Chapter XI: Part 11

Amid the other horrors, the mighty mountain now cast up columns of boiling water. Blent and kneaded with the half-burning ashes, the streams fell like seething mud over the streets in frequent intervals. And full, where the priests of Isis had now cowered around the altars, on which they had vainly sought to kindle fires and pour incense, one of the fiercest of those deadly torrents, mingled with immense fragments of scoria, had poured its rage. Over the bended forms of the priests it dashed: that cry had been of death--that silence had been of eternity! The ashes--the pitchy stream--sprinkled the altars, covered the pavement, and half concealed the quivering corpses of the priests!

In proportion as the blackness gathered did the lightnings around Vesuvius increase in their vivid and scorching glare. Nor was their horrible beauty confined to the usual hues of fire; no rainbow ever rivalled their varying and prodigal dyes. Now brightly blue as the most azure depth of a southern sky--now of a livid and snakelike green, darting restlessly to and fro as the folds of an enormous serpent--now of a lurid and intolerable crimson, gushing forth through the columns of smoke, far and wide, and lighting up the whole city from arch to arch--then suddenly dying into a sickly paleness, like the ghost of their own life!

In the pauses of the showers you heard the rumbling of the earth beneath and the groaning waves of the tortured sea; or, lower still, and audible but to the watch of intensest fear, the grinding and hissing murmur of the escaping gases through the chasms of the distant mountain. Sometimes the cloud appeared to break from its solid mass, and, by the lightning, to assume quaint and vast mimicries of human or of monster shapes, striding across the gloom, hurtling one upon the other, and vanishing swiftly into the turbulent abyss of shade; so that to the eyes and fancies of the affrighted wanderers the unsubstantial vapors were as the bodily forms of gigantic foes--the agents of terror and of death.

The ashes in many places were already knee-deep; and the boiling showers which came from the steaming breath of the volcano forced their way into the houses, bearing with them a strong and suffocating vapor. In some places immense fragments of rock, hurled upon the house roofs, bore down along the streets masses of confused ruin, which yet more and more, with every hour, obstructed the way; and, as the day advanced, the motion of the earth was more sensibly felt--the footing seemed to slide and creep--nor could chariot or litter be kept steady, even on the most level ground.

Sometimes the huger stones, striking against each other as they fell, broke into countless fragments, emitting sparks of fire, which caught whatever was combustible within their reach; and along the plains beyond the city the darkness was now terribly relieved, for several houses, and even vineyards, had been set on flames; and at various intervals the fires rose sullenly and fiercely against the solid gloom. To add to this partial relief of the darkness, the citizens had, here and there, in the more public places, as the porticoes of temples and the entrances to the forum, endeavored to place rows of torches; but these rarely continued long; the showers and the winds extinguished them, and the sudden darkness into which their sudden birth was converted had something in it doubly terrible and doubly impressing on the impotence of human hopes, the lesson of despair.

Frequently, by the momentary light of these torches, parties of fugitives encountered each other, some hurrying toward the sea, others flying from the sea back to the land; for the ocean had retreated rapidly from the shore--an utter darkness lay over it, and upon its groaning and tossing waves the storm of cinders and rock fell without the protection which the streets and roofs afforded to the land. Wild--haggard--ghastly with supernatural fears, these groups encountered each other, but without the leisure to speak, to consult, to advise; for the showers fell now frequently, though not continuously, extinguishing the lights, which showed to each band the death-like faces of the other, and hurrying all to seek refuge beneath the nearest shelter.

The whole elements of civilization were broken up. Ever and anon, by the flickering lights, you saw the thief hastening by the most solemn authorities of the law, laden with and fearfully chuckling over the produce of his sudden gains. If, in the darkness, wife was separated from husband, or parent from child, vain was the hope of reunion. Each hurried blindly and confusedly on. Nothing in all the various and complicated machinery of social life was left save the primal law of self-preservation!

In parts, where the ashes lay dry and uncommixed with the boiling torrents, cast upward from the mountain at capricious intervals, the surface of the earth presented a leprous and ghastly white. In other places cinder and rock lay matted in heaps, from beneath which emerged the half-hid limbs of some crushed and mangled fugitive.

The groans of the dying were broken by wild shrieks of women's terror--now near, now distant--which, when heard in the utter darkness, were rendered doubly appalling by the crushing sense of helplessness and the uncertainty of the perils around; and clear and distinct through all were the mighty and various noises from the fatal mountain; its rushing winds; its whirling torrents; and, from time to time, the burst and roar of some more fiery and fierce explosion. And ever as the winds swept howling along the street, they bore sharp streams of burning dust, and such sickening and poisonous vapors as took away, for the instant, breath and consciousness, followed by a rapid revulsion of the arrested blood, and a tingling sensation of agony trembling through every nerve and fibre of the frame.

Suddenly all became lighted with an intense and lurid glow. Bright and gigantic through the darkness, which closed around it like the walls of hell, the mountain shone--a pile of fire! Its summit seemed riven in two; or rather, above its surface there seemed to rise two monster shapes, each confronting each, as demons contending for a world. These were of one deep blood-red hue of fire, which lighted up the whole atmosphere far and wide; but _below_, the nether part of the mountain was still dark and shrouded, save in three places, adown which flowed, serpentine and irregular, rivers of molten lava. Darkly red through the profound gloom of their banks they flowed slowly on, as toward the devoted city. Over the broadest there seemed to spring a cragged and stupendous arch, from which, as from the jaws of hell, gushed the sources of the sudden Phlegethon. And through the still air was heard the rattling of the fragments of rock, hurtling one upon another as they were borne down the fiery cataracts--darkening, for one instant, the spot where they fell, and suffused the next, in the burnished hues of the flood in which they floated!

