PAGAN ROME.
Infamy of Commodus.――His Death.――The Reign of Pertinax.――The
Mob of Soldiers.――Death of Pertinax.――Julian purchases the
Crown.――Rival Claimants.――Severus.――Persecutions.――Martyrdom
of Perpetua and Felicitas.――The Reign of Caracalla.――Fiendlike
Atrocities.――Elagabalus, Priest of the Sun.――Death by the Mob.
――Alexander and his Christian Mother.――Contrast between Paganism
and Christianity.――The Sin of Unbelief.
AFTER a stormy reign of twenty-three years, the Emperor Aurelius died,
and his son Commodus, nineteen years of age, succeeded to the throne.
He was a demon. His atrocities I must not describe: nothing can be
imagined, in the way of loathsome, brutal, fiendlike vice, of which he
was not guilty. A foul pagan, he filled the palaces of Rome with all
the atrocities of iniquity.
He murdered one of his own sisters, and worse than murdered the rest.
He amused himself in cutting off the lips and noses of those who
incurred his displeasure. The rich he slew, to get their money; the
virtuous, because their example reproved his vices; the influential,
fearing lest they should attain too much power.
Under Commodus, the Christians were not exposed to governmental
persecution, though there were occasional acts of the grossest outrage.
One of his female favorites, who had great influence over him, became
their protector. Conversions were rapidly multiplied. Many of the most
noble and opulent in Rome embraced the Christian faith, which they
could see presented the only hope for this lost world. One of these
very distinguished men, Apollonius, an accomplished scholar, presented
to the Roman senate a very eloquent appeal in favor of Christianity.
The senate demanded that he should retract his opinions. As he refused,
he was sent to the block, and beheaded.
The outrages Commodus was perpetrating, and the executions he was
daily ordering, at length became intolerable. His nominal wife,
the same Marcia who had protected the Christians, finding, from a
memorandum which she picked from his pocket, that he had doomed her
with several others to die, gave him a cup of poison. As he was reeling
under the influence of the draught, an accomplice plunged a dagger into
his heart, and “he went to his own place.” “To his own place!” Where
was that place? No one can be familiar with the history of the awful
crimes which have been perpetrated upon this globe, and not feel that
there is necessity for justice and retribution beyond the grave.
The joy in Rome was indescribable when the rumor spread through the
thronged streets, on the morning of the 1st of January, 193, that the
tyrant was dead. The senate and army placed Pertinax, mayor of Rome,
upon the vacant throne. He was, for a pagan, a good man. He found the
nation with an empty treasury, and enormously in debt, and attempted to
economize; but the army demanded the wealth and luxury which could be
obtained only by rapine.
Commodus had accumulated a vast amount of gold and silver plate;
chariots of most costly construction; robes of imperial purple,
heavily embroidered with gems and gold; and last, but not least,
he had seized, and crowded into his harem, six hundred of the most
beautiful boys and girls. The plate, the chariots, the robes, and the
handsome boys and beautiful girls, were all sold to the highest bidder.
It is Christianity alone which recognizes the brotherhood of man.
Pertinax, a pagan, could perhaps see no wrong in selling these young
men and maidens into slavery. All the money thus infamously obtained
was honestly paid into the exhausted treasury.
The army had loved Commodus. He allowed the soldiers unlimited license;
he filled their purses with gold; he crowded their camp with male and
female slaves. Pertinax wished to introduce reforms. The army hated
Pertinax because he was good, as devils hate angels. “Away with him!”
was the cry which resounded through the whole encampment.
Three hundred burly wretches, from the encampment outside the walls
of Rome, marched to the palace. Deliberately they cut off the head
of Pertinax. Parading it upon a lance, they, with shouts of triumph,
marched back through the streets of Rome to their barracks. The
citizens looked on in dismay: they dared not utter a word. The army was
their master. A standing army and an unarmed people place any nation at
the mercy of an ambitious general.
Sixteen thousand soldiers, thoroughly trained, and heavily armed in
steel coats of mail, were always quartered just outside the gates of
Rome. From their commanding encampment on the broad summits of the
Quirinal and Viminal Hills they held the millions of the Roman capital
in subjection. The gory head of Pertinax was elevated upon a pike. The
brutal soldiery gathered around it with yells and hootings, and offered
the crown to the highest bidder.
