Chapter 9

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