But being
what they are, they cannot be hidden; through the treble veil of crape
which she wears, the fierce light of a blazing misery, that rests not
for matins or for vespers, for noon of day or noon of night, for ebbing
or for flowing tide, may be read from the very ground. She is the defier
of God. She also is the mother of lunacies, and the suggestress of
suicides. Deep lie the roots of her power; but narrow is the nation that
she rules. For she can approach only those in whom a profound nature has
been upheaved by central convulsions; in whom the heart trembles and the
brain rocks under conspiracies of tempest from without and tempest from
within. Madonna moves with uncertain steps, fast or slow, but still with
tragic grace. Our Lady of Sighs creeps timidly and stealthily. But this
youngest sister moves with incalculable motions, bounding, and with a
tiger's leaps. She carries no key; for though coming rarely amongst men,
she storms all doors at which she is permitted to enter at all. And
_her_ name is _Mater Tenebrarum_,--Our Lady of Darkness.

These were the _Semnai Theai_, or Sublime Goddesses, these were the
_Eumenides_, or Gracious Ladies (so called by antiquity in shuddering
propitiation) of my Oxford dreams. Madonna spoke. She spoke by her
mysterious hand. Touching my head, she beckoned to our Lady of Sighs;
and _what_ she spoke, translated out of the signs which (except in
dreams) no man reads, was this:--

"Lo! here is he whom in childhood I dedicated to my altars. This is he
that once I made my darling. Him I led astray, him I beguiled, and from
heaven I stole away his young heart to mine. Through me did he become
idolatrous; and through me it was, by languishing desires, that he
worshiped the worm, and prayed to the wormy grave. Holy was the grave to
him; lovely was its darkness; saintly its corruption. Him, this young
idolator, I have seasoned for thee, dear gentle Sister of Sighs! Do thou
take him now to _thy_ heart, and season him for our dreadful sister. And
thou,"--turning to the _Mater Tenebrarum_, she said,--"wicked sister,
that temptest and hatest, do thou take him from _her_. See that thy
sceptre lie heavy on his head. Suffer not woman and her tenderness to
sit near him in his darkness. Banish the frailties of hope, wither the
relenting of love, scorch the fountains of tears, curse him as only thou
canst curse. So shall he be accomplished in the furnace, so shall he see
the things that ought