Julian, a vile demagogue, the richest man in Rome, offered a thousand
dollars to each soldier, making sixteen millions of dollars. He could
easily win back treble the sum by extortion and the plunder of war.
The soldiers accepted the offer. Surrounding Julian, they marched in
dense column into the city to the capitol, and compelled the senate
to recognize him as emperor. There were sixteen thousand swords as so
many indisputable arguments to enforce their demands. The senate, with
the sword at its throat, obsequiously obeyed. The trembling populace
was equally submissive. With apparently universal acclaim, Julian was
proclaimed emperor.
But there were other imperial armies besides the sixteen thousand which
held Rome in awe. There was one in Greece of twenty thousand, one of
twenty thousand in Britain, and one of thirty thousand in Syria. Each
of these armies followed the example of the Pretorian Guard, as the
army at Rome was called. Each chose an emperor from among its generals.
There were thus four rival emperors, each at the head of a powerful
army. The arbitrament of bloody battle alone could decide who should
hold the prize.
The three distant armies commenced an impetuous march upon Julian at
Rome. Severus from Greece was nearest. With giant strides he pressed
forward, sweeping all opposition before him. As he drew near the camp
of the Pretorian Guard, the soldiers, who had already received their
thousand dollars each from Julian, coolly cut off Julian’s head, and
sent it to Severus. The two armies then fraternized under Severus, and
took possession of Rome.
Albinus was advancing with his twenty thousand men from Britain.
Enormous bribes were sent to him by Severus; and he gave in his
adhesion to the successful general who was so formidably intrenched at
Rome. Niger then, marching from Syria, was easily routed by the three
combined armies opposed to him. He was taken captive, and beheaded.
Severus thus became emperor without a rival. In commemoration of his
victory, he reared in Rome a colossal triumphal arch, which remains to
the present day.
Severus was a thoroughly bad man; and yet he protected the Christians.
A physician who had embraced the new religion had saved the life of
his child. Severus gratefully took him into the palace, and treated
him with the utmost kindness. Though unwilling to regulate his own
conduct by the religion of Jesus, he so far appreciated the excellence
of Christianity as to appoint one of its advocates as teacher of
his child. When the fury of the populace at Rome rose against the
Christians, Severus interposed to shield them.
But in remote parts of the empire, where the power of the crown was
but feebly felt, persecution raged terribly. The father of the renowned
Eusebius was beheaded: his property was confiscated, and his widow and
children left utterly destitute. Eusebius, who was then but seventeen
years of age, and a very earnest Christian, was so anxious to follow
his father to martyrdom, that his mother could with great difficulty
restrain him. He lived to establish a reputation which has filled the
world with his name.
In Africa, also, the persecution was violent. In Carthage, twelve
Christians at one time were brought before the pro-consul, three
of whom were females. They refused to abjure their faith, and were
condemned to be beheaded. We have a minute account of the trial,――the
questions and their answers. Upon being condemned to death simply for
being Christians, they knelt together, and thanked God that they were
honored with the crown of martyrdom. Joyfully each one received the
death-blow. It was at this time, and at Carthage, that Tertullian wrote
his world-renowned apology for Christianity. It was so eloquent in
its rhetoric, and so convincing in its logic, that it exerted a very
powerful influence over all thoughtful minds.
The martyrdom of Perpetua and Felicitas at Carthage was one of the
memorable events of this persecution. Perpetua was a Roman lady
of exalted birth, and highly educated, who had become a Christian.
Felicitas was a young Christian bride, about to become a mother. The
parents of Perpetua were pagans, and also her two brothers. She was but
twenty-two years of age, recently married, and had an infant child.
She was arrested, and thrown into prison. Her aged father, who loved
Perpetua tenderly, prostrated himself upon his knees before his
daughter, and, with tears gushing from his eyes, entreated her to save
her life by sacrificing to the gods. She remained firm. The high social
position of the captive caused a large crowd to be assembled at the
trial. Her father came, bringing to the court her babe, and entreating
Perpetua, for the sake of her child, to save her life. He hoped that
the sight of her child would cause her to relent, and renounce Jesus.