* * * * *

Nearly seventeen centuries had rolled away when the city of Pompeii was disinterred from its silent tomb,[45] all vivid with undimmed hues; its walls fresh as if painted yesterday--not a hue faded on the rich mosaic of its floors--in its forum the half-finished columns as left by the workman's hand--in its gardens the sacrificial tripod--in its halls the chest of treasure--in its baths the _strigil_--in its theatres the counter of admission--in its saloons the furniture and the lamp--in its _triclinia_ the fragments of the last feast--in its _cubicula_ the perfumes and the rouge of faded beauty--and everywhere the bones and skeletons of those who once moved the springs of that minute yet gorgeous machine of luxury and of life!

In the house of Diomed, in the subterranean vaults, twenty skeletons (one of a babe) were discovered in one spot by the door, covered by a fine ashen dust, that had evidently been wafted slowly through the apertures, until it had filled the whole space. There were jewels and coins, candelabra for unavailing light, and wine hardened in the _amphoræ_ for the prolongation of agonized life. The sand, consolidated by damps, had taken the forms of the skeletons as in a cast; and the traveller may yet see the impression of a female neck and bosom of young and round proportions. It seems to the inquirer as if the air had been gradually changed into a sulphurous vapor; the inmates of the vaults had rushed to the door, to find it closed and blocked up by the scoria without, and, in their attempts to force it, had been suffocated with the atmosphere.

In the garden was found a skeleton with a key by its bony hand, and near it a bag of coins. This is believed to have been the master of the house, who had probably sought to escape by the garden, and been destroyed either by the vapors or some fragment of stone. Beside some silver vases lay another skeleton, probably that of a slave.

Various theories as to the exact mode by which Pompeii was destroyed have been invented by the ingenious; I have adopted that which is the most generally received, and which, upon inspecting the strata, appears the only one admissible by common sense; namely, a destruction by showers of ashes and boiling water, mingled with frequent irruptions of large stones, and aided by partial convulsions of the earth. Herculaneum, on the contrary, appears to have received not only the showers of ashes, but also inundations from molten lava; and the streams referred to must be considered as destined for that city rather than for Pompeii. Volcanic lightnings were evidently among the engines of ruin at Pompeii. Papyrus, and other of the more inflammable materials, are found in a burned state. Some substances in metal are partially melted; and a bronze statue is completely shivered, as by lightning. Upon the whole--excepting only the inevitable poetic license of shortening the time which the destruction occupied--I believe my description of that awful event is very little assisted by invention, and will be found not the less accurate for its appearance in a romance.

FOOTNOTES:

[41] The Romans used to lie or walk naked in the sun, after anointing their bodies with oil, which was esteemed as greatly contributing to health, and therefore daily practised by them. This custom, however, of anointing themselves, is inveighed against by the satirists as in the number of their luxurious indulgences; but since we find the elder Pliny here, and the amiable Spurinna in a former letter, practising this method, we cannot suppose the thing itself was esteemed unmanly, but only when it was attended with some particular circumstances of an over-refined delicacy.

[42] About six miles distant from Naples.

[43] An island near Naples, now called Capri.

[44] The Stoic and Epicurean philosophers held that the world was to be destroyed by fire, and all things fall again into original chaos; not excepting even the national gods themselves from the destruction of this general conflagration.

[45] Destroyed A.D. 79; first discovered A.D. 1750.

THE JEWS' LAST STRUGGLE FOR FREEDOM: THEIR FINAL DISPERSION

A.D. 132

CHARLES MERIVALE

The successful revolt of the Maccabees against the bloody
persecutions of the Assyrian king Antiochus Epiphanes, about B.C.
164, inaugurated a glorious epoch in Jewish history. From that time
the Jews enjoyed their freedom under the dynasty of their
priest-kings till, B.C. 63, the Romans under Pompey took possession
of Jerusalem. A period of Roman tyranny and oppression followed. In
A.D. 66-70 a great revolt of the Jews occurred. The Romans burned
Jerusalem to the ground. Josephus says the number killed in this
revolt was one million one hundred thousand, and the number of
prisoners ninety-seven thousand. Of those who survived, "all above
seventeen years old were sent to Egypt to work in the mines, or
distributed among the provinces to be exhibited as gladiators in
the public theatres and in the combats against wild beasts."

About fifty years later, A.D., 116, a tremendous uprising occurred
among the Jews of the eastern Mediterranean, in which many lives
were lost. It was quickly suppressed by the emperor Trajan, and the
punishments were similar in cruelty to those which followed the
previous insurrection.

But this dauntless people were not yet conquered. When the emperor
Hadrian, A.D., 130, arrived at Jerusalem on his tour of the empire,
he resolved that the holy city of the Jews should be rebuilt as a
Roman colony, and its name changed to Ælia Capitolina; and the Jews
were forbidden to sojourn in the new city. By this and other
measures the spark of revolt was once more kindled among the
religious and patriotic spirits of the Jewish nation. The Jews in
Palestine flew to arms, A.D., 132, encouraged by the prayers, the
vows, and the material support of their compatriots in Rome,
Byzantium, Alexandria, and Babylon. The Jewish war-cry echoed
around the civilized world.

