Part 31 (1/2)

'That the Christians had desired this audience before him and the sacred senate, and he had therefore granted them their request. And he was now here, to listen to whatever they might urge in their behalf. But,' said he, 'I tell them now, as I have told them before, that it can be of no avail. The acts of former Emperors, from Nero to the present hour, have sufficiently declared what the light is in which a true Roman should view the superst.i.tion that would supplant the ancient wors.h.i.+p of the G.o.ds. It is enough for me, that such is the acknowledged aim, and a.s.serted tendency and operation of this Jewish doctrine. No merits of any kind can atone for the least injury it might inflict upon that venerable order of religious wors.h.i.+p which, from the time of Romulus, has exercised over us its benignant influence, and, doubtless, by the blessings it has drawn down upon us from the G.o.ds, crowned our arms with a glory the world has never known before--putting under our feet every civilized kingdom from the remotest East to the farthest West, and striking terror into the rude barbarians of the German forests.

Nevertheless, they shall be heard; and if it is from thee, Christian, that we are to know what thy faith is, let us now hear whatever it is in thy heart to say. There shall no bridle be put upon thee; but thou hast freest leave to utter what thou wilt. There is nothing of worst concerning either Rome or her wors.h.i.+p, her rulers or her altars, her priesthood or her G.o.ds, but thou mayest pour it forth in such measure as shall please thee, and no one shall say thee nay. Now say on; the day and the night are before thee.'

'I shall require, great Emperor,' replied Probus, 'but little of either; yet I thank thee, and all of our name who are here present thank thee, for the free range which thou hast offered. I thank thee too, and so do we all, for the liberty of frank and undisturbed speech, which thou hast a.s.sured to me. Yet shall I not use it to malign either the Romans or their faith. It is not with anger and fierce denunciation, O Emperor, that it becomes the advocate, of what he believes to be a religion from Heaven, to a.s.sail the adherents of a religion like this of Rome, descended to the present generation through so many ages, and which all who have believed it in times past, and all who believe it now, do hold to be true and woven into the very life of the state--the origin of its present greatness, and without which it must fall asunder into final ruin, the bond that held it together being gone. If the religion of Rome be false, or really injurious, it is not the generations now living who are answerable for its existence formerly or now, nor for the principles, truths, or rites, which const.i.tute it. They have received it, as they have received a thousand customs which are now among them, by inheritance from the ancestors who bequeathed them, which they received at too early an age to judge concerning their fitness or unfitness, but to which, for the reason of that early reception, they have become fondly attached, even as to parents, brothers, and sisters, from whom they have never been divided. It becomes not the Christian, therefore, to load with reproaches those who are placed where they are, not by their own will, but by the providence of the Great Ruler. Neither does it become you of the Roman faith to reproach us for the faith to which we adhere; because the greater proportion of us also have inherited our religion, as you yours, from parents and a community who professed it before us, and all regard it as heaven-descended, and so proved to be divine, that without inexpiable guilt we may not refuse to accept it. It must be in the face of reason, then, and justice, in the face of what is both wise and merciful, if either should judge harshly of the other.

'Besides, what do I behold in this wide devotion of the Roman people to the religion of their ancestors, but a testimony, beautiful for the witness it bears, to the universality of that principle or feeling, which binds the human heart to some G.o.d or G.o.ds, in love and wors.h.i.+p?

The wors.h.i.+p may be wrong, or greatly imperfect, and sometimes injurious; the G.o.d or G.o.ds may be so conceived of, as to act with hurtful influences upon human character and life; still it is religion; it is a sentiment that raises the thoughts of the humble and toilworn from the earthly and the peris.h.i.+ng, to the heavenly and the eternal. And this, though accompanied by some or many rites shocking to humanity, and revolting to reason, is better than that men were, in this regard, no higher nor other than brutes; but received their being as they do theirs, they know not whence, and when they lose it, depart like them, they know not and care not whither. In the religious character of the Roman people--for religious in the earlier ages of this empire they eminently were, and they are religious now, though in less degree--I behold and acknowledge the providence of G.o.d, who has so framed us that our minds tend by resistless force to himself; satisfied at first with low and crude conceptions, but ever aspiring after those that shall be worthier and worthier.

