Chapter XVII: Part 17

Eleazar was minded to speak: Mathias begged of him not to withhold his thoughts, but to speak them, and it was at this moment that Paul entered, walking softly, lest his footsteps should interrupt Eleazar, whom he heard say that he disagreed with the last part of Mathias' speech, inasmuch as it would be against the word of the Scriptures and likewise against all tradition to accept God as no more than the absolute substance, which strictly taken would exclude all differences and relation, even the differences and relation of subject and object in self-consciousness. I shall not be lacking in appreciation of the wisdom of our learned brother, Paul heard him say, if I venture to hold to the idea of a God whom we know at least to be conscious, for he says: I am, a statement which had much interest for Paul; and while considering it he heard Manahem say: it is hard to conceive of God except as a high principle of being and well-being in the universe, who binds all things to each other in binding them to himself. Then there are two Gods and not one God, Saddoc interposed quickly, an objection to which Manahem made this answer: not two Gods but two aspects, thereby confuting Saddoc for the moment, who muttered: two aspects which have, however, to be reduced to unity.

Paul's eyes went from Saddoc to Mathias, and he thought that Mathias' face wore an expression of amused contempt as he listened and called upon other disputants to contribute their small thoughts to the discussion. Encouraged by a wave of his hand, Caleb ventured to remark: there is God and there is the word of God, to which Hazael murmured this reply: there is only one God; one who watches over his chosen people and over all the other nations of the earth. But does God love the other nations as dearly as the Hebrew people? Manahem asked, and Hazael answered him: we may not discriminate so far into the love of God, it being infinite, but this we may say, that it is through the Hebrew people that God makes manifest his love of mankind, on condition, let it be understood, of their obedience to his revealed will. And if I may add a few words to the idea so eloquently suggested by our Brother Mathias, I would say that God is the primal substance out of which all things evolve. But these words must not be taken too literally, thereby refusing to God a personal consciousness, for God knows certainly all the differences and all the relations, and we should overturn all the teaching of Scripture and lose ourselves in the errors of Greek philosophy if we held to the belief of a God, absolute, pure, simple, detached from all concern with his world and his people. But in what measure, Manahem asked, laying his scroll upon his knees and leaning forward, his long chin resting on his hand, in what measure, he asked, speaking out of his deepest self, are we to look upon God as a conscious being; if Mathias could answer that question we should be grateful, for it is the question which torments every Essene in the solitude of his cell.

Has any other brother here a word to say? Now you, Brother Caleb? I am sure there is a thought in your heart that we would all like to hear. Brother Saddoc, I call upon thee! Brother Saddoc seemed to have no wish to speak, but Mathias continued to press him, saying. Brother Saddoc, for what else hast thou been seeking in thy scroll but for a text whereon to base an argument? And seeing that it was impossible for him to escape from the fray of argument, Brother Saddoc answered that he took his stand upon Deuteronomy. Do we not read that the Lord thy God that goeth before thee shall fight for thee, and in the desert thou hast seen that he bore thee, as a man bears his sons, all the way that ye went till ye came unto this place. But Saddoc, Eleazar interrupted, has forgotten that one of the leading thoughts in this discourse is that the words in Deuteronomy were written for starving tribes that came out of Arabia rather than for us to whom God has given the land of Canaan. We were then among the rudiments of the world and man was but a child, incapable, as Mathias has said, of the knowledge of God as an absolute being. But then, answered Saddoc, the Scriptures were not written for all time. Was anything, Mathias murmured, written for all time? Paul was about to ask himself if Mathias numbered God among the many things that time wastes away when his thought was interrupted by Manahem asking how we are to understand the words, the heavens were created before the earth. Do the Scriptures mean that intelligence is prior to sense? Mathias' face lighted up, and, foreseeing his opportunity to make show of his Greek proficiency he began: heaven is our intelligence and the earth our sensibility. The spirit descended into matter, and God created man according to his image, as Moses said and said well, for no creature is more like to God than man: not in bodily form (God is without body), but in his intelligence; for the intelligence of every man is in a little the intelligence of the universe, and it may be said that the intelligence lives in the flesh that bears it as God himself lives in the universe, being in some sort a God of the body, which carries it about like an image in a shrine. Thus the intelligence occupies the same place in man as the great President occupies in the universe--being itself invisible while it sees everything, and having its own essence hidden while it penetrates the essences of all other things. Also, by its arts and sciences, it finds its way through the earth and through the seas, and searches out everything that is contained in them. And then again it rises on wings and, looking down upon the air and all its commotions, it is borne upwards to the sky and the revolving heavens and accompanies the choral dances of the planets and stars fixed according to the laws of music. And led by love, the guide of wisdom, it proceeds still onward till it transcends all that is capable of being apprehended by the senses, and rises to that which is perceptible only by the intellect. And there, seeing in their surpassing beauty the original ideas and archetypes of all the things which sense finds beautiful, it becomes possessed by a sober intoxication, like the Corybantian revellers, and is filled with a still stronger longing, which bears it up to the highest summit of the intelligible world till it seems to approach to the great king of the intelligible world himself. And while it is eagerly seeking to behold him in all his glory, rays of divine light are pouring forth upon it which by their exceeding brilliance dazzle the eyes of the intelligence.

