I.

CAST OUT.

A serene and happy old age may delight in recalling the glory and the dream of youth, of which it is the crown and the fulfillment; but the wretched and desolate, nearing the grave, revert seldom to the past things of a life they are eager to exchange for a better.

A solemn sense of duty to mankind impels me to be my own biographer.

My story is the most wonderful in the world: so wonderful that the men of the present age cannot comprehend or believe me. I am spiritually alone.

None before me have penetrated consciously into the invisible world: examined its structure and its people: and returned to his fellow-men, enriched and burdened with its awful secrets.

This have I done.

I am Lazarus of Bethany, whom Christ raised from the dead.

II.

CLOUDS GATHERING.

We were now orphans, and of that kind most to be pitied, who have fallen into the hands of a cold and selfish step-uncle. He had a father’s power over us, without a father’s affection to regulate and sanctify it. There was no one to supervise his conduct toward us; no appeal from his baseness or cruelty, unless his acts were so flagrant and unconcealed as to call down the vengeance of the laws.

This uncle whom we so much dreaded and had so much reason to dread, wore at first a smooth and pleasing mask. He came every day to see us, and endeavored by as much civility and kindness as he could counterfeit, to soften our feelings and satisfy us with our condition. He professed the deepest sympathy for our poor father’s calamity. He regretted the severity of the Jewish and Roman laws on the subject of leprosy, but excused them as a necessary protection to society. He assured us that our father had a comfortable lodge on the border of the wilderness, and that servants were despatched every other day with fresh supplies of food and wine and water. This assurance brought tears to our eyes and comfort to our hearts.

When the storm of our grief had abated a little, we re[pg 30]quested to see our aunt; for we yearned for the presence and sympathy of woman. Magistus conducted us over to his residence which adjoined our own, but fronted upon another street. A high brick wall separated his garden from ours. He had a door cut in this wall so as to facilitate the passage from one house to another. His mansion was completely concealed from the public eye by a thick grove of trees which surrounded it. In the most retired chamber of this quiet and really beautiful place, we found Ulema, my father’s invalid sister.

She was a middle-aged woman of extreme thinness and pallor. Her face was waxen-colored and ghastly. There was a wild terrified expression about her black eyes, which was absolutely painful. She had evidently been a great sufferer in mind and body. She received us with a faint, sickly smile, and then her features assumed an expression of profound pity. We supposed this was on account of the loss of our father. We did not know the reasons which the poor woman had for pitying any one who came within the shadow of Magistus.

After the interchange of a few commonplaces, our uncle cut short the visit on the plea of Ulema’s feeble and nervous condition. This visit was repeated every Sabbath after the morning sacrifice. Magistus always accompanied us, and drew us away as quickly as possible. My aunt had always the same expressions of terror and pity. Thus our repeated interviews added nothing to our knowledge of her character. In vain we petitioned Magistus to let us live with our aunt, or to let us visit her oftener, or to let us stay longer.

Our own home was sadly changed. The furniture, the [pg 31]pictures, the statues, the fountain, the flowers, were all the same, but there was an air of silence and melancholy about the whole place, as if the inanimate objects had felt and shared the misfortunes of the orphan children. There was a different sphere around us, a different light upon us. The organizing and unitizing spirit was gone;—the good and wise father, who made all happy and cheerful about him, and held his little household together in the sweet bonds of perfect order and peace.

It was a cruel act of Magistus to substitute servants and creatures of his own for those who had been with us from our infancy. We were soon surrounded by strange faces, so that our father’s house began to appear to us, what it really was, a prison. The domestics of an establishment acquire in time a coloring from the kind of life within it, as insects are colored by the leaves and bark of the trees they inhabit. Ours were respectful, obedient and cheerful; these were cunning, insolent and dishonest.

The chief butler or head servant was, however, a good character, who plays a remarkable part in my story. He was an African about thirty years of age, very black and homely. He was a eunuch, and dumb. These disadvantages, which at first excited a feeling of repulsion, were atoned for by a singular kindness, deference and sympathy, which were displayed in his features and manners. The other servants held him in great awe; for he had been brought from Egypt about three years before by a magician, and was supposed to be gifted with supernatural power.

It was this advantage in command, as well as a certain kind of talent, industry and reliability, which induced [pg 32]Magistus to give him the supreme charge of both households. He had been with us but a few days, before he had quite won our hearts by his friendly attentions and evident sympathy for our distress. I, who had been made suspicious by my father’s opinion of our guardian, detected in the face of Ethopus (for that was his name) the same expression of pity which shone in the features of our sick aunt.

All this, however, he concealed from Magistus with the greatest care; for he was always cold and impassive toward us in the presence of his master. Unfortunately Ethopus was dumb. His communications at this time might have been of incalculable service to us. I endeavored to learn something of the habits and character of my uncle from the other servants, but on that subject they were as dumb as Ethopus; for whenever I approached it, they manifested signs of fear, and invariably put the finger on the lip.

I became dissatisfied with this secresy. I resolved to teach Ethopus to read and write, so that he might tell me his own story, and initiate me into the mysteries and dangers of my position. He comprehended my idea at once, and came to me secretly at hours when he knew Magistus was absent. He had made some little progress,—though the difficulties of the first steps were very great,—when one evening Magistus walked slyly in and surprised us at our studies. We had been betrayed by one of the servants, who all acted as spies on each other.

Magistus was in a towering passion. He beat Ethopus severely, notwithstanding my protestations that I alone was to blame—and drove him from the room.

III.

NIGHT BY THE DEAD SEA.

With my thoughts fluctuating between the extreme beauty of Mary Magdalen and the danger which Ethopus seemed to apprehend, I walked some distance without regarding my new companion.

When I did so, I was surprised and puzzled at his appearance. He was a young man of singularly handsome features, the only drawback being a nose which was a little too aquiline. His black hair curled in short ringlets close to his head, and his face was thoroughly bronzed by sun and tempest. His dress was rather that of some foreigner attached to an Assyrian or Egyptian caravan, than the coarse and simple clothing of a Hebrew servant. And then there was something bold and free in his bearing, which precluded the idea that he was a menial either in character or condition.

“Are you engaged in my uncle’s service?” said I.

He shifted the heavy basket from one arm to the other, and made no reply.

I repeated my question in a louder tone; but he did not seem to hear me, looking straight ahead at the road before him.

“This handsome fellow is both deaf and dumb,” said [pg 40]I to myself. “My uncle has a curious passion for silent people.”

Debarred the pleasure of conversation, I relapsed into reverie. I determined to make a use of this visit which my uncle little anticipated. I resolved to approach my father boldly, contagion or no contagion, and have an interview with him. I wanted to tell him of the neglected and unhappy condition of his children, of our increasing repugnance to Magistus, and of the indifference or treachery of Caiaphas. I wanted his advice. He could surely direct me to friends in the city, whose assistance might arrest our impending ruin.

Made happier by that resolution, as if it had already accomplished something, I let my mind revert back to the woman I saw at the gate, and a new cause of uneasiness arose as I reflected upon that accidental meeting. Boyish and inexperienced as I was, I discovered something in the dress and manner of the early visitor, which whispered to me that she was not a suitable companion for my sisters. She certainly was not a domestic. Who could she be? What could she want at our house just after daybreak? Perhaps she came to see Magistus on business. It was not the hour or the place for that. Perhaps she was one of the midnight revelers whom I heard singing and dancing in the basement story of my uncle’s secluded residence. That idea startled me more than all. I determined to get back home by rapid walking before nightfall, and explore this disquieting mystery.

We had passed over hill and dale through a highly-cultivated country, full of vineyards and gardens and orchards, full of sweet little villages and beautiful rural [pg 41]villas. This did not last long, and we turned in a south-easterly direction. The villages disappeared; the houses became more sparse and humble; the trees became more stunted and bare; the rocks larger and the road more difficult. At the point where the highway leads down the steep hills toward Jericho and the plain of the Jordan, my guide turned suddenly due south into a rough, barren and wild country, where there was no road at all.

The sounds of life faded behind us. Vegetation almost wholly disappeared. No animals were to be seen but a few goats far away browsing among the rocks. The birds seemed to refuse to accompany us further. The silence of the desert fell gradually upon us. This was the wilderness of Judea.

We were winding downward to the Salt Sea, that great watery waste, in whose silent deeps Sodom and Gomorrah lie buried; on whose shores stand bleak and desolate mountains full of sulphur springs; the gloom without the glory of nature; the home of wild beasts and lepers and robbers and demons; mountains fearful in their nakedness and solitude; evil genii guarding in stern silence the eternal sleep of the lost cities of the plain.

I grew uneasy and melancholy as we approached these famous and dangerous places. The taciturnity of my guide, together with an increasing shadow on his expressive face, magnified my apprehensions almost into fears. I felt my boyish weakness and inexperience by the side of this strong, rough, silent man of the wilderness, who now seemed to my excited imagination to have got into his native element, and to be a part of the lonely and supernatural region into which we had entered.

V.

THE BANQUET.

I am too deeply impressed with the vanity of our worldly affairs in comparison with the verities of the spiritual life, to employ my own time or engage a reader’s attention with a biography, however pleasing or romantic, unless there was a subtle connecting link, which I expect to reveal, between the facts narrated and those eternal truths which overshadow all others in importance.

I, alone of all mankind, have lived consciously in both worlds long enough to discover their relations to each other. What my fellow-men have seen only on the surface, I have examined interiorly. I have seen the secret springs of human pride, ambition, passion and folly. I have seen the souls of men as they appear in the sight of angels. And my instructions in that world were all based upon my experiences in this.

