Alarming as was the outlook in Alexandria, the races, were to be held
as usual. This had been decided only a few hours since at the Bishop’s
palace, and criers had been sent abroad throughout the streets
and squares of the city to bid the inhabitants to this popular
entertainment. In the writing-office of the Ephemeris, which would be
given to the public the first thing in the morning, five hundred slaves
or more were occupied in writing from dictation a list of the owners of
the horses, of the ‘agitatores’ who would drive them, and of the prizes
offered to the winners, whether Christians or heathen.
[Ephemeris--The news-sheet, which was brought out, not only in Rome,
but in all the cities of the Empire, and which kept the citizens
informed of all important events.]
The heat in the Episcopal council-hall had been oppressive, and not less
so the heat of temper among the priests assembled there; for they
had fully determined, for once, not to obey their prelate with blind
submission, and they knew full well that Theophilus, on occasion, if his
will were opposed, could not merely thunder but wield the bolt.
Besides the ecclesiastical members of the council, Cynegius,
the Imperial legate--Evagrius, the Prefect--and Romanus, the
commander-in-chief and Comes of Egypt,--had all been present. The
officials of the Empire--Roman statesmen who knew Alexandria and her
citizens well, and who had often smarted under the spiritual haughtiness
of her Bishop--were on the prelate’s side. Cynegius was doubtful; but
the priests, who had not altogether escaped the alarms that had stricken
the whole population, were so bold as to declare against a too hasty
decision, and to say that the celebration of the games at a time of such
desperate peril was not only presumptuous but sinful, and a tempting of
God.
In answer to a scornful enquiry from Theophilus as to where the danger
lay if--as the Comes promised--Serapis were to be overthrown on the
morrow, one of the assembly answered in the name of his colleagues. This
man, now very old, had formerly been a wonderfully successful exorcist,
and, notwithstanding that he was a faithful Christian, he was the leader
of a gnostic sect and a diligent student of magic. He proceeded to
argue, with all the zeal and vehemence of conviction, that Serapis was
the most terrible of all the heathen daemons, and that all the oracles
of antiquity, all the prophecies of the seers, and all the conclusions
of the Magians and astrologers would be proved false if his fall--which
the present assembly could only regard as a great boon from Heaven--did
not entail some tremendous convulsion of nature.
At this Theophilus gave the reins to his wrath; he snatched a little
crucifix from the wall above his episcopal throne, and broke it in
fragments, exclaiming in deep tones that quavered with wrath:
“And which do you regard as the greater: The only-begotten Son of God,
or that helpless image?” And he flung the pieces of the broken crucifix
down on the table round which they were sitting. Then, as though
horror-stricken at his own daring act, he fell on his knees, raised his
eyes and hands in prayer, and gathering up the broken image, kissed it
devoutly.
This rapid scene had a tremendous effect. Amazement and suspense were
painted on every face, not a hand, not a lip moved as Theophilus rose
again and cast a glance of proud and stern defiance round the assembly,
which each man took to himself. For some moments he remained silent,
as though awaiting a reply; but his repellent mien and majestic bearing
made it sufficiently clear that he was ready to annihilate any opponent.
In fact none of the priests contradicted him; and, though Evagrius
looked at him with a doubting shake of his shrewd head, Cynegius on
the other hand nodded assent. The Bishop, however, seemed to care for
neither dissent nor approval, and it was in brief and cutting terms,
with no flourish of rhetoric, that he laid it down that wood and stone
had nothing to do with the divine Majesty, even though they were made
in the image of all that was Holy and worshipful or were most lavishly
beautified by the hand of man with the foul splendors of perishable
wealth. The greater the power ascribed by superstition to the base
material--whatever form it bore--the more odious must it be to the
Christian. Any man who should believe that a daemon could turn even a
breath of the Most High to its own will and purpose, would do well to
beware of idolatry, for Satan had already laid his clutches somewhere on
his robe.
At this sweeping accusation many a cheek colored wrathfully, and not
a word was spoken when the Bishop proceeded to require of his hearers
that, if the Serapeum should fall into the hands of the Imperial troops,
it should be at once and ruthlessly destroyed, and that his hearers
should not cease from the work of ruin till this scandal of the city
should be swept from the face of the earth.
“If then the world crumbles to atoms!” he cried, “well and good--the
heathen are right and we are wrong, and in that case it were better
to perish; but as surely as I sit on this throne by the grace of God,
Serapis is the vain imagining of fools and blind, and there is no god
but the God whose minister I am!”
