Illustrious Romans, it is not the Apostle Paul who has the honour of
addressing you. It is not that worthy Jew who was born at Tarsus,
according to the _Acts of the Apostles_, and at Giscala according
to Jerome and other fathers; a dispute that has led some to believe
that one may be born in two different places at the same time, just
as there are among you certain bodies which are created by a few
Latin words, and are found in a hundred thousand places at the same
time.[38]
It is not the bald, hot-headed man, with long and broad nose,
black eyebrows, thick and continuous, and broad shoulders and
crooked legs,[39] who, having carried off the daughter of his
master Gamaliel, and being subsequently dissatisfied with her,
divorced her[40]; and, in pique, if we may believe contemporary
Jewish writers, put himself at the head of the nascent body of the
Christians.
It is not that St. Paul who, when he was a servant of Gamaliel, had
the good Stephen, the patron of deacons and of those who are stoned,
slain with stones, and who, while it was done, took care of the
cloaks of the murderers--a fitting employment for a priest’s valet.
It is not he who fell from his horse, blinded in midday by a heavenly
light, and to whom God said in the air, as he says every day to so
many others: “Why persecutest thou me?” It is not he who wrote to
the half-Jewish, half-Christian shopkeepers of Corinth: “Have we not
power to eat and to drink ... and to lead about a sister or a wife?
Who goeth to war any time at his own charge?”[41] By those fine words
the Reverend Father Menou, Jesuit and apostle of Lorraine, profited
so well that they brought him, at Nancy, eighty thousand francs a
year, a palace, and more than one handsome woman.
It is not he who wrote to the little flock in Thessalonica that the
universe was about to be destroyed, and on that account it was not
worth while keeping money about one. As Paul said: “For the Lord
himself shall descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of the
archangel, and with the trump of God; and the dead in Christ shall
rise first; then we which are alive and remain shall be caught up
together with them.”[42]
Observe, generous Romans, that St. Paul did but announce these
pleasant things to the tailors and grocers of Thessalonica in virtue
of the express prophecy of Luke (ch. xxi.), who had publicly--that
is, to some fifteen or sixteen chosen souls among the people--averred
that this generation would not pass away before the son of man came
on the clouds with great power and glory. It is true, O Romans,
that Jesus came not on the clouds with a great power; but at least
the popes have had this great power, and thus are the prophecies
fulfilled.
He who writes this epistle to the Romans is, again, not that St.
Paul, half Jew, half Christian, who, having preached Jesus and
announced the destruction of the Mosaic law, not only went to Judaise
in the temple of Hershalaim, which the vulgar call Jerusalem, but,
on the advice of his friend James, observed there certain rigorous
practices which the Holy Inquisition now punishes with death.[43]
He who writes to you has been neither priest’s valet, nor murderer,
nor keeper of cloaks, nor apostate, nor maker of tents, nor buried in
the depths of the sea, like Jonah, for twenty-four hours, nor caught
up to the third heaven, like Elias, without learning what the third
heaven is.
He who writes to you is more a citizen than this Saul Paul, who, it
is said, boasted of being one, and assuredly was not. For Tarsus, if
he came from there, was not made a Roman colony until the time of
Caracalla [211-217 A.D.]; and Giscala in Galilee, from which it is
more probable that he came, since he was of the tribe of Benjamin,
was certainly not a Roman town. Roman citizenship was not bestowed
on Jews at Tarsus or anywhere else. The author of the _Acts of the
Apostles_ (xvi., 37) asserts that this Jew Paul and another Jew named
Silas were arrested by the authorities in the town of Philippi in
Macedonia (a town founded by the father of Alexander, near which the
battle between Cassius and Brutus, on the one side, and Antony and
Octavian, on the other, decided the fate of your empire). Paul and
Silas were scourged for stirring up the populace, and Paul said to
the officers: “They have beaten us, being Romans” (_Acts_ xvi., 37).
Commentators freely admit that Silas was not a Roman citizen. They do
not say that the author of _Acts_ lied, but they agree that what he
says is untrue; and I am sorry for the Holy Spirit, who, no doubt,
dictated the _Acts of the Apostles_.
In fine, he who now writes to the descendants of Marcellus, the
Scipios, the Catos, Cicero, Titus, and the Antonines, is a Roman
gentleman of an ancient and transplanted family, one who cherishes
his venerable country, bemoans her condition, and has left his heart
in her Capitol.
Romans, listen to your fellow-citizen; listen to Rome and your
ancient valour.
_L’Italico valor non è ancor morto._