Why not? In an age when, as has been well and often said, emperors and consulars crawl to the tombs of a tent-maker and a fisherman, and kiss the mouldy bones of the vilest slaves? Why not, among a people whose God is the crucified son of a carpenter? Why should learning, authority, antiquity, birth, rank, the system of empire which has been growing up, fed by the accumulated wisdom of ages,why, I say, should any of these things protect your life a moment from the fury of any beggar who believes that the Son of God died for him as much as for you, and that he is your equal if not your superior in the sight of his low-born and illiterate deity! [Footnote: These are the arguments and the language which were commonly employed by Porphyry, Julian, and the other opponents of Christianity.]
My most eloquent philosopher, this may beand perhaps isall very true. I quite agree that there are very great practical inconveniences of this kind in the newI mean the Catholic faith; but the world is full of inconveniences. The wise man does not quarrel with his creed for being disagreeable, any more than he does with his finger for aching: he cannot help it, and must make the best of a bad matter. Only tell me how to keep the peace.
And let philosophy be destroyed?
That it never will be, as long as Hypatia lives to illuminate the earth; and, as far as I am concerned, I promise you a clear stage anda great deal of favour; as is proved by my visiting you publicly at this moment, before I have given audience to one of the four hundred bores, great and small, who are waiting in the tribunal to torment me. Do help me and advise me. What am I to do?
I have told you.
Ah, yes, as to general principles. But out of the lecture-room I prefer a practical expedient for instance, Cyril writes to me hereplague on him! he would not let me even have a weeks hunting in peace-that there is a plot on the part of the Jews to murder all the Christians. Here is the precious documentdo look at it, in pity. For aught I know or care, the plot may be an exactly opposite one, and the Christians intend to murder all the Jews. But I must take some notice of the letter.
I do not see that, your excellency.
Why, if anything did happen, after all, conceive the missives which would be sent flying off to Constantinople against me!
Let them go. If you are secure in the consciousness of innocence, what matter?
Consciousness of innocence? I shall lose my prefecture!
Your danger would just be as great if you took notice of it. Whatever happened, you would be accused of favouring the Jews.
And really there might be some truth in the accusation. How the finances of the provinces would go on without their kind assistance, I dare not think. If those Christians would but lend me their money, instead of building alms-houses and hospitals with it, they might burn the Jews quarter to-morrow, for aught I care. But now....
But now, you must absolutely take no notice of this letter. The very tone of it forbids you, for your own honour, and the honour of the empire. Are you to treat with a man who talks of the masses at Alexandria as the flock whom the King of kings has committed to his rule and care? Does your excellency, or this proud bishop, govern Alexandria?
Really, my dear lady, I have given up inquiring.
But he has not. He comes to you as a person possessing an absolute authority over two-thirds of the population, which he does not scruple to hint to you is derived from a higher source than your own. The consequence is clear. If it be from a higher source than yours, of course it ought to control yours; and you will confess that it ought to control ityou will acknowledge the root and ground of every extravagant claim which he makes, if you deign to reply.
But I must say something, or I shall be pelted in the streets. You philosophers, however raised above your own bodies you may be, must really not forget that we poor worldlings have bones to be broken.
Then tell him, and by word of mouth merely, that as the information which he sends you comes from his private knowledge and concerns not him as bishop, but you as magistrate, you can only take it into consideration when he addresses you as a private person, laying a regular information at your tribunal.
Charming! queen of diplomatists as well as philosophers! I go to obey you. Ah! why were you not Pulcheria? No, for then Alexandria had been dark, and Orestes missed the supreme happiness of kissing a hand which Pallas, when she made you, must have borrowed from the workshop of Aphrodite.
Recollect that you are a Christian, answered Hypatia, half smiling.
So the prefect departed; and passing through the outer hall, which was already crowded with Hypatias aristocratic pupils and visitors, bowed his way out past them and regained his chariot, chuckling over the rebuff which he intended to administer to Cyril, and comforting himself with the only text of Scripture of the inspiration of which he was thoroughly convincedSufficient for the day is the evil thereof.
At the door was a crowd of chariots, slaves with their masters parasols, and the rabble of onlooking boys and market-folk, as usual in Alexandria then, as in all great cities since, who were staring at the prefect, and having their heads rapped by his guards, and wondering what sort of glorious personage Hypatia might be, and what sort of glorious house she must live in, to be fit company for the great governor of Alexandria. Not that there was not many a sulky and lowering face among the mob, for the great majority of them were Christians, and very seditious and turbulent politicians, as Alexandrians, men of Macedonia, were bound to be; and there was many a grumble among them, all but audible, at the prefects going in state to the heathen womans househeathen sorceress, some pious old woman called herbefore he heard any poor souls petition in the tribunal, or even said his prayers in church.