“Whose Kingdom is everlasting, Amen!” chanted an old priest; and
Cynegius rose to explain that he should do nothing to hinder the total
overthrow of the temple and image.
Then the Comes spoke in defence of the Bishop’s resolution to allow
the races to be held, as usual, on the morrow. He sketched a striking
picture of the shallow, unstable nature of the Alexandrians, a people
wholly given over to enjoyment. The troops at his command were few in
number in comparison with the heathen population of the city, and it was
a very important matter to keep a large proportion of the worshippers
of Serapis occupied elsewhere at the moment of the decisive onset.
Gladiator-fights were prohibited, and the people were tired of wild
beasts; but races, in which heathen and Christian alike might enter
their horses for competition, must certainly prove most attractive just
at this time of bitter rivalry and oppugnancy between the two religions,
and would draw thousands of the most able-bodied idolaters to the
Hippodrome. All this he had already considered and discussed with the
Bishop and Cynegius; nay, that zealous destroyer of heathen worship
had come to Alexandria with the express purpose of overthrowing the
Serapeum; but, as a prudent statesman, he had first made sure that the
time and circumstances were propitious for the work of annihilation. All
that he had here seen and heard had only strengthened his purpose; so,
after suggesting a few possible difficulties, and enjoining moderation
and mercy as the guiding principles of his sovereign, he commanded, in
the Emperor’s name, that the sanctuary of Serapis should be seized by
force of arms and utterly destroyed, and that the races should be held
on the morrow.
The assembled council bowed low; and when Theophilus had closed the
meeting with a prayer he withdrew to his ungarnished study, with his
head bent and an air of profound humility, as though he had met with a
defeat instead of gaining a victory.
.......................
The fate of the great god of the heathen was sealed, but in the wide
precincts of the Serapeum no one thought of surrender or of prompt
defeat. The basement of the building, on which stood the grandest temple
ever erected by the Hellenes, presented a smooth and slightly scarped
rampart of impregnable strength to the foe. A sloping way extended up
over a handsomely-decorated incline, and from the middle of the grand
curve described by this road, two flights of steps led up to the three
great doors in the facade of the building.
The heathen had taken care to barricade this approach in all haste,
piling the road and steps with statuary-images of the gods of the finest
workmanship, figures and busts of kings, queens, and heroes, Hermes,
columns, stelae, sacrificial stones, chairs and benches-torn from their
places by a thousand eager hands. The squared flags of the pavement and
the granite blocks of the steps had been built up into walls and these
were still being added to after the besiegers had surrounded the temple;
for the defenders tore down stones, pilasters, gutters and pieces of the
cornice, and flung them on to the outworks, or, when they could, on to
the foe who for the present were not eager to commence hostilities.
The captains of the Imperial force had miscalculated the strength of
the heathen garrison. They supposed a few hundreds might have entrenched
themselves, but on the roof alone above a thousand men were to be seen,
and every hour seemed to increase the number of men and women crowding
into the Serapeum. The Romans could only suppose that this constantly
growing multitude had been concealed in the secret halls and chambers of
the temple ever since Cynegius had first arrived, and had no idea that
they were still being constantly reinforced.
Karnis, Herse, and Orpheus, among others, had made their way thither
from the timber-yard, down the dry conduit, and an almost incessant
stream of the adherents of the old gods had preceded and followed them.
While Eusebius had been exhorting his congregation in the church of St.
Mark to Christian love towards the idolaters, these had collected in the
temple precincts to the number of about four thousand, all eager for
the struggle. A vast multitude! But the extent of the Serapeum was so
enormous that the mass of people was by no means densely packed on the
roof, in the halls, and in the underground passages and rooms. There was
no crowding anywhere, least of all in the central halls of the temple
itself; indeed, in the great vestibule crowned with a dome which formed
the entrance, in the vast hall next to it, and in the magnificent
hypostyle with a semicircular niche on the furthest side in which stood
the far-famed image of the god, there were only scattered groups of men,
who looked like dwarfs as the eye compared them with the endless rows of
huge columns.
The full blaze of day penetrated nowhere but into the circular
vestibule, which was lighted by openings in the drum of the cupola that
rested on four gigantic columns. In the inner hall there was only dim
twilight; while the hypostyle was quite dark, but for a singularly
contrived shaft of light which produced a most mysterious effect.
