Quo Vadis: A Narrative of the Time of Nero
divine. In his soul he rejected it; but he felt that he was parting as
if from a field full of spikenard, a kind of intoxicating incense;
when a man has once breathed of this he must, as in the land of the
lotus-eaters, forget all things else ever after, and yearn for it only.
It seemed to him that there was nothing real in that religion, but that
reality in presence of it was so paltry that it deserved not the time
for thought. Expanses of some kind, of which hitherto he had not had a
suspicion, surrounded him,--certain immensities, certain clouds. That
cemetery began to produce on him the impression of a meeting-place for
madmen, but also of a place mysterious and awful, in which, as on a
mystic bed, something was in progress of birth the like of which had
not been in the world so far. He brought before his mind all that, which
from the first moment of his speech, the old man had said touching life,
truth, love, God; and his thoughts were dazed from the brightness, as
the eyes are blinded from lightning flashes which follow each other
unceasingly.
As is usual with people for whom life has been turned into one single
passion, Vinicius thought of all this through the medium of his love for
Lygia; and in the light of those flashes he saw one thing distinctly,
that if Lygia was in the cemetery, if she confessed that religion,
obeyed and felt it, she never could and never would be his mistress.
For the first time, then, since he had made her acquaintance at Aulus’s,
Vinicius felt that though now he had found her he would not get her.
Nothing similar had come to his head so far, and he could not explain it
to himself then, for that was not so much an express understanding as
a dim feeling of irreparable loss and misfortune. There rose in him
an alarm, which was turned soon into a storm of anger against the
Christians in general, and against the old man in particular. That
fisherman, whom at the first cast of the eye he considered a peasant,
now filled him with fear almost, and seemed some mysterious power
deciding his fate inexorably and therefore tragically.
The quarrymen again, unobserved, added torches to the fire; the wind
ceased to sound in the pines; the flame rose evenly, with a slender
point toward the stars, which were twinkling in a clear sky. Having
mentioned the death of Christ, the old man talked now of Him only. All
held the breath in their breasts, and a silence set in which was deeper
than the preceding one, so that it was possible almost to hear the
beating of hearts. That man had seen! and he narrated as one in whose
memory every moment had been fixed in such a way that were he to close
his eyes he would see yet. He told, therefore, how on their return from
the Cross he and John had sat two days and nights in the supper-chamber,
neither sleeping nor eating, in suffering, in sorrow, in doubt, in
alarm, holding their heads in their hands, and thinking that He had
died. Oh, how grievous, how grievous that was! The third day had dawned
and the light whitened the walls, but he and John were sitting in the
chamber, without hope or comfort. How desire for sleep tortured them
(for they had spent the night before the Passion without sleep)! They
roused themselves then, and began again to lament. But barely had the
sun risen when Mary of Magdala, panting, her hair dishevelled, rushed in
with the cry, “They have taken away the Lord!” When they heard this,
he and John sprang up and ran toward the sepulchre. But John, being
younger, arrived first; he saw the place empty, and dared not enter.
Only when there were three at the entrance did he, the person now
speaking to them, enter, and find on the stone a shirt with a winding
sheet; but the body he found not.
Fear fell on them then, because they thought that the priests had
borne away Christ, and both returned home in greater grief still. Other
disciples came later and raised a lament, now in company, so that the
Lord of Hosts might hear them more easily, and now separately and in
turn. The spirit died within them, for they had hoped that the Master
would redeem Israel, and it was now the third day since his death; hence
they did not understand why the Father had deserted the Son, and they
preferred not to look at the daylight, but to die, so grievous was the
burden.
The remembrance of those terrible moments pressed even then from the
eyes of the old man two tears, which were visible by the light of the
fire, coursing down his gray beard. His hairless and aged head was
shaking, and the voice died in his breast.
“That man is speaking the truth and is weeping over it,” said Vinicius
in his soul. Sorrow seized by the throat the simple-hearted listeners
also. They had heard more than once of Christ’s sufferings, and it was
known to them that joy succeeded sorrow; but since an apostle who had
seen it told this, they wrung their hands under the impression, and
sobbed or beat their breasts.
But they calmed themselves gradually, for the wish to hear more gained
the mastery. The old man closed his eyes, as if to see distant things
more distinctly in his soul, and continued,--“When the disciples had
lamented in this way, Mary of Magdala rushed in a second time, crying
that she had seen the Lord. Unable to recognize him, she thought him
the gardener: but He said, ‘Mary!’ She cried ‘Rabboni!’ and fell at his
feet. He commanded her to go to the disciples, and vanished. But they,
the disciples, did not believe her; and when she wept for joy, some
upbraided her, some thought that sorrow had disturbed her mind, for
she said, too, that she had seen angels at the grave, but they, running
thither a second time, saw the grave empty. Later in the evening
appeared Cleopas, who had come with another from Emmaus, and they
returned quickly, saying: ‘The Lord has indeed risen!’ And they
discussed with closed doors, out of fear of the Jews. Meanwhile He stood
among them, though the doors had made no sound, and when they feared, He
said, ‘Peace be with you!’