It is now necessary to drop for a while my personal narrative, and to go back and relate, from the evidence of others, what happened in Bethany during my absence.

My sisters had been left with our atrocious uncle, like two lambs under the guardianship of a wolf. One capable of assassinating his nephew, a mere youth, would not [pg 61]hesitate at any wickedness against his beautiful nieces. This man’s character was so cruel and wicked, that some explanation is needed of the singular maturity of diabolism to which he had attained.

Magistus had neither religion nor honor. Honor binds us in duty to our neighbor, as religion binds us both to God and the neighbor. It is a moon which shines brilliantly in the absence of the sun. The light of honor is also but the reflected light of religion. When both shine together, honor is absorbed and swallowed up in the more effulgent blaze of religion. The soul without religion or honor, is like the earth without sun or moon—cold, dark, desolate, hideous.

Such was the soul of Magistus.

Irreligion, like drunkenness, is sometimes inherited. The father of Magistus was a scoffer and sensualist. Fatal incubus of moral deformity descending from father to son! In this he was typical of the age. The hereditary pressure toward hell was so great, that a few more centuries of transmission would have brought the world into perfect sympathy with the lower regions. The advent of the Lord arrested that for a while.

Without religion or honor man is very close to hell. The veriest barbarian has some faint idea of natural religion, and some feeble impulse of natural honor, which distinguish him from the beasts and unite him to his kind. These are barriers against the influx of infernal life. He is ignorant of the devils within him, and the devils within him are ignorant of him. Wise and blessed provision! Were he brought into conscious rapport with his own attendant evil spirits, he would soon be one with them. [pg 62]Their life in hell and his life on earth would be animated by the same breath.

This had happened to Magistus.

Not that he was a barbarian. He was an educated, cultivated man, accustomed to the luxuries and full of the suavities of civilized life. Civilization and religion are not synonymous. Hell itself has a stupendous civilization. Magistus was a Pharisee by profession: a ritualist, and a strict observer of feast-days and ordinances and ceremonies. That, however, was not the man, but only his outer garment—his cloak. Supposed by the world to be virtuous and honest, this wealthy and reputable Pharisee was spiritually a whited sepulchre, full of dead men’s bones and all uncleanness.

He was a spiritualist, a sorcerer, a necromancer, a magician. He at first sought and became familiar with these people, with their studies and arts, from natural curiosity. It was very pleasant to call up his dead father and various dead friends, and converse with them. It was agreeable to know that they were all happy, and advancing in various degrees toward the infinite divine perfection. They showed him wonderful things. They performed miracles in his sight greater than those which the magicians of Egypt performed before Pharaoh.

Then they told him that the Jewish Scriptures were not divinely inspired, but a medley of fables, passable poetry and childish philosophy. He had already suspected this; and he congratulated the spirits on possessing a critical genius so similar to his own. He finally acquired, from these supernatural instructors, a grand system of philoso[pg 63]phy, revealing the divinity of nature and the laws of progress.

Having become convinced that there are great and subtile powers emanating from the spiritual world, unknown to most men, he determined to avail himself of those powers for his own private ends. He became a secret pupil and disciple of magicians and wizards. He communicated with spirits and permitted them to take possession of him, soul and body, so that they spoke through his mouth and wrote through his hand and came at his call.

He learned all the tricks and spells of legerdemain, the arts and formulas and incantations of magic, and the rites and ceremonies of the black art in its broadest sense. He obtained means of seeing objects at any distance, of producing hallucinations or optical illusions, of personating the dead, of finding hidden treasures, of reading men’s thoughts, of sowing enmity between friends, of discovering secrets, and a thousand other astounding and almost incredible things.

The soul is not destroyed in a moment: it is the work of years. The evil spirits and demons with whom he was thus brought into contact, slowly poisoned the fountain-head of character; extinguished his reverence, his modesty, his respect for marriage; undermined his conscience; swept away all religious and even social and civil scruples; and fired and sustained all his evil propensities; so that, externally a faithful disciple of Moses, he was interiorly a devil, governed only by the love of self and the world.

This formidable hypocrite, the most of whose wealth [pg 64]had been obtained by secret frauds, and was not unstained with blood, had his dwelling in the centre of an immense area surrounded by lofty walls and concealed by a dense grove of trees. He received no visitors but those who came to him at night, and for no good purpose. He had the character of a recluse, devoted to sacrifice and prayer. He thus indulged his secret vices and carried on his diabolical incantations unsuspected. The dark shadows of his princely mansion enveloped a degree of Assyrian luxury scarcely exceeded by the Caprean court of the emperor Tiberius.

Caiaphas, the priest, was his best friend, who shared his private pleasures and maintained by constant applause his public reputation for sanctity and honor.

The influence of evil spirits who possess us is at first gentle and subtile, coinciding with our own inclination. Thinking to lead, we are led. When a man is chained so that he can no longer resist, they urge him headlong to a crisis. They fire his evil passions; they blind his perverted intellect; they inflate his pride and self-conceit; they make him scornful and regardless of others, impatient of all barriers to his self-gratification, and assure him of boundless immunity and protection. In this state of horrible fantasy and inflamed passion, he is ready to trample upon all laws human and divine.

To this fearful point in his spiritual life had Magistus arrived.

When my father was driven into the wilderness, Caiaphas and my uncle plotted together how to get speedy and sole possession of his great wealth. To get rid of or destroy his children was the first, and, indeed, the only [pg 65]thing necessary. But they resolved to allow some months to elapse—to let our misfortunes die out from the public memory, and even ourselves be quite forgotten. Hence the seclusion, the solitude, the systematic neglect to which we were subjected.

The plan was finally matured. The boy was to be decoyed into the wilderness and murdered by Barabbas. It was to be given out that he was a wild, incorrigible lad, who had run away from home and joined a band of robbers. After a few months a letter was to be received from Barabbas, whose fame as an outlaw was widespread, giving the particulars of his death in an attack of the party upon some caravan. This was to settle the matter for ever in the public mind.

It was more difficult to dispose of my sisters than of myself. A hundred schemes were suggested by the inventive villains, but all rejected or suspended. It was finally agreed to draw them out and test their characters, to make experiments upon them, to see what could be done with them. It was a delicate task; but Magistus had boldness and cruelty for anything, and Caiaphas was to back him incessantly with his private counsel and his public support. He had already begun his insidious work, by lamenting to sundry influential persons, with sanctimonious regrets, that the daughters of his old and dear friend exhibited so early a singular perverseness of character and disregard of their social and religious obligations. The result, he added, of that laxity of discipline and passion for individual liberty, which characterized the unhappy leper.

The first and best instrument of evil is always a woman. [pg 66]Mary Magdalen, left an orphan without relatives at a very early age, had fallen into the hands of a strolling showman, who taught her to sing and dance, accompanying herself on the timbrel. Her extraordinary beauty attracted attention in the streets of Jerusalem, and she soon passed into the possession of one of those connoisseurs who study the anatomy as well as the philosophy of art. She quickly disappeared from sight; and it was rumored that she had been sent to Ashkelon to serve in the gorgeous temple of Ashtoreth, the Venus of Assyria. She had gone one dark night no further than Bethany, and had buried her talents and her shame in the princely mansion of Magistus.

On the morning of my departure this serpent was introduced into the dove-cote. Magistus represented her as a distant relative whom he had invited to spend several weeks with his nieces, hoping that her gayety of spirits would lighten the constant gloom of his little charges. The children, dazzled by her great beauty and won by her free and affectionate manner, were delighted with their new companion. She entertained them with curious stories of what she had seen and heard, refraining from any allusion which might reveal her true life and character.

But the plot of the two arch-demons did not work as they had calculated. Indeed, it worked in a way quite opposite to their expectations. They had counted on the corrupting influence of a bold, fascinating woman on the gentle and unsophisticated thoughts and feelings of innocent girls. They had not counted, cunning and sagacious as they were, on the possible influence of the girls upon Mary Magdalen.

VII.

SAVED.

After Martha came out of her swoon, the night was spent in consultation between the two women as to the surest method of averting the catastrophe which impended. It was determined that the sisters should escape from the house early in the morning, and appeal for help to some worthy and influential residents of Bethany, friends of my father. They were so sure of obtaining succor and deliverance, that they became quite cheerful as the sunlight broke above the hills.

Magistus suddenly entered the room, and their hearts sank within them as they noticed the silent ferocity of his countenance. Without saying a word he clasped iron rings upon their ankles and wrists, and chained them securely to the bed-posts. Their tears, cries, inquiries, supplications, were all in vain. He took no notice of them whatever, and locked and bolted the door behind them, leaving them bound and in despair.

A different but equally painful scene occurred in the chamber of Mary Magdalen. Mary, my sister, had just awakened with a deep sigh, and began narrating an ominous dream which had disturbed her night’s rest, when a loud knock was heard at the door, and a strange voice commanded them to dress and come forth immediately. [pg 94]They sprang up in great trepidation and obeyed the order. On opening the door they turned back into the room with a loud shriek.

Simon Magus stood before them with his serpent and leopard. He had these creatures about him almost constantly. It was to keep them in good training, for his personal protection, to excite wonder, to inspire awe, and to enforce his authority. They were admirable adjuvants to his pretensions and power. Every one quailed before them.