Whilst he spoke, his periods constructed with regard for every comma, Mathias' eyes were directed so frequently towards Paul that Paul could not but think that Mathias was vaunting his knowledge of Greek expressly, as if to reprove him, Paul, for the Aramaic idiom that he had never been able to wring out of his Greek, which he regretted, but which, after hearing Mathias, he would not be without; for to rid himself of it he would have to sacrifice the spirit to the outer form; as well might he offer sacrifice to the heathen gods; and he could not take his eyes off the tall, lean figure showing against the blue sky, for Mathias spoke from the balcony, flinging his grey locks from his forehead, uncertain if he should break into another eloquent period or call upon Paul to speak. He was curious to hear Paul, having divined a quick intelligence beneath an abrupt form that was withal not without beauty; he advanced towards Hazael and, leaning over his chair, whispered to him. He is telling, Paul said to himself, that it would be well to hear me as I am about to start for Rome to proclaim the truth in that city wherein all nations assemble. Well, let it be so, since it was to this I was called hither.

Hazael raised his eyes and was about to ask Paul to speak, but at that moment the bakers arrived with their bread baskets, and the Essenes moved from the deep embrasure in the wall into the domed gallery, each one departing into his cell and returning clothed in a white garment and white veil. Paul was about to withdraw, but Hazael said to him: none shares this repast with us; it is against the rule; but so many of the rules of the brethren have been set aside in these later days that, with the consent of all, I will break another rule and ask Paul of Tarsus to sit with us though he be not of our brotherhood, for is he not our brother in the love of God, which he has preached travelling over sea and land with it for ever in his mouth for the last twenty years. Preaching, Paul answered, the glad tidings of the resurrection, believing myself to have been bidden by the same will of God that called me hither and saved me from death many times that I might continue to be the humble instrument of his will. I will tell you that I was behoven to preach in Jericho--called out of myself--God knowing well they would not hear me and would drive me into the mountains and turn my feet by night to this place. Be it so, Paul, thou shalt tell thy story, the president answered, and the cook put a plate of lentils before the brethren and the baker set by each plate a loaf of bread, and everyone waited till the grace had been repeated before he tasted food. The peace, concord and good will; all that he had recommended in his Epistles; Paul saw around him, and he looked forward to teaching the Essenes of the approaching end of the world, convinced that God in his great justice would not allow him, Paul, to leave Palestine without every worthy servant hearing the truth. So he was impatient to make an end of the food before him, for the sustenance of the body was of little importance to him, its only use being to bear the spirit and to fortify it. He took counsel therefore with himself while eating as to the story he should tell, and his mind was ready with it when the president said: Paul, our meal is finished now; we would hear thee.

CHAP. XXXIV.

Yesterday the Jews would have thrown me into the Jordan or stoned me together with Timothy, my son in the faith, who instead of following me round the hill shoulder kept straight on for Cæsarea, where I pray that I may find him. These things you know of me, for three of the brethren were on that balcony yesternight when, upheld by the will of God, my feet were kept fast in the path that runs round this ravine. The Jews had abandoned their hunt when I arrived at your door, awakening fear in Brother Saddoc's heart that I was a robber or the head of some band of robbers. Such thoughts must have disturbed his mind when he saw me, and they were not driven off when I declared myself a prisoner to the Romans; for he besought me to depart lest my presence should bring all here within the grip of the Roman power. A hard and ruthless power it may be, but less bitter than the power which the Jews crave from the Romans to compel all to follow not the law alone, but the traditions that have grown about the law. But you brethren who send no fat rams to the Temple for sacrifice, but worship God out of your own hearts, will have pity for me who have been persecuted by the Jews of Jerusalem (who in their own eyes are the only Jews) for no reason but that I preach the death and the resurrection from the dead of our Lord Jesus Christ, whose apostle I am, being so made by himself when he spoke to me out of the clouds on the road to Damascus.

