He is a victim of amor senilis, and right here if Mansfield took one step more his realism would be appalling, but he stops in time and suggests what he dares not express.  This tottering, doddering, slobbering, sniffling old man is in love—­he is about to wed a young, beautiful girl.  He selects jewels for her—­he makes remarks about what would become her beauty, jeers and laughs in cracked falsetto.  In the animality of youth there is something pleasing—­it is natural—­but the vices of an old man, when they have become only mental, are most revolting.

The people about Ivan are in mortal terror of him, for he is still the absolute monarch—­he has the power to promote or disgrace, to take their lives or let them go free.  They laugh when he laughs, cry when he does, and watch his fleeting moods with thumping hearts.

He is intensely religious and affects the robe and cowl of a priest.  Around his neck hangs the crucifix.  His fear is that he will die with no opportunity of confession and absolution.  He prays to High Heaven every moment, kisses the cross, and his toothless old mouth interjects prayers to God and curses on man in the same breath.

If any one is talking to him he looks the other way, slips down until his shoulders occupy the throne, scratches his leg, and keeps up a running comment of insult—­“Aye,” “Oh,” “Of course,” “Certainly,” “Ugh,” “Listen to him now!” There is a comedy side to all this which relieves the tragedy and keeps the play from becoming disgusting.

Glimpses of Ivan’s past are given in his jerky confessions—­he is the most miserable and unhappy of men, and you behold that he is reaping as he has sown.

All his life he has been preparing for this.  Each day has been a preparation for the next. Ivan dies in a fit of wrath, hurling curses on his family and court—­dies in a fit of wrath into which he has been purposely taunted by a man who knows that the outburst is certain to kill the weakened monarch.

Where does Ivan the Terrible go when Death closes his eyes?

I know not.  But this I believe:  No confessional can absolve him—­no priest benefit him—­no God forgive him.  He has damned himself, and he began the work in youth.  He was getting ready all his life for this old age, and this old age was getting ready for the fifth act.

The playwright does not say so, Mansfield does not say so, but this is the lesson:  Hate is a poison—­wrath is a toxin—­sensuality leads to death—­clutching selfishness is a lighting of the fires of hell.  It is all a preparation—­cause and effect.

If you are ever absolved, you must absolve yourself, for no one else can.  And the sooner you begin, the better.

We often hear of the beauties of old age, but the only old age that is beautiful is the one the man has long been preparing for by living a beautiful life.  Every one of us are right now preparing for old age.