he would have ill satisfied the favorite’s curiosity, or much alarm’d her modesty. But in order to amuse her, and make her forget the story of the schoolmaster, he related the following.
“Madam,” says the courtier, “in a vast country near the sources of the Nile, lived a young man, beautiful as Adonis. Before he was eighteen years of age, all the maidens contended for his heart, and there were few women, who would not accept of him for their lover. Born with an amorous heart, he loved as soon as he was in a condition to love.
“On a certain day, while he was in the temple assisting at the public worship of the great Pagoda; and was, according to the usual ceremony, preparing to make the seventeen genuflections prescribed by the law; the beauty, with which he was captivated, chanced to pass by, and darted a glance on him accompany’d with a smile, which threw him into such distraction, that he lost his poise, fell on his nose, scandalized the congregation by his fall, forgot the number of genuflections, and performed but sixteen.
“The great Pagoda irritated at the offence and scandal, punished him cruelly. Hilas, for that was his name, the poor Hilas felt himself instantly inflamed with the most violent desires, and smack-smooth as the palm of his hand, deprived of the means of gratifying them. Equally surprised and grieved at so great a loss, he consulted the Pagoda. ‘Thou shalt never be restored to thy pristine state,’ answered she sneezing, ‘but between the arms of a woman, who shall not love thee the less for knowing thy misfortune.’
“Presumption is generally the companion of youth and beauty. Hilas fancied that his wit and the comeliness of his person would soon gain him a heart of nice sentiments; who content with what he had remaining, would love him for himself, and soon restore to him what he had lost. He first addrest himself to the lady, who had been the innocent cause of his misfortune. She was young, brisk, voluptuous and a coquet. Hilas adored her, and obtained a meeting; where by a train of allurements he was drawn into the road leading to a place which it was impossible for him to reach. In vain did he torment himself, and in the arms of his mistress seek the accomplishment of the oracle: nothing appeared. When the lady was tired of waiting, she set herself to rights in a moment, and quitted him. The worst of the affair was, that the foolish girl told it in confidence to one of her female friends, who, out of her great discretion, related it but to three or four of hers, who did the same to as many others: so that Hilas, two days before the darling of all the sex, was despised, pointed at, and looked on as a monster.
“The wretched Hilas, cried down in his native country, resolved to travel, and seek a remedy for his disease in remote climes. He set out alone, and arrived incognito at the court of the Abyssinian emperor. The young stranger was singled out by the ladies, and the contest was, who should have him: but Hilas prudently avoided all engagements, in which he had apprehensions of not finding his account, proportionable to his certainty that the women who pursued him would not find theirs in him. But observe and admire the penetration of the sex: ‘a man so young, so comely, and so modest,’ said they, ‘is quite a prodigy:’ and the union of these qualities in him had almost made them suspect his real defect; so as, for fear of allowing him what an accomplished man should have, to refuse him the very thing which he wanted.
“After having for some time studied the chart of the country, Hilas linked an acquaintance with a young woman, who, by some unknown caprice, had passed from refined gallantry to the highest devotion. He gradually insinuated himself into her confidence, espoused her notions, copied her practices, handed her in and out of the temples, and conversed with her so frequently on the vanity of worldly pleasures, that he insensibly revived her taste, as well as remembrance of them. They had now, for above a month, frequented the mosques, assisted at sermons, and visited the sick together, when he prepared himself for a thorough cure; but all in vain. His devote friend, though intimately acquainted with all the transactions of heaven, knew as well as others, how a man should be made on earth: and the poor lad lost in a moment all the fruits of his good works. If anything consoled him, it was, that his secret was inviolably kept. One word would have rendered his disease incurable; but this word was not uttered, and Hilas linked in with some other pious women, whom he took, one after another, for the specific ordained by the oracle, and who did not break his enchantment, because they loved him only for what he was not. The habit, they had acquired of spiritualizing all objects, was of no service to him. They required sense, but it was of that sort which springs from pleasure. Hilas complained that they did not love him. But their answer was, ‘pray, sir, are you ignorant, that people should know each other, before they love; nay, you must acknowledge, that, disgraced as you are, you are not lovely even when you are known.’