Of this great wonder you shall hear in good time, but before beginning the story you have asked me to relate I would before all calm Brother Saddoc's fears: I am no prisoner as he imagines me to be, but am under the law to return to Cæsarea, having appealed to Cæsar as was my right to do, being a Roman citizen long persecuted by the Jews; and I would thank you for the blankets I enjoyed last night and for the bread I have broken with you. Also for the promise that I have that one of you shall at nightfall put me on the way to Cæsarea and accompany me part of the way, so that I may not fall into the hands of my enemies the Jews, of Jerusalem, but shall reach Cæsarea to take ship for Rome. None of you need fear anything; you have my assurances; I am here by the permission of the noble Festus.

And now that you have learnt from me the hazard that cast me among you I will tell you that I am a Jew like yourselves: one born in Tarsus, a great city of Cilicia; a Roman citizen as you have heard from me, a privilege which was not bought by me for a great sum of money, nor by any act of mine, but inherited from my father, a Hebrew like yourselves, and descended from the stock of Abraham like yourselves. And by trade a weaver of that cloth of which tents are made; for my father gave me that trade, for which I thank him, for by it I have earned my living these many years, in various countries and cities. At an early age I was a skilful hand at the loom, and at the same time learned in the Scriptures, and my father, seeing a Rabbi in me, sent me to Jerusalem, and while I was taught the law I remember hearing of the Baptist, and the priests of the Temple muttering against him, but they were afraid to send men against him, for he was in great favour with the people. Afterwards I returned to Tarsus, where I worked daily at my loom until tidings came to that city that a disciple of John was preaching the destruction of the law, saying that he could destroy the Temple and build it up again in three days. We spoke under our breaths in Tarsus of this man, hardly able to believe that anyone could be so blasphemous and reprobate, and when we heard of his death upon a cross we were overjoyed and thought the Pharisees had done well; for we were full of zeal for the traditions and the ancient glory of our people. We believed then that heresy and blasphemy were at an end, and when news came of one Stephen, who had revived all the stories that Jesus told, that the end of the world was nigh and that the Temple could be destroyed and built up again, I laid my loom aside and started for Jerusalem in great anger to join with those who would root out the Nazarenes: we are now known as Christians, the name given to us at Antioch.

I was telling that I laid aside my loom in Tarsus and set out for Jerusalem to aid in rooting out the sect that I held to be blasphemous and pernicious. Now on the day of my arrival in that city, while coming from the Temple I saw three men hurrying by, one whose face was white as the dead, with a small crowd following; and everyone saying: not here, not here! And as they spoke stones were being gathered, and I knew that they were for stoning the man they had with them, one Stephen, they said, who had been teaching in the Temple that Jesus was born and died and raised from the dead, and that since his death the law is of no account. So did I gather news and with it abhorrence, and followed them till they came to an angle, at which they said: this corner will do. Stephen was thrown into it, and stones of all kinds were heaped upon him till one spattered his brains along the wall, after which the crowd muttered, we shall have no more of them.

That day I was of the crowd, and the stone that spattered the brains of Stephen along the wall seemed to me to have been well cast; I hated those who spoke against the law of our fathers, which I held in reverence, as essential and to be practised for all time; and the mild steadfastness in their faces, and the great love that shone in their eyes when the name of our Lord Jesus Christ was mentioned, instead of persuading me that I might be persecuting saints, exasperated me to further misdeeds. I became foremost in these persecutions, and informed by spies of the names of the saints, I made search in their houses at the head of armed agents and dragged them into the synagogue, compelling them to renounce the truth that the Messiah had come which had been promised in the Scriptures. Nor was I satisfied when the last Nazarene had been rooted out of Jerusalem, but cast my eyes forward to other towns, into which the saints might have fled, and, hearing that many were in Damascus, I got letters from the chief priests and started forth in a fume of rage which I strove to blow up with the threats of what we would put the saints to when we reached Damascus. But while the threats were on my lips there was in my heart a mighty questioning, from which I did not seem to escape, perhaps because I had not thrown a stone but stood by an approving spectator merely. I know not how it was, but as we forded the Jordan the cruelties that I had been guilty of, the inquisitions, the beatings with rods, the imprisonment--all these things rose up in my mind, a terrible troop of phantoms. Gentle faces and words of forgiveness floated past me one night as we lay encamped in a great quarry, and I asked myself again if these saints were what they seemed to be; and soon after the thought crossed my mind that if the Nazarenes were the saints that they seemed to be, bearing their flogging and imprisonments with fortitude, without complaint, it was of persecuting God I was guilty, since all goodness comes from God.

