X.

_AT ATHENS._

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I lived at Athens a year, studying the philosophy and poetry of the

Greeks. I longed to see my beautiful sisters and my good old uncle; but I

cannot disguise the fact that I was greatly fascinated with Grecian life

and manners. I frequently wished that I had been born a Greek and not a

Jew, and that I could spend my days in sight of the marble-crowned

Acropolis and the blue Ægean Sea.

I taught Anthony to read and write, hoping that he would prove to be of

superior mental calibre to his brother. But the result was the same. He

surprised me at first by his brightness and afterward by his stupidity. He

was more impetuous than Ethopus, and braver; but then his spirit had not

been broken and subdued by contact with the magicians of Egypt, those

subterranean devils who defied the assaults of reason against their

pretensions and the vigilance of government against their crimes. Ceasing

to be a good soldier and incapable of becoming a philosopher, he proved an

invaluable servant.

The letters from my sisters, who wrote alternately, were full of

tenderness and piety. They continued to give glowing accounts of the power

and progress of the teaching of John the Baptist. Martha quoted all the

passages in the prophets alluding to the forerunner of the Messiah, and

Mary dwelt upon the influence of his doctrines and baptism upon the hearts

and lives of the people. Mary perceived intuitively that the only valuable

thing in a religion is the life which it induces one to lead. One day I

received a letter from this enthusiastic young girl, which indicated that

some great spiritual ferment was working in the land of Judea:

“DEAREST LAZARUS:

“The hunger and thirst of our souls will soon be satisfied. I have seen

him with my own eyes—him, the Son of God, the Messiah. Oh what grace! what

wisdom! what goodness! what power!

“Do not think I am dreaming! Some time ago John baptized a young man, whom

he pronounced by heavenly vision to be the Messiah, or as he styled him,

the Lamb of God. This mysterious person disappeared from sight. It was

rumored that he had retired into the wilderness, to undergo some terrible

combat with the powers of hell, preparatory to his great mission upon

earth. Our hearts have been watching eagerly for his reappearance.

“After a while we heard that a great prophet had arisen in Galilee, who

had astonished all men by the wonderful spirituality of his preaching. He

had also exhibited miraculous power by turning water into wine at a

marriage-feast in Cana. Perhaps this Jesus of Nazareth was the promised

deliverer! But how could the ignoble names of Nazareth and Galilee be

connected with the Prince of the house of David?

“Not long afterward a strange incident occurred in the temple. The

miracle-worker of Cana appeared, and assuming extraordinary authority, as

if the temple were his own house, he drove out all the traders and

money-changers and idlers who have so long desecrated the holy place by

the connivance of the corrupt and wicked priests. They would no doubt have

destroyed him in their anger; but the people, and indeed the better class

of Pharisees also, applauded the courageous act of the man, who dared,

single-handed, to vindicate the holiness of the Lord’s house, and to

scourge the profaners out of the sacred precincts.

“I was pondering over this incident, when our good and kind friend

Nicodemus came in, and told us he had witnessed the scene himself, and

that this Jesus of Nazareth was the same person whom he saw baptized by

John in Jordan, at the time when John bare witness that he saw the Spirit

of God descending upon him in the shape of a dove.

“Was not this cleansing of the temple prophetic of his spiritual cleansing

of the Church, as well as of the purification of those little temples and

churches, our own hearts?

“The good Nicodemus, who inquires into everything quickly, but into

nothing thoroughly, paid Jesus a visit at night and drew him into

conversation. He was astonished and puzzled at the new ideas of this

spiritual teacher. Now, my dear brother, do not laugh at me when I assure

you, that what seemed so unintelligible to a learned ruler in Israel, was

a sun-burst of truth and beauty to the heart of your poor little sister

Mary.

“How strange it is that I can see clearly what seems hidden from the eyes

of those so much more capable than myself!

“Jesus said to Nicodemus:

“‘Except a man be born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God.’

“How stupid it was in the good old doctor to stumble at this sublime

sentence, and to ask:

“‘How can a man be born again when he is old?’

“And the reply of Jesus, how beautiful!—

“‘Verily I say unto you, Except a man be born of water and of the Spirit,

he cannot enter into the kingdom of God.

“‘That which is born of the flesh is flesh; and that which is born of the

Spirit is spirit.’

“I understand it, Lazarus; I see, feel, know, comprehend the whole

mystery. It may be the flower comprehends the sun better than the

philosopher.

“We were born of water through the baptism of John. By the repentance and

obedience taught by him, we are washed of the uncleanness and sensuality

of our old life and enter upon the sweetness and purity of the new. Jesus

will baptize us with the Spirit of divine love, as John did with the

spirit of divine truth; and we shall be new creatures, born again as it

were, into a spiritual kingdom of light and peace.

“The Sabbath after my interview with Nicodemus, I started with Martha to

the temple, hoping to see Jesus with my own eyes. And I saw him, Lazarus,

not only with my eyes, but with my heart and soul. We had reached the pool

of Bethesda by the sheep-market, and were looking at the crowd of feeble

and paralytic people, who were waiting for the periodical moving of the

water, when a murmur arose: ‘The prophet, the prophet of Nazareth!’ I

looked and saw Jesus standing in one of the porches on the first step that

leads down into the water.

“The moment I saw his face I believed. My heart beat audibly within me. A

divine ardor burned in my soul. A faith, strong as the mountains or the

ocean, took possession of my whole being. My impulse was to rush forward,

fall at his feet and proclaim him the Messiah to the assembled multitude.

Martha held me back and said: ‘Listen! he speaks!’

