Vondel's Lucifer Part 17

It is maintained by several eminent Dutch critics that the "Lucifer" is a political allegory like the "Palamedes" and several other tragedies of Vondel.

Some of these literati have displayed considerable ingenuity in their attempt to prove that it typifies the struggle of the Netherlands against Spain; Orange corresponding to Lucifer, Philip II. to G.o.d, Alva to Michael, the Cardinal Granvelle to Adam.

Many of the situations of the play bear out this a.n.a.logy. Lucifer, like Orange, was the idol of his followers. Both desire to change a hated tyranny to a state of freedom. Both speak grandiloquently of a charter disannulled and of ancient privileges violated.

The simile of the sea das.h.i.+ng in vain against the rock in the battle-scene of the "Lucifer" may be supposed to ill.u.s.trate the device of Orange: "_Saevis tranquillus in undis._" The crescent array of the rebels may refer to the s.h.i.+bboleth of the water-beggars: "Rather Turk than Papist."

The lion and the dragon that draw the chariot of the Archfiend are also blazoned upon the crest of the two provinces, Holland and Zealand, which were the chief supporters of Orange. The medley of seven beasts into which Lucifer, in falling, was changed, may be taken to represent the seven Northern provinces that became the Dutch Republic, while the Southern provinces, which remained loyal to Spain, nearly two-thirds of the whole number, may be typified by the faithful angels.

Lucifer renewed the fight three times; so did Orange. Both pretended to fight "_pro lege, rege, et grege_."

In that age, before successful revolutions had established a precedent, no revolt could hope for success unless by conforming to the maxim "the king can do no wrong"--a cardinal principle in every religion of that day. By this political fiction rebels professed to fight for the king, though really fighting against him. Vondel pictured his revolt after these examples, the most prominent of which was the revolt of his own country against Philip II. Lucifer, however, fell, and Orange triumphed; though the a.s.sa.s.sination of the latter might be taken as equivalent to a fall. Lucifer accomplished the fall of Adam, even as Orange brought about the expulsion of Granvelle. Alva, like Michael, furthermore, received the charge "to burn out with a glow of fire and zeal" the polluting stains of heresy. Egmont and Montigny, like Gabriel and Rafael, acted as amba.s.sadors.

The cause of the jealousy of the Netherlander, as in the "Lucifer," was the fact that greater privileges were accorded to foreigners (the Spaniards) than to the hereditary princes of the land. As in the drama Gabriel's proclamation is followed by protest and rebellion, so in the Netherlands the unjust edicts of Philip were the primary cause of revolt.

It was the sworn duty of the Stadtholder, William of Orange, even as of the Stadtholder Lucifer, to maintain the laws of his superior. Orange also held a position similar to that of Lucifer. He was the favorite of Charles V., Stadtholder of Holland, and Knight of the Golden Fleece.

Each placed himself at the head of the disaffected at their earnest importunity. Each was accused of ambition. Each accomplished his designs by Machiavelian methods, and attained a brief exaltation.

Cardinal Granvelle, who held a position similar to Adam in the drama, was, like him, of low descent; and was honored with greater privileges than even the n.o.bles themselves, who hated him intensely. The opponents of the Cardinal changed the liveries of their servants into motley to mock him; so, also, we hear Lucifer say to his minions:

"Lay off your morning rays and wreaths of light."

The n.o.bles complained of the presence of Spanish troops in the land; so the Luciferians speak of "Adam's life-guard, many thousand strong." The arguments of the drama were also the arguments advanced by the several parties in the Dutch revolt.

The three hierarchies of Heaven in the "Lucifer" correspond to Margaret's three Councils of State. Lucifer, though described as nighest to G.o.d, belonged only to the third rank of the hierarchies; just as Orange, though first among the Dutch n.o.blemen, and next to Philip II., was yet subject to the State as Stadtholder.

Brederode, as the head of the aristocrats who went with supplications to Margaret of Parma, bears a close a.n.a.logy to Belzebub, where the latter says to the Luciferians,

"With prayers ye first and best might gain your end,"

and where, too, he expresses his willingness to act as mediator. In this scheme, furthermore, Apollion would represent Louis of Na.s.sau, and Belial, Marnix St. Aldegonde.

Others see in the drama the career of the great Wallenstein, the ambitious Generalissimo of the Thirty Years' War. In his envy of the son of his emperor, and in his desire to place the crown of Hungary on his own head, an a.n.a.logy is suggested to Lucifer's att.i.tude to Adam. Even as the celestial rebels swore their chief allegiance, so, too, his generals, after the reverse of Pilsen, when his enemies wished to deprive him of his command, swore him faith and fealty.

Vondel, it is a.s.serted, was conscious of this when he dedicated this drama to Ferdinand the Third, Emperor of Austria, who was no other than the intended King of Hungary who had aroused the envy of Wallenstein, and whose succession to the crown had been so much endangered by the latter's treachery.

But there is yet another view of the subject, which has even more show of probability than either of the others. It is supposed by many that the "Lucifer" was intended to represent the English Rebellion of 1648.

Lucifer in this a.n.a.logy is supposed to represent Cromwell, whom Vondel hated so bitterly and against whom he thundered such tremendous invective. Indeed, there are some external circ.u.mstances in support of this theory. Speaking of his lampoons on the great English rebel, the poet says that they were written the same year that he "taught Lucifer his role to play." He also says elsewhere that the "Lucifer" was presented,

"Forsooth, as edifying lore, Wherein proud England hath much store."