The public prosecutor, Hilarien, then said to her,――
“In mercy to your aged father, in mercy to your babe, throw not away
your life, but sacrifice to the gods.”
“I am a Christian,” she replied, “and cannot deny Christ.” The
anguish of her father was so great, that he was unable to restrain loud
expressions of grief; and the brutal soldiers drove him off with cruel
blows. “I felt the blows,” says Perpetua in a brief memorial which she
left of her trials, “as if they had fallen on myself.” Perpetua was
then condemned to be torn to pieces by wild beasts.
“When the day for the spectacle arrived,” says Perpetua, “my father
threw himself on the ground, tore his beard, cursed the day in which he
was born, and uttered piercing cries which were sufficient to move the
hardest heart.”
Both Perpetua and Felicitas were doomed to the same death. The two
victims were led into the arena of the vast amphitheatre, where, with
the utmost ingenuity of cruelty, they were to be gored to death by
bulls. The rising seats which surrounded the amphitheatre were crowded
with spectators to enjoy the spectacle.
Let us, in imagination, descend into the dark, damp dungeons opening
into the arena. Here in this den are growling lions, gaunt and fierce;
and here is a den of panthers with glaring eyeballs. They have been
kept starved for many days to make them furious. Here in this cell of
stone and iron, which the glare of the torch but feebly illumines, is
a band of Christians,――fathers, mothers, sons, and daughters. They are
to be thrown to-morrow into the arena naked, that they may be torn to
pieces by the panthers and the lions, and that the hundred thousand
pagan spectators may enjoy the sport of seeing them torn limb from limb,
and devoured by the fierce and starved beasts.
In one of these cells Perpetua and Felicitas were confined. In
another were several wild bulls. It was a glorious summer’s day,
and the cloudless sun shone down upon the amphitheatre, over which a
silken awning was spread, and which was crowded with many thousands of
spectators. Here were congregated all the wealth and beauty and fashion
of the city,――vestal virgins, pontiffs, ambassadors, senators, and, in
the loftiest tier, a countless throng of slaves. Carthaginian ladies,
affecting the utmost delicacy and refinement, vied with men in the
eagerness with which they watched the bloody scenes.
In the centre of the arena there was suspended a large network bag of
strong fine twine, with interstices so large as to afford no covering
or veil whatever to the person. Perpetua was first brought into the
arena, young and beautiful, a pure and modest Christian lady. She was
led forth entirely divested of her clothing, that to the bitterness
of martyrdom might be added the pangs of wounded modesty. A hundred
thousand voices assailed her with insult and derision. Brutal soldiers
placed her in the transparent network. There she hung in mid-air,
but two feet from the ground, as if floating in space. Then the burly
executioners gave her a swing with their brawny arms, whirling her in
a wide circle around the arena, and retired.
An iron door creaks upon its hinges, and flies open. Out from the
dungeon leaps the bull, with flaming eyes, tail in air, bellowing,
and pawing the sand in rage. He glares around for an instant upon the
shouting thousands, and then catches a view of the maiden swinging
before him. With a bound he plunges upon her, and buries his horns in
her side. The blood gushes forth, and she is tossed ten feet in the
air; while the shrieks of the tortured victim are lost in the hundred
thousand shouts of joy.
This scene cannot be described: it can hardly be imagined. Lunge after
lunge the bull plunges upon his victim, piercing, tossing, tearing,
mangling, till the sand of the arena is drenched with the blood of the
victim; until her body swings around, a lifeless, mangled mass, having
lost all semblance of humanity. Felicitas in the mean time is compelled
to gaze upon the scene, that she may taste twice the bitterness of
death. In her turn she is placed in the suspended network, and in the
same fiery chariot of martyrdom ascends to heaven.
Several other Christians perished at the same time, being torn by wild
beasts, and devoured by half-famished bears, leopards, and wild boars.
Pages might be filled with similar accounts; but this record must be
brief.
The Emperor Severus died on an expedition to Britain, in the year of
our Lord 211, leaving the crown to his two sons, Caracalla and Geta.