A fitting leader for the insurrectionists soon appeared in the
person of Simon Barcochebas. Julius Severus, who was in Britain
ordering the affairs of that distant province, was summoned to the
East to quell the disturbance, which had swollen to the dimensions
of a revolution and threatened to abolish Roman authority in
Palestine. The conflict which ensued lasted from A.D. 132 to 135,
and was very bitterly contested on both sides. It was not before
the Hebrew leader fell amid thousands of his followers that the
Jewish forces were defeated. We are told that in this last
revolution the Romans took fifty fortresses, nine hundred and
eighty-five villages were occupied, and that the people killed
numbered five hundred and eighty thousand. The Jews were dispersed
to every quarter of the known world and remain so to this day. The
new city of Hadrian continued to exist, but did not prosper; and
the Jews were prohibited under penalty of death from ever setting
foot in Jerusalem.

The thread of imperial life could hardly snap without a jar which would be felt throughout the whole extent of the empire. Trajan, like Alexander, had been cut off suddenly in the Far East, and, like Alexander, he had left no avowed successor. Several of his generals abroad might advance nearly equal claims to the sword of Trajan; some of the senators at home might deem themselves not unworthy of the purple of Nerva.

On every side there was an army or faction ready to devote itself to the service of its favorite or its champion.

The provinces lately annexed were at the same time in a state of ominous agitation; along one half of the frontiers Britons, Germans, and Sarmatians were mustering their forces for invasion; a virulent insurrection was still glowing throughout a large portion of the empire. Nevertheless, the compact body of the Roman Commonwealth was still held firmly together by its inherent self-attraction. There was no tendency to split in pieces, as in the ill-cemented masses of the Macedonian conquest; and the presence of mind of a clever woman was well employed in effecting the peaceful transfer of power and relieving the State from the stress of disruption.

Of the accession of Publius Ælius Hadrianus, A.D., 117, to the empire; of the means by which it was effected; of the character and reputation he brought with him to the throne; of the first measures of his reign, by which he renounced the latest conquests of his predecessor, while he put forth all his power to retain the realms bequeathed him from an earlier period--is matter for another story.

But let us turn to a review of eastern affairs; to the great Jewish insurrection, and the important consequences which followed from it. Trajan was surely fortunate in the moment of his death. Vexed, as he doubtless was, by the frustration of his grand designs for incorporating the Parthian monarchy with the Roman, and fulfilling the idea of universal empire which had flitted through the mind of Pompius or Julius, but had been deliberately rejected by Augustus and Vespasian, his proud spirit would have been broken indeed had he lived to witness the difficulties in which Rome was plunged at his death, the spread of the Jewish revolt in Asia and Palestine, the aggressions of the Moors, the Scythians, and the Britons at the most distant points of his dominions.

The momentary success of the insurgents of Cyprus and Cyrene had prompted a general assurance that the conquering race was no longer invincible, and the last great triumphs of its legions were followed by a rebound of fortune still more momentous.

The first act of the new reign was the formal relinquishment of the new provinces beyond the Euphrates. The Parthian tottered back with feeble step to his accustomed frontiers. Arabia was left unmolested; India was no longer menaced. Armenia found herself once more suspended between two rival empires, of which the one was too weak to seize, the other too weak to retain her.

All the forces of Rome in the East were now set free to complete the suppression of the Jewish disturbances. The flames of insurrection which had broken out in so many remote quarters were concentrated, and burned more fiercely than ever in the ancient centre of the Jewish nationality.

Martius Turbo, appointed to command in Palestine, was equally amazed at the fanaticism and the numbers of people whose faith had been mocked, whose hopes frustrated, whose young men had been decimated, whose old men, women, and children had been enslaved and exiled. Under the teaching of the doctors of Tiberia faith had been cherished and hope had revived. Despised and unmolested for fifty years, a new generation had risen from the soil of their ancestors, recruited by the multitudes who flocked homeward, year by year, with an unextinguishable love of country, and reënforced by the fugitives from many scenes of persecution, all animated with a growing conviction that the last struggle of their race was at hand, to be contested on the site of their old historic triumphs.

It is not perhaps wholly fanciful to imagine that the Jewish leaders, after the fall of their city and Temple and the great dispersion of their people, deliberately invented new means for maintaining their cherished nationality. Their conquerors, as they might observe, were scattered like themselves over the face of the globe and abode wherever they conquered; but the laws, the manners, and the traditions of Rome were preserved almost intact amid alien races by the consciousness that there existed a visible centre of their nation, the source, as it were, to which they might repair to draw the waters of political life. But the dispersions of the Jews seemed the more irremediable as the destruction of their central home was complete.

To preserve the existence of their nation one other way presented itself. In their sacred books they retained a common bond of law and doctrine, such as no other people could boast. In these venerated records they possessed, whether on the Tiber or the Euphrates, an elixir of unrivalled virtue. With a sudden revulsion of feeling the popular orators and captains betook themselves to the study of law, its history and antiquities, its actual text and its inner meaning. The schools of Tiberias resounded with debate on the rival principles of interpretation, the ancient and the modern, the stricter and the laxer, known respectively by the names of their teachers, Schammai and Hillel.