If the last supposition be true, the drama is remarkable as prophesying the fall of the Commonwealth, and the Restoration. It would then, moreover, not be uninteresting to compare it with Dryden's "Absalom and Achitophel," in which Oliver Cromwell is also one of the chief characters.

THE INTERPRETATION.

Yet we cannot believe that the "Lucifer" is a political allegory. Vondel was no more the poet of the "Palamedes." Those thirty years had wonderfully developed his art. Nor is it an idyllic allegory like the "Comus;" but, like the "Divina Commedia," an allegory of the world. Yet behind the characters of the sacred legend we may also see the national heroes, Siegfried, Beowulf, Civilis, Orange.

The "Lucifer" represents the gigantic and eternal battle of evil with good, with the universe as the battle-field--a type of the unending conflict in which the good finally conquers. We see here the Oriental imagination curbed by the reason of the Occident--the cold, statuesque Greek form aglow with the blazing Hebrew soul. The flaming Seraph of Christianity, winged with truth and armed with the lightning sword of Jehovah and the blasting thunderbolts of Jupiter, sweeps triumphant through the whole drama. Right prevails; wrong is overthrown.

The "Lucifer" is a theory of existence, a scheme of the universe. It is the revolt of the aspiring ideal against the invincible actual. It is the material against the spiritual; the unknown rendered comprehensible by the symbolism of the known.

"From shadowy types to truth; from flesh to spirit"

--this is the order of its progression.

It is the revolution of the speculative against the rule of dogma; an impa.s.sioned contemplation of life, in which the whole gamut of human feelings is harmoniously sounded; in which every link in the chain of causation is struck into the music of its meaning; in which the past and the future are mirrored in the present.

It is the struggle of a soul against the unchangeable environment of fate; the drama of the collective human soul aspiring from a chaos of unrest to the unattainable peace of absolute truth.

Furthermore, the tragedy typifies the character of the Hollanders themselves; a people who, as Charles V. once remarked, made "the best of subjects, but the worst of slaves;" a nation that has ever been in revolt, not only against man, but even against the sublime forces of nature; a race that has never known defeat.

The Batavians, who under Claudius Civilis carried on a successful rebellion against the all-conquering eagles of Rome--the only Germans who never bowed beneath the Latin yoke--and their Saxon descendants, who were the strongest foes of the territorial aggressions of Charlemagne, were all flamed with the same unconquerable spirit. It was this spirit, too, that enabled the Hollanders of the seventeenth century, after more than eighty years of terrible conflict, to free themselves alike from the grinding oppression of Spain and the still more oppressive coils of religious tyranny.

The Dutch struggle itself was a terrific drama, of which William the Silent was the protagonist, and liberty the one controlling purpose that animated every character, that impelled every action. It was the details, the reasons, the arguments, and the conditions of this stupendous struggle that were before the poet's mind when he wrote this tragedy.

The "Lucifer," though a symbolic sketch of the age which preceded it, is essentially a drama embodying the spirit of the time in which it was created. It is a reflex of the life of that epoch, the embodiment of the soul consciousness of the "storm and stress" period of Vondel's own life. He himself was in perpetual revolt against the universal practices of his age.

Is it a wonder that men, seeing in it not only a picture of themselves, but also of their time, were at once attracted by its significance?

The t.i.tanic imagination of the "Nibelungen" and the tremendous imagery of "Beowulf" were both the inevitable expression of the tumultuous soul of the Teuton, conscious of a great destiny. This was in the dawn of the nation's childhood.

We next view the race in the pride of its glorious youth, rousing itself, after the sleep of centuries, to gigantic action. From that age sprang the "Lucifer."

We then see it in the maturity of n.o.ble, reflecting manhood, whose years have given dignity and strength. "Faust" stands before us as its full expression. And Vondel and Goethe are each the "Seeing Eye" that pierced the hidden mystery of his time. Each in his own way solved the world riddle.

Like "Faust," the "Lucifer" is "ever more a striving towards the highest existence." True, the striving hero has here been hurled to the depths of the lowest abyss; yet is not his motive also the animating spirit of the race, ever onward and upward towards the unattainable?

Like the defeated Lucifer in h.e.l.l, the Teuton is ever evolving courage for a new attempt, fired with the hope that never despairs.

"Siegfried," "Beowulf," and "Lucifer," all typify the Anglo-Saxon spirit of revolt, that love of freedom and that strong individualism which has always been the distinguis.h.i.+ng characteristic of the Low Germans.

Of the "Lucifer," therefore, it may truly be said, it is the biography of a national soul.

TRANSLATOR.

Bibliography of Vondelian Literature.

JOOST VAN DEN VONDEL, SEIN LEBEN UND SEINE WERKE. Von A. Baumgartner, S.J. Freiburg-im Breisgau, 1882. Pages 344-347, synopsis of Vondel's works.

BIBLIOGRAPHY OF VONDEL'S WORKS. J.H.W. Unger. Amsterdam, 1888 (Frederic Muller & Co.). All editions of the "Lucifer" are here mentioned. This volume is in the library of Columbia University.

For the student we would recommend the excellent little edition of the "Lucifer" edited by N.A. Cramer (1891). Price 40 cents. Publisher, W.E.J. Tjeenk Willink, Zwolle, Holland.