“And I saw Him, as did all, and He was like light, and like the
happiness of our hearts, for we believed that He had risen from the
dead, and that the seas will dry and the mountains turn to dust, but His
glory will not pass.
“After eight days Thomas Didymus put his finger in the Lord’s wounds and
touched His side; Thomas fell at His feet then, and cried, ‘My Lord and
my God!’ ‘Because thou hast seen me thou hast believed; blessed are they
who have not seen and have believed!’ said the Lord. And we heard those
words, and our eyes looked at Him, for He was among us.”
Vinicius listened, and something wonderful took place in him. He forgot
for a moment where he was; he began to lose the feeling of reality, of
measure, of judgment. He stood in the presence of two impossibilities.
He could not believe what the old man said; and he felt that it would be
necessary either to be blind or renounce one’s own reason, to admit
that that man who said “I saw” was lying. There was something in his
movements, in his tears, in his whole figure, and in the details of
the events which he narrated, which made every suspicion impossible. To
Vinicius it seemed at moments that he was dreaming. But round about he
saw the silent throng; the odor of lanterns came to his nostrils; at a
distance the torches were blazing; and before him on the stone stood
an aged man near the grave, with a head trembling somewhat, who, while
bearing witness, repeated, “I saw!”
And he narrated to them everything up to the Ascension into heaven. At
moments he rested, for he spoke very circumstantially; but it could be
felt that each minute detail had fixed itself in his memory, as a thing
is fixed in a stone into which it has been engraved. Those who listened
to him were seized by ecstasy. They threw back their hoods to hear him
better, and not lose a word of those which for them were priceless. It
seemed to them that some superhuman power had borne them to Galilee;
that they were walking with the disciples through those groves and on
those waters; that the cemetery was turned into the lake of Tiberius;
that on the bank, in the mist of morning, stood Christ, as he stood
when John, looking from the boat, said, “It is the Lord,” and Peter cast
himself in to swim, so as to fall the more quickly at the beloved feet.
In the faces of those present were evident enthusiasm beyond bounds,
oblivion of life, happiness, and love immeasurable. It was clear that
during Peter’s long narrative some of them had visions. When he began
to tell how, at the moment of Ascension, the clouds closed in under
the feet of the Saviour, covered Him, and hid Him from the eyes of the
Apostles, all heads were raised toward the sky unconsciously, and a
moment followed as it were of expectation, as if those people hoped to
see Him or as if they hoped that He would descend again from the fields
of heaven, and see how the old Apostle was feeding the sheep confided to
him, and bless both the flock and him.
Rome did not exist for those people, nor did the man Cæsar; there were
no temples of pagan gods; there was only Christ, who filled the land,
the sea, the heavens, and the world.
At the houses scattered here and there along the Via Nomentana, the
cocks began to crow, announcing midnight. At that moment Chilo pulled
the corner of Vinicius’s mantle and whispered,--“Lord, I see Urban over
there, not far from the old man, and with him is a maiden.”
Vinicius shook himself, as if out of a dream, and, turning in the
direction indicated by the Greek, he saw Lygia.
Chapter XXI
EVERY drop of blood quivered in the young patrician at sight of her.
He forgot the crowd, the old man, his own astonishment at the
incomprehensible things which he had heard,--he saw only her. At last,
after all his efforts, after long days of alarm, trouble, and suffering,
he had found her! For the first time he realized that joy might rush at
the heart, like a wild beast, and squeeze it till breath was lost. He,
who had supposed hitherto that on “Fortuna” had been imposed a kind of
duty to accomplish all his wishes, hardly believed his own eyes now and
his own happiness. Were it not for that disbelief, his passionate
nature might have urged him to some unconsidered step; but he wished
to convince himself first that that was not the continuation of those
miracles with which his head was filled, and that he was not dreaming.
But there was no doubt,--he saw Lygia, and an interval of barely a few
steps divided them. She stood in perfect light, so that he could rejoice
in the sight of her as much as he liked. The hood had fallen from her
head and dishevelled her hair; her mouth was open slightly, her eyes
raised toward the Apostle, her face fixed in listening and delighted.
She was dressed in a dark woollen mantle, like a daughter of the people,
but never had Vinicius seen her more beautiful; and notwithstanding all
the disorder which had risen in him, he was struck by the nobility of
that wonderful patrician head in distinction to the dress, almost that
of a slave. Love flew over him like a flame, immense, mixed with a
marvellous feeling of yearning, homage, honor, and desire. He felt
the delight which the sight of her caused him; he drank of her as of
life-giving water after long thirst. Standing near the gigantic Lygian,
she seemed to him smaller than before, almost a child; he noticed,
too, that she had grown more slender. Her complexion had become almost
transparent; she made on him the impression of a flower, and a spirit.
But all the more did he desire to possess that woman, so different from
all women whom he had seen or possessed in Rome or the Orient. He felt
that for her he would have given them all, and with them Rome and the
world in addition.