'And now, O Emperor, for the same reason that we believe G.o.d the creator did implant in us all, of all tribes and tongues, this deep desire to know, wors.h.i.+p, and enjoy him, so that no people have ever been wholly ignorant of him, do we believe that he has, in these latter years, declared himself to mankind more plainly than he did in the origin of things, or than he does through our own reason, so that men may, by such better knowledge of himself and of all necessary truth which he has imparted, be raised to a higher virtue on earth, and made fit for a more exalted life in heaven. We believe that he has thus declared himself by him whom you have heard named as the Master and Lord of the Christian, and after whom they are called, Jesus Christ. Him, G.o.d the creator, we believe, sent into the world to teach a better religion than the world had; and to break down and forever destroy, through the operation of his truth, a thousand injurious forms of false belief. It is this religion which we would extend, and impart to those who will open their minds to consider its claims, and their hearts to embrace its truths, when they have once been seen to be divine. This has been our task and our duty in Rome, to beseech you not blindly to receive, but strictly to examine, and, if found to be true, then humbly and gratefully to adopt this new message from above--'

'By the G.o.ds, Aurelian,' exclaimed Porphyrius, 'these Christians are kindly disposed! their benevolence and their philosophy are alike. We are obliged to them--'

'Not now, Porphyrius,' said Aurelian. 'Disturb not the Christian. Say on, Probus.'

'We hope,' continued Probus, nothing daunted by the scornful jeers of the philosopher, 'that we are sincerely desirous of your welfare, and so pray that in the lapse of years all may, as some have done, take at our hands the good we proffer them; for, sure we are, that would all so receive it, Rome would tower upwards with a glory and a beauty that should make her a thousand-fold more honored and beloved than now, and her roots would strike down, and so fasten themselves in the very centre of the earth, that well might she then be called the Eternal City. Yet, O Emperor, though such is our aim and purpose; though we would propagate a religion from G.o.d, and, in doing so, are willing to labor our lives long, and, if need be, die in the sacred cause, yet are we charged as atheists. The name by which we are known, as much as by that of Christian, is atheist--'

'Such, I have surely believed you,' said Porphyrius, again breaking in, 'and, at this moment, do.'

'But it is a name, Aurelian, fixed upon us ignorantly or slanderously; ignorantly, I am willing to believe. We believe in a G.o.d, O Emperor; it is to him we live, and to him we die. The charge of atheism I thus publicly deny, as do all Christians who are here, as would all throughout the world with one acclaim, were they also here, and would all seal their testimony, if need were, with their blood. We believe in G.o.d; not in many G.o.ds, some greater and some lesser, as with you, and whose forms are known and can be set forth in images and statues--but in one, one G.o.d, the sole monarch of the universe; whom no man, be he never so cunning, can represent in wood, or bra.s.s, or stone; whom, so to represent in any imaginary shape, our faith denounces as unlawful and impious. Hence it is, O Emperor, because the vulgar, when they enter our churches or our houses, see there no image of G.o.d or G.o.ddess, that they imagine we are without a G.o.d, and without his wors.h.i.+p. And such conclusion may in them be excused. For, till they are instructed, it may not be easy for them to conceive of one G.o.d, filling Heaven and earth with his presence. But in others it is hard to see how they think us atheists on the same ground, since nothing can be plainer than that among you, the intelligent, and the philosophers especially, believe as we do in a great pervading invisible spirit of the universe. Plato wors.h.i.+pped not nor believed in these stone or wooden G.o.ds; nor in any of the fables of the Greek religion; yet who ever has charged him with atheism? So was it with the great Longinus. I see before me those who are now famed for their science in such things, who are the teachers of Rome in them, yet not one, I may venture to declare, believes other than as Plato and Longinus did in this regard. It is an error or a calumny that has ever prevailed concerning us; but in former times some have had the candor, when the error has been removed, to confess publicly that they had been subject to it. The Emperor Marcus Aurelius, to name no other, when, in the straits into which he was fallen at Cotinus, he charged his disasters upon the Christian soldiers, and, they praying prostrate upon the earth for him and his army and empire, he forthwith gained the victory, which before he had despaired of--did then immediately acknowledge that they had a G.o.d, and that they should no longer be reviled as atheists; since it was plain that men might believe in a G.o.d, and carry about the image of him in their own minds, though they had no visible one. It is thus we are all believers. We carry about with us, in the sanctuary of our own bosoms, our image of the great and almighty G.o.d whom we serve; and before that, and that only, do we bow down and wors.h.i.+p. Were we indeed atheists, it were not unreasonable that you dealt with us as you now do, nay and much more severely; for, where belief in a G.o.d does not exist, it is not easy to see how any state can long hold together. The necessary bond is wanting, and, as a sheaf of wheat when the band is broken, it must fall asunder.