The doctors decided in favor of the more accommodating system, by which the stern exclusiveness of the original letter was extenuated, and the law of the rude tribes of Palestine moulded to the varied taste and temper of a cosmopolitan society, while the text itself was embalmed in the _Masora_, an elaborate system of punctuation and notation, to every particle of which, to insure its uncorrupted preservation, a mystical significance was attached. By this curious contrivance the letter of the Law, the charter of Judaism, was sanctified forever, while its spirit was remodelled to the exigencies of the present or the future, till it would have been no longer recognized by its authors, or even by very recent disciples. To this new learning of traditions and glosses the ardent youth of the nation devoted itself with a fanaticism not less vehement than that which had fought and bled half a century before. The name of the rabbi Akiba is preserved as a type of the hierophant of restored Judaism.

The stories depicting him are best expounded as myths and figures. He reached, it was said, the age of a hundred and twenty years, the period assigned in the sacred records to his prototype, the law-giver Moses.

Like David, in his youth he kept sheep on the mountains; like Jacob, he served a master, a rich citizen of Jerusalem, for Jerusalem in his youth was still standing. His master's daughter cast the eyes of affection upon him and offered him a secret marriage; but this damsel was no other than Jerusalem itself, so often imaged to the mind of the Jewish people by the figure of a maiden, a wife, or a widow.

This mystic bride required him to repair to the schools, acquire knowledge and wisdom, surround himself with disciples; and such, as we have seen, was the actual policy of the new defenders of Judaism.

The damsel was rebuked by her indignant father; but when, after the lapse of twelve years, Akiba returned to claim his bride, with twelve thousand scholars at his heels, he heard her replying that, long as he had been absent, she only wished him to prolong his stay twice over, so as to double his knowledge; whereupon he returned patiently to his studies, and frequented the schools twelve years longer. Twice twelve years thus passed, he returned once more with twice twelve thousand disciples, and then his wife received him joyfully, and, covered as she was with rags, an outcast and a beggar, he presented her to his astonished followers as the being to whom he owed his wisdom, his fame, and his fortune.

Such were the legends with which the new learning was consecrated to the defence of Jewish nationality.

The concentration of the Roman forces on the soil of Palestine seems to have repressed for a season all overt attempts at insurrection.

The Jewish leaders restrained their followers from action as long as it was possible to feed their spirit with hopes only. It was not till about the fourteenth year of Hadrian's reign that the final revolt broke out.

When the Jews of Palestine launched forth upon the war, the doctor Akiba gave place to the warrior Barcochebas. This gallant warrior, the last of the national heroes, received or assumed his title, "the Son of the Star," given successively to several leaders of the Jewish people, in token of the fanatic expectations of divine deliverance by which his countrymen did not yet cease to be animated. Many were the legends which declared this champion's claims to the leadership of the national cause. His size and strength were vaunted as more than human. "It was the arm of God, not of man," said Hadrian when he saw at last the corpse encircled by a serpent, "that could alone strike down the giant." Flame and smoke were seen to issue from his lips in speaking, a portent which was rationalized centuries later into a mere conjurer's artifice. The concourse of the Jewish nation at his summons was symbolized, with a curious reference to the prevalent idea of Israel as a school and the Law as a master, by the story that at Bethar, the appointed rendezvous and last stronghold of the national defence, were four hundred academies, each ruled by four hundred teachers, each teacher boasting a class of four hundred pupils.

Akiba, now at the extreme point of his protracted existence, like Samuel of old, nominated the new David to the chiefship of the people. He girded Barcochebas with the sword of Jehovah, placed the staff of command in his hand, and held himself the stirrup by which he vaulted into the saddle.

The last revolt of the Jewish people was precipitated apparently by the increased severity of the measures which the rebellion under Trajan had drawn down. They complained that Hadrian had enrolled himself as a proselyte of the Law, and were doubly incensed against him as a persecutor and a renegade.

This assertion, indeed, may have no foundation. On the other hand, it is not unlikely that this prince, a curious explorer of religions of opinions, had sought initiation into some of the mysteries of the Jewish faith and ritual.

But however this may be, he gave them mortal offence by perceiving the clear distinction between Judaism and Christianity, and by forbidding the Jews to sojourn in the town which he was again raising on the ruins of Jerusalem, while he allowed free access to their rivals. He is said to have even prohibited the rite of circumcision by which they jealously maintained their separation from the nations of the West.

At last, when they rose in arms, he sent his best generals against them. Tinnius Rufus was long baffled and often defeated; but Julius Severus, following the tactics of Vespasian, constantly refused the battle they offered him, and reduced their strongholds in succession by superior discipline and resources. Barcochebas struggled with the obstinacy of despair. Every excess of cruelty was committed on both sides, and it is well, perhaps, that the details of this mortal spasm are almost wholly lost to us.

The later Christian writers, while they allude with unseemly exultation to the overthrow of one inveterate enemy by another who proved himself in the end not less inveterate, affirmed that the barbarities of the Jewish leader were mainly directed against themselves.

On such interested assertions we shall place little reliance. In the counter-narration of the Jews even the name of Christian is contemptuously disregarded. It relates, however, how at the storming of Bethar, when Barcochebas perished in the field, ten of the most learned of the rabbis were taken and put cruelly to death, while Akiba, reserved to expire last, and torn in pieces with hot pincers, continued to attest the great principle of the Jewish doctrine, still exclaiming in his death throes, _Jehovah Erhad_! ("God is one").

