“Then,” said Villefort, more and more amazed, and really supposing he was speaking to a mystic or a madman, “you consider yourself as one of those extraordinary beings whom you have mentioned?”
“And why not?” said Monte Cristo coldly.
“Your pardon, sir,” replied Villefort, quite astounded, “but you will excuse me if, when I presented myself to you, I was unaware that I should meet with a person whose knowledge and understanding so far surpass the usual knowledge and understanding of men. It is not usual with us corrupted wretches of civilization to find gentlemen like yourself, possessors, as you are, of immense fortune — at least, so it is said — and I beg you to observe that I do not inquire, I merely repeat; — it is not usual, I say, for such privileged and wealthy beings to waste their time in speculations on the state of society, in philosophical reveries, intended at best to console those whom fate has disinherited from the goods of this world.”
“Really, sir,” retorted the count, “have you attained the eminent situation in which you are, without having admitted, or even without having met with exceptions? and do you never use your eyes, which must have acquired so much finesse and certainty, to divine, at a glance, the kind of man by whom you are confronted? Should not a magistrate be not merely the best administrator of the law, but the most crafty expounder of the chicanery of his profession, a steel probe to search hearts, a touchstone to try the gold which in each soul is mingled with more or less of alloy?”
“Sir,” said Villefort, “upon my word, you overcome me. I really never heard a person speak as you do.”
“Because you remain eternally encircled in a round of general conditions, and have never dared to raise your wings into those upper spheres which God has peopled with invisible or exceptional beings.”
“And you allow then, sir, that spheres exist, and that these marked and invisible beings mingle amongst us?”
“Why should they not? Can you see the air you breathe, and yet without which you could not for a moment exist?”
“Then we do not see those beings to whom you allude?”
“Yes, we do; you see them whenever God pleases to allow them to assume a material form. You touch them, come in contact with them, speak to them, and they reply to you.”
“Ah,” said Villefort, smiling, “I confess I should like to be warned when one of these beings is in contact with me.”
“You have been served as you desire, monsieur, for you were warned just now, and I now again warn you.”
“Then you yourself are one of these marked beings?”
“Yes, monsieur, I believe so; for until now, no man has found himself in a position similar to mine. The dominions of kings are limited either by mountains or rivers, or a change of manners, or an alteration of language. My kingdom is bounded only by the world, for I am not an Italian, or a Frenchman, or a Hindu, or an American, or a Spaniard — I am a cosmopolite. No country can say it saw my birth. God alone knows what country will see me die. I adopt all customs, speak all languages. You believe me to be a Frenchman, for I speak French with the same facility and purity as yourself. Well, Ali, my Nubian, believes me to be an Arab; Bertuccio, my steward, takes me for a Roman; Haidee, my slave, thinks me a Greek. You may, therefore, comprehend, that being of no country, asking no protection from any government, acknowledging no man as my brother, not one of the scruples that arrest the powerful, or the obstacles which paralyze the weak, paralyzes or arrests me. I have only two adversaries — I will not say two conquerors, for with perseverance I subdue even them, — they are time and distance. There is a third, and the most terrible — that is my condition as a mortal being. This alone can stop me in my onward career, before I have attained the goal at which I aim, for all the rest I have reduced to mathematical terms. What men call the chances of fate — namely, ruin, change, circumstances — I have fully anticipated, and if any of these should overtake me, yet it will not overwhelm me. Unless I die, I shall always be what I am, and therefore it is that I utter the things you have never heard, even from the mouths of kings — for kings have need, and other persons have fear of you. For who is there who does not say to himself, in a society as incongruously organized as ours, ‘Perhaps some day I shall have to do with the king’s attorney’?”