Quo Vadis: A Narrative of the Time of Nero
a vain and empty jingle of words without meaning. Thou rememberest the
question which he put thee: ‘But if Cæsar were a Christian, would ye
not all feel safer, surer of possessing that which ye possess, free of
alarm, and sure of to-morrow?’ Thou didst say to me that our teaching
was an enemy of life; and I answer thee now, that, if from the beginning
of this letter I had been repeating only the three words, ‘I am happy!’
I could not have expressed my happiness to thee. To this thou wilt
answer, that my happiness is Lygia. True, my friend. Because I love her
immortal soul, and because we both love each other in Christ; for such
love there is no separation, no deceit, no change, no old age, no death.
For, when youth and beauty pass, when our bodies wither and death comes,
love will remain, for the spirit remains. Before my eyes were open to
the light I was ready to burn my own house even, for Lygia’s sake; but
now I tell thee that I did not love her, for it was Christ who first
taught me to love. In Him is the source of peace and happiness. It
is not I who say this, but reality itself. Compare thy own luxury,
my friend, lined with alarm, thy delights, not sure of a morrow, thy
orgies, with the lives of Christians, and thou wilt find a ready answer.
But, to compare better, come to our mountains with the odor of thyme, to
our shady olive groves on our shores lined with ivy. A peace is waiting
for thee, such as thou hast not known for a long time, and hearts that
love thee sincerely. Thou, having a noble soul and a good one, shouldst
be happy. Thy quick mind can recognize the truth, and knowing it thou
wilt love it. To be its enemy, like Cæsar and Tigellinus, is possible,
but indifferent to it no one can be. O my Petronius, Lygia and I are
comforting ourselves with the hope of seeing thee soon. Be well, be
happy, and come to us.”
Petronius received this letter in Cumæ, whither he had gone with other
Augustians who were following Cæsar. His struggle of long years with
Tigellinus was nearing its end. Petronius knew already that he must fall
in that struggle, and he understood why. As Cæsar fell lower daily to
the role of a comedian, a buffoon, and a charioteer; as he sank deeper
in a sickly, foul, and coarse dissipation,--the exquisite arbiter became
a mere burden to him. Even when Petronius was silent, Nero saw blame in
his silence; when the arbiter praised, he saw ridicule. The brilliant
patrician annoyed his self-love and roused his envy. His wealth and
splendid works of art had become an object of desire both to the ruler
and the all-powerful minister. Petronius was spared so far in view of
the journey to Achæa, in which his taste, his knowledge of everything
Greek, might be useful. But gradually Tigellinus explained to Cæsar that
Carinas surpassed him in taste and knowledge, and would be better able
to arrange in Achæa games, receptions, and triumphs. From that moment
Petronius was lost. There was not courage to send him his sentence in
Rome. Cæsar and Tigellinus remembered that that apparently effeminate
and æsthetic person, who made “day out of night,” and was occupied only
in luxury, art, and feasts, had shown amazing industry and energy,
when proconsul in Bithynia and later when consul in the capital. They
considered him capable of anything, and it was known that in Rome he
possessed not only the love of the people, but even of the pretorians.
None of Cæsar’s confidants could foresee how Petronius might act in a
given case; it seemed wiser, therefore, to entice him out of the city,
and reach him in a province.
With this object he received an invitation to go to Cumæ with other
Augustians. He went, though suspecting the ambush, perhaps so as not
to appear in open opposition, perhaps to show once more a joyful face
devoid of every care to Cæsar and the Augustians, and to gain a last
victory before death over Tigellinus.
Meanwhile the latter accused him of friendship with the Senator
Scevinus, who was the soul of Piso’s conspiracy. The people of
Petronius, left in Rome, were imprisoned; his house was surrounded by
pretorian guards. When he learned this, he showed neither alarm nor
concern, and with a smile said to Augustians whom he received in his own
splendid villa in Cumæ,--
“Ahenobarbus does not like direct questions; hence ye will see his
confusion when I ask him if it was he who gave command to imprison my
‘familia’ in the capital.”
Then he invited them to a feast “before the longer journey,” and he had
just made preparations for it when the letter from Vinicius came.
When he received this letter, Petronius grew somewhat thoughtful,
but after a time his face regained its usual composure, and that same
evening he answered as follows:--
“I rejoice at your happiness and admire your hearts, for I had not
thought that two lovers could remember a third person who was far away.
Ye have not only not forgotten me, but ye wish to persuade me to go to
Sicily, so that ye may share with me your bread and your Christ, who, as
thou writest, has given you happiness so bountifully.
“If that be true, honor Him. To my thinking, however, Ursus had
something to do with saving Lygia, and the Roman people also had a
little to do with it. But since thy belief is that Christ did the
work, I will not contradict. Spare no offerings to Him. Prometheus also
sacrificed himself for man; but, alas! Prometheus is an invention of the
poets apparently, while people worthy of credit have told me that they
saw Christ with their own eyes. I agree with thee that He is the most
worthy of the gods.
“I remember the question by Paul of Tarsus, and I think that if
Ahenobarbus lived according to Christ’s teaching I might have time to
visit you in Sicily. In that case we could converse, in the shade of
trees and near fountains, of all the gods and all the truths discussed
by Greek philosophers at any time. To-day I must give thee a brief
answer.