Just as he was stepping into his curricle a tall young man, as gorgeously bedizened as himself, lounged down the steps after him, and beckoned lazily to the black boy who carried his parasol.
Ah, Raphael Aben-Ezra! my excellent friend, what propitious deityahem! martyrbrings you to Alexandria just as I want you? Get up by my side, and let us have a chat on our way to the tribunal.
The man addressed came slowly forward with an ostentatiously low salutation, which could not hide, and indeed was not intended to hide, the contemptuous and lazy expression of his face; and asked in a drawling tone
And for what kind purpose does the representative of the Caesars bestow such an honour on the humblest of his, etc. etc.your penetration will supply the rest.
Dont be frightened; I am not going to borrow money of you, answered Orestes, laughingly, as the Jew got into the curricle.
I am glad to hear it. Really one usurer in a family is enough. My father made the gold, and if I spend it, I consider that I do all that is required of a philosopher.
A charming team of white Nisaeans, is not this? And only one gray foot among all the four.
Yes.... horses are a bore, I begin to find, like everything else. Always falling sick, or running away, or breaking ones peace of mind in some way or other. Besides, I have been pestered out of my life there in Cyrene, by commissions for dogs and horses and bows from that old Episcopal Nimrod, Synesius.
What, is the worthy man as lively as ever?
Lively? He nearly drove me into a nervous fever in three days. Up at four in the morning, always in the most disgustingly good health and spirits, farming, coursing, shooting, riding over hedge and ditch after rascally black robbers; preaching, intriguing, borrowing money; baptizing and excommunicating; bullying that bully, Andronicus; comforting old women, and giving pretty girls dowries; scribbling one half-hour on philosophy, and the next on farriery; sitting up all night writing hymns and drinking strong liquors; off again on horseback at four the next morning; and talking by the hour all the while about philosophic abstraction from the mundane tempest. Heaven defend me from all two-legged whirlwinds! By the bye, there was a fair daughter of my nation came back to Alexandria in the same ship with me, with a cargo that may suit your highness.
There are a great many fair daughters of your nation who might suit me, without any cargo at all.
Ah, they have had good practice, the little fools, ever since the days of Jeroboam the son of Nebat. But I mean old Miriamyou know. She has been lending Synesius money to fight the black fellows with; and really it was high time. They had burnt every homestead for miles through the province. But the daring old girl must do a little business for herself; so she went off, in the teeth of the barbarians, right away to the Atlas, bought all their lady prisoners, and some of their own sons and daughters, too, of them, for beads and old iron; and has come back with as pretty a cargo of Lybian beauties as a prefect of good taste could wish to have the first choice of. You may thank me for that privilege.
After, of course, you had suited yourself, my cunning Raphael?
Not I. Women are bores, as Solomon found out long ago. Did I never tell you? I began, as he did, with the most select harem in Alexandria. But they quarrelled so, that one day I went out, and sold them all but one, who was a Jewessso there were objections on the part of the Rabbis. Then I tried one, as Solomon did; but my garden shut up, and my sealed fountain wanted me to be always in love with her, so I went to the lawyers, allowed her a comfortable maintenance, and now I am as free as a monk, and shall be happy to give your excellency the benefit of any good taste or experience which I may possess.
Thanks, worthy Jew. We are not yet as exalted as yourself, and will send for the old Erictho this very afternoon. Now listen a moment to base, earthly, and political business. Cyril has written to me, to say that you Jews have plotted to murder all the Christians.
Wellwhy not? I most heartily wish it were true, and think, on the whole, that it very probably is so.
By the immortalsaints, man! you are not serious?
The four archangels forbid! It is no concern of mine. All I say is, that my people are great fools, like the rest of the world; and have, for aught I know or care, some such intention. They wont succeed, of course; and that is all you have to care for. But if you think it worth the troublewhich I do notI shall have to go to the synagogue on business in a week or so, and then I would ask some of the Rabbis.
Laziest of men!and I must answer Cyril this very day.
An additional reason for asking no questions of our people. Now you can honestly say that you know nothing about the matter.