They were both thoroughly depraved boys. Caracalla, the elder, invited
his brother Geta to meet him in the presence of his mother to confer
upon the division of the empire. During the conference, Caracalla
drew near his brother, and, taking a dagger from beneath his dress,
buried it to the hilt in Geta’s heart. The murdered boy sprang into his
mother’s arms, and died, she being deluged with the blood of her son.
This was early in the third century, when pagan Rome was at the summit
of its wealth, refinement, luxury, and power. The murderer of Geta thus
became sole emperor of Rome.
Christianity was beginning to create a public conscience. It was
throwing the light of future judgment and final retribution upon such
hideous crimes. Both of these young men, depraved though they were, had
received some religious instruction. The stings of remorse imbittered
every remaining hour of Caracalla’s life. The image of his brother
Geta, gasping, shrieking, dying, bathed in blood, in the arms of his
terrified mother, pursued the murderer to his grave: but it did not
soften his heart; it only hardened him in sin, and inflamed his soul
with almost insane jealousy and fear. Every individual who was supposed
to be in the interest of Geta was put to death, without regard to age
or sex. In the course of a few months, twenty thousand perished by this
wholesale proscription.
A wag in one of the schools in Alexandria wrote a burlesque verse upon
Caracalla. The tyrant, in consequence, ordered the whole city to be
destroyed. Every man, woman, and child was ordered to be put to death.
A few only of the young and beautiful were reserved as slaves.
The only way in this world to be happy is to strive to promote the
happiness of others. He who makes others wretched is always wretched
himself. Caracalla lived the life of a demon, filling the world with
woe; but, in all the empire, there was scarcely to be found a greater
wretch than he.
One of his generals, Macrinus, who had displeased the emperor, learning
that he was doomed to death, engaged a centurion, a man of herculean
strength, to assassinate him. A dagger through the back pierced the
heart of the tyrant. Thus terminated the diabolical sway of Caracalla,
with which God had allowed the world to be cursed for six years.
The army had adored Caracalla; for he had given free rein to the
license of the soldiers, and had enriched them by plunder. Macrinus,
the assassin, was not illustrious either by birth, wealth, or military
exploits. The soldiers reluctantly, and with many murmurs, submitted
to the decision of the senate recognizing him as emperor. The army
was encamped in winter quarters in Syria. Macrinus, exulting in
new-born dignity, was luxuriating in his palace at Antioch. Under
these circumstances, a Syrian soldier, by the name of Elagabalus, a
reckless, unprincipled man, formed a conspiracy in the camp outside the
walls of Antioch. He assumed that he was a son of one of the concubines
of Caracalla. The soldiers, eager for the renewal of their former
privileges of plunder and outrage, enthusiastically rallied around the
banner of the insurgent general. There was one short battle. Macrinus
was slain, and the troops with one accord welcomed Elagabalus as
emperor. The senate, not daring to present opposition to the army,
obsequiously confirmed its vote.
This rude, untamed pagan was a worshipper of the sun. He had been
a high priest in one of the idol temples. With his army enlarged
by brutal hordes from the East, he marched upon Rome in the double
capacity of pagan pontiff and emperor. He was arrayed in sacerdotal
robes of damask embroidered with gold. A gorgeous tiara was upon his
brow; and he wore bracelets and a necklace incrusted with priceless
gems. The city pavements over which he passed were sprinkled with
gold-dust. Six milk-white horses, sumptuously caparisoned, drew a
chariot containing a black stone, the symbol of the god he worshipped.
Elagabalus, as pontiff, held the reins with his back to the horses,
that his eyes might not be for a moment turned from the object of his
idolatry.
A new temple was reared for this new idol on the Palatine Hill.
Its worship was introduced with splendor such as Rome had never
yet witnessed. Syrian girls of great beauty danced around the altar.
Elagabalus, with his crowd of adorers of the new divinity, rioted in
those dissolute rites, which even the pen of a Roman historian shrinks
from recording.
