ither God nor Devil, why
fearest thou the eye of a man?

"It is not the first time I have been a witness to your opinions on the
infirmity of gratitude," said Zanoni.

Nicot suppressed an exclamation, and, after gloomily surveying Zanoni
with an eye villanous and sinister, but full of hate impotent and
unutterable, said, "I know you not,--what would you of me?"

"Your absence. Leave us!"

Nicot sprang forward a step, with hands clenched, and showing his teeth
from ear to ear, like a wild beast incensed. Zanoni stood motionless,
and smiled at him in scorn. Nicot halted abruptly, as if fixed and
fascinated by the look, shivered from head to foot, and sullenly, and
with a visible effort, as if impelled by a power not his own, turned
away.

Glyndon's eyes followed him in surprise.

"And what know you of this man?" said Zanoni.

"I know him as one like myself,--a follower of art."

"Of ART! Do not so profane that glorious word. What Nature is to God,
art should be to man,--a sublime, beneficent, genial, and warm creation.
That wretch may be a PAINTER, not an ARTIST."

"And pardon me if I ask what YOU know of one you thus disparage?"

"I know thus much, that you are beneath my care if it be necessary to
warn you against him; his own lips show the hideousness of his heart.
Why should I tell you of the crimes he has committed? He SPEAKS crime!"

"You do not seem, Signor Zanoni, to be one of the admirers of the
dawning Revolution. Perhaps you are prejudiced against the man because
you dislike the opinions?"

"What opinions?"

Glyndon paused, somewhat puzzled to define; but at length he said, "Nay,
I must wrong you; for you, of all men, I suppose, cannot discredit the
doctrine that preaches the infinite improvement of the human species."

"You are right; the few in every age improve the many; the many now may
be as wise as the few were; but improvement is at a standstill, if you
tell me that the many now are as wise as the few ARE."

"I comprehend you; you will not allow the law of universal equality!"

"Law! If the whole world conspired to enforce the falsehood they could
not make it LAW. Level all conditions to-day, and you only smooth away
all obstacles to tyranny to-morrow. A nation that aspires to EQUALITY
is unfit for FREEDOM. Throughout all creation, from the archangel to the
worm, from Olympus to the pebble, from the radiant and completed planet
to the nebula that hardens through ages of mist and slime