“I care for two philosophers only: Pyrrho and Anacreon. I am ready to
sell the rest to thee cheaply, with all the Greek and Roman Stoics.
Truth, Vinicius, dwells somewhere so high that the gods themselves
cannot see it from the top of Olympus. To thee, carissime, thy Olympus
seems higher still, and, standing there, thou callest to me, ‘Come, thou
wilt see such sights as thou hast not seen yet!’ I might. But I answer,
‘I have not feet for the journey.’ And if thou read this letter to the
end, thou wilt acknowledge, I think, that I am right.
“No, happy husband of the Aurora princess! thy religion is not for me.
Am I to love the Bithynians who carry my litter, the Egyptians who heat
my bath? Am I to love Ahenobarbus and Tigellinus? I swear by the white
knees of the Graces, that even if I wished to love them I could not.
In Rome there are a hundred thousand persons at least who have either
crooked shoulders, or big knees, or thin thighs, or staring eyes, or
heads that are too large. Dost thou command me to love these too? Where
am I to find the love, since it is not in my heart? And if thy God
desires me to love such persons, why in His all might did He not give
them the forms of Niobe’s children, for example, which thou hast seen on
the Palatine? Whoso loves beauty is unable for that very reason to love
deformity. One may not believe in our gods, but it is possible to love
them, as Phidias, Praxiteles, Miron, Skopas, and Lysias loved.
“Should I wish to go whither thou wouldst lead me, I could not. But
since I do not wish, I am doubly unable. Thou believest, like Paul of
Tarsus, that on the other side of the Styx thou wilt see thy Christ in
certain Elysian fields. Let Him tell thee then Himself whether He would
receive me with my gems, my Myrrhene vase, my books published by Sozius,
and my golden-haired Eunice. I laugh at this thought; for Paul of
Tarsus told me that for Christ’s sake one must give up wreaths of roses,
feasts, and luxury. It is true that he promised me other happiness, but
I answered that I was too old for new happiness, that my eyes would be
delighted always with roses, and that the odor of violets is dearer to
me than stench from my foul neighbor of the Subura.
“These are reasons why thy happiness is not for me. But there is one
reason more, which I have reserved for the last: Thanatos summons
me. For thee the light of life is beginning; but my sun has set, and
twilight is embracing my head. In other words, I must die, carissime.
“It is not worth while to talk long of this. It had to end thus. Thou,
who knowest Ahenobarbus, wilt understand the position easily. Tigellinus
has conquered, or rather my victories have touched their end. I have
lived as I wished, and I will die as pleases me.
“Do not take this to heart. No God has promised me immortality; hence
no surprise meets me. At the same time thou art mistaken, Vinicius, in
asserting that only thy God teaches man to die calmly. No. Our world
knew, before thou wert born, that when the last cup was drained, it
was time to go,--time to rest,--and it knows yet how to do that with
calmness. Plato declares that virtue is music, that the life of a sage
is harmony. If that be true, I shall die as I have lived,--virtuously.
“I should like to take farewell of thy godlike wife in the words with
which on a time I greeted her in the house of Aulus, ‘Very many persons
have I seen, but thy equal I know not.’
“If the soul is more than what Pyrrho thinks, mine will fly to thee
and Lygia, on its way to the edge of the ocean, and will alight at your
house in the form of a butterfly or, as the Egyptians believe, in the
form of a sparrowhawk. Otherwise I cannot come.
“Meanwhile let Sicily replace for you the gardens of Hesperides; may the
goddesses of the fields, woods, and fountains scatter flowers on your
path, and may white doves build their nests on every acanthus of the
columns of your house.”
Chapter LXXIII
PETRONIUS was not mistaken. Two days later young Nerva, who had always
been friendly and devoted, sent his freedman to Cumæ with news of what
was happening at the court of Cæsar.
The death of Petronius had been determined. On the morning of the
following day they intended to send him a centurion, with the order
to stop at Cumæ, and wait there for further instructions; the next
messenger, to follow a few days later, was to bring the death sentence.
Petronius heard the news with unruffled calmness.
“Thou wilt take to thy lord,” said he, “one of my vases; say from me
that I thank him with my whole soul, for now I am able to anticipate the
sentence.”
And all at once he began to laugh, like a man who has came upon a
perfect thought, and rejoices in advance at its fulfilment.
That same afternoon his slaves rushed about, inviting the Augustians,
who were staying in Cumæ, and all the ladies, to a magnificent banquet
at the villa of the arbiter.
He wrote that afternoon in the library; next he took a bath, after which
he commanded the vestiplicæ to arrange his dress. Brilliant and stately
as one of the gods, he went to the triclinium, to cast the eye of a
critic on the preparations, and then to the gardens, where youths and
Grecian maidens from the islands were weaving wreaths of roses for the
evening.
Not the least care was visible on his face. The servants only knew that
the feast would be something uncommon, for he had issued a command
to give unusual rewards to those with whom he was satisfied, and
some slight blows to all whose work should not please him, or who had
deserved blame or punishment earlier. To the cithara players and the
singers he had ordered beforehand liberal pay. At last, sitting in the
garden under a beech, through whose leaves the sun-rays marked the earth
with bright spots, he called Eunice.
She came, dressed in white, with a sprig of myrtle in her hair,