He assured the women that his pets should not hurt them, if they followed him in silence, turning neither to the right nor to the left. There was no alternative but to obey. He conducted them to our father’s residence through the gardens and the gate in the garden wall. He had given every point a recent inspection. He passed into the inner courtyard, and led them down a flight of steps to a room in the cellar used by two of the domestics as a bed-chamber. Here he locked and bolted them in and retired.

Thus were the sisters secured without the possibility of communication or escape. The conspirators took every possible precaution. No one was permitted to leave the grounds, or to come in during the day. Magistus or Simon kept the black eunuch continually in sight. Whether his agitated and anxious manner betrayed him, or whether the magician really read his thoughts, his masters suspected that Ethopus meditated a revolt against the snares which had fascinated the leopard and the serpent. He was closely watched.

The situation of this poor fellow was very touching. [pg 95]His dark face was an index of a darkened soul, not by evil but by the absence of light. Under his homely exterior was a brave and generous heart. He was born and reared in a barbaric land, full of strange beasts and birds and stranger men, where Nature herself is wild and savage. He had been the victim of incredible oppression and cruelty. It is wonderful that the last spark of human feeling had not been trodden out from his spirit.

It spoke well for the native richness of the soil when good seed sprang up so luxuriantly as soon as planted. From the day he became acquainted with my sisters and myself, a new life had dawned upon him. Friendly voices, gentle words, kindly looks, sympathizing deeds, were food and drink to his amiable and child-like nature. His soul grew and expanded under them as flowers under dew and sunlight. Sincere attachment to us and hatred of our common enemies took possession of the whole man. He was ready for any labor, any danger, any sacrifice in our behalf.

Imagine the mental tortures of this humble and voiceless friend, when he saw the terrible fate which was impending over us, and found himself so helpless to avert it or to assist us!

Thus passed away the long, dreary, gloomy day—the day of my father’s funeral. It was spent by my sisters in prayer and tears and unavailing struggles to escape or to make themselves heard. Mary Magdalen identified herself thoroughly with the gentle and innocent child with whom she was imprisoned. She taxed her ingenuity to the utmost to give her consolation and hope; and when invention failed, she resorted to tears.

IX.

SACRIFICE.

My uncle summoned me one day into his presence, and told me that he wished me to enlarge my education by travel.

“You must visit Egypt, Greece and Italy,” said he, “the typical centres of the world, and converse with the master-spirits in art, science and philosophy. I have made arrangements to keep you amply supplied with money at Alexandria, Athens and Rome, and with letters to agreeable and influential people.

“This will consume three years of your life; and if you are wise and prudent, they will be pleasantly and profitably spent. When you return I will surrender your father’s estate into your hands, and make a handsome settlement upon your sisters from my own means. I am growing old and shall need but little for the rest of my pilgrimage.”

“Then,” he continued to my surprise and sorrow, “then I shall go back to the great East—nearer to the sun—to die.”

“Go back to the East?” I exclaimed with trepidation. “Why so? Your old age requires the presence of loving friends and relatives. What can we—made your children by your kindness—what can we do without you?”

XI.

HELENA.

In the school of philosophy where the doctrines of Socrates and Plato were taught with an eloquence equal to their own, I met a young Greek resident of the city by the name of Demetrius. He was the son of Calisthenes, a very wealthy merchant, who, contrary to the usual custom, attempted to rival in his private residence the magnificent art which was bestowed only on the public works. He was ambitious that his only son should enjoy more than mercantile honors, and arrive at greater distinction than that which wealth alone could bestow.

As usual in such cases, his paternal aspirations were doomed to disappointment. Nine-tenths of the genius of the world comes from that great middle class which knows neither riches nor poverty. The possession of great wealth is generally a hinderance to intellectual or spiritual advancement. Demetrius was a handsome, amiable fellow, of mediocre talent, slothful by nature and indulgence, and more ambitious of social success than of a front place in the class of philosophy.

I know not how it happened, but he had attached himself more strongly to me than I to him. I attained the [pg 142]entrÉe of his father’s house by a lucky accident. While we were rowing in the harbor one day, our little vessel was capsized, and it was only by my desperate exertions in his behalf that Demetrius was saved from drowning. Gratitude did more for the deliverer than friendship had done for the fellow-student: it opened the doors of the princely mansion, and showed me the household gods.

I was rejoiced at this, for I had heard one of my companions say:

“Helena, the sister of Demetrius, is the most wonderful creature in the world.”

I verified the truth of his remark. It was indeed the echo of the popular lip. Helena was an institution of Athens, sought, seen and admired like its other wonders and beauties. No language can convey any adequate description of this cunning masterpiece of nature. There was no statue in all the rich collections of Grecian art, which excelled the matchless symmetry of her form or the perfect beauty of her features. She was the poet’s dream of perfection, embodied in the delicate tissues of a splendid womanhood.

A neck and bust of immaculate beauty were surmounted by a head, every attitude of which was a study for artists and lovers. Her hair was a cloud of dark, brown waves faintly dashed with gold. Her broad imperial brow was pure as the silver surface of some cloudless dawn. Her soft, hazel eyes were radiant centres of inexpressible light and power. Her cheeks, nose, mouth and chin were miracles of shape, warmth and color. Her shell-tinted ears were hung with pearls less beautiful than themselves; and a necklace of golden beads made [pg 143]conspicuous a throat which it could not beautify. Her hands and fingers were so lucid, delicate and expressive, that they might be called features also, revealing in part the movements of her mind.

Poor artist that I am, I throw my pencil down in disgust. I cannot reproduce Helena to your eyes as she appeared to me.

To see this woman, for a young enthusiastic spirit, with his celestial dream pressing downward for realization, was to love her. The shaft of love flies from one eye to another; from the eye to the heart; from the heart to the brain; from the brain to the soul. I looked, I loved. I was smitten to the soul by that malady which has no cure but the cause which inflicts it.

Helena had not only an irresistible sweetness of voice and grace of manner, but she had a singular directness of attack, concentrating all her charms upon you at once; so that few men ever left her presence without feeling that she had absorbed and taken from them some portion of their life, which they could only recover by returning into the enchanted atmosphere which surrounded her beautiful person.

Thus bewildered by her beauty and bewitched by her fascinations, I lost my life when away from her, and found it again, enhanced and glorified, when I approached her footstool. I was attracted to her continually; and if I tore myself away, and climbed the mountain-top, or walked by the sea-shore, she became the inspiring genius of my solitary rambles; and the beauties of nature were only beautiful, because in some inexplicable manner they seemed akin to, or associated with her.

XII.

THE HALL OF APOLLO.

I was awakened from my delicious dream by Demetrius, who importuned me to accompany him to Rome, whither he had been despatched by his father on business of extreme importance. This reminded me that a visit to Rome was an essential part of my uncle’s educational programme. I had abandoned philosophy for love, and love cares nothing for thought, except as one mode of expressing the sentiments. My education, therefore, was at a stand-still. I hesitated and shuddered at the idea of leaving the charmed circle in which I stood entranced. I would, perhaps, have neither gratified my friend nor obeyed my uncle, had not Helena carelessly dropped the remark, that no student could truly regard his course of instruction completed until he had visited Rome. To acquire this title to perfection in the eyes of Helena, I endured the pangs of parting and the miseries of absence; became a compliant friend and an obedient nephew. I went to Rome.

Rome did not impress me so favorably as Athens. I was fond of art, but cared little for glory. The efforts of man to reproduce the beauties of Nature excited my admiration; his labors to immortalize himself and his deeds excited my contempt. The art of Rome was imported; [pg 150]her glory was self-acquired. I had soon seen all that I cared to see of the imperial city, which Augustus had found of brick and left of marble.

Demetrius had letters to some of the most powerful and influential men in Rome, so that we were soon introduced into the best society there. It was not long before we received an invitation to one of the splendid suppers of Hortensius, the richest man and the greatest epicure in the world. I remembered the conversation of the slave-dealer at Alexandria. I mentally resolved, as we drove through the magnificent arch of his palace gate, that, although I might taste of the nightingales of Hortensius, I certainly would take none of his fish.

“Beware of the fish-ponds,” said I, laughingly, to Anthony, who accompanied us as footman.

This palace of Hortensius was an affair of Babylonian magnificence. Everything about it was of colossal proportions. It was said to have as many chambers as there were days in the year. Hortensius had twelve bed-rooms for himself, each named after one of the months, and gorgeously furnished in a manner to represent the month after which it was named. There were seven banqueting-halls named after gods and goddesses—the dreams rather than the creations of art. This grand structure was burned during the fire in the reign of Nero, and its splendors, no longer to be found anywhere on earth, are already regarded as fabulous.

We supped in the Hall of Apollo.

The company was altogether male, which I did not regret; for I did not wish to see or speak to a woman in [pg 151]the world but Helena or my sisters. It was composed of the magnates, the great stars of Roman society—soldiers, statesmen, senators, governors, etc.—the least of them immeasurably above the two young plebeian students, who, dumbfounded at all they saw, could not but experience a painful sense of their own insignificance.

On my right hand, however, at the table, was a noble and sedate Roman, Pontius Pilate, the governor of Judea. He had visited Rome to consult the emperor and the senate about the affairs of his province, and was on the eve of returning. He seemed pleased when he learned that my home was in the neighborhood of Jerusalem; and with great tact and urbanity drew me out of my abstracted mood, dissipated my bashfulness, and engaged me in an animated conversation.