The Jews who fell in these their latest combats are counted by hundreds of thousands, and we may conclude that the suppression of the revolt was followed by sanguinary proscriptions, by wholesale captivity and general banishment. The dispersion of the unhappy race, particularly in the West, was now complete and final. The sacred soil of Jerusalem was occupied by a Roman colony, which received the name of Ælia Capitolina, with reference to the Emperor who founded it, and to the supreme God of the pagan mythology, installed on the desecrated summits of Zion and Moriah.

The fane of Jupiter was erected on the site of the holy Temple, and a shrine of Venus planted, we are assured, on the very spot hallowed to Christians by our Lord's crucifixion. But Hadrian had no purpose of insulting the disciples of Jesus, and this desecration, if the tradition be true, was probably accidental. A Jewish legend affirms that the figure of a swine was sculptured, in bitter mockery, over a gate of the new city. The Jews have retorted with equal scorn that the effigy of the unclean animal, which represented to their minds every low and bestial appetite, was a fitting emblem of the colony and its founder, of the lewd worship of its gods, and the vile propensities of its Emperor.

The fancy of later Christian writers that Hadrian regarded their coreligionists with special consideration seems founded on misconception. We hear, indeed, of the graciousness with which he allowed them, among other sectarians, to defend their usages and expound their doctrines in his presence; and doubtless his curiosity, if no worthier feeling, was moved by the fact, which he fully appreciated, of the interest they excited in certain quarters of the empire. But there is no evidence that his favor extended further than to the recognition of their independence of the Jews, from whom they now formally separated themselves, and the discouragement of the local persecutions to which they were occasionally subjected.

So far the bigoted hostility of their enemies was overruled at last in their favor.

In another way they learned to profit by the example of their rivals. From the recent policy of the Jews they might understand the advantage to a scattered community, without a local centre or a political status, of erecting in a volume of sacred records their acknowledged standard of faith and practice.

The scriptures of the New Testament, like the _Nuschua_ of the Jewish rabbis, took the place of the holy of holies as the tabernacle of their God and the pledge of their union with him.

The canon of their sacred books, however casual its apparent formation, was indeed a providential development. The habitual references of bishops and doctors to the words of their Founder, and the writings of the first disciples, guided them to the proper sources of their faith and taught them justly to discriminate the genuine from the spurious.

Meagre as are the remains of Christian literature of the second century, they tend to confirm our assurance that the scriptures of the new dispensation were known and recognized as divine at that early period, and that the Church of Christ, the future mistress of the world, was already become a great social fact, an empire within the empire.

MARTYRDOM OF POLYCARP AND JUSTIN MARTYR

POLYCARP'S EPISTLE TO THE PHILIPPIANS

A.D. 155

H. COX POLYCARP

The Roman emperor Antoninus Pius, who died A.D. 161, had been
tolerant to the new Judaic sect known as Christians. Under his mild
_regime_, although he did not encourage them, the faithful had
greatly multiplied. The Christians had become a body great enough
to be reckoned with in a political sense. The populace were
generally hostile to them as "enemies of the gods." More than one
of the apostolic fathers had suffered martyrdom, among them
Ignatius, a disciple of St. John and bishop of Antioch, who is said
to have been thrown to the lions in the Circus about A.D. 107. But
the account of the martyrdom of Polycarp is probably the first
authentic description we have.

Polycarp was born about A.D. 60, probably of Christian parents. He
bridges the little-known period between the age of his master, the
apostle John, and that of his own disciple, Irenæus. During the
earlier half of the second century he was bishop of Smyrna. Ephesus
had become the new hope of the faith, and in that city Polycarp had
received his education and "lived in familiar intercourse with many
who had seen Christ." He was also intimate with Papias and
Ignatius. The only writing of Polycarp extant is the Epistle to the
Philippians, which follows. It is of great value for questions of
the canon, the origin of the Church, and the Ignatian epistles. Of
the authenticity of Polycarp's epistle Rev. Father W. O'B. Pardow,
S.J., says, "There are long and learned controversies about some of
these [apocryphal] books." Of that in question he says: "Probably
authentic; not inspired." Archbishop Wake was fully convinced of
its genuineness, and his translation has been here used.

Justin, surnamed "the Martyr," was born at Sichen, Samaria, about
A.D. 100. After his conversion to Christianity he wandered about
arguing for the truth of the new faith. He was of a bold,
aggressive nature, and scorned to temporize in things spiritual.
His language and mode of address were borrowed from the Stoics, but
were the "true utterance of his own manly soul. 'You can kill us;
you cannot harm us,'" was his answer when condemned for being a
Christian. The words proceeded from a believer ready and destined
to give his life for the faith.

Truly did the blood of the martyrs prove the seed of the Church.
Polycarp's Epistle to the Philippians, hereto annexed, is taken
from a rare work which contains the uncanonical books of the period
of Christ's infancy and the early days of the Church, entitled _The
Apocryphal Books of the New Testament_. The laity have little
knowledge of it, but it is well known by the clergy.

HOMERSHAM COX

Polycarp, bishop of Smyrna, was undoubtedly a companion of the apostle John, and received instruction from other apostles. "About this time," says Eusebius, referring to the commencement of the second century, "flourished Polycarp in Asia, an intimate disciple of the apostles, who received the episcopate of the Church of Smyrna at the hands of eye-witnesses and servants of the Lord."

