Christa Giles

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mysticism to base satanism,˝ we are informed in Là-bas,
˝there is but one step. In the Beyond all things touch.˝ 216 It is
for this reason that Gilles de Rais could ˝from a pious
man… suddenly become satanic, from an erudite and
placid man to a violator of little children and a ripper of
boys and girls.˝ 217 In a more oblique fashion, the idea that
˝to have a capacity for a passion and not to realise it, is to
make oneself incomplete and limited˝ 218 suggests the
ambiguity of good and evil and the reliance on purely
aesthetic values already remarked upon in The Picture of
Dorian Gray. Nietzsche described the modern artist as the
intermediary species between madman and
criminal restrained from crime by weakness
of will and social timidity and not yet ripe for
the madhouse but reaching out inquisitively
towards both spheres with his antennae 219
and Wilde, believing evil was an aspect of man to be dealt
with by the modern artist, postulated that: ˝We cannot go
back to the saint. There is much more to be learned from
the sinner.˝ 220 In Là-bas a claim is made that the only people
of any interest are ˝saints, scoundrels and cranks.˝ 221 This is
consistent with the idea that superhuman passions or
obsessions are of value in and of themselves. According to
Des Hermies in Là-bas, ˝the cult of the Demon is no more
insane than that of God. One is rotten and the other