第一百八十六章 五 贫穷是苦难的好邻居
五 贫穷是苦难的好邻居
马吕斯喜欢这个坦率的老人，他眼见自己渐渐陷入贫困的魔爪，却并不忧愁，反而渐渐感到惊异。马吕斯遇见了古费拉克，并去找了马伯夫神甫。不过他很少去，最多一个月两次。
马吕斯喜欢独自一人在外面的林荫大道上，或战神广场，或卢森堡公园最冷僻的小径上作长时间的散步。他常常花半天时间看菜园里的莴苣、粪堆上的鸡群、拉水车的马。行人带着惊异的神情打量他，有些人觉得他衣着可疑，面目可憎。他只是一个胡思乱想的穷青年。
正是在这种散步中，他发现了戈尔博老屋，被它的偏僻和便宜所吸引，便住了下来。他只用“马吕斯先生”这个名字出现在那里。
他父亲的某些老将军或老战友，在得知他的情况后，邀请他去看望他们。马吕斯没有拒绝这些邀请。这给了他谈论父亲的机会。于是他时常去拜见帕若尔伯爵、贝拉韦纳将军、弗里里翁将军和荣军院。那里有音乐和舞会。在这些晚上，马吕斯穿上他的新外套。但他只在天气寒冷的时候才去参加这些晚会或舞会，因为他雇不起马车，又不愿意穿着不像镜子般光亮的靴子到达。
他有时没有怨恨地说：“人的天性就是这样，在客厅里，你可以浑身污秽，除了鞋子。人们只要求你一样无可指摘的东西；良心？不，是靴子。”
除了内心的激情，一切热情都会被幻想驱散。马吕斯的政治狂热就这样消失了。1830年革命在满足和安抚他的同时，也助长了这一过程。除去他的愤怒发作，他仍然一成不变。他仍然保持着同样的观点。不过，它们变得温和了。准确地说，他不再有观点，只有同情。他属于哪个党派？人道党派。在人道中，他选择了法国；在民族中，他选择了人民；在人民中，他选择了女人。他的怜悯主要指向这里。现在，他偏爱思想胜于行动，诗人胜于英雄，他欣赏约伯这样的书胜于马伦戈这样的事件。然后，当他在冥想中度过一天后，傍晚时分通过林荫大道返回时，透过树枝瞥见远方那深不可测的空间、无名的光辉、深渊、阴影、神秘，所有那些仅仅属于人类的事物在他看来都显得十分美好。
他认为自己已经，事实上也确实到达了生活和人类哲学的真理，并且最终只凝视天空，那是真理从井底唯一能看见的东西。
这并不妨碍他增加他的计划、他的组合、他的构想、他对未来的规划。在这种幻想的状态中，如果有一双眼睛能够窥见马吕斯的内心，一定会被那灵魂的纯洁所眩惑。事实上，如果我们的肉眼能够注视他人的良心，我们就能根据一个人的梦想，比根据他的思想更准确地判断他。思想中有意志，梦想中没有。幻想，完全自发，即使在宏伟和理想中，也保持并塑造我们精神的形式。没有什么比我们未经预谋的、对命运光辉的无边渴望，更直接、更真诚地出自我们灵魂的深处。在这些渴望中，比在有意识的、理性的、协调的思想中，更能找到一个人的真实性格。我们的幻想是最像我们的东西。我们每个人都根据自己的本性梦想着未知和不可能。
1831年年中，伺候马吕斯的老妇人告诉他，他的邻居，那个可怜的容德雷特一家，被赶出了门。马吕斯几乎整天不在家，几乎不知道他有邻居。
“为什么赶他们走？”他问。
“因为他们不付房租；他们欠了两个季度的。”
“多少？”
“二十法郎，”老妇人说。
马吕斯抽屉里有三十法郎积蓄。
“拿着，”他对老妇人说，“这是二十五法郎。替这些穷人付房租，给他们五法郎，别说是我给的。”
Marius liked this candid old man who saw himself gradually falling into
the clutches of indigence, and who came to feel astonishment, little by
little, without, however, being made melancholy by it. Marius met
Courfeyrac and sought out M. Mabeuf. Very rarely, however; twice a
month at most.