'The first principle of the religion of Christ is this belief in G.o.d; in his righteous providence here on earth, and in a righteous retribution hereafter. How then can the religion of Christ in this respect be of dangerous influence or tendency? It is well known to all, who are acquainted in the least with history or philosophy, that in the religion of the Jews, the belief and wors.h.i.+p of one G.o.d almost const.i.tutes the religion itself. Every thing else is inferior and subordinate. In this respect the religion of Jesus is like that of the Jews. It is exceeding jealous of the honor and wors.h.i.+p of this one G.o.d--this very same G.o.d of the Jews; for Jesus was himself a Jew, and has revealed to us the same G.o.d whom we are required to wors.h.i.+p, only with none of the ceremonies, rites, and sacrifices, which were peculiar to that people. It is this which has caused us, equally to our and their displeasure, frequently to be confounded together, and mistaken the one for the other. But the differences between us are, excepting in the great doctrine I have just named, very great and essential. This doctrine therefore, which is the chief of all, being so fundamental with us, it is not easy, I say, to see how we can on religious accounts be dangerous to the state. For many things are comprehended in and follow from this faith. It is not a barren, unprofitable speculation, but a practical and restraining doctrine of the greatest moral efficiency. If it be not this to us, to all and every one of us, it is not what it ought to be and we wrongly understand or else wilfully pervert it.

'We believe that we are everywhere surrounded by the presence of our G.o.d: that he is our witness every moment, and everywhere conscious, as we are ourselves, of our words, acts, and thoughts; and will bring us all to a strict account at last for whatever he has thus witnessed that has been contrary to that rigid law of holy living which he has established over us in Christ. Must not this act upon us most beneficially? We believe that in himself he is perfect purity, and that he demands of us that we be so in our degree also. We can impute to him none of the acts, such as the believers in the Greek and Roman religions freely ascribe to their Jove, and so have not, as others have, in such divine example, a warrant and excuse for the like enormities. This one G.o.d too we also regard as our judge, who will in the end sit upon our conduct throughout the whole of our lives, and punish or reward according to what we shall have been, just as the souls of men, according to your belief, receive their sentence at the bar of Minos and Rhadamanthus. And other similar truths are wrapt up with and make a part of this great primary one. Wherefore it is most evident, that nothing can be more false and absurd than to think and speak of us as atheists and for that reason a nuisance in the state.

'But it is not only that we are atheists, but that, through our atheism, we are to be looked upon as disorderly members of society, disturbers of the peace, disaffected and rebellious citizens, that we hear on every side. I do not believe that this charge has ever been true of any, much less of all. Or if any Christian has at any time and for any reason disobeyed the laws, withheld his taxes when they have been demanded, or neglected any duties which, as a citizen of Rome, he has owed to the Emperor, or any representative of him, then so far he has not been a Christian. Christ's kingdom is not of this world--though, because we so often and so much speak of a kingdom, we have been thought to aim at one on earth--it is above; and he requires us while here below to be obedient to the laws and the rulers that are set up over us, so far as we deem them in accordance with the everlasting laws of G.o.d and of right; to pay tribute to whomsoever it is due; here in Rome to Caesar; and, wherever we are, to be loyal and quiet citizens of the state. And the reception of his religion tends to make such of us all. Whoever adopts the faith of the gospel of Jesus will be a virtuous, and holy, and devout man, and therefore, both in Rome, in Persia, and in India, and everywhere, a good subject.

'We defend not nor abet, great Emperor, the act of that holy but impetuous and pa.s.sionate man, who so lately, in defiance of the imperial edict and before either remonstrance or appeal on our part, preached on the very steps of the capitol, and there committed that violence for which he hath already answered with his life. We defend him not in that; but neither do we defend, but utterly condemn and execrate the unrighteous haste, and the more than demoniac barbarity of his death.

G.o.d, we rejoice in all our afflictions to believe, is over all, and the wicked, the cruel, and the unjust, shall not escape.