The lengthened life of the apostle John, who attained to an extreme old age, connects the fathers of the second century with the immediate followers of Christ. Polycarp must have been a contemporary of St. John for about twenty years.

A letter of Irenæus, who was a pupil of Polycarp, has been preserved, which gives a graphic and remarkably interesting account of the familiar intercourse of Polycarp with the apostle. The letter is addressed by Irenæus to a friend named Florinus, with whom he remonstrates for holding erroneous doctrines:

"These doctrines, O Florinus, to say the least, are not of a sound understanding. These doctrines are inconsistent with the Church, and calculated to thrust those that follow them into the greatest impiety; these doctrines not even the heretics out of the Church ever attempted to assert; these doctrines were never delivered to thee by the presbyters before us, those who also were the immediate disciples of the apostles.

"For I saw thee when I was yet a boy in Lower Asia with Polycarp moving in great splendor at court, and endeavoring by all means to gain his esteem. I remember the events of those times much better than those of more recent occurrence, as the studies of our youth growing with our minds unite with them so firmly that I can tell also the very place where the blessed Polycarp was accustomed to sit and discourse, and also his entrances, his walks, his manner of life, the form of his body, his conversations with the people and familiar intercourse with John, as he was accustomed to tell, as also his familiarity with those that had seen the Lord; also concerning his miracles, his doctrine; all these were told by Polycarp in consistency with the Holy Scriptures, and he had received them from the eye-witnesses of the doctrine of salvation.

"These things, by the mercy of God and the opportunity then afforded me, I attentively heard, noting them down, not on paper, but in my heart; and these same facts I am always in the habit, by the grace of God, of recalling faithfully to mind; and I can bear witness in the sight of God that, if that blessed and apostolic presbyter had heard any such thing as this, he would have exclaimed and stopped his ears, and, according to his custom, would have said: 'O good God! unto what things hast thou reserved me, that I should tolerate these things?' He would have fled from the place in which he had sat or stood hearing doctrines like these.

"From his epistles also, which he wrote to the neighboring churches in order to confirm them, or to some of the brethren in order to admonish or exhort them, the same thing may be clearly shown."

In another place Irenæus states that Polycarp was appointed bishop of Smyrna by the apostles themselves:

"Polycarp also was not only instructed by apostles, and conversed with many who had seen Christ, but was also by apostles in Asia appointed bishop of the Church in Smyrna, whom I also saw in my early youth, for he lived a very long time; and when a very old man, gloriously and most nobly suffering martyrdom, departed this life, having always taught those things which he had learned from the apostles, and which the Church has handed down, and which alone are true."

Of the numerous letters which Polycarp as bishop of Smyrna wrote to the neighboring churches only one is extant. It is addressed by "Polycarp and the presbyters with him to the Church of God sojourning at Philippi," and probably was written about the middle of the second century. In this epistle he praises the Philippians for their firm Christian faith, and exhorts them to adhere to the doctrine which St. Paul had taught them by word of mouth and by his epistle. After various exhortations to presbyters, deacons, and other members of the Church, Polycarp refers to the martyrdom of Ignatius, but apparently was ignorant of the circumstances attending it, for the epistle concludes with a request for information respecting him.

The martyrdom of Polycarp himself is described in an epistle addressed by the Church of Smyrna, of which he was bishop, to the Church of Philomelium, a city of the neighboring province of Phrygia. There are probably some interpolations; but, excepting these, the document can hardly be of much later date than the death of the martyr. There are several reasons for this conclusion.

In the first place, the general tenor shows that it is intended to give information of events which had recently happened; secondly, a postscript states that a copy of it belonged to Irenæus, a disciple of Polycarp; and thirdly, a large part of it is transcribed by Eusebius, who treats it as an authentic document.

The date of the death of Polycarp is well ascertained to be A.D. 167, in the reign of Marcus Aurelius. For some time previously there had been a cruel persecution of the Christians at Smyrna, in which both the Gentile and Jewish inhabitants took part. Against Polycarp especially, as the chief minister of the Christian Church, their hostility was directed. After several Christians had been tortured and thrown to the lions, the multitude clamored for the death of the bishop.

Yielding to the urgent entreaties of those around him Polycarp quitted the city; but he was pursued and brought back. The proconsul, who had reluctantly allowed him to be arrested, was anxious to save him.

"When he was led forward, a great tumult arose among those that heard he was taken. At length, as he advanced, the proconsul asked him whether he was Polycarp, and, he answering that he was, he urged him to deny Christ, saying, 'Have a regard for your age,' and adding similar expressions such as are usual for them to employ.

"'Swear,' he said, 'by the genius of Cæsar. Repent. Say, "Away with those that deny the gods."'

"But Polycarp, with a countenance grave and serious, and contemplating the whole multitude that were collected in the stadium, beckoned with his hand to them, and with a sigh looked up to heaven and said, 'Away with the atheists.'

"The governor continued to urge him again, saying: 'Swear, and I will dismiss you. Revile Christ.'

"'Revile Christ!' Polycarp replied. 'Eighty-and-six years have I served him and he never did me wrong; and how can I now blaspheme my King who has saved me?'"