I had asked for letters from Hanan, the High Priest, that would give me the right to arrest all ill thinkers, and to lead them back in chains to Jerusalem, and these letters seemed to take fire in my bosom, and when we came in view of the town, and saw the roofs between the trees, I heard a voice crying to me: Saul, Saul, why persecutest thou me? It is hard for thee to kick against the pricks; and trembling I fell forward, my face upon the ground, and the Lord said: I am Jesus whom thou persecutest. Arise, and go into the city and it shall be told to thee what thou must do; by these words appointing me his apostle and establishing my rights above those of Peter or John or James or any of the twelve who walked with him whilst he lived as a man in Galilee. My followers, who were merely stricken, but not blinded as I was, took me by the arm and led me into Damascus, where I abode as a blind man till Ananias laid his hands upon me and the scales fell from my eyes, and I cried out for baptism, and having received baptism, which is spiritual strength, and taken food, which is bodily, I went up to the synagogue to preach that Jesus is the son of God, and continued till the Jews in that city rose up against me and would have killed me if I had not escaped by night, let down from the wall in a basket.

From Damascus I went into Arabia, and did not go up to Jerusalem for three years to confer with the apostles, nor was there need that I should do so, for had I not received my apostleship by direct revelation? But after three years I went thither, hearing that the persecutions had ceased, and that some of those whom I had persecuted had returned. The brother of Jesus, James, had come down from Galilee and as a holy man was a great power in Jerusalem. His prayers were valued, and his appearance excited pity and belief that God would hearken to him when he knelt, for he was naked but for a coarse cloth hanging from his neck to his ankles. Of water and cleanliness he knew naught, and his beard and hair grew as the weeds grow in the fields. Peter, too, was in Jerusalem, and come into a great girth since the toil of his craft, as a fisher, had been abandoned, as it had to be, for, as ye know, it is dry desert about Jerusalem, without lakes or streams. But he lived there better than he had ever lived before, by talking of our Lord Jesus Christ, of whom it was no longer a danger to talk, for James had made his brother acceptable in Jerusalem by lopping from him all that was Jesus, making him according to his own image; with these Christians he no longer stood up as an opponent of the law, but as one who believed in it, who had said: I come not to abolish the law but to confirm it. So did his brother James interpret Jesus to me who had heard Jesus speak out of the spirit, and when I answered that he had said too that he had come to abolish the law, James answered only that his brother had said many things and that some were not as wise as others. Peter, who was called upon to testify that Jesus wished the Jews to remain Jews, and that circumcision and all the observances were needed, answered that he did not know which was the truth, Jesus not having spoken plainly on these matters, and neither one nor the other seemed to understand that it was of no avail that Jesus should have been born, should have died and been raised from the dead by his Father if the law were to prevail unchanged for evermore. To James and to Peter Jesus was a prophet, but no more than the prophets, and unable to understand either Peter or Jesus, I returned to Tarsus broken-hearted, for there did not seem to be on earth a true Christian but myself, and I knew not whom to preach to, Gentiles or Jews. Only of one thing was I sure, that the Lord Jesus Christ had spoken to me out of the clouds and ordained me his apostle, but he had not pointed out the way, and I mourned that I had gone up to Jerusalem, and abode in Tarsus disheartened, resuming my loom, sitting at it from daylight till dark, waiting for some new sign to be given me, for I did not lose hope altogether, but, knowing well that the ways of Providence are not immediate, waited in patience or in such patience as I might possess myself. Barnabas I had forgotten, and he was forgotten when I said that I had met none in Jerusalem that could be said to be a follower of the Master.

It was Barnabas who brought me to James, the brother of the Lord, and to Peter, and told them that though I had persecuted I was now zealous, and had preached in many synagogues that Christ Jesus had died and been raised from the dead. But whether they feared me as a spy, one who would betray them, or whether it was that our minds were divided upon many things, I know not, but Barnabas could not persuade them, and, as I have said, I left Jerusalem and returned to Tarsus, and resumed my trade, until Barnabas, who had been sent to Antioch to meet some disciples, said to them, but there is one at Tarsus who has preached the life and death of our Lord Jesus Christ and brought many to believe in him. So they said to him: go to Tarsus for this man and bring him hither. And when they had seen and conferred with me and knew what sort of man I was, Barnabas said, with your permission and your authority, Paul and I will start together for Cyprus, for that is my country, and my friends there will believe us when we tell them that Jesus was raised from the dead and was seen by many: first by Martha and Mary, the sisters of Lazarus, and afterwards by Peter and by the apostles and many others. As the disciples were willing that we should go to preach the Gospel in Cyprus, we went thither furnished with letters, and received a kindly welcome from everybody, as it had been foretold by Barnabas, and many heard the Gospel, and if my stay among you Essenes could be prolonged beyond this evening and for several days I could tell you stories of a great magician and how he was confuted by me by the grace of God working through me, but as everything cannot be told in the first telling I will pass from Cyprus back to Antioch, where we rested awhile, so that we might tell the brethren of the great joy with which the faith had been received in Cyprus, of the churches we founded and our promise to the Cyprians to return to them.

