Part 12 (1/2)

'I wish, good Nicomachus, that I had your powers of speech, of which, as you can remember, I have been witness in former days--those happy days in Syria--when you used, so successfully, to withstand and subdue my giddy or headstrong mind. Here have I been for weary hours--not weary neither, for their aim has, I am sure, been a worthy one--but, here have I been persuading, with all the reason and eloquence I could bring to bear, this self-willed girl to renounce these fantastic notions she has imbibed from the Christians, and their books, were it only for the sake of domestic peace. Aurelian is growing daily more and more exasperated against this obscure tribe, and drops, oftener than I love to hear them, dark hints of what awaits them, not excepting, he says, any of whatever rank or name. Not that I suppose that either he, or the senate, would proceed further than imprisonments, banishment, suppression of free speech, the destruction of books and churches; so much indeed I understand from him. But even thus far, and we might lose Aurelia--a thing not to be thought of for a moment. He has talked with her himself, reasoned with her, threatened her; but in vain. Now he has imposed the same task upon me--it is equally in vain. I know not what to do.'

'Because,' I replied, 'nothing can be done. Where it is possible to see, you have eyes within you that can penetrate the thickest darkness as well as any. But here you fail; but only where none could succeed. A sincere honest mind, princess, is not to be changed either by persuasion or force. Its belief is not subject to the will. Aurelia, if I have heard aright, is a Christian from conviction. Evidence made her a Christian--stronger evidence on the side of her former faith can alone unmake her.'

'I cannot reason with her to that extent, Nicomachus,' replied the Empress. 'I know not the grounds of the common faith, any more than those of Christianity. I only know that I wish Aurelia was not a Christian. Will you, Nicomachus, reason with her? I remember your logic of old.'

'Alas, princess, I can engage in no such task! Where I have no faith myself, I should in vain attempt to plant it in others. How, either, can I desire that any mind should remain an hour longer oppressed by the childish and abominable superst.i.tions which prevail in Rome? I cannot but congratulate the excellent Aurelia, so far as the question of truth is concerned, that in the place of the infinite stupidities of the common religion, she has received the, at least, pure and reasonable doctrines of the Christians. You cannot surely, princess, desire her re-conversion?'

'Only for her own sake, for the sake of her safety, comfort, happiness.'

'But in her judgment these are best and only secured where she now is.

How thinks Mucapor?'

'As I believe,' answered Livia, 'he cares not in the matter, save for her happiness. He will not wish that she should have any faith except such as she herself wishes. I have urged him to use his power to constrain her, but he loves liberty himself too dearly, he says, to put force upon another.'

'That is right and n.o.ble,' I said; 'it is what I should have looked for from Mucapor.'

'In good sooth, Nicomachus, I believe you still take me but for what I was in Palmyra. Who am I?'

'From a princess you have become an Empress, Empress of Rome, that I fully understand, and I trust never to be wanting in the demeanor that best becomes a subject; but you are still Livia, the daughter of Zen.o.bia, and to her I feel I can never fear to speak with sincerity.'

'How omnipotent, Nicomachus, are simplicity and truth! They subdue me when I most would not. They have conquered me in Aurelia and now in you.

Well, well, Aurelia then must take the full weight of her uncle's wrath, which is not light.'

At this moment Aurelian himself entered, accompanied by Fronto. Livia, at the same time, arose and withdrew, not caring, I thought, to meet the eyes of that basilisk, who, with the cunning of a priest, she saw to be usurping a power over Aurelian which belonged of right to her. I was about also to withdraw, but the Emperor constraining me, as he often does, I remained, although holding the priest in still greater abhorrence, I believe, than Livia herself.

'While you have been absent from the city, Fronto,' said Aurelian, 'I have revolved the subjects upon which we last conversed, and no longer doubt where lie, for me, both duty, and the truest glory. The judgment of the colleges, lately rendered, agrees both with yours and mine. So that the very finger of the G.o.d we wors.h.i.+p points the way.'