The palaces of the Cæsars had been as corrupt as Europe knew how to
make them; but Elagabalus transported to them all the additional vices
of Asia. Modern civilization will not allow the story of his infamy to
be told: the enlightenment of the nineteenth century could not bear the
recital. The change which Christianity has introduced into the world
is so great, that there is not a court in Europe now, no matter how
corrupt, which would endure for a day a Nero or an Elagabalus.
Even pagan Rome could not long submit to so unmitigated a wretch. There
was mutiny in the camp. Elagabalus was cut down in the fray. A mob of
soldiers, with infuriate yells, dragged the corpse by the heels through
the streets, and cast the mangled, gory mass into the Tiber. The senate
passed a decree consigning his name to eternal infamy. Posterity has
ratified that decree.
There are those, it is said, who believe that there is no punishment
after death; that all the dead go at once to heaven. Strange must be
the philosophy, and stranger still the theology, which can contemplate
Elagabalus welcomed at the golden gates, angels crowding to meet him,
while God, with beaming countenance, exclaims, “Well done, good and
faithful servant! enter thou into the joy of thy Lord.”
The Pretorian Guard of sixteen thousand mailed and veteran soldiers,
whose encampment was just outside the walls of Rome, took a nephew
of Elagabalus,――Alexander Severus, a boy of but seventeen years of
age,――and made him emperor. Two reasons influenced them: first, he was
available; second, he was young, and they thought they could mould him
at their will.
And now again we get a gleam of Christian light upon this
dark scene,――a gleam of that Christian influence which ennobles
statesmanship, purifies morals, and promotes every virtue; that sublime
Christian principle, which requires, that whether we eat or drink, or
whatever we do, we do all to the glory of God.
The mother of young Alexander was a Christian. Never was the maxim more
beautifully illustrated, that blessed is the boy who has a pious mother.
This noble woman, notwithstanding all the unspeakable corruptions which
surrounded her, had trained her child in the faith and morals of Jesus.
Like a guardian angel, she had watched over her son amidst all the
temptations of the palace.
Alexander, upon ascending the throne, in the very palace where
Elagabalus had so recently practised his pagan orgies, habitually rose
at an early hour, and upon his bended knees implored God’s guidance.
He then held a cabinet council, aided by sixteen of the most virtuous
senators. The affairs of state were carefully discussed, efforts being
made to redress every wrong.
A few hours were then set apart for study, that he might, by
intellectual culture, be better prepared for his responsible situation.
He then practised for a time at the gymnasium for the promotion of his
bodily vigor. After lunch, he received petitions and dictated replies
till supper, at six, which was the principal meal of the day. Guests
of distinction were always invited to sup with him. His table was
frugal, his dress simple, his morals were pure, his manners polished
and courtly. He adopted for his motto the golden maxim of Jesus our
Lord: “As ye would that men should do to you, do ye also to them
likewise.”[172] It was then fresh and new. Few even of those who
admired the sentiment knew that it was Jesus who had given it its
emphatic announcement.
When Severus appointed a governor of a province, he first publicly
propounded his name, that, if there were any disqualification, it might
be mentioned. “It is thus,” he said, “the Christians appoint their
pastors: I will do the same with my representatives.”
And yet, strange as it may seem, Alexander Severus does not seem
to have been a true Christian. He was simply like many upright,
high-minded, honorable young men now, who assent to Christianity, are
measurably governed by its morals, but are not in _heart_ disciples of
Jesus.
Alexander was deficient in moral courage: he wished to compromise.
While he professed belief in Jesus, he professed also belief in the
Roman gods. He wished to build a temple in Rome, to be dedicated to
Jesus Christ, for Christian worship; but the oracles told him, that, if
he did this, everybody would become Christian, and the temples of the
gods would be abandoned. He therefore desisted. Still, throughout his
reign, Christians were protected so far as he could protect them; but,
in remote sections of the empire, Christians often suffered terribly
from the malice of pagan magistrates, and from the brutality of the mob.
The reforms of justice and mercy which Alexander Severus was
introducing into the empire were hateful to the soldiers. They wished
to give free range to their appetites and passions, and to riot in
plunder. A mutiny was excited in the camp against him. In a paroxysm
of rage, the Pretorian Guard, sixteen thousand strong, marched into the
city, breathing threatenings and slaughter. For three days and three
nights, a terrible battle raged in the streets of Rome. There was a
wasting conflagration, and multitudes were slain. The city was menaced
with total destruction. And all this because a virtuous emperor wished
to protect the innocent, and to restrain the wicked from crime!