And so joyful were the brethren in Antioch at our success that I said to Barnabas: let us not tarry here, but go on into Galatia. We set out, accompanied by John Mark, Barnabas' cousin, but he left us at Perga, being afraid, and for his lack of courage I was unable to forgive him, thereby estranging myself later on from Barnabas, a God-fearing man. But to tell you what happened at Lystra. We found the people there ready to listen to the faith, and it was given to me to set a cripple that had never walked in his life straight upon his feet, and as sturdily as any. The people cried out at this wonder, the gods have come down to us, and when the rumour reached the High Priest that the gods had come to their city, he drove out two oxen, garlanded, and would have sacrificed them in our honour, but we tore our garments, saying, we are men like yourselves and have come to preach that you should turn from vanities and false gods and worship the one true living God, who created the earth, and all the firmament. The people heard us and promised to abjure their idolatries, and would have abjured them for ever if the Jews from the neighbouring cities had not heard of our preaching and had not gathered together and denounced us in Lystra, where there were no Jews, or very few. Nor were they content with denouncing us, but on a convenient occasion dragged Barnabas and myself outside the town, stoned us and left us for dead, for we, knowing that God required us, feigned death, thereby deceiving them and escaping death we returned to the town by night and left it next day for Derbe.

Now, Essenes, this story that I tell of what happened to us at Lystra has been told with some care by me, for it is significant of what has happened to me for twenty years, since the day, as you have heard, when the Lord Jesus himself spoke to me out of the clouds and appointed me to preach the Gospel he had given unto me, which, upheld by him, I have preached faithfully, followed wherever I went by persecution from Jews determined to undo my work. But undeterred by stones and threats, we returned to Lystra and preached there again, and in Perga and Attalia, from thence we sailed to Antioch, and there were great rejoicings in Saigon Street, as we sat in the doorways telling of the churches that we founded in Galatia, and how we flung open the door of truth to the pagans, and how many had passed through.

But some came from Jerusalem preaching that the uncircumcised could not hope for salvation, and that there could be no conversion unless the law be observed, and the first observance of the law, they said, is circumcision. We answered them as is our wont that it is no longer by observances of the law but by grace, through our Lord Jesus Christ, that men may be saved; and we being unable to yield to them or they to us, it was resolved that Barnabas and Titus, a Gentile that we brought over to the faith, should go to Jerusalem.

On the way thither we preached that the Saviour promised to the Jews had come, and been raised from the dead, and the Samaritans hearkened and were converted in great numbers, and the news of these conversions preceding us the joy among the brethren was very great, for you, who know the Scriptures, need not be told that the conversion of the Gentiles has been foretold; nor was it till we began to talk about the abrogation of the law that James and the followers of James rose up against us. We wondered, and said to each other: were ever two brothers as unlike as these? Though myself had never seen the Lord in the flesh, I knew of him from Peter, and we whispered together with our eyes fixed on the long, lean man whose knees were reported callous from kneeling in the Temple praying that God might not yet awhile destroy the world. It was sufficient, so it was said, for him to hold up his hand to perform miracles, and we came to dislike him and to remember that he had always looked upon Jesus our Lord with suspicion during his lifetime. Why then, we asked, should he come into power derived from his brother's glory?

He seemed to be less likely than any other Jew to understand the new truth born into the world. So I turned from him to Peter, in whom I thought to find an advocate, knowing him to be one with us in this, saying that it were vain to ask the Gentiles to accept a yoke which the Hebrews themselves had been unable to bear; but Peter was still the timid man that he had ever been, and myself being of small wit in large and violent assemblies said to him: thou and I and James will consult together in private at the end of this uproar. But James could not come to my reason, saying always that the Gentiles must become Jews before they became Christians; and remembering very well all the trouble and vexation the demand for the circumcision of Titus had put upon me (to which I consented, for with a Jew I am a Jew so that I may gain them), and how he had submitted himself lest he should be a stumbling-block, I said to Timothy, my own son in the faith, thy mother and grandmother were hearers of the law, and he answered, let me be a Jew externally, and myself took and circumcised. A good accommodation Peter thought this to be, and I said to Peter, henceforth for thee the circumcised and for me the uncircumcised. Against which Peter and James had nothing to say, for it seemed to them that the uncircumcised were one thing in Jerusalem and another thing beyond Jerusalem. But I was glad thus to come to terms with them, thinking thereby to obtain from them the confirmation of my apostleship, though there was no need for any such, as I have always held, it having teen bestowed upon me by our Lord Jesus Christ himself; and holding it to be of little account that they had known our Lord Jesus in the flesh, I said to their faces, it were better to have known him in the spirit, thereby darkening them. It might have been better to have held back the words.

