struck at others, it behoved me to reprove my own. It was no easy
service, as you may guess, but it must be done. And not only was Aurelia
herself pertinaciously wedded to this fatal mischief, but she was
subduing the manly mind of Mucapor too, who, had he been successfully
wrought upon, were as good as dead to me and to Rome--and he is one whom
our legions cannot spare. We have Christians more than enough already in
our ranks: a Christian general was not to be borne. This was additional
matter of accusation against Aurelia, and made it right that she should
die. But she had her free choice of life, honor, rank, riches, and,
added to all, Mucapor, whose equal Rome does not hold, if she would but
take them. One word spoken and they were all her own; with no small
chance that she should one day be what Livia is. But that one word her
obstinate superstition would not let her speak.'
'No, Aurelian; there is that in the Christian superstition that always
forbids the uttering of that one word. Death to the Christian is but
another word for life. Apostacy is the true death. You have destroyed
the body of Aurelia, but her virtuous soul is already with God, and it
is you who have girded upon her brow a garland that shall never fade. Of
that much may you make your boast.'
'Piso, I bear with you, and shall; but there is no other in Rome who
might say so much.'
'Nay, nay, Aurelian, there I believe you better than you make yourself.
To him who is already the victim of the axe or the beasts do you never
deny the liberty of the tongue,--such as it then is.'
'Upon Piso, and he the husband of Julia, I can inflict no evil, nor
permit it done.'
'I would take shelter, Aurelian, neither behind my own name, my
father's, nor my wife's. I am a Christian--and such fate as may befall
the rest, I would share. Yet not willingly, for life and happiness are
dear to me as to you--and they are dear to all these innocent multitudes
whom you do now, in the exercise of despotic power, doom to a sudden and
abhorred death. Bethink yourself, Aurelian, before it be too late--'
'I have bethought myself of it all,' he replied--'and were the suffering
ten times more, and the blood to be poured out a thousand times more, I
would draw back not one step. The die has been cast; it has come up as
it is, and so must be the game. I listen to no appeal.'
'Not from me,' I replied; 'but surely you will not deny a hearing to
what these people may say in their own defence. That were neither just
nor merciful; nor were it like Aurelian. There is much which by their
proper organs they might say to place before you their faith in the
light of truth. You have heard what you have received concerning it,
chiefly from the lips of Fronto; and can he know what he has never
learned? or tell it unperverted by prejudices black as night?'
'I have already said,' rejoined the Emperor, 'that I would hear them,
and I will. But it can avail them no more than words uttered in the
breath of the tempest that is raging up from the north. Hear them! This
day have I already heard them--from one of those madmen of theirs who
plague the streets of Rome. Passing early by the temple of
Æsculapius--that one which stands not an arrow's flight from the column
of Trajan--I came upon a dense crowd of all sorts of persons listening
to a gaunt figure of a man who spoke to them. Soon as I came against
him, and paused on my horse for the crowd to make way, the wild beast
who was declaiming, shouted at me at the top of his voice, calling on me
to 'hear the word of God which he would speak to me.' Knowing him by
such jargon to be a Christian, I did as he desired, and there stood,
while he, for my especial instruction, laid bare the iniquities and
follies of the Roman worship; sent the priesthood and all who entered
their temples to the infernal regions; and prophesied against
Rome--which he termed Babylon--that ere so many centuries were gone,
her walls would lie even with the ground, her temples moulder in ruins,
her language become extinct, and her people confounded with other
nations and lost. And all this because, I, whom he now called, if I
remember the names aright, Ahaz and now Nebuchadnezzar, oppressed the
children of God and held them in captivity: while in the same breath he
bid me come on with my chains, gibbets, beasts, crosses, and fires, for
they were ready, and would rejoice to bear their testimony in the cause
of Christ. As I turned to resume my way, his words were; 'Go on, thou
man of pride and blood; go on thy way! The gates of hell swing open for
thee! Already the arm of the Lord is bared against thee! the winged
lightning struggles in his hand to smite thee! I hear thy cry for mercy
which no one answers--' and more, till I was beyond the reach of his
owl's voice. There was an appeal, Piso, from this people! What think you
of it?'