A kind Providence gave Alexander the victory. The insurgents were
driven back to their camp. Still they were too powerful to be punished.
The whole reign of Severus was harassed and imbittered by the outrages
of this licentious soldiery.
We have now come down in our narrative to the middle of the third
century. The Romans were a very powerful, and in many respects a
highly-cultivated people. Their literature has excited the admiration
of the world. It is still studied in the highest seats of learning.
Their paganism was the best which the world has ever known. We have
presented in impartial contrast the practical workings of the religion
of Rome and the religion of Jesus Christ. Every thoughtful reader must
be impressed with the wonderful, the divine superiority of Christianity.
It must be manifest to every reflective mind, that, in the religion of
Jesus Christ, we find the only hope for our lost world. That religion
is not a religion of dead doctrines and pompous ceremonies, but one of
a living faith and a holy life.
“Do right,” says Christianity,――“right to God by loving him and
worshipping him as your heavenly Father; right to yourself by
cultivating in your own heart every thing that is pure, lovely, and of
good report; right to your fellow-man, regarding him as your brother,
and doing every thing in your power to elevate him, purify him, and
prepare him for heaven. Your past sins may all be forgiven. Christ has
died upon the cross, and made atonement for them. Penitence for sin,
trust in an atoning Saviour, and the earnest, prayerful return to a
holy life, will open to you the gates of heaven.” This is Christianity.
It needs not the enforcement of labored argument: it is its own best
witness. “He that believeth on the Son of God hath the witness in
himself.”[173]
It not unfrequently happens that a young man gets the impression that
there is something a little distinguished in being an unbeliever. He
assumes the air of a sceptic, and takes the ground that Christianity
is the religion of weak minds; that the reason why he does not believe
is, that he has more intelligence and knowledge than those people who
believe.
Should there chance to be such a one who reads these pages, I would
ask him, How do you account for the fact that the most intelligent men
in the world have been Christians? Were Bacon and Boyle, Sir Matthew
Hale and Herschel, men whose intellectual renown has filled centuries,
weak-minded men?――and yet they were Christians. Was Napoleon Bonaparte
a man of feeble intellect?――yet he said at St. Helena,――
“The loftiest intellects since the advent of Christianity have had
faith, a practical faith, in the mysteries and the doctrines of the
gospel; not only Bossuet and Fénelon, who were preachers, but Descartes
and Newton, Leibnitz and Pascal, Corneille and Racine, Charlemagne and
Louis XIV.” Were Washington and Jackson, Clay and Lincoln, ignorant and
weak men?――they were Christians. Are the presidents in nearly all the
colleges and universities of Christendom incapable of comprehending the
force of argument?――they are Christians.
Was Daniel Webster a man of feeble powers of comprehension, incapable
of appreciating the force of an argument?――he bears the following
testimony to his faith in Christianity:――
“Philosophical argument, especially that drawn from the vastness of the
universe, compared with the apparent insignificance of this globe, has
sometimes shaken my reason for the faith that is in me; but my heart
has always assured and re-assured me that the gospel of Jesus Christ
must be a divine reality. This belief enters into the very depths of my
conscience. The whole history of man proves it.”
No: it is too late for any one to take the ground that Christianity
is the religion of ignorant men and weak women. God has given evidence
sufficient to convince every candid mind. This evidence is so abundant,
that God declares it a great sin not to believe. There is no crime
more severely denounced in the Bible than that of unbelief. Perhaps you
say, “I cannot believe without evidence;” but God has given evidence
sufficient to convert every heart which is not so wicked that it will
not believe.
Not to believe will surely bring condemnation at God’s bar. To believe
in Christianity, and yet not in heart to accept it, and not publicly
to avow one’s faith, is perhaps a greater sin. The declaration of our
Saviour is positive, that he will not recognize at the judgment-day
those who have not confessed him before men.