Myself and Barnabas and Titus returned to Antioch and it was some days after that I said to Barnabas: let us go again into the cities in which we have preached and see if the brethren abide in our teaching and how they do with it. But Barnabas would bring John Mark with him, he who had left us before in Perga from cowardice of soul. Therefore I chose Silas and departed. He was our warrant that we were one with the Church of Jerusalem, which was true inasmuch as we were willing to yield all but essential things so that everybody, Jews and Gentiles, might be brought into communion with Jesus Christ.

We went together to Lystra and Mysia, preaching in all these towns, and the brethren were confirmed in their faith in us, and leaving them we were about to set out for Bithynia and would have gone thither had we not been warned one night by the Holy Breath to go back, and instead we went to Troas, where one night a vision came to me in my sleep: a man stood before me at the foot of my bed, a Macedonian I knew him to be, by his dress and speech, for he spoke not the broken Greek that I speak, but pure Greek, the Greek that Mathias speaks, and he told me that we were to go over into Macedonia.

To tell of all the countries we visited and the towns in which we preached, and the many that were received into the faith, would be a story that would carry us through the night and into the next day, for it would be the story of my life, and every life is long when it is put into words; nor would the story be profitable unto you in any great measure, though it be full of various incidents. But I am behoven to tell that wherever we went the persecution that began in Lystra followed us. As soon as the Jews heard of our conversions they assembled either to assault us or to lay complaints before the Roman magistrates, as they did at Philippi, the chief city of Macedonia. Among my miracles was the conversion of a slave, a pythonist, a teller of fortunes, a caster of horoscopes, who brought her master good money by her divinations, and seeing that he would profit thereby no longer, he drew myself and Silas into the market-place and calling for help of others had us brought before the rulers, and the pleading of the man was, and he was supported by others, that we taught many things that it was not lawful of them, being Jews, to hearken to, and the magistrates, wishing to please the multitude, commanded us to be beaten, and when many stripes had been laid on us we were cast into prison, and the jailer being charged to keep us in safety thrust our feet into the stocks.

Myself and Silas prayed and sang praises unto God despite our wounds, and as if in response there was a great earthquake, and the prison was shaken and all the doors opened, on seeing which the keeper of the prison drew his sword and would have fallen upon it, believing that the prisoners had fled, if I had not cried to him in a loud voice: there is no reason to kill thyself, for thy charges are here. What may I do to be saved? he said, being greatly astonished at the miracle, and we answered: believe in the Lord Jesus Christ. Thereupon he invited us into his house and set food before us, and he was baptized and bidden to have no fear, for we confided to him that we were Romans, and that the magistrates would tremble when they heard that they had ordered a citizen of Rome to be beaten and him uncondemned. Why, he asked, did ye not declare yourselves to be Romans? Because, we answered, we were minded to suffer for our Lord Jesus Christ's son, at which he wondered and gave thanks. He was baptized by us, and when he had carried the news of their mistake to the ears of the magistrates they sent sergeants saying that we were to be allowed to go. But we refused to leave the prison, saying, we are Romans and have been beaten uncondemned. Let the magistrates come to fetch us. Which message being taken to them they came beseeching us to go, and not to injure them, for they had done wrong unwittingly, and taking pity of them for the sake of our Lord Jesus Christ we passed into Thessalonica, where I preached in the synagogues for three Sabbaths and reasoned with the Jews, showing them passages in the Scriptures confirming all that we said to them about the Christ that had suffered and been raised from the dead. Some believed, and others assaulted the house of Jason, in which we were living, and the Romans were perplexed to know how to keep order, for wherever we went there were stirs and quarrels among the Jews, the fault being with them and not with us. In Corinth too the Jews pleaded against us before the Roman magistrates and----

CHAP. XXXV.

A sudden dryness in Paul's throat prevented him from finishing his sentence, and he asked for a cup of water, and having drained it he put down the cup and said, looking round, I was speaking to you about Corinth. The moment seemed a favourable one to Mathias to ask a question. How was it, he said, that you passed on to Corinth without stopping at Athens? I made stay at Athens, Paul answered, and I thank you, Mathias, for having reminded me of Athens, for the current of my discourse had borne me past that city, so eager was I to tell of the persecutions of the Jews. We are all Jews here! I speak only of the Hierosolymites who understand only that the law has been revealed, and we have only to follow it; though, indeed, some of them cannot tell us why we should follow any law, since they do not believe in any life except the sad life we lead on the surface of this earth.