The Hall of Apollo was a miracle of beauty. Its area was immense; its shape, circular. Supported by twenty-four golden columns, the ceiling rose to a vast height, as a blue dome painted to represent the visible heavens. The sun blazing up through masses of dense and crimson clouds; the intensely clear cerulean ether above; the horizon all around pierced by mountain peaks, overhung by rolling vapors of purple and gold, produced an illusion of astonishing power and magnificence.

Every object in the room, the pictures, the statuary, the bass-reliefs upon the columns, the carvings upon the couches and the gorgeous table, and even the engravings and embossings upon the splendid vases and vessels which adorned it, were all descriptive or symbolical of Apollo, his attributes and achievements. The wonder of the hall, however, was a golden chandelier of incredible size, con[pg 152]taining a thousand rose-colored tapers, which lighted the scene with a brilliancy rivaling the day.

I will not attempt to describe the feast, having no particular fondness for epicurism. The bill of fare exceeded anything I had ever imagined. There was service after service, dessert after dessert, wine after wine, seemingly without end. The meat-courses, lasting about three hours, were presented by handsome boys of every nationality, clad in beautiful livery. The after-courses, of sweets and luxuries, were brought on by female servants, lovely in person and graceful in manner, revealing by their dress or otherwise every charm of the human body.

When the company was well filled and duly flushed by the delicious wines, the whole western wall of the apartment, by some hidden and admirable mechanism, suddenly opened or changed like a dissolving view, and revealed an interior apartment a little above the level of ours, which looked like a beautiful garden adorned and lighted in a style of Oriental magnificence.

The shrubbery and flowers of this garden were the concentrated beauties of the floral world in all regions, cultivated here by art, and offering an incense of perfume to these Roman rulers, who aspired to conquer not only man but nature. Ivory statues of gods and goddesses, of nymphs and fawns and satyrs, added greatly to the beauty of the scene. But when a dozen dancing-girls alighted as it were from heaven upon this miraculous stage, and whirled among these statues and flowers, less perfect and beautiful than themselves, the fascination, to those who regarded such enchantments, was complete.

XIV.

MY SPIRITUAL BODY.

Our sleep is an awakening: our death is a birth; our burial a resurrection.

The slumber of a babe upon its mother’s breast, drawing from her bodily warmth the secret magnetism of life, is a picture of the true state of every human soul, leaning unconsciously upon the bosom of God at the moment when bereaved friends are exclaiming,

“He is dead! he is dead!”

They called me dead. My sisters and their companions rent their garments and covered their heads with ashes. Unconscious of their grief, I passed beyond the shadows of this world, beyond these voices and sorrows, into the pure light of a spiritual realm.

Dead, indeed! I lived most when I seemed to live least. Death is nothing but a name for a change of condition.

The first thing I remember on returning to consciousness, was a soft strain of distant and ravishing music. I could not open my eyes, nor did I care to do so. It was perfect bliss to lie there in sweet repose, and listen to those heavenly sounds which came nearer and nearer. [pg 172]I have been asked if there was music in heaven. Why, the least motion of the air there is musical. Music is to the ear what light is to the eye; and the sounds of heaven are as sweet as its colors are beautiful.

I next became aware of presences about me. How can I describe the new sense which informed me of their nearness! I did not see or feel or hear them. I perceived them, intuitively as it were, by a holy atmosphere of love and purity and beauty which came with them. So the flowers, without senses like our own, when the dark and chilly night is over, must feel the tremulous waves of light gladdening around them.

These invisible, inaudible attendants were engaged in some office of love about me. What it was I did not understand; but I felt as if my body was being drawn out of something, as a hand is withdrawn from a glove,—although no one seemed to touch me. I entered into a state of exalted and blissful sensations, totally new to me, and quite incomprehensible to men still lingering in the flesh. My affections seemed to be concentrated or detained upon pure, tender, lovely and holy things, so that nothing painful or doubtful or sorrowful should stain the shining mirror of the soul.

I do not know how long this exquisite state of happiness lasted. It must have been rounded off with a delicious sleep; for it seemed itself like a sweet and mysterious dream, when I discovered that I was wider awake than before, and surrounded by a different though still delightful and purifying sphere of impressions.

From the presences about me I seemed to absorb the power of thinking and remembering distinctly. I [pg 173]could not open my eyes, but I seemed to be contemplating a luminous atmosphere, an infinite variety of splendid and dazzling colors, a whole universe of light. The ecstasy of Joy with which, bewildered and fascinated, I studied this inexpressible chaos of light, is beyond my power of description. In the midst of it I felt that two persons were near me, one at my head and one at my feet. One of them seemed to bend over me, and to be reading my face as one reads a book. He then said to the other in a gentle voice:

“It is good. His last thoughts were about the Lord.”

I pondered these words and asked myself whether I was dead or dreaming or in a trance.

My invisible friend then passed his hands several times gently over my face. He next drew a fine film from my eyelids and breathed upon my forehead. I instantly recovered my sight and looked around me. There were two men before me with beautiful and noble faces, and clad in robes of shining linen. I could not remove my eyes from them, there was something so inexpressibly tender and brotherly in their looks and motions.

“You are in the world of spirits, my brother,” said one of them with ineffable sweetness. “Be not afraid, but rejoice! The world of spirits is the vast realm betwixt earth and heaven into which all men come when they are first raised from the dead.”

“Raised from the dead?” said I, in extreme bewilderment.

“Yes—you have been raised from the dead. You have left the earth upon which you were born; you have left your natural body, which your friends will bury in [pg 174]the ground; you are now in a spiritual body and a spiritual state of existence.”

I looked at myself and looked around me.

“I cannot understand it,” said I, sorely puzzled. “You are certainly strangers to me, and you look so unlike any of the men I have ever seen, that I can readily believe you are angels. Nor do I see my beloved sisters, Martha and Mary, who, I know, would not leave my bedside for a moment. But this body is the same body I have always had; this is the room in which I have been sick so long; and looking out of that window, I see the Mount of Olives and the familiar sky of Judea. Explain how this can be.”

They looked at each other smiling, and one of them replied:

“The last impressions made upon the mind linger a while after death; so that the transition from natural to spiritual life may not be too sudden, and the sensation of personal identity may be fully preserved. This will change to you presently. We do not see the room that you see, nor the Mount of Olives, nor the Judean sky. These will all vanish from your sight after a little, and you will find yourself differently clad and moving about among novel and beautiful scenes.”

“But,”—said I, incredulously,—“but this body of flesh and blood, in which I live, move and think, how came it here?”

“That body of flesh and blood you have left behind you. The soul is a spiritual substance organized in the shape of its natural body. The natural body resembles the spiritual as a glove resembles the hand contained with[pg 175]in it. You have dropped the glove. You see the naked hand.”

“Our mission,” he continued, “is now ended, and another takes our place. We assist in the resurrection.”

They made a motion of departure, but I seized one of them by the hand.

“Oh stay!” said I, “do not go. Your words interest me beyond measure. I would learn more of the heavenly life. Pardon my incredulity, pity my ignorance.”

“One approaches,” said he, “who is much nearer and dearer to you than we. Relatives delight to render to relatives these charming offices of comfort and instruction. He comes!”

“Who?” I exclaimed, eagerly.

“Your father!”

I looked in the direction indicated by the angel’s face. Out of the darkness—which appeared to me and not to the angels, for it proceeded from my own mind and not from theirs—out of the darkness slowly loomed up a human figure. It brightened as it advanced. Then there stood before me a young man of radiant beauty, clad in a tissue of shining purple. His face was full of eager expectation, sparkling with love and joy.

While I was gazing at this form, which seemed to me a beautiful apparition, the other angels disappeared.

“My son! my son!” exclaimed the shining visitor in a voice of touching sweetness, and which seemed in some way remotely familiar. “Do you not know me?”

I was silent and troubled, for there was not the faintest [pg 176]resemblance between the splendid being who stood before me and the poor father I had buried in the wilderness.

“I am permitted for your sake,” said he, “to return back into the mental states of my earth-life and to resume its forms. This is one of the wonders of the spiritual world, but one which you will frequently see and soon understand. Look steadfastly at the changes I shall undergo, and you will believe.”

The light about him began to fade. The purple tissue darkened; his face grew pale; the lustre passed from his hair. His features gradually changed, becoming less and less beautiful, less and less youthful. Wrinkles appeared; his cheeks became haggard; his eyes sunken and sad; his head bowed and bare; his beard gray. Unsightly scars came upon his forehead; and when he held up his withered hands, from which two or three fingers had dropped, I knew the poor old leper whom the cruel law had driven into the wilderness.

“My father! my father!” I exclaimed, weeping at the sight which recalled so vividly the sorrows long buried in the soul, “I am satisfied. Return again into the beauty and glory of your heavenly youth. Let us forget the past. Let me see you as you are!”

His figure then underwent exactly the reverse series of changes; and when his angelic form was restored, I fell upon his neck and wept tears of joy.

I inquired into the philosophy of the astounding metamorphoses I had witnessed. I was taught that spiritual things—states of our affections and thoughts—are not so perishable as natural things; that they are stored away [pg 177]and preserved; and that they can be recalled and reproduced with a fac-simile of all the surrounding concomitants and phenomena. A spirit can be made to return into any state of his past life, when he will repeat his conduct to the least word and motion and incident. Thus nothing can be concealed; the entire past can be re-enacted; truth discovered and judgment given.