The governor continued to urge him, and in vain threatened him with the wild beasts. At length a herald was ordered to proclaim in the midst of the stadium that "Polycarp confesses he is a Christian." Thereupon the multitude cried out, "This is that teacher of Asia, the father of the Christians, the destroyer of our gods," and demanded that he should be burned alive; and the governor gave sentence accordingly.

According to the horrid custom of the times the executioners were about to fasten his hands to the stake by spikes, when he begged that he might be bound merely, saying that He who gave him strength to bear the flames would also give him strength to remain unmoved on the pyre.

This last request was granted; and being bound to the stake, he uttered this beautiful prayer:

"Father of thy well-beloved and blessed Son, Jesus Christ, through whom we have received the knowledge of thee, the God of angels and powers and all creation, and of all the family of the righteous that live before thee, I bless thee that thou hast thought me worthy of the present day and hour, to have a share in the number of the martyrs and in the cross of Christ unto the resurrection of eternal life, both of the soul and body, in the incorruptible felicity of the Holy Spirit, among whom may I be received in thy sight this day as a rich and acceptable sacrifice, as thou, the faithful and true God, hast prepared, hast revealed, and fulfilled. Wherefore, on this account and for all things, I praise thee, I bless thee, I glorify thee through the eternal High Priest, Jesus Christ, thy well-beloved Son, through whom glory be to thee with him in the Holy Ghost, both now and evermore. Amen."

The flames did not immediately seize upon his body; so one of the executioners--in mercy perhaps--plunged a sword into his body, and so ended his sufferings. The centurion then placed the body in the midst of the fire and burned it, "according to the custom of the Gentiles."

"Thus at last, taking up his bones, valued more than precious stones, more tried than gold, we deposited them where they should be. There also, as far as we can, the Lord will grant us to celebrate the natal day of his martyrdom in joy and gladness, both in commemoration of those who finished their contest before, and to prepare those that shall be hereafter."

There is something wonderfully touching in this reference to the "natal day of his martyrdom." Those who wrote it thought that the day on which Polycarp was pierced by the sword was not the day of his death, but the birthday of a new and happier life.

* * * * *

Justin, who from the manner of his death is often called Justin Martyr, was a native of Samaria. He was of Roman parentage, and was born early in the second century, and therefore must have been contemporary with many persons who had seen some of the apostles.

Justin, who was addicted to philosophical pursuits, has given in one of his works a very curious account of his studies and search after religious truth. First, he thought to find it in the Stoic philosophy:

"I surrendered myself to a certain Stoic, and, having spent a considerable time with him, when I had not acquired any further knowledge of God--for he did not know it himself, and said such instruction was unnecessary--I left him and betook myself to another, who was called a Peripatetic, and, as he fancied, shrewd. And this man, after having entertained me for a few days, requested me to settle the fee, in order that our intercourse might not be unprofitable. Him, too, for this reason I abandoned, believing him to be no philosopher at all."

Disgusted with the mercenary spirit of the Peripatetic, the inquirer next determined to make a trial of Pythagorean philosophy. But the celebrated Pythagorean teacher whom he consulted wished him to learn music, astronomy, and geometry. Those kinds of knowledge, however, were not what Justin wanted, and besides he thought that they would take up too much time. So he next resolved to make a trial of Platonism; and this time he was more successful.

"In my helpless condition it occurred to me to have a meeting with the Platonists, for their fame was great. I thereupon spent as much of my time as possible with one who had lately settled in our city--a sagacious man holding a high position among the Platonists--and I progressed and made the greatest improvements daily. And the perception of immaterial things quite overpowered me, and the contemplation of ideas furnished my mind with wings, so that in a little while I supposed that I had become wise; and such was my folly that I expected forthwith to look upon God, for this is the end of Plato's philosophy."

Justin then proceeds to give a remarkably interesting and graphic account of his conversion to Christianity:

"And while I was thus disposed, when I wished to be filled with great quietness and to shun the path of men, I used to go into a certain field not far from the sea. And when I was near that spot one day where I purposed to be by myself, a certain old man of dignified appearance, exhibiting meek and venerable manners, followed me at a little distance. And when I turned around on him, having halted, I fixed my eyes rather keenly upon him."

Justin gets into conversation with the old man and says that he delights in solitary spots, where his attention is not distracted and where his converse with himself is uninterrupted, and proceeds to a fervid laudation of philosophy.

"'Does philosophy, then, make happiness?' said he, interrupting. 'Assuredly,' said I, 'and it alone.' 'What, then, is philosophy?' he said, 'and what is happiness? Pray tell me, unless something hinders you from saying.'

"'Philosophy,' said I, 'is a knowledge of that which really exists and a clear perception of truth, and happiness is the reward of such knowledge and wisdom.' 'But what do you call God?' said he. 'That which always maintains the same nature and is the cause of all other things--that, indeed, is God.' So I answered him, and he listened with pleasure."

The conversation, which is too long to be fully transcribed, turns on the attributes of the soul. Justin discourses on that topic after the manner of the Platonists. The old man, on the other hand, urges him to study the prophets of the Old Testament, for they predicted the coming of Christ, and their prophecies have been fulfilled. "'They,' said he, 'both glorified the Creator, the God and Father of all, and proclaimed his Son the Christ sent by him. But,' he added, 'pray that, above all things, the gates of light may be opened to you, for these things cannot be perceived or understood by all, but only by him to whom God and his Christ have imparted wisdom.'

