to Athens was to me as a picture from the ancient chronicles. Yes, I see
in him David born again, to smite the champions of the heathen. God’s
spirit watch over him in the strife, now and for ever.”
JULIAN.
[_Grasping his arm._] Enough of that! She too? What is it that you all,
as with one mouth, demand of me? Have I sealed you a bond to do battle
with the lions of power——?
BASIL.
How comes it that all believers look towards you in breathless
expectation?
JULIAN.
[_Paces once or twice up and down the colonnade, then stops and
stretches out his hand for the letter._] Give it to me; let me see.
[_Reading._] “God’s spirit watch over him in the strife, now and for
ever.”—
Oh, Basil, if I could——! But I feel like Daedalus, between sky and sea.
An appalling height and an abysmal depth.—What sense is there in these
voices calling to me, from east and west, that I must save Christendom?
Where is it, this Christendom that I am to save? With the Emperor or
with Caesar? I think their deeds cry out, “No, no!” Among the powerful
and high-born;—among those sensual and effeminate courtiers who fold
their hands over their full bellies, and quaver: “Was the Son of God
created out of nothing?” Or among the men of enlightenment, those who,
like you and me, have drunk in beauty and learning from the heathen
fountains? Do not most of our fellows lean to the Arian heresy, which
the Emperor himself so greatly favours?—And then the whole ragged rabble
of the Empire, who rage against the temples, who massacre heathens and
the children of heathens! Is it for Christ’s sake? Ha ha! see how they
fall to fighting among themselves for the spoils of the slain.—Ask
Makrina if Christendom is to be sought in the wilderness,—on the pillar
where the stylite-saint stands on one leg? Or is it in the cities?
Perhaps among those bakers in Constantinople who lately took to their
fists to decide whether the Trinity consists of three individuals or of
three hypostases!—Which of all these would Christ acknowledge if he came
down to earth again?—Out with your Diogenes-lantern, Basil! Enlighten
this pitchy darkness.—Where is Christendom?
BASIL.
Seek the answer where it is ever to be found in evil days.
JULIAN.
Hold me not aloof from the well of your wisdom! Slake my thirst, if you
can. Where shall I seek and find?
BASIL.
In the writings of holy men.
JULIAN.
The same despairing answer. Books,—always books! When I came to
Libanius, it was: books, books! I come to you,—books, books, books!
Stones for bread! I cannot live on books;—it is life I hunger
for,—face-to-face communion with the spirit. Was it a book that made
Saul a seer? Was it not a flood of light that enveloped him, a vision, a
voice——?
BASIL.
Do you forget the vision and the voice which that Agathon of Makellon——?
JULIAN.
An enigmatic message; an oracle I cannot interpret. Was _I_ the chosen
one? The “heir to the empire,” it said. And what empire——? That matter
is beset with a thousand uncertainties. Only this I know: Athens is not
the lion’s den. But where, where? Oh, I grope like Saul in the darkness.
If Christ would have aught of me, he must speak plainly. Let me touch
the nail-wound——
BASIL.
And yet it is written——
JULIAN.
[_With a gesture of impatience._] I know all that is written. This “it
is written” is not the living truth. Do you not feel disgust and nausea,
as on board ship in a windless swell, heaving to and fro between life,
and written doctrine, and heathen wisdom and beauty? There must come a
new revelation. Or a revelation of something new. It must come, I
say;—the time is ripe.—Ah, a revelation! Oh, Basil, could your prayers
call down that upon me! A martyr’s death, if need be——! A martyr’s
death—ah, it makes me dizzy with its sweetness; the crown of thorns on
my brow——! [_He clasps his head with both hands,_ _feels the wreath of
roses, which he tears off, bethinks himself long, and says softly_:]
That! I had forgotten that! [_Casting the wreath away._] One thing alone
have I learnt in Athens.
BASIL.
What, Julian?
JULIAN.
The old beauty is no longer beautiful, and the new truth is no longer
true.
_LIBANIUS enters hastily through the colonnade on the right._
LIBANIUS.