But you asked me, Mathias, about Athens. A city of graven images and statues and altars to gods. On raising my eyes I always saw their marble deities--effigies, they said, of all the spirits of the earth and sea and the clouds above the earth and the heavens beyond the clouds. Whereupon I answered that these statues that they had carved with their hands could in no wise resemble any gods even if the gods had existence outside of their images, for none sees God. Moses heard God on Mount Sinai, but he saw only the hinderparts; which is an allegory, for there are two covenants, and I come to reveal---- Whereat they were much amused and said: if Moses saw the hinderparts why should we not see the faces, for our eyes see beauty, whereas the Hebrews see but the backside? At which I showed no anger, for they were not Jews, but strove, as it is my custom, to be all things to all men. The Jews require a miracle, the Greeks demand reason, and therefore I asked them why they set up altars to the unknowable God. And they said: Paul, thou readest our language as badly as thou speakest it; we have inscriptions "to unknown gods" but not to the unknowable God. Didst go to school at Tarsus, yet canst not tell the plural from the singular? To which I answered: then you are so religious-minded that you would not offend any god whose name you might not have heard, and so favour him by the inscription to an unknown God? But some of your philosophers, Athenians, call God unknowable. I knew this before I learnt how superstitious ye are. Ye are all alike ignorant since God left you to your sins for your idolatry; God, unknown or unknowable, has been made manifest to us by our Lord Jesus Christ, who was born like us all for a purpose, his death, which was to save the world from its sins, whereupon, greedy for a story, they began to listen to me, and I had their attention till I came to these words--"And was raised by his Father from the dead." Paul, they answered, we will listen another day to the rest of this story of thy new divinity.

A frivolous people, Mathias, living in a city of statues in the air, and in the streets below a city of men that seek after reason, and would explain all things in the heavens above and the earth beneath by their reason, and only willing to listen to the story of a miracle because miracles amuse them. A race much given to enjoyment, like women, Mathias, and among their mountains they are not a different race from what they are in the city, but given to milking goats and dancing in the shade to the sounds of a pipe, and dreaming over the past glories of Athens, that are dust to-day though yesterday they were realities, a light race that will be soon forgotten, and convinced of their transience I departed for Corinth, a city of fencing masters, merchants, slaves, courtesans, yet a city more willing to hearken to the truth than the light Athenians, perhaps because it has much commerce and is not slothful in business, a city wherein I fortuned upon a pious twain, Aquila and Priscilla, of our faith, and of the same trade as myself, wherefore we set up our looms together in one house and sold the cloths as we weaved them, getting our living thereby and never costing the faithful anything, which was just pride, and mine always, for I have travelled the world over gaining a living with my own hands, never taking money from anybody, though it has been offered to me in plenty by the devout, thinking it better to be under no obligation, for such destroys independence....

Once only was this rule broken by me. In Macedonia, a dyer of purple---- But Lydia's story concerns ye not, therefore I will leave her story untold and return to Corinth, to Priscilla and Aquila, weavers like myself, with whom I worked for eighteen months, and more than that; preaching the death and resurrection of our Lord Jesus Christ to all who would hear us when our daily work was done, until the same fate befell us--the intervention of the Jews, who sought to embroil us, as beforetimes, with the Romans.

We preached in the synagogues on the Sabbath and I upheld the faith I had come to preach: that the Messiah promised to the Jews had lived and had died for us. Whereupon there was a great uproar among the Jews, who would not believe, and so I tore my garments and said: then I will go forth to the Gentiles, and find believers in our Lord Jesus Christ, and leave you who were elected by God as his chosen people, who were his by adoption, a privilege conferred upon you throughout the centuries, the race out of whom came the patriarchs, and Jesus Christ himself in the flesh. I will leave you, for you are not worthy and will perish as all flesh perishes; will drift into nothingness, and be scattered even as the dust of the roads is scattered by the winds. My heart is broken for you, but since ye will it so, let it be so.

So did I speak, but my heart is often tenderer than my words, and I strove again to be reconciled with the Jews, and abode in Corinth proving their folly to them by the Scriptures till again they sought to rid themselves of me by means of the Romans, saying before Gallic: this fellow persuadeth men to worship God contrary to the law. But Gallic, understanding fully that his judgment seat had not been set up for the settling of disputes of the spirit, but of the things of this world, drove the Jews out of his court, and there was an uproar and Sosthenes, a God-fearing man, was beaten. Yet for the sake of the race of the patriarchs, the chosen people of God, I abode in Corinth till the close of the second year, when news reached me of the many dissensions that had arisen in Jerusalem.

