Читать книгу Ariel (A Shelley Romance) - Andre Maurois - Страница 8

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About a month after these unfortunate holidays, Messrs. Munday & Slatter, the Oxford booksellers to whom Timothy Shelley had recommended the literary freaks of his son, saw that young man burst into their shop, his hair flying, his shirt-collar wide open, and a fat parcel of pamphlets under his arm. He wished these to be sold at sixpence each, and to be displayed conspicuously in the shop-window. To be sure of this being well done, he set about doing it himself.

The booksellers watched him at work with the amused and fatherly benevolence which Oxford tradesmen show to Oxford freshmen who have plenty of money. Had they looked closer they would have been horrified at the explosive matter with which their young customer strewed their counters and windows.

The title of the pamphlet, The Necessity of Atheism, was the most scandalous imaginable in a mealy-mouthed, theological city like Oxford. It was signed by the unknown name of “Jeremiah Stukeley,” and had Messrs. Munday & Slatter turned over its pages they would have been more horrified still by the insolent logic of the imaginary Stukeley.

“A close examination of the validity of the proofs adduced to support any proposition, has ever been allowed to be the only sure way of attaining truth, upon the advantages of which it is unnecessary to descant.”

It was with this bold axiom that the pamphlet began, and written in the form of a geometrical theorem it proceeded to prove the impossibility of the existence of God. It ended triumphantly with the three letters Q.E.D., quod erat demonstrandum.

To Shelley who knew nothing of mathematics, this formula had always seemed like a magician’s spell for the evocation of Truth. Although he had an ardent belief in a Spirit of universal Goodness, the creator and director of all things; although he professed the personal theology of an anglican “Vicaire Savoyard”; the word “Atheist” pleased him because of its vigour. He loved to fling it in the face of Bigotry. He picked up the epithet with which he had already been pelted at Eton, as a Knight Errant picks up a glove. To the physical and moral courage of his race, he added intellectual courage, thus affronting great dangers and an inevitable scandal.

The Necessity of Atheism had been published just twenty minutes, when the Rev. John Walker, a Fellow of New College, a man of a sinister and inquisitorial turn of mind, passed the shop-window and looked in.

The Necessity of Atheism! ... Astounded and outraged, the Rev. John strode into the shop, calling out in stentorian tones, “Mr. Munday! Mr. Slatter! What is the meaning of this?”

“Really, sir, we know nothing about it. We have not personally examined the pamphlet....”

“The Necessity of Atheism! ... But the title in itself is sufficient to inform you.”

“Quite so, sir. Quite so. And now that our attention has been called to it ...”

“Now that your attention, gentlemen, has been called to it, you will have the goodness to withdraw immediately every copy from your window, and to carry them, as well as any other copies you may possess, into your kitchen and throw them all into the fire.”

Mr. Walker had not, of course, the smallest right to give any such order, but the booksellers knew that he had only to complain to the University authorities, and they would see their shop put out of bounds. So they obeyed with obsequious smiles, and sent one of their clerks to beg young Mr. Shelley to step round for a few minutes’ conversation with them.

“We are very sorry, Mr. Shelley, very sorry indeed, but really we couldn’t help ourselves. Mr. Walker insisted on it, and in your own interest ...”

But his “own interest” was the last thing Shelley ever thought of. In his piercing, urgent voice, he asserted to the much-worried booksellers his right to think as he pleased, and to communicate his thoughts to the world.

“And,” he told them triumphantly, “I have done worse than spread my net in the sight of callow Oxford birds. I have sent a copy of The Necessity of Atheism to every bishop on the Bench, to the Chancellor of the University, and to every college Master, Warden, and Dean, with the compliments of ‘Jeremiah Stukeley’ in my own handwriting!”

⁂

A few days later a porter appeared in Hogg’s rooms with the Dean’s compliments to Mr. Shelley, and would he go down to him immediately. He went down to the Common Room where he found the Master and several of the Fellows; a little group of learned puritans, all classical and muscular Christians who had always abhorred Shelley because of his long hair, his eccentricities of dress, and his really low taste for experimental science.

The Dean showed him a copy of The Necessity of Atheism, and asked him if he were the author. As he spoke in a rude, abrupt, and insolent voice, Shelley did not reply.

“Are you, yes or no, the author of this pamphlet?”

“If you can prove that it is by me, produce your evidence. It is neither just nor lawful to interrogate me in this fashion. Such proceedings would become a court of inquisitors, but not free men in a free country.”

“Do you choose to deny that this is your composition?”

“I refuse to reply.”

“Then you are expelled, and I desire that you will quit the college to-morrow morning at the very latest.”

An envelope sealed with the college seal was immediately handed to him by one of the Fellows. It contained the sentence of expulsion.

Shelley dashed back to Hogg’s rooms, flung himself down on the sofa, and trembling with rage repeated “Expelled! ... Expelled!”

The punishment was terrible. It put a stop to his studies; made it impossible for him to enter any other university; deprived him of the peaceful life he so much enjoyed; and drew down on his head his father’s grotesque and inextinguishable anger.

Hogg was as indignant as his friend, and carried away by a youthful generosity, instantly addressed a note to the Master and Fellows, expressing his grief and astonishment that such treatment could have been meted out to such a man as Shelley. He trusted that the sentence was not final.

The note was dispatched. The Conclave was still sitting. In a moment the porter returned with “the Dean’s compliments to Mr. Hogg and would he go down at once.”

The audience was brief.

“Did you write this?”

It was the letter he had just written and he acknowledged it.

“And this?” putting into Hogg’s hand the pamphlet on Atheism.

With a wealth of arguments and the subtleties of a K.C., Hogg pointed out the absurdity of the question, and the injustice of punishing Shelley for having refused to answer it, the obligation lying on every man conscious of his rights....

“That’s enough!” shouted the Master in a furious voice. “You’re expelled too!” ... He seemed in a mood to have expelled every man in the college. Hogg was handed the sealed envelope in his turn.

In the course of the day a large official paper was affixed to the door of hall. It was signed by the Master and Dean, bore the college seal, and declared that Thomas Jefferson Hogg and Percy Bysshe Shelley were publicly expelled for refusing to answer certain questions put to them.