'He whom you heard,' I replied, 'I know, and know him to be honest and
true; as loyal a subject too as Rome holds. He is led away by his hot
and hasty temper both to do and say what injures not only him, but all
who are joined with him, and the cause he defends. He offends the
Christians hardly less than others. Judge not all by him. He stands
alone. If you would hear one whom all alike confide in, and who may
fitly represent the feelings and principles of the whole body of
Christians, summon Probus. From him may you learn without exaggeration
or concealment, without reproach of others or undue boasting of
themselves, what the Christians are in their doctrines and their lives,
as citizens of Rome and loyal subjects of Aurelian, and what, as
citizens of heaven and loyal followers of Jesus Christ.'
The Emperor promised to consider it. He had no other reason to deny such
favor, but the tedium of listening to what could profit neither him nor
others.
We then turned toward the palace, where I saw Livia; now as silent and
sad as, when in Palmyra, she was lively and gay. Not that Aurelian
abates the least of his worship, but that the gloom which overshadows
him imparts itself to her, and that knowing what has befallen Aurelia,
she cannot but feel it to be a possible thing for the blow to fall
elsewhere and nearer. Yet is there the same outward show as ever. The
palace is still thronged, with not Rome only, but by strangers from all
quarters of the empire, anxious to pay their homage at once to the
Empress of Rome, to the most beautiful woman in the world--such is the
language--and to a daughter of the far-famed Zenobia.
The city is now crowded with travelers of all nations, so much so that
the inns can scarce receive them; and hardly ever before was private
hospitality so put to all its resources. With all, and everywhere, in
the streets, at the public baths, in the porticos, at the private or
public banquet, the Christians are the one absorbing topic. And, at
least, this good comes with the evil, that thus the character of this
religion, as compared with that of Rome and other faiths, is made known
to thousands who might otherwise never have heard of it, or have felt
interest enough in it to examine its claims. It leads to a large demand
for, and sale of, our sacred books. The copyists can hardly supply them
so fast as they are wanted. For in the case of any dispute or
conversation, it is common to hear the books themselves referred to,
and then to be called in as witnesses for or against a statement made.
And pleasant enough is it to see how clear the general voice is on our
side--especially with the strangers--how indignant they are, for the
most part, that violence, to the extreme of another Decian persecution,
should be so much as dreamed of. Would that the same could be said of
our citizens and countrymen! A large proportion of them indeed embrace
the same liberal sentiments, but a greater part, if not for extreme
violence, are yet for oppression and suppression; and I dare not say how
many, for all that Aurelian himself designs. Among the lower orders,
especially, a ferocious and blood-thirsty spirit breaks out in a
thousand ways that fills the bosom both with grief and terror.
The clouds are gathering over us, Fausta, heavy and black with the
tempest pent up within. The thunders are rolling in the distance, and
each hour coming nearer and nearer. Whom the lightnings shall
strike--how vain to conjecture! Would to God that Julia were
anywhere but here! For, to you I may say it, I cannot trust
Aurelian--yes--Aurelian himself I may; but not Aurelian the tool of
Fronto. Farewell.
LETTER IX.
FROM PISO TO FAUSTA.
When I turned from the palace of Aurelian and again took my way towards
the Coelian, I did it in the belief that before the day should end,
edicts against the Christians would be published. I found, as I
conversed with many whom I met in the way, that from other sources the
same opinion had become common. In one manner or another it had come
abroad that measures had been resolved upon by the Emperor, and would
soon be put in force. Many indeed do not give the least credit to the
rumors, and believe that they all spring from the violent language of
Fronto, which has been reported as that of Aurelian. You may wonder that
there should be such uncertainty respecting a great design like this.
