The Inferno, August Strindberg [classic english novels TXT] 📗

Ah! what a game the gods play with us poor mortals! And therefore, in the most tormented moments of life, we too can laugh with self-conscious raillery.

How is it that you wish us to take earnestly what is nothing but a huge bad joke?

For whom was Christ the Saviour? Consider the most Christian of all Christians, our pious Scandinavians, these anaemic, wretched, timid creatures, who look as though they were possessed. They seem to carry an evil spirit in their hearts, and observe how most of their leaders have ended in prison as criminals. Why has their master delivered them over to the enemy? Is religion a punishment, and Christ an Avenger?

The sun shines, everyday life proceeds on its usual course, the cheerful bustle of business raises the spirits. Then one feels rebellious, and challenges heaven with doubts. But when night, silence, and loneliness reign, the heart beats, and the breast suffers from constriction. Then one jumps out of window into a hedge of thorns, and humbly begs a physician for help, and seeks someone to share the sleeping chamber.

Go again into your room, and you will find someone is there; he is invisible, but you feel his presence. Then go to the asylum, and ask the doctor; he will talk to you about neurasthenia, paranoia, angina pectoris, and stories of that kind, but will never heal you. Whither, then, will you go, all ye who, sleepless, wander through street after street, waiting for the dawn? “The mills of the universe,” “The mills of God,” are two expressions in common use. Have you had that roaring in your ears which is like the noise of a waterwheel? Have you in the solitude of night or in broad daylight observed how memories of the past stir and arise, singly or in groups? Memories of all your faults, crimes, and follies which make your ears tingle, your brows perspire, your spine shudder? You relive your life from your birth to the present day, you suffer over again all the sorrows you have endured; you empty again all the cups which you have drunk to the dregs so often; you crucify your skeleton when there is no more flesh left to crucify; you consume your soul when your heart is reduced to ashes!

You know all that?

Those are the “mills of God” which grind slowly but exceeding small. You are ground to powder, and think it is over. But no! You are brought again to the mill. Be thankful! That is hell upon earth, as Luther knew it, and reckoned it a special grace to be pulverised on this side of the grave.

Think yourself happy and be thankful!

What is one to do then? Humble oneself?

If you humble yourself before men, you will arouse their pride, for all will think themselves, no matter how guilty they may be, better than you.

Well, then, is one to humble oneself before God? But is it not disgraceful to degrade the Highest by conceiving of Him as the overseer of a slave plantation?

Shall we pray? What! Presume to try to alter the will and decision of the Eternal by flattery and crawling? I look for God and find the Devil! That is my destiny! I have repented and reformed myself.

I renounce alcohol, and come about nine o’clock soberly home to drink milk. The room is filled with all kinds of demons, who drag me out of bed and try to stifle me under the blankets. But if I come home at midnight intoxicated, I sleep like an angel and wake up strong as a young god, and ready to work like a galley-slave.

I live a chaste life, and am troubled by unwholesome dreams. I accustom myself to think only good of my friends, entrust my secrets and my money to them, and am betrayed. If I show offence at such treachery, it is always I who am punished.

I try to love mankind in the mass; I shut my eyes to their faults, and with inexhaustible patience endure their meanesses and slanders, and one fine day I find myself a sharer of their crimes. Whenever I withdraw from society which I consider injurious, the demons of solitude attack me, and when I look for better friends, I come on the track of the worst. Yes, after I have conquered my evil inclinations and through loneliness have attained to a certain degree of inward peace, I am caught in the snare of self-satisfaction and despising my neighbour. And self-conceit is the deadliest of sins, which is instantly punished.

How is one to explain the fact that every step of progress in virtue gives rise to a fresh sin?

Swedenborg solves the puzzle by declaring that sins are punishments inflicted on men in requital for sins of the more heinous class. Thus those who are greedy of power are condemned to the hell of the Sodomites. Supposing this theory to be true, we must endure the burden of our wickedness and rejoice at the pangs of conscience which accompany it, as at the payment of fees at a tollgate. To seek virtue, accordingly, resembles an attempt to escape from prison and its punishments. That is what Luther asserts in article xxix against the Romish bull, when he declares that “souls in purgatory sin continually, because they seek for peace, and try to avoid torments.” Similarly, in article xxxiv, he says, “To fight with the Turks is equivalent to rebellion against God, whose instrument the Turks are, in order to punish our sins.” It is therefore obvious “that all our good works are deadly sins,” and that “the world must become guilty before God, and learn that no one is justified except through grace.”

Let us therefore suffer without hoping for any real joy in life, for, my brothers, we are in hell. And do not let us accuse the Lord, when we see our little innocent children suffer. No one knows why, but divine justice