Aurelian; or, Rome in the Third Century
before. They had ever impressed me as a simple-minded, virtuous
community, of notions too subtle for the world ever to receive, but
which, upon themselves, appeared to exert a power altogether beneficial.
Many of this faith I had known well, and they were persons to excite my
highest admiration for the characters which they bore. Need I name more
than the princess Julia, and her husband, the excellent Piso? Others
like them, what wonder if inferior! had also, both in Palmyra, and at
Tibur and Rome--for they were to be found everywhere--drawn largely both
on my respect and my affections. I beheld with sorrow the signs which
now seemed to portend suffering and disaster. And my sympathies were the
more moved seeing that never before had there been upon the throne a man
who, if he were once entered into a war of opposition against them, had
power to do them greater harm, or could have proved a more stern and
cruel enemy. Not even Nero or Domitian were in their time to be so much
dreaded. For if Aurelian should once league him with the state against
them, it would not with him be matter of mere cruel sport, but of
conscience. It would be for the honor of the gods, the protection of
religion, the greatness and glory of the empire, that he would assail
and punish them; and the same fierce and bloody spirit that made him of
all modern conquerors the bloodiest and fiercest, it was plain would
rule him in any encounter with this humble and defenceless tribe. I
could only hope that I was deceived, as well as others, in my
apprehensions, or, if that were not so, pray that the gods would be
pleased to take their great subject to themselves.
Full of such reflections and emotions I arrived at the palace, and was
ushered into the presence of Livia. There was with her the melancholy
Aurelia--for such she always seems--who appeared to have been engaged in
earnest talk with the Empress, if one might judge by tears fast falling
from her eyes. The only words which I caught as I entered were these
from Aurelia, 'but, dear lady, if Mucapor require it not, why should
others think of it so much? Were he fixed, then should I indeed have to
ask strength of God for the trial--' then, seeing me, and only receiving
my salutations, she withdrew.
Livia, after first inquiring concerning Zenobia and Faustula, returning
to what had just engaged her, said,
'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 superstitions 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 noble,' 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
Zenobia, 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 god we worship 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 multitudes of Palmyra.'
'It will, Fronto. But first I have this to say, and, by the gods, 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
assent to this nor like it. But it is true, I am persuaded, as the gods
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.
'Hellenism, Fronto, is disgraced, and its very life threatened by the
vices of her chief ministers. The gods 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
gods, while their houses of worship, 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 worshipped in Rome no
one has found by experience the public assistance of the gods.' 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 worshippers. 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 gods.
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 gods, 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,