It was in accordance with this great spiritual law of changing forms corresponding with the changing states of the soul, that the disciples beheld Jesus from such different stand-points. If Thomas Didymus could have entered into the spiritual state of the three disciples on the mount, he would not have seen the Christ showing the wound in his side and the print of the nails, but he would have beheld him radiant—in his transfigured glory. It was the varying stand-points or mental states of the disciples, which give us such different manifestations of the Unchangeable.

I was not, however, thinking of these things at that moment. I was contemplating the youth and beauty of my father’s spiritual body.

“I was told,” said I, “that the spiritual body was a fac-simile of the natural body. How comes it that yours is so totally different?”

“When I first rose from the dead,” he replied, “I seemed to myself to be in the same leprous body that I had in the wilderness; and like all men I found some difficulty in realizing the fact that I was living in a different world. The spiritual body or external form of the soul, changes rapidly according to the changes of its internal form, which is composed of affections and thoughts. [pg 178]In proportion as these are purified from the evil and false things imbibed during the natural life, the body is freed from its imperfections, its feebleness and its want of symmetry.”

“And why do you look so young?” I inquired.

“Time,” said he, “does not belong to the spiritual world. We have no computations here by months and years; no revolution of suns and planets, which produce day and night and the changing seasons of the world. Our external surroundings, what you would call our visible nature, are the immediate outgrowth of our own spiritual states. The exterior changes continually with the interior. All in heaven are therefore young and beautiful, because their soul-life is good and pure, and is fitly represented by youth and beauty.”

My father then questioned me about the dear ones I had left behind. He manifested the deepest and tenderest sympathy in all that had happened to us since his departure from the world. He had heard of us frequently from new-comers into the world of spirits. We do not cease to love our earthly friends after death. But in the heavenly life there is such a thorough, soul-satisfying trust in the wise and merciful guidance of Divine Providence, that fears, doubts and anxieties about our absent loved ones, are utterly impossible.

“And my mother?” I inquired in turn,—“my mother and my little brother Samuel, where are they?”

“In heaven,” said he, “where you shall see them, but not now. You will undergo sundry preparations of state, inexplicable to you at present, by which you will be fitted for the ascent into their resplendent abodes.”

XV.

THE WORLD OF SPIRITS.

I was greatly astonished at the nature and importance of that intermediate state of life which I have called the world of spirits. Although the doctrine of a place of departed spirits, called Sheol or Hades, is distinctly taught in Scripture and by tradition, it seems to have made a very feeble impression on the minds even of the most devout. Most men think they will go immediately to heaven or to hell when they die. They are mistaken.

The world of spirits receives into its vast bosom the mighty congregation of the dead from all nations and climes. It is the first grand receptacle of the whole human race after death. It is the place of judgment, special and general. It may be compared to the stomach, into which all articles of food and drink are collected; where they are all comminuted, concussed, expressed, decomposed and digested; and what is found good and nutritive is taken up into the blood and makes a part of the living man; while the hard, unwholesome and innutritious portions, which cannot be dissolved or appropriated, are cast out of the system as useless or injurious.

XVII.

JUDGMENT OF THE JEWS.

When I awoke, the sun was shining through a golden mist: the dew glittered like a rainbow fallen upon the grass and flowers: the air was full of sweet odors and the voices of birds: a strange warmth and vigor pervaded my body, and a delightful activity reigned in my soul.

“Come,” said my father, “the first awakening thought should be always a prayer.”

He then repeated those beautiful words by which Jesus taught his disciples to pray. I will not describe the spiritual phenomena which attended this prayer. The multitude of ideas and influxes and perceptions which were crowded into every sentence, would be incomprehensible to men. It seemed to be an epitome of the universe, and to bring the soul into loving contact with all the spheres of the divine creation.

“Has Jesus taught that prayer in the world of spirits also?” I inquired.

“Yes. This prayer is the universal prayer which binds the heavens and all the angels together. It is the holiest thing of religion. It descends from God to angels and men; and blessed is he who receives it into his heart!

“We are now ready,” continued my father, “by the [pg 204]divine permission and under the divine protection, to explore some of the evil spheres which have congregated in the world of spirits, and which infuse their deadly poisons into men in the world. You will then understand a part of the great work which Christ is performing in this intermediate state.”

Thereupon he examined my face, head and hands with the utmost minuteness. A man’s whole life is written upon these; and angels, having a perfect knowledge of correspondences, the key of symbolism, can read from them your whole history as from a book.

“I perceived,” said he, “that in your earth-life you have been brought into contact with the corrupt sphere of the Jewish Church, with the sensuousness of Grecian art and philosophy, with the splendors of Roman ambition, and with the ancient and subtle power of Egyptian magic. You have seen these things on the natural or earthly side. I will show them to you on the spiritual and interior side, so that you may comprehend the dreadful condition of the human race, and see the necessity of the Divine incarnation.”

The geography, if we may use the expression, of the world of spirits is ever changing. The Church of the Lord, meaning those who come from the world and possess a divine revelation, always occupies the centre; other nations with different religions are arranged in successive zones around it; the farthest off in the circumference being those pagans who have received the least portion of the divine light and life.

“Behold the mutations of the world,” said my father. [pg 205]“Those remotest people, away off in the darkness and cold of the circumference, were once the chosen people of God, his church, occupying the centre, immediately under the down-falling rays of the Divine Sun. They proved faithless to their trust. They became so evil that a terrible spiritual catastrophe overwhelmed them, described as a flood,—for they were engulfed in a flood of falsities. They were the antediluvians, of celestial genius, the most richly endowed, the most beautiful of all; and now their descendants, the most hideous and debased, are the black and bronzed barbarians and savages of the world.”

“We are accustomed to think,” said I, “that those lower types of mankind are the last created, and therefore the least perfect.”

“No! they are the descendants of the first created and most perfect. They are not imperfect but degraded types. Imperfect types would progress upward and onward by natural law. These barbarians of Africa will never make the least advance until new causes which do not now exist, are put in operation. This great mystery of the Divine Providence will not be solved for many, many ages to come.

“After the destruction of that antediluvian church, another succeeded, possessing a written Word, a splendid ceremonial and boundless treasures of spiritual wisdom. They also forfeited their birth-right and betrayed their trust. Their judgment occurred in this world of spirits when Sodom and Gomorrah were destroyed by fire. Abraham and his family were the remnant saved from that church for the beginning of a new, as Noah and [pg 206]his family had been the remnant saved from the preceding.

“The descendants of this lost church compose chiefly the nationalities of Asia. They have remained for ages and will remain for ages to come in a stationary, semi-petrified condition, possessing no genuine truth, no vital religion, no element of progress; but living upon fables and myths which are the fragments of spiritual truth, whose interior light has long been lost to their understandings.

“For many centuries now of natural time, the Jewish Church has held the centre of the world of spirits. It also has become thoroughly corrupt, and is about to be removed to the circumference. Its great judgment is impending; its destruction approaches; but of this, that church itself is profoundly ignorant.”

During this conversation we had ascended by insensible degrees to the summit of a high mountain. I was astonished at the splendid panorama spread out beneath us. It was the whole land of Canaan, from the Jordan on the east to the borders of Philistia on the west; from Damascus and Antioch gleaming away to the north, down to the great desert that frowned along the southern boundary.

Immediately beneath us was a city of Jerusalem, ten times as large as our earthly capital; and a holy temple of corresponding proportions, all transcending in glory and grandeur anything ever seen on earth.

“Behold,” said my father, “the creation of spiritual fantasy, the imaginary heaven of the Jews, which will [pg 207]pass away like a scroll at the breath of the Lord when He comes in judgment upon them.

“You seem astonished,” he continued, “that spirits should reproduce around themselves these spiritual semblances of the cities and countries they have left behind. Nothing is more simple and rational. These people are gross and sensual in their nature, with little or nothing of the celestial or spiritual about them. They loved material things exclusively; their thoughts never rose above outward, civil, and political affairs. Here their interior life is reproduced in exteriors. Therefore they create around themselves their old homes, cities, and countries; and re-enact, as far as possible, their earthly life, because all their affections and thoughts are earthly.”

“This mountain,” said I, “upon which we are standing puzzles me; for there is no similar elevation in the neighborhood of Jerusalem.”

“This mountain,” answered my father, “is symbolical of the lofty state of spiritual pride and presumption in which the Jewish Church now is—a state of self-glorification which precedes its judgment and final destruction. It is only from this height, corresponding to their own spiritual state, that you can see the holy city and temple as they appear to them.

“Is it strange that a people, so gross, so unspiritual, so near their extinction as a church, should be so inflated with spiritual and theological conceit? They appear in their own eyes to have the most glorious city, the most holy church, and the most august ceremonials that ever existed; accounting all others unfit for heaven and unworthy of the Divine favor.

XVIII.

IMAGINARY HEAVENS.

After these things we were taken up another high mountain, whence we had a view of all the kingdoms in the world of spirits at once. Hither it was that Jesus was carried by the evil spirit who offered him all this power and glory, if he would fall down and worship him. There is no mountain in the natural world from which such an outlook were possible.

“This great height,” said my father, “represents the infernal sphere of self-aggrandizement, which aspires to universal dominion. It is that ambition which corrodes the heart with envious passion so long as anything remains unconquered. This spirit is common to nations and individuals, to the greatest and the least. This mountain rears its awful summit in every human breast. This is the spiritual mountain which is to be cast into the sea by faith.”

Looking down, I now beheld a city of Rome as before I had seen a city of Jerusalem. Beautiful, shadowy pictures of cities, homes of spirits, vastly magnified and made glorious with ethereal colors! Man cannot imagine the splendid creations which spirits can instantaneously produce from the plastic substance of the spiritual world. [pg 215]These cities and countries, however, are peculiar to the intermediate state. They do not exist in heaven.

