imply from the dictates of superior wisdom--the wisdom of the
serpent--which, no Ramorney ever did. The skill with which the crawling,
paltry leech controls his fierce lord; the contempt for his power and
pride shown in Dwining's adroit sneers, and above all, the ease with
which the latter casts into the shade Ramorney's fancied superiority in
wickedness, is well set forth--and such a character could only have been
conceived by deep study of the motives and agencies which formed it. To
do so, Scott had recourse to the same Oriental source--the same fearful
school of atheism which in another and higher form gave birth to the
Templar and the gypsy. 'I have studied,' says Dwining, 'among the sages
of Granada, where the fiery-souled Moor lifts high his deadly dagger as
it drops with his enemy's blood, and avows the doctrine which the pallid
Christian practises, though, coward-like, he dare not name it.' His
sneers at the existence of a devil, at all 'prejudices,' at religion,
above all, at brute strength and every power save that of intellect, are
perfectly Oriental--not however of the Oriental Sufi, or of the
initiated in the House of Wisdom, whose pantheistic Idealism went hand
in hand with a faith in benefiting mankind, and which taught
forgiveness, equality, and love, but rather that corrupted Asiatic
vanity of wisdom which abounded among the disciples of Aristotle and of
Averroes in Spain, and which was entirely material. I err, strictly
speaking, therefore, when I speak of this as the _same_ Oriental school,
though in a certain sense it had a common origin--that of believing in
the infinite power of human wisdom. Both are embraced indeed in the
beguiling _eritis sicut Deus_, 'ye shall be as GOD,' uttered by the
serpent to Eve.

Quite subordinate as regards its position among the actors of the novel,
yet extremely interesting in a historical point of view, is the
character of Jasper Dryfesdale the steward of the Douglas family, in
'The Abbot.' In this man Scott has happily combined the sentiment of
absolute feudal devotion to his superiors with a gloomy fatalism learned
'among the fierce sectaries of Lower Germany.' If carefully studied,
Dryfesdale will be found to be, on the whole, the most morally
instructive character in the entire range of Scott's writings. In the
first place, he illustrates the fact, so little noted by the advocates
of loyalty, aristocracy, 'devoted retainers,' and 'faithful vassals,'
that all suc