Well, after all, ignorance is a stronghold for poor statesmen. So you need not hurry yourself.
I assure your excellency I will not.
Ten days hence, or so, you know.
Exactly, after it is all over.
And cant be helped. What a comfort it is, now and then, that Cant be helped!
It is the root and marrow of all philosophy. Your practical man, poor wretch, will try to help this and that, and torment his soul with ways and means, and preventives and forestallings; your philosopher quietly saysIt cant be helped. If it ought to be, it will beif it is, it ought to be. We did not make the world, and we are not responsible for it.There is the sum and substance of all true wisdom, and the epitome of all that has been said and written thereon from Philo the Jew to Hypatia the Gentile. By the way, heres Cyril coming down the steps of the Caesareum. A very handsome fellow, after all, though lie is looking as sulky as a bear.
With his cubs at his heels. What a scoundrelly visage that tall fellow-deacon, or reader, or whatever he is by his dresshas!
There they arewhispering together. Heaven give them pleasant thoughts and pleasanter faces!
Amen! quoth Orestes, with a sneer: and he would have said Amen in good earnest, had he been able to take the libertywhich we shalland listen to Cyrils answer to Peter, the tall reader.
From Hypatias, you say? Why, he only returned to the city this morning.
I saw his four-in-hand standing at her door, as I came down the Museum Street hither, half an hour ago.
And twenty carriages besides, I dont doubt?
The street was blocked up with them. There! Look round the corner now.Chariots, litters, slaves, and fops.When shall we see such a concourse as that where it ought to be?
Cyril made no answer; and Peter went onWhere it ought to be, my fatherin front of your door at the Serapeium?
The world, the flesh, and the devil know their own, Peter: and as long as they have their own to go to, we cannot expect them to come to us.
But what if their own were taken out of the way?
They might come to us for want of better amusement.... devil and all. Wellif I could get a fair hold of the two first, I would take the third into the bargain, and see what could be done with him. But never, while these lecture-rooms lastthese Egyptian chambers of imagerythese theatres of Satan, where the devil transforms himself into an angel of light, and apes Christian virtue, and bedizens his ministers like ministers of righteousness, as long as that lecture-room stands and the great and the powerful flock to it, to learn excuses for their own tyrannies and atheisms, so long will the kingdom of God be trampled under foot in Alexandria; so long will the princes of this world, with their gladiators, and parasites, and money-lenders, be masters here, and not the bishops and priests of the living God.
It was now Peters turn to be silent; and as the two, with their little knot of district-visitors behind them, walk moodily along the great esplanade which overlooked the harbour, and then vanish suddenly up some dingy alley into the crowded misery of the sailors quarter, we will leave them to go about their errand of mercy, and, like fashionable people, keep to the grand parade, and listen again to our two fashionable friends in the carved and gilded curricle with four white blood-horses.
A fine sparkling breeze outside the Pharos, Raphaelfair for the wheat-ships too.
Are they gone yet?
Yeswhy? I sent the first fleet off three days ago; and the rest are clearing outwards to-day.
Oh!ahso!Then you have not heard from Heraclian?
Heraclian? What the-blessed saints has the Count of Africa to do with my wheat-ships?
Oh, nothing. Its no business of mine. Only he is going to rebel .... But here we are at your door.
To what? asked Orestes, in a horrified tone.
To rebel, and attack Rome.
Good godsGod, I mean. A fresh bore! Come in, and tell a poor miserable slave of a governorspeak low, for Heavens sake!I hope these rascally grooms havent overheard you.
Easy to throw them into the canal, if they have, quoth Raphael, as he walked coolly through hall and corridor after the perturbed governor.
Poor Orestes never stopped till he reached a little chamber of the inner court, beckoned the Jew in after him, locked the door, threw himself into an arm-chair, put his hands on his knees, and sat, bending forward, staring into Raphaels face with a ludicrous terror and perplexity.
Tell me all about it. Tell me this instant.
I have told you all I know, quoth Raphael, quietly seating himself on a sofa, and playing with a jewelled dagger. I thought, of course, that you were in the secret, or I should have said nothing. Its no business of mine, you know.
Orestes, like most weak and luxurious men, Romans especially, had a wild-beast vein in himand it burst forth.
Hell and the furies! You insolent provincial slaveyou will carry these liberties of yours too far! Do you know who I am, you accursed Jew? Tell me the whole truth, or, by the head of the emperor, Ill twist it out of you with red-hot pincers!