The Romans risen from the dead had reconstructed their imperial city of precious stones, so that it always shone from afar as if some grand illumination were going on, whose splendors were again reflected from the clouds which floated above it.

We looked into this marvelous city, its capital and palaces, its temples and amphitheatres. The great avenues were crowded with a vast and gorgeous procession. Many kings and queens and nobles were walking in chains, brought as prisoners from so many conquered countries. The treasures of these plundered captives were borne by thousands of slaves of all colors and nationalities, in massive and curiously-carved vessels of gold and silver. Specimens of wild animals from all regions of the Roman world, drawn in gilded cages, and of the more wonderful plants and flowers carried upon the shoulders of men, and screened from the sun by flaming canopies of silk, added to the picturesqueness and grandeur of the scene.

The Roman senators, generals and magnates were seen heading the different divisions of this vast multitude, riding in blazing chariots drawn by superb horses richly caparisoned. On both sides of the captives marched the victorious armies of Rome; so that the very air above them was golden with the flash of helmets, spears and shields, and the gleam of Roman eagles.

These were the spirits of that vain-glorious and indomitable race who had changed the geography of the natural world, and were now celebrating their victories with transcendent magnificence in the intermediate state. The sphere [pg 216]of their interior character was wafted to my spiritual perceptions, and I felt as I did in the Hall of Apollo when Hortensius and his guests fixed their haughty and contemptuous gaze upon Anthony and myself.

“How unutterably base, cruel and sensual,” exclaimed my father, “is the spirit of man when he loves himself supremely, and overreaches and overrides his fellow-creatures. Behold the spiritual side to this magnificent exterior!”

Thereupon the light from a higher sphere streamed down, and the pomp, the glory, the beauty of the whole scene disappeared. We beheld a vast crowd of beggars in filthy rags, and a confused heap of low buildings made of mud and straw. The proud and fierce Romans were all slaves themselves, wearing long chains and driven by infernal spirits in the shape of grinning apes. Where the Capitol had stood, appeared a pool of blood-colored water, in which a dragon of hideous dimensions lay, spouting from his mouth a stream of fire. A lurid twilight hung over all, prognosticating a wild and tempestuous night.

“Such,” said my father, “will be the fate of ambition when the Lord comes in judgment. Let us now descend to a lower region, and see a people greater than these, but who have sunk into darker depths; a people now destitute of spiritual pride or civil ambition; a degenerate, effeminate, corrupt race, dead to all genuine and ennobling aspirations, and immersed like beasts in the life of the senses.”

We seemed to go down to the sea-coast—for the blue ocean girdles also the world of spirits. Soon we came [pg 217]into the sphere of the Grecian souls who had risen from the dead, and who had reconstructed about them, according to spiritual laws, their own charming and ethereal country. The scene was not far from Athens, whose marble-crowned Acropolis gleamed in the distance, with clouds more beautiful than itself floating above it.

The poetic faculty, full of the inspiration of Grecian art, can alone appreciate what I next witnessed. The Hall of Apollo in the palace of Hortensius was a beggarly chamber in comparison with this great hall of nature in which Pan presided, and in which earth, sky and ocean had each its part. The guests also of the luxurious Roman were mere schoolboys in comparison with the august assembly before us, which was gathered to a feast in the imaginary heaven of the Greeks.

We seemed to be standing on a hill that sloped and fell by beautiful green terraces down to the silver beach of a placid sea. The summit of that hill was long, broad and level, and crowned with a grove of extraordinary beauty. The trees were far apart, and rose like emerald columns to a great height before they branched. Their foliage was pruned and led by threads of invisible wire to intertwine overhead, forming a delicate arch for a roof. The ground was carpeted with an inwrought tissue of living flowers, which yielded elastically to the tread, sending up continually a delicious perfume.

In this immense grove were spread a thousand tables seemingly of solid precious stones, and crowned with great vases of wine and cups of crystal, and adorned with ethereal fruits and flowers. At these tables were seated or reclining thousands and thousands of the ancient heroes [pg 218]and heroines of Greece, served by thousands of beautiful nymphs, Dryads and Naiads, who had left the woods and the waters to bestow their charms on these happy souls.

The gods and goddesses were also in attendance; for heaven and earth were thrown together in such admirable confusion that each partook the qualities of the other. The sky and the air were literally full of divinities. On a rose-and-purple cloud condensed into a throne, and lowered half-way between the ceiling and the floor, sat Venus, crowned with myrtles and presiding at the feast. The Graces were kneeling at her feet, while her swans and doves were grouped about her. Near by stood Cupid twanging his bow, and laughing at the sight of his empty quiver; for every heart in the crowd had been pierced by one of his golden arrows.

Looking out to the sea, we saw Neptune, of colossal proportions, riding in his chariot constructed of shells, and drawn by horses with brazen hoofs and gilded manes. Myriads of sea-nymphs and sea-monsters sported and gamboled about him, sometimes in the air, sometimes on the shining surface of the deep.

In mid-sky Apollo in person drove the chariot of the sun, attended by the Muses and the flying Hours. In the west, Iris the messenger of Juno, planted her rainbow on a passing cloud, and smiled in colors to the world. Afar off, in the east, the Seasons had opened the massive Gates of Cloud, and we had a glimpse of the old Olympian gods in conclave august, feasting upon ambrosial food.

Thousands of these beautiful figures were nude; and I saw the spiritual models which had inspired and immor[pg 219]talized Grecian art. Thousands also were draped, and with such infinite variety and beauty, that it seemed no work of human ingenuity, but as if Nature herself had invested them with her forms and colors.

“Oh, my father!” said I excitedly, “surely this is real; this is heaven. These things will not vanish also, or change into something hideous and terrible.”

A shade of sadness came over my father’s face; for he saw that the subtile and powerful sphere of this Grecian nature-worship had awakened the activities of my own sensuous life.

“Yes, my son; these are phantasms. These are wicked Grecian spirits who are personating their gods and goddesses, their heroes and heroines. You see before you what wonders spirits can achieve by magic and fantasy. This is the sphere which flows into and governs the present population of Greece. These spirits would, if they could, obsess and control the human race. The interior state of these souls is terrible.”

“O, do not show it to me yet,” I exclaimed. “Let me contemplate a little longer this marvelous scene.”

“When all these spirits are judged,” continued my father, “and cast out of the world of spirits, the Greece and Rome of the natural world will become feeble and death-stricken. Their oracles will become silent; their arts will fail; their glory perish; their civilization decay. Their very languages will die. Their exact modes of thought will no more be possible to men. Ages of bondage and darkness will ensue, after the light they have perverted and the liberty they have profaned.”

I scarcely heard these last words; for the vast assem[pg 220]bly of gods and men, which had been in comparative repose, became suddenly animated by a wild excitement. There issued from the cool and leafy forests on all sides a crowd of beautiful nymphs headed by Diana, resplendent as a statue of pearl, clad in an apron of green leaves and flowers, and with a constellation of fire-flies in her hair.

Her merry troop of nymphs, arrayed like herself, were flying in affected fear from the jolly god Bacchus, who appeared in pursuit, crowned with vine leaves and berries and drawn by his Indian tigers striped with ebony and gold. He was followed by a rabble rout of Fauns and Satyrs and bacchanalian revelers, male and female. This beautiful chaos threw itself pell-mell, reeling and whirling and dancing, shouting and singing, into the midst of the brilliant assembly.

A scene of the wildest carnival followed. The heroes and heroines caught the contagious frenzy, and soon all were entangled in the embraces of the maddest dance that ever was witnessed. Neptune and his water-nymphs sprang high into the air to view the scene; and all the deities in Olympus crowded down to the Gates of Cloud, which they illumined afar off by the sun-like radiance of their presence.

I was gazing on this scene with the utmost astonishment, when my eyes fell suddenly upon Helena, the beautiful daughter of Calisthenes.

“My father,” said I, with profound emotion, “do you not see that superb figure of a woman more beautiful than all these goddesses, leaning against yonder tree and clapping her hands with delight at the drunken Bacchus [pg 221]making love to Venus? That is Helena of Athens! the dream of my life, the idol of my soul.”

“Not so,” said my father, “it is a phantasm—a spirit resembling your earthly Helena; perhaps some cunning Syren who has assumed her form to allure you to herself.”

“Oh no!” said I, “impossible!” feasting my eyes and heart on the lovely apparition.

“Every one,” continued my monitor, “fresh from the natural world, who enters this magical and fantastic sphere, sees, or thinks he sees, some wondrous woman, whom he declares to be the idol and dream of his soul. Beware, my son, of these seductive emotions. The light of heaven will dispel for us all these illusions.”

“Oh no!” said I, wildly, “it cannot; it must not. This, this, is heaven, and all else is illusion.”

My heart beat with passionate fervor, and I sprang forward to meet my beloved. My father suddenly disappeared from my sight! In the spiritual world, when two persons enter into totally different states of thought and feeling, they mutually vanish from each other’s sight. Heaven and hell are thus separated, and the existence of each is even unknown to the other. I noticed the fact that my father had vanished; but I cared nothing about it, for my infatuated soul thought only of Helena.

I advanced toward her. She turned upon me a look of beautiful recognition; and stretching out her ivory arms, exclaimed with a sun-burst of her old bewitching smiles:

“My boy-lover of Bethany! welcome! I thought I had killed you with love!”