The shadows of the great columns in the fore hall, and of the double
colonnade on each side of the hypostyle, lay like bands of crape on
the many-colored pavement; borders, circles, and ellipses of mosaic
diversified the smooth and lucent surface, in which were mirrored the
astrological figures which sparkled in brighter hues on the ceiling,
the trophies of symbols and mythological groups that graced the walls
in tinted high relief, and the statues and Hermes between the columns.
A wreath of lovely forms and colors dazzled the eye with their
multiplicity and profusion, and the heavy atmosphere of incense which
filled the halls was almost suffocating, while the magical and mystical
signs and figures were so many and so new that the enquiring mind,
craving for an explanation and an interpretation of all these
incomprehensible mysteries, hardly dared investigate them in detail.
A heavy curtain, that looked as though giants must have woven it on a
loom of superhuman proportions, hung, like a thick cloud shrouding a
mountain-peak, from the very top of the hypostyle, in grand folds over
the niche containing the statue, and down to the floor; and while it
hid the sacred image from the gaze of the worshipper it attracted his
attention by the infinite variety of symbolical patterns and beautiful
designs which were woven in it and embroidered on it.
The gold and silver vessels and precious jewels that lay concealed by
this hanging were of more value than many a mighty king’s treasure; and
everything was on so vast a scale that man shuddered to feel his own
littleness, and the mind sought some new standard of measurement by
which to realize such unwonted proportions. The finite here seemed to
pass into the infinite; and as the spectator gazed up, with his head
thrown back, at the capitals of the lofty columns and the remote
height of the ceiling, his sight failed him before he had succeeded
in distinguishing or even perceiving a small portion only of the
bewildering confusion of figures and emblems that were crowded on to
the surface. Greek feeling for beauty had here worked hand in hand with
Oriental taste for gorgeous magnificence, and every detail could bear
examination; for there was not a motive of the architecture, not a work
of sculpture, painting, or mosaic, not a product of the foundry or the
loom, which did not bear the stamp of thorough workmanship and elaborate
finish. The ruddy, flecked porphyry, the red, white, green, or yellow
marbles which had been used for the decorations were all the finest and
purest ever wrought upon by Greek craftsmen. Each of the hundreds of
sculptured works which here had found a home was the masterpiece of some
great artist; as the curious visitor lingered in loving contemplation of
the mosaics on the polished floor, or examined the ornamental mouldings
that framed the reliefs, dividing the walls into panels, he was
filled with wonder and delight at the beauty, the elegance and the
inventiveness that had given charm, dignity, and significance to every
detail.
Adjoining these great halls devoted especially to the worship of the
god, were hundreds of courts, passages, colonnades and rooms, and
others not less numerous lay underground. There were long rows of rooms
containing above a hundred thousand rolls of books, the famous library
of the Serapeum, with separate apartments for readers and copyists;
there were store-rooms, refectories and assembly-rooms for the
high-priests of the temple, for teachers and disciples; while acrid
odors came up from the laboratories, and the fragrance of cooking from
the kitchen and bake-houses. In the very thickness of the walls of the
basement were cells for penitents and recluses, long since abandoned,
and rooms for the menials and slaves, of whom hundreds were employed
in the precincts; under ground spread the mystical array of halls,
grottoes, galleries and catacombs dedicated to the practice of the
Mysteries and the initiation of neophytes; on the roof stood various
observatories--among them one erected for the study of the heavens by
Eratosthenes, where Claudius Ptolemaeus had watched and worked. Up here
astronomers, star-gazers, horoscopists and Magians spent their nights,
while, far below them, in the temple-courts that were surrounded by
store-houses and stables, the blood of sacrificed beasts was shed and
the entrails of the victims were examined.
The house of Serapis was a whole world in little, and centuries had
enriched it with wealth, beauty, and the noblest treasures of art and
learning. Magic and witchcraft hedged it in with a maze of mystical and
symbolical secrets, and philosophy had woven a tissue of speculation
round the person of the god. The sanctuary was indeed the centre of
Hellenic culture in the city of Alexander; what marvel then, that
the heathen should believe that with the overthrow of Serapis and his
temple, the earth, nay the universe itself must sink into the abyss?
Anxious spirits and throbbing hearts were those that now sought shelter
in the Serapeum, fully prepared to perish with their god, and yet eager
with enthusiasm to avert his fall if possible.