But you must remember that Aurelian has of late shrouded himself in a
studied obscurity. Not a despot, in the despotic lands of Asia, keeps
more secret counsel than he, or leans less upon the opinion or advice of
others. All that is done throughout the vast compass of the empire,
springs from him alone--all the affairs of foreign and dependent
kingdoms are arranged and determined by him. As for Italy and the
capital, they are mere playthings in his hand. You ask if the senate
does not still exist? I answer, it does; but, as a man exists whom a
palsy has made but half alive; the body is there, but the soul is gone,
and even the body is asleep. The senators, with all becoming gravity,
assemble themselves at the capitol, and what time they sleep not away
the tedious hours in their ivory chairs, they debate such high matters
as, 'whether the tax which this year falls heavy upon Capua, by reason
of a blast upon the grapes, shall be lightened or remitted!' or 'whether
the petition of the Milanese for the construction at the public expense
of a granary shall be answered favorably!' or 'whether V. P. Naso shall
be granted a new trial after defeat at the highest court!' Not that
there is not virtue in the senate, some dignity, some respect and love
for the liberties of Rome--witness myself--but that the Emperor has
engrossed the whole empire to himself, and nothing is left for that body
but to keep alive the few remaining forms of ancient liberty, by
assembling as formerly, and taking care of whatever insignificant
affairs are intrusted to them. In a great movement like this against the
Christians, Aurelian does not so much as recognize their existence. No
advice is asked, no coöperation. And the less is he disposed to
communicate with them in the present instance perhaps, from knowing so
well that the measure would find no favor in their eyes; but would, on
the contrary, be violently opposed. Everything, accordingly, originates
in the sovereign will of Aurelian, and is carried into effect by his arm
wielding the total power of this boundless empire--being now, what it
has been his boast to make it, coëxtensive with its extremest borders as
they were in the time of the Antonines. There is no power to resist him;
nor are there many who dare to utter their real opinions, least of all,
a senator, or a noble. A beggar in the street may do it with better
chance of its being respected, if agreeable to him, and of escaping
rebuke or worse, if it be unpalatable. To the people, he is still, as
ever, courteous and indulgent.
* * * * *
There is throughout the city a strange silence and gloom, as if in
expectancy of some great calamity; or of some event of dark and
uncertain character. The Christians go about their affairs as usual, not
ceasing from any labors, nor withdrawing from the scene of danger; but
with firm step and serious air keep on their way as if conscious of the
great part which it is theirs to act, and resolved that it shall not
suffer at their hands. Many with whom I have spoken, put on even a
cheerful air as they have greeted me, and after the usual morning's
salutation, have passed on as if things were in their usual train.
Others with pale face and quivering lip confessed the inward tumult, and
that, if they feared naught for themselves, there were those at home,
helpless and exposed, for whom the heart bled, and for whom it could not
but show signs of fear.
I met the elder Demetrius. His manly and thoughtful countenance--though
it betrayed nothing of weakness--was agitated with suppressed emotion.
He is a man full of courage, but full of sensibility too. His affections
are warm and tender as those of a girl. He asked me 'what I could inform
him of the truth of the rumors which were now afloat of the most
terrific character.' I saw where his heart was as he spoke, and answered
him, as you may believe, with pain and reluctance. I knew, indeed, that
the whole truth would soon break upon him--it was a foolish
weakness--but I could hardly bring myself to tell him what a few hours
would probably reveal. I told him, however, all that I had just learned
from Aurelian himself, and which, as he made no reserve with regard to
me, nor enjoined concealment, I did not doubt was fully resolved upon,
and would be speedily put in force. As I spoke, the countenance of the
Greek grew pale beyond its usual hue of paleness. He bent his head, as
in perplexed and anxious thought; the tears were ready to overflow as he
raised it, after a moment, and said,
'Piso, I am but recently a Christian. I know nothing of this religion
but its beauty and truth. It is what I have ever longed for, and now
that I possess it I value it far more than life. But,'--he paused a
moment--'I have mingled but little with this people; I know scarcely
any; I am ignorant of what they require of those who belong to their
number in such emergences. I am ready to die myself, rather than shrink
from a bold acknowledgment of what in my heart I believe to be the
divinest truth; but--my wife and my children!--must they too meet these
dangers? My wife has become what I am; my children are but infants; a
Greek vessel sails to-morrow for Scio, where dwells, in peaceful
security, the father of my wife, from whom I received her, almost to his
distraction; her death would be his immolation. Should I offend'--
'Surely not,' I replied. 'If, as I believe will happen, the edicts of
the Emperor should be published to-day, put them on board to-night, and
let to-morrow see them floating on the Mediterranean. We are not all to
stand still and hold our throats to the knife of this imperial butcher.'