XX.

FRIENDS IN HEAVEN.

Heaven is above the world of spirits, as the latter is above the earth. The way to heaven is through the world of spirits; but it is not reached by a process of death, but by a process of preparation. We are prepared for heaven by putting off the evils and falsities and imperfections that we carry with us from the natural world. We are then taught to feel, think and act in unison and love with thousands and millions of other beings. It takes a long time and a great deal of instruction in the world of spirits to bring some people to this degree of social development.

The harmony of souls in heaven is like that of an immense choir of music. Each has a distinct part, and each must be perfect in his part. Imagine thousands of good and pure spirits living in choirs of thought, choirs of feeling, choirs of acting; and you will begin to have a faint idea of the order, peace, beauty and felicity of the social life in heaven.

New-comers into the world of spirits are always anxious to be admitted into heaven. There is a process by which they can be elevated into heavenly societies, and shown the wonders and glories of the celestial life. This favor is extended to all, and their legitimate curiosity is gratified. [pg 237]They then return into the world of spirits for judgment and preparation, and to undergo those organic changes which are necessary to a permanent residence in the higher spheres.

I was delighted to hear my father say that I had been unconsciously prepared for this wonderful journey. Walking along with a glad heart, engaged in pleasant conversation about the difference between the world of spirits and heaven, I suddenly perceived a beautiful road ascending a mountain deeply shaded with overhanging trees and bordered with brilliant flowers.

“This is our way,” said my father. “The roads which lead out of the world of spirits, either up into heaven or down into hell, are invisible to all but those who have been prepared to follow them. There is no danger of any one going astray. No mistakes are made here; no revelations but to the proper parties. All the art and cunning of Simon Magus or his master demons could not enable them to discover this little road leading up into the heaven where our loved ones reside.”

How easy, how buoyant, how charming was that ascent! No fatigue, no hurry, no impatience, no terrestrial sensations. Our bodies seemed to grow lighter and stronger, and our minds clearer and happier as we ascended. The air grew fresher and sweeter; the trees and flowers more beautiful; the sky softer and more brilliant. As we neared the summit we saw the most exquisite green lawns and terraces, which seemed to have been dipped in a golden ether. Here and there was a flock of sheep. Now a swarm of pearl and crimson but[pg 238]terflies would sport around us; and then a flock of birds like little flying rainbows would illumine the air.

“These things,” said my father, “are typical of the thoughts and affections of the blessed people whose homes we are approaching.”

The vista from the summit exceeded in magnificence and beauty everything I had ever imagined. There were two interminable series of green knolls, one on the right hand and the other on the left, separated by a charming little valley with the softest, brightest verdure I had ever seen. On every knoll was a resplendent palace built of precious stones. The grand rainbow-like illumination produced by these mineral splendors flashing in the sun, is altogether indescribable. Away in the east where the palaces seemed to approach each other, the view was terminated by a great temple resembling the temple at Jerusalem, and shining like a gem in the distance.

The valley between these palaces was laid out in lawns, parks and gardens, adorned with flowers, statues, fountains, lakes, and picturesque walks and arbors. These things are common enough on earth; but here each of them exceeded the corresponding earthly form in all the elements of artistic beauty, as much as the most precious diamond in the world exceeds the commonest pebble on the sea-shore.

This was the heaven of a society of angels, all belonging to the tribe of Benjamin, and all interiorly united by similar thoughts and affections. Now for the first time I learned that all angels were once men upon our earth or some other; that the physical universe is the indestructible basis of the spiritual; and that all things [pg 239]first receive root and form and substance in the former, to rise and expand indefinitely, in the latter. The earth is the footstool of the Lord, and is established for ever.

I now noticed that I had on different garments from those I had worn in the world of spirits, and much more beautiful.

“These garments are given you,” said my father, “to adapt you to the sphere which you have entered. We are clothed here imperceptibly to ourselves, as the trees and flowers in the natural world are clothed with forms and colors by a generous nature. All our external things arise spontaneously around us, without our thought or care or labor, being perfect correspondences and mirrors of the things within us.”

“Here is the home of your brother,” said he; and we stood before a palace of marvelous splendor. Twelve steps of lustrous pearl led up to a grand piazza covered with a dazzling arch and supported by twelve columns of gold. We entered the spacious hall, and before I had time to observe its beauties, a youthful spirit advanced, strongly resembling my father; and with a face full of light and love, and a voice overflowing with kindness, welcomed me to that little spot, as he called it, of the Lord’s spiritual kingdom.

“You shall see me as I used to be,” he said “and then you will know me better.”

Thereupon he underwent the same series of spiritual changes by which my father revealed himself to me as the poor old leper of the wilderness. He returned into the states and forms of his boyhood, as a full-blown rose might shut, leaf after leaf, contracting itself slowly into [pg 240]a beautiful bud again. He was the same little Samuel who sported with my sisters and myself in our garden in Bethany, and whose withdrawal from us had left so dark a cloud on the sunny places of our childhood.

Reassuming his angelic form while I gazed at him with admiration and joy, he pointed to a chamber, the half-open door of which was one superb crystal. From it there issued a beautiful female form, clad in a silk robe of lustrous white. Her face was radiant with smiles and beauty, and a single rose was in her hair. The extreme gentleness and gracefulness of her movements, her manners, her tones, revealed the pure soul of this bright angel.

“Behold my wife!” said my brother.

Bewildered and delighted, I pressed timidly a brotherly kiss upon her cheek, and said:

“This is to me the greatest wonder of all in this realm of wonders. Married in heaven! Husbands and wives living together in wedded bliss! Enlighten my darkness; tell me something of this great and beautiful mystery.”

“I perceive,” said my brother, seriously, “by the glance of your eye and the tone of your voice, that you cannot yet be initiated into the sublime and heavenly secrets of the spiritual marriage. You have not been sufficiently divested of your earthly and sensuous state of thought to penetrate those truths which are only visible in the light of heaven. Be satisfied for the present to know that sex and marriage are universal and eternal; that love is inextinguishable, and becomes purer and holier the higher it rises; and that conjugal pairs live together in heaven in eternal youth and eternal bliss.”

XXII.

BACK TO EARTH.

I was borne to my bed-chamber by my friends; for I was not able to walk. The curious crowd followed us to the gate, but very few persons were admitted into the house. They judiciously forebore attempting to converse with me, and I fell immediately into a refreshing sleep.

When I awoke my sisters were ready with stimulants and nourishment. Looking up into their sweet, eager, happy faces, I found stimulus and nourishment of a higher kind.

“Back in the world again!” I exclaimed, as soon as I could breathe for the kisses they were showering upon me.

“Yes—raised from the dead!” said Martha; “Praise be to the Son of God!”

“Raised from the dead!” echoed Mary with deep solemnity, her voice faltering with emotion.

Trying to recall what had happened, I was struck with a curious impression which had been left on my mind. It was the impression that a very long time—months, years, many years, had elapsed since I died. I had passed through so many wonderful states, had seen so many astounding things, and been initiated into so many spiritual mysteries, that when I came to think of them [pg 262]from my earthly stand-point, it seemed impossible that so much experience could have been crowded into a few days.

“If this be really Lazarus,” said I aloud, “he ought to be a gray-headed old man, and his sisters wrinkled old women; for surely many years have passed since he fell sick in Bethany.”

The words disquieted my sisters, who were afraid of returning delirium. They enjoined upon me absolute silence on the plea of my great weakness. So I lay upon my couch, looking alternately out of the two windows of my room. One of them opened upon the inner courtyard with its little fountain of water, as beautiful to my eyes as if it had been a great column of crystal. From the other I saw the summit of the Mount of Olives, beyond which lay the Holy City, concealed as heaven is concealed from us by the intervening heights of our earthly passions.

Mary sat near me engaged on some fine needlework; Martha at a little table close by, poring over a beautiful golden-clasped parchment of the Psalms of David. They occasionally lifted their eyes with watchful interest to my face. It was a soothing pleasure to contemplate these lovely women. There was a soft, pure, heavenly atmosphere about them, which reminded me of the heaven I had left; and I understood the words of the Psalmist, that man was created only a little lower than the angels.

“Where is Jesus, our benefactor?” I inquired, breaking through their injunction to keep silence.

“Gone into Jerusalem,” was the reply.

“If our good father was here,” said I, “he would tell [pg 263]us what great change in the world of spirits was coming next; for every movement of Jesus on earth is significative of wonderful things going on in the sphere above us. But alas! from this earthly point of view, all is darkness!”

The startled expression of my sisters’ faces showed that they thought my mind was wandering. They only replied by putting their fingers warningly upon their lips.

So I shut my eyes and addressed myself to sleep again; but pictures from that museum of Art which memory builds for us all, came floating before me. Mary standing silent and downcast at the mouth of the deserted cave; the Son of the Desert, the zebra of my vision, wearing in his wild life the ring which Martha had given him; Ethopus parting with his treasure to rescue his brother; the haughty stare of the guests of Hortensius in the Hall of Apollo; Helena, the beautiful, leaning against the emerald tree and clapping her hands at the drunken Bacchus; Mary Magdalen toiling up the hill under the terrible load, and comforted by invisible spirits; the great snow-fields and ice-mountains of the spiritually dead, whom I felt but did not see; all these things and many more passed and repassed before my mind’s eye, until, lulled as if by the ceaseless patter of rain, I fell a second time into a deep slumber.