A strange medley indeed of men and women had collected within
these sacred precincts! Grave sages, philosophers, grammarians,
mathematicians, naturalists, and physicians clung to Olympius and obeyed
him in silence. Rhetoricians with shaven faces, Magians and sorcerers,
whose long beards flowed over robes embroidered with strange figures;
students, dressed after the fashion of their forefathers in the palmy
days of Athens; men of every age, who dubbed themselves artists though
they were no more than imitators of the works of a greater epoch,
unhappy in that no one at this period of indifference to beauty called
upon them to prove what they could do, or to put forth their highest
powers. Actors, again, from the neglected theatres, starving histrions,
to whom the stage was prohibited by the Emperor and Bishop, singers and
flute-players; hungry priests and temple-servitors expelled from the
closed sanctuaries; lawyers, scribes, ships’ captains, artisans, though
but very few merchants, for Christianity had ceased to be the creed of
the poor, and the wealthy attached themselves to the faith professed by
those in authority.
One of the students had contrived to bring a girl with him, and several
others, seeing this, went back into the streets by the secret way and
brought in damsels of no very fair repute, till the crowd of men was
diversified by a considerable sprinkling of wreathed and painted
girls, some of them the outcast maids of various temples, and others
priestesses of higher character, who had remained faithful to the old
gods or who practised magic arts.
Among these women one, a tall and dignified matron in mourning robes,
was a conspicuous figure. This was Berenice, the mother of the young
heathen who had been ridden down and wounded in the skirmish near the
Prefect’s house, and whose eyes Eusebius had afterwards closed. She had
come to the Serapeum expressly to avenge her son’s death and then to
perish with the fall of the gods for whom he had sacrificed his young
life. But the mad turmoil that surrounded her was more than she could
bear; she stood, hour after hour, closely veiled and absorbed in her own
thoughts, neither raising her eyes nor uttering a word, at the foot of a
bronze statue of justice dispensing rewards and punishments.
Olympius had entrusted the command of the little garrison of armed men
to Memnon, a veteran legate of great experience, who had lost his left
arm in the war against the Goths. The high-priest himself was occupied
alternately in trying to persuade the hastily-collected force to
obey their leader, and in settling quarrels, smoothing difficulties,
suppressing insubordination, and considering plans with reference to
supplies for his adherents, and the offering of a great sacrifice at
which all the worshippers of Serapis were to assist. Karnis kept near
his friend, helping him so far as was possible; Orpheus, with others
of the younger men, had been ordered to the roof, where they were
employed--under the scorching sun, reflected from the copper-plated
covering and the radiating surface of the dome--in loosening blocks of
stone from the balustrade to be hurled down to-morrow on the besieging
force.
Herse devoted herself to the sick and wounded, for a few who had
ventured forth too boldly to aid in barricading the entrance, had
been hurt by arrows and lances flung by the idle soldiery; and a still
greater number were suffering from sun-stroke in consequence of toiling
on the top of the building.
Inside the vast, thick-walled halls it was much cooler than in the
streets even, and the hours glided fast to the besieged heathen. Many of
them were fully occupied, or placed on guard; others were discussing the
situation, and disputing or guessing at what the outcome might, or must
be. Numbers, panic-stricken or absorbed in pious awe, sat huddled on
the ground, praying, muttering magical formulas, or wailing aloud. The
Magians and astrologers had retired with knots of followers into
the adjoining studies, where they were comparing registers, making
calculations, reading signs, devising new formulas and defending them
against their opponents.
An incessant bustle went on, to and fro between these rooms and the
great library, and the tables were covered with rolls and tablets
containing ancient prophecies, horoscopes and potent exorcisms.
Messengers, one after another, were sent out from thence to command
silence in the great halls, where the assembled youths and girls were
kissing, singing, shouting and dancing to the shrill pipe of flutes and
twang of lutes, clapping their hands, rattling tambourines--in short,
enjoying to the utmost the few hours that might yet be theirs before
they must make the fatal leap into nothingness, or at least into the dim
shades of death.
The sun was sinking when suddenly the great brazen gong was loudly
struck, and the hard, blatant clatter rent the air of the temple-hall.
