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read here what Jonathan have written:-- |
"That other of his race who, in a later age, again and again, brought |
his forces over The Great River into Turkey Land; who, when he was |
beaten back, came again, and again, and again, though he had to come |
alone from the bloody field where his troops were being slaughtered, |
since he knew that he alone could ultimately triumph." |
"What does this tell us? Not much? no! The Count's child-thought see |
nothing; therefore he speak so free. Your man-thought see nothing; my |
man-thought see nothing, till just now. No! But there comes another word |
from some one who speak without thought because she, too, know not what |
it mean--what it _might_ mean. Just as there are elements which rest, |
yet when in nature's course they move on their way and they touch--then |
pouf! and there comes a flash of light, heaven wide, that blind and kill |
and destroy some; but that show up all earth below for leagues and |
leagues. Is it not so? Well, I shall explain. To begin, have you ever |
study the philosophy of crime? 'Yes' and 'No.' You, John, yes; for it is |
a study of insanity. You, no, Madam Mina; for crime touch you not--not |
but once. Still, your mind works true, and argues not _a particulari ad |
universale_. There is this peculiarity in criminals. It is so constant, |
in all countries and at all times, that even police, who know not much |
from philosophy, come to know it empirically, that _it is_. That is to |
be empiric. The criminal always work at one crime--that is the true |
criminal who seems predestinate to crime, and who will of none other. |
This criminal has not full man-brain. He is clever and cunning and |
resourceful; but he be not of man-stature as to brain. He be of |
child-brain in much. Now this criminal of ours is predestinate to crime |
also; he, too, have child-brain, and it is of the child to do what he |
have done. The little bird, the little fish, the little animal learn not |
by principle, but empirically; and when he learn to do, then there is to |
him the ground to start from to do more. '_Dos pou sto_,' said |
Archimedes. 'Give me a fulcrum, and I shall move the world!' To do once, |
is the fulcrum whereby child-brain become man-brain; and until he have |
the purpose to do more, he continue to do the same again every time, |
just as he have done before! Oh, my dear, I see that your eyes are |
opened, and that to you the lightning flash show all the leagues," for |
Mrs. Harker began to clap her hands and her eyes sparkled. He went on:-- |
"Now you shall speak. Tell us two dry men of science what you see with |
those so bright eyes." He took her hand and held it whilst she spoke. |
His finger and thumb closed on her pulse, as I thought instinctively and |
unconsciously, as she spoke:-- |
"The Count is a criminal and of criminal type. Nordau and Lombroso would |
so classify him, and _quâ_ criminal he is of imperfectly formed mind. |
Thus, in a difficulty he has to seek resource in habit. His past is a |
clue, and the one page of it that we know--and that from his own |
lips--tells that once before, when in what Mr. Morris would call a |
'tight place,' he went back to his own country from the land he had |
tried to invade, and thence, without losing purpose, prepared himself |
for a new effort. He came again better equipped for his work; and won. |
So he came to London to invade a new land. He was beaten, and when all |
hope of success was lost, and his existence in danger, he fled back over |
the sea to his home; just as formerly he had fled back over the Danube |
from Turkey Land." |
"Good, good! oh, you so clever lady!" said Van Helsing, |
enthusiastically, as he stooped and kissed her hand. A moment later he |
said to me, as calmly as though we had been having a sick-room |
consultation:-- |
"Seventy-two only; and in all this excitement. I have hope." Turning to |
her again, he said with keen expectation:-- |
"But go on. Go on! there is more to tell if you will. Be not afraid; |
John and I know. I do in any case, and shall tell you if you are right. |
Speak, without fear!" |
"I will try to; but you will forgive me if I seem egotistical." |
"Nay! fear not, you must be egotist, for it is of you that we think." |
"Then, as he is criminal he is selfish; and as his intellect is small |
and his action is based on selfishness, he confines himself to one |
purpose. That purpose is remorseless. As he fled back over the Danube, |
leaving his forces to be cut to pieces, so now he is intent on being |
safe, careless of all. So his own selfishness frees my soul somewhat |
from the terrible power which he acquired over me on that dreadful |
night. I felt it! Oh, I felt it! Thank God, for His great mercy! My soul |
is freer than it has been since that awful hour; and all that haunts me |
is a fear lest in some trance or dream he may have used my knowledge for |
his ends." The Professor stood up:-- |
"He has so used your mind; and by it he has left us here in Varna, |
whilst the ship that carried him rushed through enveloping fog up to |
Galatz, where, doubtless, he had made preparation for escaping from us. |
But his child-mind only saw so far; and it may be that, as ever is in |
God's Providence, the very thing that the evil-doer most reckoned on for |
his selfish good, turns out to be his chiefest harm. The hunter is taken |
in his own snare, as the great Psalmist says. For now that he think he |
is free from every trace of us all, and that he has escaped us with so |
many hours to him, then his selfish child-brain will whisper him to |
sleep. He think, too, that as he cut himself off from knowing your mind, |
there can be no knowledge of him to you; there is where he fail! That |
terrible baptism of blood which he give you makes you free to go to him |
in spirit, as you have as yet done in your times of freedom, when the |
sun rise and set. At such times you go by my volition and not by his; |
and this power to good of you and others, as you have won from your |
suffering at his hands. This is now all the more precious that he know |
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