“Yes—he spoke; and I heard that voice I had so often heard in my dreams,

dreaming of the restoration of Israel!

“He spoke to the oldest, the feeblest, the most forlorn-looking person in

the crowd:

“‘Wilt thou be made whole?’ he said, in a voice of infinite tenderness and

beauty.

“Strangely enough, before the sick man answered, the same question entered

into my own soul. I felt a deadly, paralytic sensation throughout my

spiritual frame, and I knew that I needed to be made whole even more than

the poor creature on the steps. The Divine question was put to the sick

man, to me, to the Church, to the whole world. It was infinite. While I

was ejaculating internally, ‘Yes, Lord! yes! entirely whole,’ the

paralytic replied:

“‘I have no one, sir, when the water is troubled to put me into the pool,

but while I am coming, another steppeth down before me.’

“Poor, old, helpless, friendless creature! Others had relatives or friends

who assisted them to descend into the restorative waters; and day after

day the selfish ones had pushed aside the weak, slow, pallid wretch. But

the great Friend had come!

“Jesus, stretching forth his hand over the prostrate form, with a majesty

indescribable, exclaimed:

“‘Rise, take up thy bed and walk.’

“And the paralytic arose amid the exclamations and plaudits of the crowd,

which pressed about them until he and Jesus were concealed from our sight.

“I have seen the Messiah several times since that miracle. He was walking

the streets with several fishermen of Galilee, whom they say he has chosen

to be his apostles. The greatest takes up the least to connect all the

intermediates with himself. The group is always followed at a distance by

a woman clad in deep mourning, and wearing a thick black veil. She never

approaches near enough to speak or be spoken to. No man knows where she

lodges or how she lives; but the first dawn of light always reveals her

dark figure opposite the house in which Jesus has slept.

“Who can she be? says every one to himself and to others. Whoever she is,

her humility and devotion are very touching; and the Power which can work

miracles no doubt reads her heart and is leading her to himself.

“Martha is profoundly impressed and greatly bewildered by the miracles and

character of Jesus; but she cannot yet believe that he is the veritable

Messiah predicted by the prophets. She thinks the Messiah must be a great

Prince, who will restore the power of David and the glory of Solomon to

the Jewish nation, and make our temple the temple of the whole world. Our

hearts, I think, our purified hearts, are the temples in which he is to

reign!

“Our dear, good, pagan uncle smiles quietly at my enthusiastic faith, and

encourages Martha’s doubts by telling us of great and good magi in Persia,

who performed greater miracles than those of Moses.

“Ah, Lazarus! How can you linger away off in those beautiful and wicked

cities of Greece, buried in spiritual darkness, and studying their foolish

or insane philosophies, when the Source of all light has risen, and the

Fountain of all truth has been opened in your own country! Oh hasten to

your home in our hearts and see these great things for yourself. If you

cannot share my faith, you will at least receive and reciprocate my love.

“Ever your MARY.”

If these strange things had occurred soon after my father’s death, when

the spirit of religious inquiry was strong, and when I loved to search the

Scriptures with my sisters, I would have been deeply, intensely interested

in them. But the hardest thing in the world is to make a devotee out of a

man who thinks himself a philosopher.

My uncle had not converted me to the doctrines of Zoroaster, but he had

convinced me that Zoroaster, Moses, and all the great leaders of religious

thought derived their inspiration from the same source. I came tacitly to

believe that no special Messiah was coming to the Jews, any more than to

the Persians or Egyptians or Romans, all of whom needed deliverance from

mountains of sin and wildernesses of error, quite as much as the Hebrew

nation which constituted so small a fraction of the human race.

Moreover the influence of travel, and especially my free and happy life at

Athens, had quite denationalized me. I was no longer a Jew.

I had breathed the mystic and magical air of Egypt, and had peeped into

one of the very cradles of the human race; where I found everything so

strange and so unlike what I had been taught by our childish Hebrew

traditions.

I had trodden all the glorious and beautiful grounds hallowed in the

immortal history and songs of Greece. I no longer wondered at the host of

gods and goddesses which were conjured from the misty deeps of antiquity,

to guard a nature so prolific and fair, and a people so perfect in form

and so gifted in spirit.

The traditions of Greece, the poetry, the eloquence, the music, the

philosophy, the art, and the divine architecture, which seemed a

combination of them all, had so impressed and transformed my mind, that I

looked back to my narrow circle of life and thought in Judea, as a man

looks back upon the school-room and play-ground of his childhood.

After these things, it was impossible for me to believe that the Jews were

the favored people of God, and that the descendants of the patriarchs were

to govern the world. It was as easy to believe that the sun rose in

Jericho and set in Joppa.

Therefore I smiled at my sister’s pious enthusiasm, and said to myself:

This Jesus of Nazareth is some estimable Jew, full of philanthropy and

zeal, possessed perhaps of extraordinary healing powers. With these he

will so astonish the poor ignorant Hebrews, that they will call him a

prophet of God, or even invest him with divine honors. In Athens he would

be simply a philosopher or a physician, more or less profound and

brilliant. His pretensions would be scrutinized by a thinking public, and

he would receive applause in proportion to his merit and capacity.

There was, I must confess, another reason why I did not turn my face

toward Judea; why the prophecies and their fulfillment had ceased to

interest me; and why even my charming sisters were occasionally forgotten.

While studying the theologies of the nations and poring over the ethereal

pantheism of Greece, I met that wonderful divinity who flies ever with his

golden shafts between the earth and the sun, and I became the devotee of a

new religion.