[_Still in the distance._] Now we have him; now we have him!
JULIAN.
Him? I thought you would have had them both.
LIBANIUS.
Both of whom?
JULIAN.
Milo’s sons.
LIBANIUS.
Ah, yes, I have them too. But we have _him_, my Julian!
JULIAN.
Whom, dear brother?
LIBANIUS.
He has caught himself in his own net!
JULIAN.
Aha—a philosopher then?
LIBANIUS.
The enemy of all wisdom.
JULIAN.
Who, who, I ask?
LIBANIUS.
Do you really not know? Have you not heard the news about Maximus?
JULIAN.
Maximus? Oh, pray tell me——
LIBANIUS.
Who could fail to see whither that restless visionary was tending,—step
by step towards madness——?
JULIAN.
In other words, towards the highest wisdom.
LIBANIUS.
Ah, that is a figure of speech. But now is the time to act, to seize the
opportunity. You, our dearly-prized Julian, you are the man. You are the
Emperor’s near kinsman. The hopes of all true friends of wisdom are
fixed upon you, both here and in Nikomedia——
JULIAN.
Listen, oh excellent Libanius,—seeing I am not omniscient——
LIBANIUS.
Know, then, that Maximus has lately made open avowal of what lies at the
bottom of his teaching.
JULIAN.
And do you blame him for that?
LIBANIUS.
He has averred that he has power over spirits and shades of the dead.
JULIAN.
[_Grasping his cloak._] Libanius!
LIBANIUS.
All on board the ship were full of the most marvellous stories, and
here—— [_He shows a letter_], here, my colleague, Eusebius, writes at
length on the subject.
JULIAN.
Spirits and shades——
LIBANIUS.
At Ephesus lately, in a large assembly both of his partisans and his
opponents. Maximus applied forbidden arts to the statue of Hecate. It
took place in the goddess’s temple. Eusebius writes that he himself was
present, and saw everything from first to last. All was in pitch-black
darkness. Maximus uttered strange incantations; then he chanted a hymn,
which no one understood. Then the marble torch in the statue’s hand
burst into flame——
BASIL.
Impious doings!
JULIAN.
[_Breathlessly._] And then——?
LIBANIUS.
In the strong bluish light, they all saw the statue’s face come to life
and smile at them.
JULIAN.
What more?
LIBANIUS.
Terror seized on the minds of most. All rushed towards the doors. Many
have lain sick or raving ever since. But he himself—would you believe
it, Julian?—in spite of the fate that befell his two brothers in
Constantinople, he goes boldly forward on his reckless and scandalous
way.
JULIAN.
Scandalous? Call you that way scandalous? Is not this the end of all
wisdom. Communion between spirit and spirit——
BASIL.
Oh, dear, misguided friend——!
LIBANIUS.
More than scandalous, I call it! What is Hecate? What are the gods, as a
whole, in the eyes of enlightened humanity? We have happily left far
behind us the blind old singer’s days. Maximus ought to know better than
that. Has not Plato—and we others after him—shed the light of
interpretation over the whole? Is it not scandalous now, in our own
days, to seek to enshroud afresh in riddles and misty dreams this
admirable, palpable, and, let me add, this laboriously constructed
edifice of ideas and interpretations which we, as lovers of wisdom, as a
school, as——
JULIAN.
[_Wildly._] Basil, farewell! I see a light on my path!
BASIL.
[_Flinging his arms around him._] I will not let you go; I will hold you
fast!
JULIAN.
[_Extricating himself from his grasp._] No one shall withhold me;—kick
not against the pricks——
LIBANIUS.
What frenzy is this? Friend, brother, colleague, whither would you go?
JULIAN.
Thither, thither, where torches light themselves and where statues
smile!
LIBANIUS.
And you can do this! You, Julian, our pride, our light, our hope,—you
can think of rushing to bewildered Ephesus, to give yourself into a
juggler’s power! Know that in the hour you so deeply debase yourself, in
that same hour you throw away all that bright renown for learning and
eloquence which, during these years in Pergamos and Nikomedia, and
especially here in the great school of Athens——
JULIAN.