“ ‘Alas!’ said he retiring, ‘this pure love, so much talked of, is nowhere to be found; this delicacy of sentiments, upon which both sexes value themselves, is a mere chimaera. The oracle has deceived me, and my disease is for life.’
“In his way, he met some of those women, who allow no other commerce with man, but that of the heart, and who hate a forward spark like a toad. They so seriously recommended to him to let nothing gross and terrestrial enter into his views, that he conceived great hopes of his cure. He complied heartily, and was quite astonished, after the amorous conversations, which they held with him, that he still remained as he was. ‘I must certainly be cured,’ said he to himself, ‘but perhaps otherwise than by words:’ and he sought an occasion of placing himself according to the intentions of the oracle. Thus it soon offered. A young female platonic, who was excessively fond of walking, led him into a lonesome wood and when they had penetrated far from the reach of any impertinent eye, the fair one was seized with a fainting fit. Hilas threw himself on her, and neglected nothing in his power to relieve her; but all his endeavours were fruitless: of which she soon became as sensible as himself.
“ ‘Ah! Sir,’ cried she, disengaging herself from his arms, ‘what sort of man are you? I shall be very cautious of ever venturing thus into lonesome places, where I have been taken so ill, and may die a hundred times for want of help.’
“Others knew his condition, pitied him, protested to him, that the tenderness they had conceived for him, should not change; and never saw him more.
“The miserable Hilas, with his graceful figure, and the most refined sentiments, gave great dissatisfaction to many ladies.”
“Then he was a fool,” interrupted the Sultan. “Why did he not address some of the vestals, of which our monasteries are full? They would be charmed with him, and he would infallibly receive his cure through a grate.”
“Prince,” replied Selim, “chronicles assure us, that he tried that method, and found by experience, that the sex of all conditions do not care to love to their certain loss.”
“If that be the case,” said the Sultan, “I take his distemper to be incurable.”
“So did he himself as well as your highness,” continued Selim; “and tired out with unsuccessful trials, he plunged himself into solitude, on the word of an infinite number of women, who had expresly declared to him, that he was useless in society.
“He had already been several days rambling in a desert, when he heard some sighs issuing from a lonely place. He listened, the sighs began again, he drew near, and saw a young maiden, fair as the morn, her head leaning on her hand, her eyes bathed in tears, and the rest of her body in a pensive and mournful posture.
“ ‘What seek you here, madam?’ said he to her. ‘And are these deserts made for you?’
“ ‘Yes,’ replied she in a melancholy strain: ‘I can at least afflict myself here quite at my ease.’
“ ‘And what is the cause of your affliction?’
“ ‘Alas!’
“ ‘Speak, madam, what is the cause?’
“ ‘Nothing.’
“ ‘How, nothing?’
“ ‘No, nothing at all, I say, is the cause of my grief: two years ago I had the misfortune to offend a Pagoda, who deprived me of my all: and it was so small a matter, that in so doing, she gave no great proof of her power. Since that time, all the men shun me, and will shun me, said the Pagoda, until I meet with one, who knowing my misfortune, will cleave to me, and love me in the state, in which I am.’
“ ‘What do I hear!’ cried Hilas. ‘This wretch, whom you behold at your feet, has nothing, and that is his distemper likewise. Some time since he had the misfortune to offend a Pagoda, who deprived him of all that he had, and without vanity it was somewhat. From that time all the women shun him, and will shun him, said the Pagoda, until he meets with one, who, knowing his misfortune, will cleave to him, and love him in the state, in which he is.’
“ ‘Is this possible?’ says the young maiden.
“ ‘Is what you have told me true?’ says Hilas.
“ ‘See,’ answered the maiden.
“ ‘See,’ answered Hilas.
“They both convinced each other beyond all doubt, that they were two objects of the celestial wrath. Their common misfortune united them. Iphis, this was the young maiden’s name, was made for Hilas, Hilas was made for her. They loved each other in a platonic manner, as you may easily imagine; for they could not well love otherwise: but in an instant the enchantment was broken, they uttered cries of joy on the event, and platonic love vanished.
“During several months, that they continued together in the desert, they had full time to be persuaded of their change. When they quitted it, Iphis was perfectly cured; but as to Hilas, the author says that he was threatened with a relapse.”