'I am glad,' replied Fronto, 'for myself, for you, for Rome, and for the world, that truth possesses and is to sway you. It will be a great day for Rome, greater than when your triumphal array swept through the streets with the world at your chariot-wheels, when the enemy that had so long waged successful war within the very gates, shall lie dead as the mult.i.tudes of Palmyra.'

'It will, Fronto. But first I have this to say, and, by the G.o.ds, I believe it true, that it is the corruptions of our own religion and its ministers, that is the offence that smells to heaven, quite as much as the presumptuous novelties of this of Judea. I perceive you neither a.s.sent to this nor like it. But it is true, I am persuaded, as the G.o.ds themselves. I have long thought so; and, while with one hand, I aim at the Gallilean atheism, with the other, I shall aim at those who dishonor, by their vices and hypocrisies, the religion they profess to serve.'

Fronto was evidently disturbed. His face grew pale as the frown gathered and darkened on the brow of Aurelian. He answered not, and Aurelian went on.

'h.e.l.lenism, Fronto, is disgraced, and its very life threatened by the vices of her chief ministers. The G.o.ds forgive me! in that, while I have purged my legions of drunkards and adulterers, I have left them in the temples. Truly did you say, I have had but one thought in my mind, I have looked but to one quarter of the heavens. My eyes are now unsealed, and I see both ways, and every way. How can we look for the favor of the G.o.ds, while their houses of wors.h.i.+p, I speak it, Fronto, with sorrow and indignation, but with the knowledge too of the truth of what I say, are houses of appointment while the very inner sanctuaries, and the altars themselves, are little better than the common stews, while the priests are the great fathers of iniquity, corrupters of innocence, the seducers of youth, examples themselves, beyond the fear of rivalry, of all the vice they teach! At their tables, too, who so swollen with meats and drink as the priests? Who, but they, are a by-word, throughout the city, for all that is vilest? What word but priest, stands, with all, as an abbreviation and epitome, of whatever pollutes, and defiles the name of man? Porphyrius says 'that since Jesus has been wors.h.i.+pped in Rome no one has found by experience the public a.s.sistance of the G.o.ds.' I believe it; and Rome will never again experience it till this black atheism is rooted out. But it is as true, I doubt not, that since their ministers have become ministers of demons, and, from teachers of morals, have turned instructers in vice--for this reason too, as well as for the other, the justly offended deities of Rome have hid themselves from their impious wors.h.i.+ppers. Here then, Fronto, is a double labor to be undergone, a double duty to be done, not less than some or all of the labors of Hercules. We are set for this work, and, not till I have begun it--if not finished--will I so much as dream of Persia. What say you?'

Fronto looked like one who had kindled a larger flame than he intended, or knew well how to manage.

'The faults of which you speak, great Emperor, it can be denied by none, are found in Rome, and can never be other than displeasing to the G.o.ds.

But then, I would ask, when was it ever otherwise? In the earlier ages of the republic, I grant, there was a virtue in the people which we see not now. But that grew not out of the purer administration of religion, but was the product of the times in part--times, in comparison with these, of a primeval simplicity. To live well, was easier then. Where no temptation is, virtue is easy, is necessary. But then it ceases to be virtue. It is a quality, not an acquisition--a gift of the G.o.ds, an accident, rather than man's meritorious work.'

'That is very true--well.'

'There may be as much real virtue now, as then. May it not be so?'

'Perhaps--it may. What then?'

'Our complaints of the present, should be softened. But, what chiefly I would urge is this, that since those ages of early virtue--after all, perhaps, like all else at the same period, partly fabulous--Rome has been but what it is, adorned by virtues that have claimed the admiration of the world, and polluted by vices that have drawn upon her the reprobation of the good, yet, which are but such as the world shows its surface over, from the farthest India, to the bleak wastes of Britain.

It is, Aurelian, a thing neither strange nor new that vices thrive in Rome. And, long since, have there been those, like Nerva and the good Severus, and the late censor Valerian, who have aimed at their correction. These, and others who, before and since, have wrought in the same work, have done well for the empire. Their aim has been a high one, and the favor of the G.o.ds has been theirs. Aurelian may do more and better in the same work, seeing his power is greater and his piety more zealous.'

'These are admitted truths, Fronto, save the last; but whither do they tend?'