Oh, the school, the school! Do you pore over your books;—you have
pointed my way to the man for whom I have been seeking.
[_He goes off hastily through the colonnade to the left._
LIBANIUS.
[_Looking after him awhile._] This princely youth is a menace to
enlightenment.
BASIL.
[_Half to himself._] Prince Julian is a menace to more than that.
ACT THIRD
_In Ephesus. A brightly lighted hall in PRINCE JULIAN’S dwelling. The
entrance from the vestibule is on the right side; further back, a
smaller door, covered by a curtain. On the left, a door, which
leads to the inner part of the house. The wall in the back is
pierced with an archway, through which a small enclosed court is
visible, decked with small statues._
_Servants prepare a festal supper, and lay cushions round the table. The
Chamberlain, EUTHERIUS, stands at the entrance, and, with much
ceremony, half forces GREGORY OF NAZIANZUS and BASIL OF CAESAREA
to enter._
EUTHERIUS.
Yes, yes; I assure you it is as I say.
GREGORY.
Impossible! Do not make sport of us.
BASIL.
You are jesting, friend! How can your master expect us? Not a creature
knew of our leaving Athens; nothing has detained us on our way; we have
kept pace with the clouds and the wild cranes.
EUTHERIUS.
Look around; see yonder table. His daily fare is herbs and bread.
GREGORY.
Ay, truly; all our senses bear you witness;—wine-flagons, wreathed with
flowers and leaves; lamps and fruits; incense filling the hall with its
odour; flute-players before the door——
EUTHERIUS.
Early this morning he sent for me. He seemed unwontedly happy, for he
paced the room to and fro, rubbing his hands. “Prepare a rich banquet,”
said he, “for before evening I look for two friends from Athens——”
[_He glances towards the door on the left, is suddenly silent,
and draws back respectfully._
BASIL.
Is he there?
[_EUTHERIUS nods in answer; then gives a sign to the servants to
withdraw; they go out by the larger door on the right; he
follows._
_PRINCE JULIAN shortly afterwards enters from the left. He is dressed in
long, Oriental garb; his whole demeanour is vivacious, and betrays
strong inward excitement._
JULIAN.
[_Going towards them, and greeting them with great warmth._] I see you!
I have you! Thanks, thanks, for sending your spirits to herald your
bodies!
GREGORY.
Julian!
BASIL.
My friend and brother!
JULIAN.
I have been like a lover, languishing for the pressure of your hands.
The court vermin, eager for certain persons’ applause, called me an
ape;—oh, would I had an ape’s four hands, to squeeze yours all at once!
GREGORY.
But explain——; your servants meet us with flutes before the door, want
to lead us to the bath, to anoint our hair and deck us with roses——
JULIAN.
I saw you last night. The moon was full, you see,—and then is the spirit
always strangely alert within me. I sat at the table in my library, and
had fallen asleep, weary, oh! so weary, my friends, with research and
writing. Of a sudden it seemed as though a storm-wind filled the house;
the curtain was swept flapping aloft, and I looked out into the night,
far over the sea. I heard sweet singing; and the singers were two large
birds, with women’s faces. They flew slanting towards the shore; there
they dropped gently earthwards; the bird-forms melted away like a white
mist, and, in a soft, glimmering light, I saw you two.
GREGORY.
Are you sure of all this?
JULIAN.
Were you thinking of me? Were you speaking of me last night?
BASIL.
Yes, yes—forward in the prow——
JULIAN.
What time of the night was it?
GREGORY.
What was the time of your vision?
JULIAN.
An hour after midnight.
GREGORY.
[_With a look at BASIL._] Strange!
JULIAN.
[_Rubbing his hands, and walking up and down the room._] You see! Ha-ha;
you see?
BASIL.
[_Following him with his eyes._] Ah, then it is true——
JULIAN.
What? What is true?
BASIL.