Marius’ pleasure consisted in taking long walks alone on the outer
boulevards, or in the Champs-de-Mars, or in the least frequented alleys
of the Luxembourg. He often spent half a day in gazing at a market
garden, the beds of lettuce, the chickens on the dung-heap, the horse
turning the water-wheel. The passers-by stared at him in surprise, and
some of them thought his attire suspicious and his mien sinister. He
was only a poor young man dreaming in an objectless way.
It was during one of his strolls that he had hit upon the Gorbeau
house, and, tempted by its isolation and its cheapness, had taken up
his abode there. He was known there only under the name of M. Marius.
Some of his father’s old generals or old comrades had invited him to go
and see them, when they learned about him. Marius had not refused their
invitations. They afforded opportunities of talking about his father.
Thus he went from time to time, to Comte Pajol, to General Bellavesne,
to General Fririon, to the Invalides. There was music and dancing
there. On such evenings, Marius put on his new coat. But he never went
to these evening parties or balls except on days when it was freezing
cold, because he could not afford a carriage, and he did not wish to
arrive with boots otherwise than like mirrors.
He said sometimes, but without bitterness: “Men are so made that in a
drawing-room you may be soiled everywhere except on your shoes. In
order to insure a good reception there, only one irreproachable thing
is asked of you; your conscience? No, your boots.”
All passions except those of the heart are dissipated by reverie.
Marius’ political fevers vanished thus. The Revolution of 1830 assisted
in the process, by satisfying and calming him. He remained the same,
setting aside his fits of wrath. He still held the same opinions. Only,
they had been tempered. To speak accurately, he had no longer any
opinions, he had sympathies. To what party did he belong? To the party
of humanity. Out of humanity he chose France; out of the Nation he
chose the people; out of the people he chose the woman. It was to that
point above all, that his pity was directed. Now he preferred an idea
to a deed, a poet to a hero, and he admired a book like Job more than
an event like Marengo. And then, when, after a day spent in meditation,
he returned in the evening through the boulevards, and caught a glimpse
through the branches of the trees of the fathomless space beyond, the
nameless gleams, the abyss, the shadow, the mystery, all that which is
only human seemed very pretty indeed to him.
He thought that he had, and he really had, in fact, arrived at the
truth of life and of human philosophy, and he had ended by gazing at
nothing but heaven, the only thing which Truth can perceive from the
bottom of her well.
This did not prevent him from multiplying his plans, his combinations,
his scaffoldings, his projects for the future. In this state of
reverie, an eye which could have cast a glance into Marius’ interior
would have been dazzled with the purity of that soul. In fact, had it
been given to our eyes of the flesh to gaze into the consciences of
others, we should be able to judge a man much more surely according to
what he dreams, than according to what he thinks. There is will in
thought, there is none in dreams. Reverie, which is utterly
spontaneous, takes and keeps, even in the gigantic and the ideal, the
form of our spirit. Nothing proceeds more directly and more sincerely
from the very depth of our soul, than our unpremeditated and boundless
aspirations towards the splendors of destiny. In these aspirations,
much more than in deliberate, rational co-ordinated ideas, is the real
character of a man to be found. Our chimæras are the things which the
most resemble us. Each one of us dreams of the unknown and the
impossible in accordance with his nature.
Towards the middle of this year 1831, the old woman who waited on
Marius told him that his neighbors, the wretched Jondrette family, had
been turned out of doors. Marius, who passed nearly the whole of his
days out of the house, hardly knew that he had any neighbors.
“Why are they turned out?” he asked.
“Because they do not pay their rent; they owe for two quarters.”
“How much is it?”
“Twenty francs,” said the old woman.
Marius had thirty francs saved up in a drawer.
“Here,” he said to the old woman, “take these twenty-five francs. Pay
for the poor people and give them five francs, and do not tell them
that it was I.”