'God be thanked!' said Demetrius, and grasping my hand with fervor
turned quickly and moved in the direction of his home.
Soon after, seated with Julia and Probus--he had joined me as I parted
from Demetrius--I communicated to her all that I had heard at the
palace. It neither surprised nor alarmed her. But she could not repress
her grief at the prospect spread out before us of so much suffering to
the innocent.
'How hard is this,' said she, 'to be called to bear such testimony as
must now be borne to truth! These Christian multitudes, so many of whom
have but just adopted their new faith and begun to taste of the
pleasures it imparts, all enjoying in such harmony and quietness their
rich blessings--with many their only blessings--how hard for them, all
at once, to see the foundations of their peace broken up, and their very
lives clamored for! rulers and people setting upon them as troops of
wild beasts! It demands almost more faith than I can boast, to sit here
without complaint a witness of such wrong. How strange, Probus, that
life should be made so difficult! That not a single possession worth
having can be secured without so much either of labor or endurance! I
wonder if this is ever to cease on earth?'
'I can hardly suppose that it will,' said Probus. 'Labor and suffering,
in some of their forms, seem both essential. My arm would be weak as a
rush were it never moved; but exercised, and you see it is nervous and
strong; plied like a smith's, and it grows to be hard as iron and
capable of miracles. So it is with any faculty you may select; the
harder it is tasked the more worthy it becomes; and without tasking at
all, it is worth nothing. So seems to me it is with the whole man. In a
smooth and even lot our worth never would be known, and we could respect
neither ourselves nor others. Greatness and worth come only of collision
and conflict. Let our path be strewed with roses, and soft southern
gales ever blow, and earth send up of her own accord our ready prepared
nutriment, and mankind would be but one huge multitude of Sybarites,
dissolved in sloth and effeminacy. If no difficulty opposed, no labor
exacted, body and mind were dead. Hence it is, we may believe, that man
must everywhere labor even for the food which is necessary to mere
existence. Life is made dear to us by an instinct--we shrink from
nothing as we do from the mere thought of non-existence--but still it is
death or toil; that is the alternative. So that labor is thus insured
wherever man is found, and it is this that makes him what he is. Then he
is made, moreover, so as to crave not only food but knowledge as much,
and also virtue; but between him and both these objects there are
interposed, for the same reason doubtless, mountains of difficulty,
which he must clamber up and over before he can bask in the pleasant
fields that lie beyond, and then ascend the distant mountain-tops, from
which but a single step removes him from the abode of God. Doubt it not,
lady, that it is never in vain and for naught that man labors and
suffers; but that the good which redounds is in proportion to what is
undergone, and more than a compensation. If, in these times of darkness
and fear, suffering is more, goodness and faith are more also. There are
Christians, and men, made by such trials, that are never made elsewhere
nor otherwise--nor can be; just as the arm of Hercules could not be but
by the labors of Hercules. What says Macer? Why even this, that God is
to be thanked for this danger, for that the church needs it! The brief
prosperity it has enjoyed since the time of Valerian and Macrianus, has
corrupted it, and it must be purged anew, and tried by fire! I think not
that; but I think this; that if suffering ever so extreme is ordained,
there will be a virtue begotten in the souls of the sufferers, and
abroad through them, that shall prove it not to have been in vain.'
'I can believe what you say,' said Julia, 'at least I can believe in the
virtue ascribed to labor, and the collision with difficulty. Suffering
is passive; may it not be that we may come to place too much merit in
this?'
'It is not to be doubted that we may,' replied Probus. 'The temptation
to do so is great. It is easy to suffer. In comparison with labor and
duty--life-long labor and duty--it is a light service. Yet it carries
with it an imposing air, and is too apt to take to itself all the glory
of the Christian's course. Many who have lived as Christians but
indifferently have, in the hour of persecution, and in the heat of that
hour, rushed upon death and borne it well, and before it extremest
torture, and gained the crown of martyrdom and the name of saint--a
crown not always without spot--a name not always honorable. He who
suffers for Christ must suffer with simplicity--even as he has lived
with simplicity. And when he has lived so, and endured the martyr's
death at last, that is to be accounted but the last of many acts of duty
which are essentially alike--unless it may be that in many a previous
conflict over temptation and the world and sin, there was a harder
victory won, and a harder duty done, than when the flames consumed him,
or the beasts tare him limb from limb.'