The rumour of the mysterious arts you practise here.
JULIAN.
Oh, what will not rumour exaggerate?—But tell me, what has rumour found
to say? I am told there are many reports afloat concerning me. If I
could believe some people’s assurances, it would seem that there are few
men in the empire so much talked about as I.
GREGORY.
That you may safely believe.
JULIAN.
And what says Libanius to all this? He could never endure that the
multitude should be busied with any one but himself. And what say all my
never-to-be-forgotten friends in Athens? They know I am in disgrace with
the Emperor and the whole court?
GREGORY.
You? I have frequent intelligence from the court; but my brother
Caesarius makes no mention of that.
JULIAN.
I cannot interpret it otherwise, good Gregory! From all sides they think
it needful to watch me. The other day, Gallus Caesar sent his chaplain
Aëtius hither, to find out whether I hold fast to the orthodox faith.
BASIL.
Well——?
JULIAN.
I am seldom absent from matins in the church. Moreover, I reckon the
martyrs among the noblest of men; for truly it is no light matter to
endure so great torments, ay, and death itself, for the sake of one’s
creed. On the whole, I believe Aëtius departed well content with me.
BASIL.
[_Grasping his hand._] Julian,—for the sake of our true friendship,—open
your heart fully to us.
JULIAN.
I am the happiest man on earth, dear friends! And Maximus—ay, he is
rightly named—Maximus is the greatest man that has ever lived.
GREGORY.
[_Preparing to depart._] We only wished to see you, my lord!
JULIAN.
Can this estrange brother from brother? You shrink in affright from the
inexplicable. Oh, I do not wonder. So I, too, shrank before my eyes were
opened, and I divined that which is the kernel of life.
BASIL.
What do you call the kernel of life?
JULIAN.
Maximus knows it. In him is the new revelation.
BASIL.
And it has been imparted to you?
JULIAN.
Almost. I am on the eve of learning it. This very night Maximus has
promised me——
GREGORY.
Maximus is a visionary, or else he is deceiving you——!
JULIAN.
How dare you judge of these hidden things? They are beyond your
learning, my Gregory! Fearful is the way into the glory of glories.
Those dreamers in Eleusis were near the right track; Maximus found it,
and I after him—by his help. I have wandered through chasms of darkness.
A dead swampy water lay on my left—I believe it was a stream that had
forgotten to flow. Piercing voices shrilled through the night
confusedly, suddenly, and, as it were, without cause. Now and then I saw
a bluish light; dreadful shapes floated past me;—I went on and on in
deathly fear; but I endured the trial to the end.—
Since then—oh, beloved ones—with this my body transformed to spirit, I
have passed far into the land of paradise; I have heard the angels chant
their hymns of praise; I have gazed at the midmost light——
GREGORY.
Woe to this ungodly Maximus! Woe to this devil-devoted heathen juggler!
JULIAN.
Blindness, blindness! Maximus pays homage to his precursor and
brother—to both his great brothers, the law-giver of Sinai and the seer
of Nazareth.——
Would you know how the spirit of realisation filled me?—It happened on a
night of prayer and fasting. I perceived that I was wafted far—far out
into space, and beyond time; for there was broad and sun-shimmering day
around me, and I stood alone on a ship, with drooping sails, in the
midst of the glassy, gleaming Aegean sea. Islands towered aloft in the
distance, like dim, still banks of clouds, and the ship lay heavily, as
though sleeping, upon the wine-blue plain.—
Then behold! the plain became more and more transparent, lighter,
thinner; at last, it was no longer there, and my ship hung over a
fearful, empty abyss. No verdure down there, no sunlight,—only the dead,
black, slimy bottom of the sea, in all its ghastly nakedness.——
But above, in the boundless dome, which before had seemed to me
empty,—there was life; there invisibility clothed itself in form, and
silence became sound.—Then I grasped the great redeeming realisation.
GREGORY.
What realisation do you mean?
JULIAN.
That which is, is not; and that which is not, is.
BASIL.