The old questions always stirring: whether the Gentiles should be admitted without circumcision and if the observances of the law were sufficient; if salvation could be obtained by works without faith, and many other questions that I thought had long been decided; in the hope of putting an end to these discussions, which could only end in schism, I bade the brethren good-bye on the wharf, and, shaving my head as a sign of my vow to keep the Feast of Pentecost, I set sail with Aquila and Priscilla for Syria and left them at Ephesus, though there were many Christians there who prayed me to remain and speak to them; but pointing to my shaved head, I said, my vow! and went down to Jerusalem and kept the Feast of Pentecost and distributed money among the poor, which had been given to me by the churches founded by me in Macedonia, in Greece and Syria.

I hoped to escape from discussion with James, the brother of the Lord, for of what good could it be to discuss once again things on which it is our nature to think differently, but upheld by hope that the Jews might be numbered among the faithful at the last day I told him that the Jews were the root of the olive-trees whose branches had been cut, and had received grafts, but let not the grafts, I said, indulge in vainglory; it is not the branches that bear the root, but the root that bears the branches. And many other things of this sort did I say, wishing to be in all things conciliatory; to be, as usual, all things to all men; but James, the brother of the Lord, answered that Jesus had not come to abrogate the law but to confirm it, which was not true, for the law stood in no need of confirmation. James could do that as well as his brother and better, and Peter not being there to bear witness of the teaching of Jesus (he too had gone forth upon a mission with John Mark as an interpreter, for Peter cannot speak Greek), Silas, who was with me, was won over by James, and easily, for Silas was originally of the Church of Jerusalem; as I have already told you, he had been sent with us to Antioch.

But I would not weary you with such small matters as Silas' desertion of me to join Peter, who was preaching in Syria, and whose doctrine he said was nearer to Jesus' than mine, it having been given to him by Jesus, whom he had known in the flesh. So be it, I said to Silas, and went without him to Antioch, a city dear to me for that it was there the word Christian was spoken for the first time; my return thither was fortunate, for there I met Barnabas, whom it was pleasant after these many years to meet again, all memory of our dissension was forgotten, which was no great matter, it having arisen out of no deeper cause than my refusal to travel with John Mark, his cousin. Titus was there too, and we had much to tell each other of our travels and the conversions we had made, and all was joy amongst us; and our joy was increased by Peter, who appeared amongst us, bringing Silas with him, who must have been grieved though he said nothing to me of it; but who must have seen that the law to which he was attached was forgotten at Antioch; not by us only, but by his new leader, Peter, who mixed like ourselves with the Gentiles and did not refuse to eat with them.

A moment indeed of great joy this was, but it did not last longer than many other moments of the same kind with which my life has been sprinkled. James, the brother of the Lord, sent up agents to Antioch with letters signed by himself. They had come to tell the people that I had not authority to teach, and could not be considered by anybody as a true apostle, for I had not known the Christ, it was said: and when I answered them that my authority came straight from him, they began to make little of my revelation, saying: even if thou didst hear the Christ on the road to Damascus, as thou sayest, it was but for a few minutes, and he couldn't teach thee all his doctrine in a few minutes. A year or more would be required. Thou wast deceived. No vision can be taken as of equal evidence to the senses. Those that we see in a vision may be but the evil spirits that, if it were possible, would deceive the very elect. If we question an apparition it answers anything that we wish. The spectre shines for an instant and disappears quickly before one has time to put further questions; the thoughts of the dreamer are not under his control. To see the Son of God outside of the natural flesh is impossible. Even an angel wishing to be seen has to clothe himself in flesh. Nor were they satisfied with such sayings as these, but mentioned the vision of infidels and evil livers, and to support their argument thus quoted Scripture, proving that God sent visions when he was irritated. As in Numbers, murmured Eleazar. And likewise in Exodus, said Manahem, and he turned over the quires before him. These emissaries and agents asked me how it was that even if Jesus had appeared to me he could not have instructed me wrongly. If I wished to prove the truth of my vision it were better for me to accept the teaching of the apostles, who had received it directly from him; to which I made answer: my revelation was not from Jesus when he lived in the flesh, but from the spiritual Jesus; the spirit descended out of heaven to instruct me, and if God has created us, which none will deny, he has created our souls wherewith to know him, and he needs not the authority of other apostles who speak as men, falling into the errors that men must fall into when they speak, for every man's truth is made known unto him by God.

One day we came out of a house heated with argument, and as we loitered by the pavement's edge regretting we had not said certain things whereby we might have confuted each other, we came upon Peter in a public inn, eating and drinking with the uncircumcised, whereupon the Hierosolymites said we see now what ye are, Peter, a Jew that eats with Gentiles and of unclean meats. Peter did not withstand them and say as he should have done: how is it that you call them that God has made unclean? but being a timid man and anxious always to avoid schism, he excused himself and withdrew, and was followed by Barnabas and Silas.