'Yet, Probus,' continued Julia, 'among the humble and the ignorant,
where we cannot suppose that vanity could operate, where men have
received Christianity only because it seemed to them just the faith they
needed, and who then when it has been required that they renounce it,
will not do so, but hold steadfastly to what they regard the truth of
God, and for it take with meekness and patience all manner of torture,
and death itself--there is surely here great virtue! Suffering here has
great worth and sets upon the soul the seal of God. Is it not so?'
'Most assuredly it is,' answered Probus. 'O there is no virtue on earth
greater than theirs! When dragged from their quiet homes--unknown,
obscure, despised, solitary, with not one pitying eye to look on upon
their sufferings, with none to record their name, none to know it
even--they do, nevertheless, without faltering, keep true to their
faith, hugging it to them the closer the more it is tried to tear them
asunder--this, this is virtue the greatest on earth! It is a testimony
borne to the truth of whatever cause is thus supported, that is daily
bringing forth its fruits in the conviction and conversion of
multitudes. It is said, that in the Decian persecution, it was the
fortitude and patience under the cruelest sufferings of those humble
Christians whom no one knew, who came none knew whence, and who were
dying out of a pure inward love of the faith they professed, that fell
upon the hearts of admiring thousands with more than the force of
miracle, and was the cause of the great and sudden growth of our numbers
which then took place. Still, suffering and dying for a faith is not
unimpeachable evidence of its truth. There have been those who have died
and suffered for idolatries the most abhorred. It is proof, indeed, not
at all of truth itself, but only of the deep sincerity of him who
professes it.'
'Yes,' replied Julia, 'I see that it is so. But then it is a presumption
in behalf of truth, strong almost as miracles done for it, when so
many--multitudes--in different ages, in the humblest condition of life,
hesitate not to die rather than renounce their faith in a religion like
this of Christianity; which panders to not one of man's passions,
appetites or weaknesses, but is the severest censor of morals the world
has ever seen; which requires a virtue and a purity in its disciples
such as no philosopher ever dared to impose upon his scholars; whose
only promise is immortality--and that an immortality never to be
separated from the idea of retribution as making a part of it. They, who
will suffer and die for such a religion, do by that act work as
effectively for it, as their master by the signs and wonders which he
did. If Christianity were like many of the forms of Paganism; or if it
ministered to the cravings of our sensual nature, as we can conceive a
religion might do; if it made the work of life light, and the reward
certain and glorious; if it relieved its followers of much of the
suffering, and fear, and doubt, that oppress others--it would not be
surprising that men should bear much for its sake; and their doing so,
for what appealed so to their selfishness, would be no evidence, at all
to be trusted, of its truth. But as it is, they who die for it afford a
presumption in behalf of it, that appeals to the reason almost or quite
with the force of demonstration. So, I remember well, my reason was
impressed by what I used to hear from Paul of the sufferings of the
early Christians.'
While Julia had been saying these things, it had seemed to me as if
there was an unusual commotion in the streets; and as she ended I was
about to look for the cause of it, when the hasty steps of several
running through the hall leading from the main entrance of the house
prevented me, and Milo breathless, followed by others of the household,
rushed into the apartment where we sat, he exclaiming with every mark of
fear and horror upon his countenance,
'Ah! sir, it is all just as I was told by Curio it would be; the edicts
are published on the capitol. The people are going about the streets now
in crowds, talking loud and furiously, and before night they say the
Christians will all be delivered to their pleasure.'
Soon as Milo could pause, I asked him 'if he had read or seen the
edicts?'
'No, I have not,' he answered; 'I heard from Curio what they were to
be.'
I told Julia and Probus that such I did not believe was their tenor. It
did not agree with usage, nor with what I had gathered from Aurelian of
his designs. But that their import was probably, at present, no more
than deprivation of a portion of their freedom and of some of their
privileges. It was the purpose of Aurelian first to convert back again
the erring multitudes to Paganism, for which time must be granted.