Oh, you are going to wreck and ruin in this maze of mists and gleams!
JULIAN.
I? Do not miracles happen? Do not both omens and certain strange
appearances among the stars declare that the divine will destines me to
issues yet unrevealed?
GREGORY.
Do not believe such signs; you cannot know whose work they are.
JULIAN.
Am I not to believe in fortunate omens which events have already borne
out?
[_He draws them nearer to him, and says softly._
Know, my friends, that a great revolution is at hand. Gallus Caesar and
I shall ere long share the dominion of the earth—he as Emperor, and I
as—what shall I call it? the unborn cannot be called by a name, for it
has none. So no more of this till the time be fulfilled. But of Caesar I
dare speak.—Have you heard of the vision for which Apollinaris, a
citizen of Sidon, has been imprisoned and put to the torture?
BASIL.
No, no; how can we know——?
JULIAN.
Apollinaris declared that he heard some one knocking many times at his
door by night. He arose, and went out from his house; and lo! there he
saw an apparition—whether man or woman, he could not tell. And the
apparition spoke to him, and bade him make ready a purple robe, such as
newly-chosen rulers wear. But when Apollinaris, in affright, would have
declined so dangerous a task, the apparition vanished, and only a voice
cried: “Go, go, Apollinaris, and speedily prepare the purple robe.”
GREGORY.
Was this the sign that you said events had borne out?
JULIAN.
[_Nodding slowly._] Seven days later Caesar’s wife died in Bithynia.
Constantina has always been his bad angel; therefore she had to be
removed, in accordance with the change in the divine will. Three weeks
after Constantina’s death, the Emperor’s emissary, the tribune Scudilo,
came with a great retinue to Antioch, greeted Gallus Caesar with
imperial honours, and invited him, in the Emperor’s name, to visit the
imperial camp at Rome.—Caesar’s journey from province to province is now
like a conqueror’s progress. In Constantinople he has held races in the
hippodrome, and the multitude loudly acclaimed him when he, though as
yet but Caesar by title, stood forth after the manner of the earlier
Emperors, and gave the crown to Corax, the winner in the race. Thus
marvellously does God again exalt our house, which had sunk under sin
and persecution.
GREGORY.
Strange! In Athens other reports were abroad.
JULIAN.
I have certain information. The purple robe will soon be needed,
Gregory! How, then, can I doubt as to the things which Maximus has
foretold as near at hand for _me_? To-night the last veil falls. Here
shall the great enigma be made manifest. Oh, stay with me, my
brothers—stay with me through this night of anxiety and expectation!
When Maximus comes you shall witness——
BASIL.
Never!
GREGORY.
It cannot be; we are on our way home to Cappadocia.
JULIAN.
And what has driven you in such haste from Greece?
BASIL.
My mother is a widow, Julian!
GREGORY.
My father is feeble, both in body and mind; he needs my support.
JULIAN.
Oh, at least remain at the hostelry; only until to-morrow——!
GREGORY.
Impossible; our travelling companions start at daybreak.
JULIAN.
At daybreak? Before midnight the day might dawn for you.
BASIL.
Julian, let me not set forth in too great sorrow of soul. Tell me,—when
Maximus has interpreted all riddles for you,—what then?
JULIAN.
Do you remember that river whereof Strabo writes—that river which rises
in the Lybian mountains? It grows, and grows in its course; but when it
is at its greatest, it oozes into the desert sands, and buries itself in
the entrails of the earth, whence it arose.
BASIL.
Say not that you long for death, Julian!
JULIAN.
What you slavishly hope for after death, ’tis the aim of the great
mystery to win for all the initiated, here in our earthly life. ’Tis
regeneration that Maximus and his disciples seek,—’tis our lost likeness
to the godhead. Wherefore so full of doubt, my brothers? Why do you
stand there as though before something insurmountable? I know what I
know. In each successive generation there has been one soul wherein the
pure Adam has been born again; he was strong in Moses the lawgiver; in
the Macedonian Alexander he had power to subdue the world; he was
well-nigh perfect in Jesus of Nazareth. But see, Basil—[_He grasps him
by the arm_]—all of them lacked what is promised to _me_—the pure woman!