'Yet it must be acknowledged that there are higher duties than those which we owe to the state, even as there is a higher sovereign to whom we owe allegiance than the head of the state, whether that head be king, senate, or emperor. Man is not only a subject and a citizen, he is first of all the creature of G.o.d, and amenable to his laws. When therefore there is a conflict between the laws of G.o.d and the king, who can doubt which are to be obeyed?--'

'Who does not see,' cried Porphyrius vehemently, 'that in such principles there lurks the blackest treason? for who but themselves are to judge when the laws of the two sovereigns do thus conflict? and what law then may be promulged, but to them it may be an offence?'

'Let not the learned Porphyrius,' resumed Probus, 'rest in but a part of what I say. Let him hear the whole, and then deny the principle if he can. I say, when the law of G.o.d and the law of man are opposite the one to the other, we are not to hesitate which to obey and which to break; our first allegiance is due to Heaven. And it is true that we ourselves are to be the judges in the case. But then we are judges under the same stern laws of conscience toward G.o.d, which compel us to violate the law of the empire, though death in its most terrific form be the penalty.

And is it likely therefore that we shall, for frivolous causes, or imaginary ones, or none at all, hold it to be our duty to rebel against the law of the land? To think so were to rate us low indeed. They may surely be trusted to make this decision, whose fidelity to conscience in other emergences brings down upon them so heavy a load of calamity. I may appeal moreover to all, I think, who hear me, of the common faith, whether they themselves would not hold by the same principle? Suppose the case that your supreme G.o.d--”Jupiter greatest and best”--or the G.o.d beyond and above him, in whom your philosophers have faith--revealed a law, requiring what the law of the empire forbids, must you not, would you not, if your religion were anything more than a mere pretence, obey the G.o.d rather than the man? Although therefore, great Emperor, we blame the honest Macer for his precipitancy, yet it ought to be, and is, the determination of us all to yield obedience to no law which violates the law of Heaven. We having received the faith of Christ in trust, to be by us dispensed to mankind, and believing the welfare of mankind to depend upon the wide extension of it, we will rather die than shut it up in our own bosoms--we will rather die, than live with our tongues tied and silent--our limbs fettered and bound! We must speak, or we will die--'

Porphyrius again sprang from his seat with intent to speak, but the Emperor restrained him.

'Contend not now, Porphyrius; let us hear the Christian. I have given him his freedom. Infringe it not.'

'I will willingly, n.o.ble Emperor,' said Probus, 'respond to whatsoever the learned Tyrian may propose. All I can desire is this only, that the religion of Christ may be seen, by those who are here, to be what it truly is; and it may be, that the questions or the objections of the philosopher shall show this more perfectly than a continued discourse.'

The Emperor, however, making a sign, he went on.

'We have also been charged, O Emperor, with vices and crimes, committed at both our social and our religious meetings, at which nature revolts, which are even beyond in grossness what have been ever ascribed to the most flagitious of mankind.'--Probus here enumerated the many rumors which had long been and still were current in Rome, and, especially by the lower orders, believed; and drew then such a picture of the character, lives, manners, and morals of the Christians, for the truth of which he appealed openly to n.o.ble and distinguished persons among the Romans then present,--not of the Christian faith, but who were yet well acquainted with their character and condition, and who would not refuse to testify to what he had said--that there could none have been present in that vast a.s.sembly but who, if there were any sense of justice within them, must have dismissed forever from their minds, if they had ever entertained them, the slanderous fictions that had filled them.

To report to you, Fausta, this part of his defence, must be needless, and could not prove otherwise than painful. He then also refuted in the same manner other common objections alleged against the Christians and their wors.h.i.+p; the lateness of its origin; its beggarly simplicity; the low and ignorant people who alone or chiefly, both in Rome and throughout the world, have received it; the fierce divisions and disputes among the Christians themselves; the uncertainty of its doctrines; the rigor of its morality, as unsuited to mankind; as also its spiritual wors.h.i.+p; the slowness of its progress, and the little likelihood that, if G.o.d were its author, he would leave it to be trodden under foot and so nearly annihilated by the very people to whom he was sending it; these and other similar things usually urged against the Christians, and now for the first time, it is probable, by most of the Romans present, heard, refuted, and explained, did Probus set forth, both with brevity and force; making nothing tedious by reason of a frivolous minuteness, nor yet omitting a single topic or argument, which it was due to the cause he defended, to bring before the minds of that august a.s.sembly. He then ended his appeal in the following manner:

'And now, great Emperor, must you have seen, in what I have already said, what the nature and character of this religion is; for in denying and disproving the charges that have been brought against it, I have, in most particulars, alleged and explained some opposite truth or doctrine, by which it is justly characterized. But that you may be informed the more exactly for what it is you are about to persecute and destroy us, and for what it is that we cheerfully undergo torture and death sooner than surrender or deny it, listen yet a moment longer. You have heard that we are named after Jesus, Jesus of Nazareth in Galilee, who, in the reign of Tiberius, was born in Judea, and there lived and taught, a prophet and messenger of G.o.d, till he was publicly crucified by his bitter enemies the Jews. We do not doubt, nay, we all steadfastly believe, that this Jesus was the Son of the Most High G.o.d, by reason of his wonderful endowments and his delegated office as the long-looked-for Messiah of the Jews. As the evidences of his great office and of his divine origin, he performed those miracles that filled with astonishment the whole Jewish nation, and strangers from all parts of the world; and so wrought even upon the mind of your great predecessor, the Emperor Tiberius, that he would fain receive him into the number of the G.o.ds of Rome. And why, O Emperor, was this great personage sent forth into the world, encircled by the rays of divine power and wisdom and goodness, an emanation of the self-existent and infinite G.o.d? And why do we so honor him, and cleave to him, that we are ready to offer our lives in sacrifice, while we go forth as preachers of his faith, making him known to all nations as the universal Saviour and Redeemer? This Jesus came into the world, and lived and taught; was preceded by so long a preparation of prophetic annunciation, and accompanied by so sublime demonstrations of almighty power, to this end, and to this end only, that he might save us from our sins, and from those penal consequences in this world and in worlds to come, which are bound to them by the stern decrees of fate. Yes, Aurelian, Jesus came only that he might deliver mankind from the thraldom of every kind of wickedness, and raise them to a higher condition of virtue and happiness. He was a great moral and religious teacher and reformer, endowed with the wisdom and power of the supreme G.o.d. He himself toiled only in Judea; but he came a benefactor of Rome too--of Rome as well as of Judea. He came to purge it of its pollutions; to check in their growth those customs and vices which seem destined, reaching their natural height and size, to overlay and bury in final ruin the city and the empire; he came to make us citizens of Heaven through the virtues which his doctrine should build up in the soul, and so citizens of Rome more worthy of that name than any who ever went before. He came to heal, to mend, to reform the state; not to set up a kingdom in hostility to this, but in unison with it; an inward, invisible kingdom in every man's heart, which should be as the soul of the other.

'It was to reform the morals of the state, to save it from itself, that you, Aurelian, in the first years of your reign, applied those energies that have raised the empire to more than its ancient glory. You aimed to infuse a love of justice and of peace, to abate the extravagances of the times, to stem the tide of corruption that seemed about to bear down upon its foul streams the empire itself, tossing upon its surface a wide sea of ruin. It was a great work--too great for man. It needed a divine strength and a more than human wisdom. These were not yours; and it is no wonder that the work did not go on to its completion. Jesus is a reformer; of Rome and of the world also. The world is his theatre of action; but with him there is leagued the arm and the power of the Supreme G.o.d; and the work which he attempts shall succeed. It cannot but succeed. It is not so much he, Jesus of Nazareth, who has come forth upon this great errand of mercy and love to mankind, as G.o.d himself in and through him. It is the Great G.o.d of the Universe, who, by Jesus Christ as his agent and messenger, comes to you, and would reform and redeem your empire, and out of that which is transitory, and by its inherent vice threatened with decay and death, make a city and an empire which, through the energy of its virtues, shall truly be eternal. Can you not, O Emperor, supposing the claims of this religion to a divine origin to be just, view it with respect? Nay, could you not greet its approach to your capital with pleasure and grat.i.tude, seeing its aim is nothing else than this, to purify, purge, and reform the state, to heal its wounds, cleanse its putrifying members, and infuse the element of a new and healthier life? Methinks a true patriot and lover of Rome must rejoice when any power approaches and offers to apply those remedies that may, with remotest probability only, bid fair to cure the diseases of which her body is sick, nigh unto death.