The mighty waves of sound reverberated from the walls of the sanctuary
like the surge of a clangorous sea, and sent their metallic vibration
ringing through every room and cell, from the topmost observatory-turret
to the deepest vault beneath, calling all who were within the precincts
to assemble. The holy places filled at once; the throng poured in
through the vestibule, and in a few minutes even the hypostyle, the
sanctum of the veiled statue, was full to overflowing. Without any
distinction of rank or sex, and regardless of all the usual formalities
or the degrees of initiation which each had passed through, the
worshippers of Serapis crowded towards the sacred niche, till a chain,
held up by neokores--[Temple-servants]--at a respectful distance from
the mystical spot, checked their advance. Densely packed and in almost
breathless silence, they filled the nave and the colonnades, watching
for what might befall.
Presently a dull low chant of men’s voices was heard. This went on for
a few minutes, and then a loud pean in honor of the god rang through the
temple with an accompaniment of flutes, cymbals, lutes and trumpets.
Karnis had found a place with his wife and son; all three, holding
hands, joined enthusiastically in the stirring hymn; and, with them,
Porphyrius, who by accident was close to them, swelling the song of the
multitude. All now stood with hands uplifted and eyes fixed in anxious
expectancy on the curtain. The figures and emblems on the hanging were
invisible in the gloom--but now-now there was a stir, as of life, in the
ponderous folds,--they moved--they began to ripple like streams, brooks,
water-falls, recovering motion after long stagnation--the curtain slowly
sank, and at length it fell so suddenly that the eye could scarcely note
the instant. From every lip, as but one voice, rose a cry of admiration,
amazement, and delight, for Serapis stood revealed to his people.
The noble manhood of the god sat with dignity on a golden throne that
was covered with a blaze of jewels; his gracious and solemn face
looked down on the crowd of worshippers. The hair that curled upon his
thoughtful brow, and the kalathos that crowned it were of pure gold
At his feet crouched Cerberus, raising his three fierce heads with
glistening ruby eyes. The body of the god--a model of strength in
repose--and the drapery were of gold and ivory. In its perfect harmony
as a whole, and the exquisite beauty of every detail, this statue bore
the stamp of supreme power and divine majesty. When such a divinity as
this should rise from his throne the earth indeed might quake and the
heavens tremble! Before such a Lord the strongest might gladly bow, for
no mortal ever shone in such radiant beauty. This Sovereign must triumph
over every foe, even over death--the monster that lay writhing in
impotent rage at his feet!
Gasping and thrilled with pious awe, enraptured but dumb with reverent
fear, the assembled thousands gazed on the god dimly revealed to them in
the twilight, when suddenly, for a moment of solemn glory, a ray of the
setting sun--a shaft of intense brightness--pierced the star-spangled
apse of the niche and fell on the lips of the god as though to kiss its
Lord and Father.
A shout like a thunder-clap-like the roar of breakers on a reef, burst
from the spectators; a shout of triumph so mighty that the statues
quivered, the brazen altars rang, the hangings swayed, the sacred
vessels clattered and the lamps trembled and swung; the echo rolled
round the aisles like a whirlpool at the flood, and was dashed from
pillar to column in a hundred wavelets of sound. The glorious sun still
recognized its lord; Serapis still reigned in undiminished might; he had
not yet lost the power to defend himself, his world and his children!
The sun was gone, night fell on the temple and suddenly there was a
swaying movement of the apse above the statue; the stars were shaken by
invisible hands, and colored flames twinkled with dazzling brightness
from a myriad five-rayed perforations. Once more the god was revealed to
his worshippers under a flood of magical glory, and now fully visible in
his unique beauty. Again the great halls rang with the acclamations of
the delirious throng; Olympius stepped forth, arrayed in a flowing robe
with the insignia and decorations of the high-priesthood; standing in
front of the image he poured on the pedestal a libation to the gods out
of a golden cup, and waved a censer of the costliest incense. Then, in
burning words, he exhorted all the followers of Serapis to fight and
conquer for their god, or--if need must--to perish for and with him. He
added a fervent prayer in a loud ringing voice--a cry for help that came
from the bottom of his heart, and went to the souls of his hearers.
Then a solemn hymn was chanted as the curtain was raised; and while
the assembled multitude watched it rise in reverent silence, the
temple-servants lighted the lamps that illuminated the sanctuary from
every cornice and pillar.
Karnis had left hold of his companions’ hands, for he wanted to wipe
away the tears of devotional excitement that flowed down his withered
cheeks; Orpheus had thrown his arms round his mother, and Porphyrius,
who had joined a group of philosophers and sages, sent a glance of
sympathy to the old musician.