There are undoubtedly those who have wickedly cherished a spirit of
unbelief, until God, as a punishment, “has sent them strong delusion,
that they should believe a lie.”[174]
The following incident affectingly illustrates this truth. The writer,
a few years ago, at the close of the afternoon’s service in the church
on a summer’s day, was called upon in his study by a man of dignified
person and manners, whose countenance and whole demeanor indicated
superior intellectual culture. I had noticed him for one or two
sabbaths in the church. His marked features, and his profound attention
to the preaching, had awakened my interest. With much courtesy he
apologized for intruding upon my time, but expressed an earnest desire
to have a little conversation with me.
“I have,” said he, “for several sabbaths, attended public worship
in your church, and need not say that I have been interested in the
preaching; and you will probably be surprised to have me add, that
I cannot believe the sentiments you advocate. I cannot believe that
the Bible is a divine revelation, or that there is any personal God.
I am what you would probably call both an infidel and an atheist; and
I should be glad to give you a brief account of my history.
“When a young man, I became interested in the writings of the French
philosophers,――Voltaire, Helvetius, Diderot, and D’Alembert. I filled
my library with their works, and perused them with eagerness. Their
teachings I accepted. They were in harmony with my desires; and I
lived accordingly. Renouncing all faith in Christianity, in any other
God than the powers of Nature, and in any future life, I surrendered
myself unrestrained to the indulgence which those principles naturally
inculcated. Thus I have lived. Christianity and its professors have
ever been the subjects of my ridicule and contempt.
“I still retain those principles. The arguments with which I have
stored my mind, and upon which I have so long relied, appear to me
invincible. I cannot believe that the Bible is any thing more than a
human production. When I look upon the world, its confusion and misery,
I can see no evidence that there is any God who takes an interest in
the affairs of men. I see that the wrong is just as likely to triumph
as the right. In the animal creation, there is, from the lowest to
the highest, a regular gradation; and as they all, at birth, came from
nothing, so, at death, into nothing they will vanish.
“I have now passed my threescore years and ten. I have lost most of my
property. My eyesight is rapidly failing. The companions of my youthful
days are all gone. Most of my children are in the grave; and I have
no more expectation of meeting them in another world than of meeting
my faithful dog or my sagacious horse. I am aged, infirm, bereaved,
and joyless. There is nothing in the retrospect of the past to give me
pleasure: the present brings but weariness, gloom, and sadness: before
me is the abyss of annihilation.
“Now, could I only believe as you believe,――that there is a loving
heavenly Father, who watches over his children; that the trials of this
life are intended to form our characters for endless happiness; that
beyond the grave there is immortality, happy realms where the sorrows
of earth are never known; that provision is made for the forgiveness
of all my sins; and that, after a few more days here, I could enter
golden gates, and be forever in heaven with the loved ones who have
gone before me,――I should indeed be the happiest man in the world. But
I cannot believe it. There is no evidence sufficiently strong to remove
my unbelief.”
Such was the confession of an unbeliever; and we know that such must be
the moral condition of every man who is approaching the grave without
the Christian’s hope. How different from this was the testimony of Paul
the Christian as he drew near the close of his noble life, even with
the pains of martyrdom opening before him! He writes to Timothy,――
“I am now ready to be offered, and the time of my departure is at hand.
I have fought a good fight; I have finished my course; I have kept
the faith: henceforth there is laid up for me a crown of righteousness,
which the Lord, the righteous Judge, shall give me at that day; and not
to me only, but unto all them also that love his appearing.”
I will simply say in conclusion, in reference to my unhappy friend,
whom I could not but love, that though he would admit that there was
a _Power_, which he called _Nature_, which had introduced him to this
world, and would ere long remove him from it, no persuasions of mine
could induce him to pray to that Power for light and guidance; though
he would, apparently with profoundest reverence, fall upon his knees at
my side, and listen to my prayers to the Creator.
Circumstances soon removed me several hundred miles from his dwelling.
Whether he be living as I now write these lines with a tearful eye,
I know not. A few years ago, after two years of absence, I met him.
Sorrow had left unmistakable traces upon his marked features. As I took
his hand, he admitted that there were still no rays of light to gild
the gloom of his pathway to the grave.