"When he had spoken these and many other things which there is no time for mentioning at present, he went away, bidding me attend to them, and I have not seen him since. But straightway a flame was kindled in my soul, and a love of the prophets and of those men who are friends of Christ possessed me; and whilst revolving his words in my mind I found this philosophy alone to be safe and profitable. Thus and for this reason I am a philosopher. Moreover, I would that all, making a resolution similar to my own, would regard the words of the Saviour, for they possess a terrible power in themselves, and are sufficient to inspire those who turn aside from the path of rectitude with awe, while the sweetest rest is afforded to those who diligently observe them."

The _Dialogue_ from which these passages are taken is a real or imaginary disputation with Trypho, a learned Jew at Ephesus, respecting the principles of Christianity, and contains an elaborate demonstration that Christ is the Messiah of the Old Testament. The controversy is carried on with courtesy on both sides, and each disputant is equally earnest in his attempt to convert the other.

Justin was a very copious writer. The two most important of his writings now remaining are the two _Apologies_. These are certainly the two earliest of the numerous ancient pleas for toleration of Christianity now extant. The first _Apologia_ is addressed to the emperor Antoninus Pius and the Roman senate and the "whole people of the Romans"; and the purport of it may be inferred from the commencement, in which Justin says that he presents this "address and petition in behalf of all nations who are unjustly hated and wantonly abused, myself being one of them."

The second _Apologia_ was addressed to the Roman senate, probably in the reign of Antoninus Marcus Aurelius, and successor of Antoninus Pius. In this work Justin appeals indignantly to the Roman senate against the unjust conduct of one Urbicus, who at Rome had condemned several persons to death simply because they professed to be Christians. This Urbicus seems to have held the office of prefect of the city--a magistrate from whom there was no appeal except to the prince himself, or, as this _Apologia_ would suggest, to the senate.

The two _Apologies_ contain the most vehement invectives against the whole system of heathen idolatry, and accuse Jupiter and the other gods whom the Romans revered of ineffable vices.

Of course the man who could thus tell the Roman senate and people that all that they held sacred was unspeakably and hideously wicked could expect but one fate. Justin threw down the gauntlet, and the constituted authorities very quietly took it up, with a result which, as the human power was all with them, it was not difficult to foresee.

Some time in the reign of Aurelius, but in what year is not known, Justin and several other Christians were accused before Rusticus, prefect of Rome, of disobedience to certain decrees then in force, by which Christians who refused to sacrifice to the gods were liable to be put to death. It is difficult to reconcile the passing of these decrees with the known character of Aurelius, who is universally described as a humane, as a benevolent king. The probable explanation is that, like his predecessor Trajan, he was actuated by motives of state policy, and regarded Christianity as rebellion against the authority of the State.

Eusebius has given an account of the martyrdom of Justin upon the authority of Tatian, who was a disciple of the martyr. This account substantially agrees with the very ancient _Martyrdom of Justin_, which concludes thus:

"The prefect says to Justin: 'Hearken, you who are called learned and think that you know true doctrines: if you are scourged and beheaded, do you believe that you will ascend into heaven?'

"Justin said, 'I hope that if I endure these things I shall have this gift, for I know that to all who have thus lived there abides the divine favor until the completion of the world.'

"Rusticus, the prefect, said, 'Do you suppose that you will ascend into heaven to receive such a recompense?' Justin said, 'I do not suppose it, but I know and am fully persuaded of it.'

"Thus also said the other Christians, 'Do what you will, for we are Christians and do not sacrifice to idols.'

"Rusticus, the prefect, pronounced sentence, saying, 'Let those who have refused to sacrifice to the gods and to yield to the command of the Emperor be scourged and led away to suffer decapitation according to the law.'

"The holy martyrs, having glorified God and having gone forth to the accustomed place, were beheaded, and perfected their testimony in the confession of the Saviour. And some of the faithful, having secretly removed their bodies, laid them in a suitable place, the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ having wrought along with them, to whom be glory forever and ever. Amen."

THE EPISTLE OF POLYCARP TO THE PHILIPPIANS

Polycarp, and the presbyters that are with him, to the Church of God which is at Philippi: mercy unto you and peace from God Almighty and the Lord Jesus Christ, our Saviour, be multiplied. I rejoiced greatly with you in our Lord Jesus Christ, that ye received the images of a true love, and accompanied, as it is behooved you, those who were in bonds, becoming saints; which are the crowns of such as are truly chosen by God and our Lord: as also that the root of the faith which was preached from ancient times remains firm in you to this day; and brings forth fruit to our Lord Jesus Christ, who suffered himself to be brought even to the death for our sins. Whom God hath raised up, having loosed the pains of death; whom, having not seen, ye love; in whom, though now ye see him not, yet believing, ye rejoice with joy unspeakable and full of glory.

Into which many desire to enter; knowing that by grace ye are saved; not by works, but by the will of God through Jesus Christ. Wherefore girding up the loins of your minds, serve the Lord with fear and in truth; laying aside all empty and vain speech, and the error of many; believing in him that raised up our Lord Jesus Christ from the dead, and hath given him glory and a throne at his right hand. To whom all things are made subject, both that are in heaven and that are in earth; whom every living creature shall worship; who shall come to be the judge of the quick and dead: whose blood God shall require of them that believe in him.