BASIL.
[_Freeing himself._] Julian, Julian!
GREGORY.
Blasphemer—to this has your pride of heart brought you!
BASIL.
Oh, Gregory, he is sick and beside himself!
JULIAN.
Why all this scornful doubt? Is it my small stature that witnesses
against me? Ha, ha; I tell you this gross and fleshly generation shall
pass away. That which is to come shall be conceived rather in the soul
than in the body. In the first Adam, soul and body were equally
balanced, as in those statues of the god Apollo. Since then the balance
has been lost. Was not Moses tongue-tied? Had not his arms to be
supported when he held them up in imprecation, there by the Red Sea? Did
not the Macedonian need ever to be fired by strong drinks and other
artificial aids? And Jesus of Nazareth, too? Was he not feeble in body?
Did he not fall asleep in the ship, whilst the others kept awake? Did he
not faint under the cross, that cross which the Jew Simon carried with
ease? The two thieves did not faint.—You call yourselves believers, and
yet have so little faith in miraculous revelation. Wait, wait—you shall
see; the Bride shall surely be given me; and then—hand in hand will we
go forth to the east, where some say that Helios is born,—we will hide
ourselves in the solitudes, as the godhead hides itself, seek out the
grove on the banks of Euphrates, find it, and there—oh glory of
glories!—thence shall a new race, perfect in beauty and in balance, go
forth over the earth; there, ye book-worshipping doubters, there shall
the empire of the spirit be founded!
BASIL.
Oh, well may I wring my hands in sorrow for your sake. Are you the same
Julian who, three years ago, came out of Constantinople?
JULIAN.
Then I was blind, as you are now; I knew only the way that stops short
at doctrine.
GREGORY.
Know you where your present way ends?
JULIAN.
Where the path and the goal are one.—For the last time, Gregory, Basil—I
implore you to stay with me. The vision I had last night,—that and many
other things, point to a mysterious bond between us. To you, my Basil, I
had so much to say. You are the head of your house; and who knows
whether all the blessings that are promised me—may not come through you
and yours——
BASIL.
Never! No one with my good will shall ever be led away by your frenzies
and your wild dreams.
JULIAN.
Ah, why talk of will? I see a hand writing on the wall; soon I shall
interpret the writing.
GREGORY.
Come, Basil.
JULIAN.
[_With outstretched arms._] Oh, my friends, my friends!
GREGORY.
Between us there is a gulf from this day forward.
[_He drags BASIL with him; both go out to the right._
JULIAN.
[_Looking after them._] Ay, go! Go, go!—What do you two learned men
know? What bring you from the city of wisdom? You, my strong, masterful
Gregory,—and you, Basil, more girl than man—you know only two streets in
Athens, the street to the schools, and the street to the church; of the
third street toward Eleusis and further, you know naught; and still
less——. Ah!
_The curtain on the right is drawn aside. Two servants in eastern
costume bring in a tall, veiled object, which they place in the
corner, behind the table. Shortly after, MAXIMUS THE MYSTIC enters
by the same door. He is a lean man of middle height, with a
bronzed, hawk-like face; his hair and beard are much grizzled, but
his thick eyebrows and moustache still retain their pitch-black
colour. He wears a pointed cap and a long black robe; in his hand
he carries a white wand._
_MAXIMUS goes, without heeding JULIAN, up to the veiled object, stops,
and makes a sign to the servants; they retire noiselessly._
JULIAN.
[_Softly._] At last!
[_MAXIMUS draws the veil away, revealing a bronze lamp on a high
tripod; then he takes out a little silver pitcher, and pours
oil into the lamp-bowl. The lamp lights of itself, and burns
with a strong reddish glare._
JULIAN.
[_In eager expectancy._] Is the time come?
MAXIMUS.
[_Without looking at him._] Art thou pure in soul and body?
JULIAN.