I was thoroughly restored when I awoke the next morning. I immediately repeated the Lord’s Prayer after my father’s example; and entered, upon the first page of the book of my new life, a firm resolution to prepare my soul by faith and obedience for an eternal [pg 264]home in the heaven I had visited, but for which I was yet unfit.

As my strength increased I gave audience to my friends—to very few at first; but recovering day by day, I soon had the house thrown open to all who wished to examine for themselves the facts in evidence of the great miracle.

The story had gone far and wide. The death, the burial, the four days in the grave, and the resurrection, were all susceptible of positive proof. There were scores of intelligent and truthful witnesses on every point. Crowds of people came to see the house, to inspect the grave, and to converse with me. I was examined and cross-examined by Scribes and Pharisees, by Jews and Greeks, by Romans and Egyptians, by infidels and disciples.

I soon discovered that, although everybody was intensely interested in the story of my sensations when dying and when coming to life again, very few appeared to be long entertained by my wonderful experiences in the world of spirits. They seemed instinctively to refer all my statements on that point to the class of dreams and visions.

At first I was astonished and even annoyed at this indifference and unbelief. But I soon learned that man at present is so immersed in the life of the senses, that faith in a spiritual world is more nominal than real; a faith so vague, shadowy and fanciful, that he will not accept as true any positive statements about the spiritual world.

Men yearn for the great veil to be lifted; to communi[pg 265]cate with departed friends; to see the patriarchs and prophets; to learn the mysteries of the heavenly kingdom. Oh that some one, say they, could return from the unseen world and tell us all about these things! With what solemnity would we listen to his words! with what joy! with what faith!

They are the victims of delusion. If their dearest friends were raised from the dead after a year’s burial, they would find themselves disappointed. They would regard them at first with wonder and awe. They would believe until they began speaking. But when they described the resurrection which happens to all as it did to me; when they taught the doctrine of a spiritual body; the reality and substantiality of the spiritual world; the civil, social and religious life of heaven; doubt after doubt would crowd upon their minds, until they would reject the whole story as a dream or a fabrication.

Christ himself declared that the appearance of one from the dead would convince no man. It is a strange declaration, but my own case is evidence of its truth.

The grounds upon which the incredulity of my visitors was based, were of the most contradictory and sometimes of the most irrational nature. One disbelieved because I had not seen Abraham, Isaac and Jacob; and because I declared that no earthly names exist in heaven, and that respect is there entertained, not for persons, but for character or quality. Another doubted my report because I said that David was not king of all the Jews in the spiritual world.

One man, a great patriot, was indignant because I affirmed that all the Romans did not go to hell. An[pg 266]other, equally zealous for Judea, was personally abusive because I declared that more people were saved from the pagan or gentile nations than from the Jewish Church. Another was shocked because I said the angels were not always engaged in singing and praising God. Another, an ideologist, scouted the idea that there was any form, shape or substance to the soul, or even in the spiritual world.

The most ignorant and conceited of the Scribes and Pharisees denounced me bitterly as teaching doctrines utterly at variance with Scripture and subversive of the interests of vital religion. On the other extreme, our worthy old Greek gardener laughed at my narrative as a tissue of hallucinations, because I had not been rowed over the river Styx by Charon the ferryman, but honestly declared that I had seen neither Charon nor the Stygian river.

The majority insisted that I had not been dead at all; that my condition was only a trance, which had often occurred before, and had been prolonged to even a greater period. To this the Pharisees added, that it was no doubt a trick of magic in which I was guilty of collusion, and which was designed to extend the fame and influence of Jesus of Nazareth.

Some believed in the fact of my resurrection; and the more enthusiastic went so far as to affirm that my body had been decomposed in the grave. These were actually angry with me when I declared that, although I was so far dead as to be living consciously in another world, yet my separation from nature was not organic and final, my natural body being preserved in a peculiar manner for a reunion with its spiritual form.

XXIII.

IMPRISONED.

Jesus at length came up from Ephraim and prepared for that triumphal entry into Jerusalem which aroused the animosity of the Sanhedrim to the highest pitch, and gave color to the charge which they brought against him, that he meditated a political conspiracy and sought the temporal authority and kingdom of Judea.

Many, indeed, of his ignorant followers expected him to seize the reins of civil government, and to maintain his position by miraculous power. Then they supposed he would raise Jerusalem and the Jewish people to the pinnacle of earthly glory. These boasted openly of their expectations; and the chief priests and rulers no doubt congratulated themselves, in their subsequent proceedings, that they were extinguishing a false religion and a civil war by the same energetic blow.

On the eve before this entry into Jerusalem my sisters gave a supper to Jesus and his disciples. It was a brilliant and beautiful scene, crowned, however, with a certain solemnity and sadness; for the great events about to transpire cast shadows before them which fell upon every heart. It was there that my sister Mary drew forth, from [pg 272]a golden box which had been given her by our good uncle Beltrezzor, a costly Persian ointment and anointed the feet of Jesus. Judas Iscariot reproved her conduct as extravagant; and Jesus responded that she was anointing him for his burial. This prediction of death on the eve of apparent triumph and glory, bewildered the minds and saddened the hearts of his hearers.

If I had known at that moment, upon what a frightful precipice I was standing, and what lifelong tribulation awaited me, I would have been the saddest of them all. But the skeleton stands invisible at our feasts, and the serpent coils undiscovered among the flowers.

Jesus, with his favorite disciples, Peter, James and John, lodged at our dwelling; but most of the guests returned to Jerusalem at a late hour. I accompanied them through the grove which crowned the Mount of Olives, and down the western slope, over the spot where Jesus was afterward betrayed, and from which also he ascended to heaven. I parted with my friends at the long arched bridge which crosses the valley and lands you near the gate of the temple called Beautiful.

As the last footsteps died away on the bridge, I turned to go back, when I was startled by the dark figure of a man advancing from behind a tree. The moon had just gone down and the wind sighed mournfully through the olive leaves. This man was Judas Iscariot.

“I have something,” he said in a low tone, “of the deepest importance to reveal to you. I know your attachment to our Master. I know your discretion and your courage. I have discovered a plot against the life of Jesus. Two hirelings in the pay of the Sanhedrim, [pg 273]conscience-stricken, or more probably afraid of the miraculous power of Jesus, have betrayed a part of the plan. They are now underneath one of the arches of that bridge, waiting for me. I wish you to accompany me into the valley, to question these men, to satisfy yourself of the nature and extent of the danger, and to aid me with your counsel and if necessary with your arm.”

I was deeply agitated at these words. I knew the animosity of the chief priests to Jesus, and I believed they would not hesitate to employ the knife of the assassin, if they could not arrest his career by a public process. I had no cause to doubt the report of Judas; but for some inexplicable reason I had a great aversion to the man.

He must have read doubt or suspicion in my manner; for he immediately exclaimed in a tone of surprise:

“Why do you hesitate? Is my word not sufficient? I have chosen you to share in this mission of honor and danger, because you are indebted to Jesus for your own life, and because he is at this moment a guest in your house. Had I communicated this to the brave Peter or the resolute James—”

“Enough!” said I, interrupting him and taking his arm; and we groped our way along the narrow path that wound down the steep hill into the valley. Reaching the level ground, Judas gave a low whistle and four men started up from behind the pillars of the bridge. One of them led a mule by the bridle. We approached them.

“Here is your man,” said Judas, suddenly stepping behind me and seizing me with great strength by the [pg 274]shoulders. The men rushed upon me, and notwithstanding my desperate struggle they bound me hand and foot in a few seconds.

“Vile traitor!” was the only exclamation that passed my lips before they were tightly closed by a strong leathern muzzle which was strapped securely over my head and behind my neck. I was then blindfolded and put upon the mule. We moved around to one of the city gates. The passwords were given, for the party were emissaries of the Sanhedrim. We traversed the streets a good distance, when we halted and I was conducted into a house. When released from my bonds I found myself in a large stone chamber with a small iron door and two lofty, iron-grated windows.

“In prison?” I exclaimed.

Judas, who stood in the doorway, rubbed his hands with insulting glee and said:

“Your uncle Magistus pays me handsomely for this.”

“If Jesus is ever murdered,” said I, with indignant scorn, “you will be the murderer.”

He sneered and went out. I saw him no more. Alas! I never saw the natural form of Jesus again. He who betrayed the disciple, was already bargaining for the thirty pieces of silver at which he estimated the life of his Lord.

The cause of my imprisonment was not doubtful. I had become obnoxious to the Sanhedrim from the mere fact of my resurrection. The attention it attracted, the prestige it conferred on Jesus, the increasing crowd that followed him, all annoyed and vexed them. I was a living proof of the power and glory of the new religion, a stand[pg 275]ing protest and menace against the old. It was necessary that I should be put out of the way.

I was shut out from the world; a pallet of straw for my bed; a rough table and a stool my only furniture. A fierce, silent guard brought me a daily supply of water and coarse food. I saw and heard nothing of the great sea of human life which was surging outside of my stone walls.

Several days and nights passed in this manner. What had become of my sisters? What had become of Jesus? If I had been made the first victim, surely these others would fall shortly beneath the malice and cruelty of such unscrupulous enemies. These thoughts, attended with gloomy forebodings, pressed with painful reiteration upon my mind. I could not eat. I could not sleep. I was all eye, all ear.

I was startled one night by a strange uproar in the street. I was so watchful, so quick of hearing, that I detected it a great way off. It gradually came nearer and nearer. It was a riot or street-fight or battle creeping in the direction of my prison. There were at last plainly heard shouts, groans, curses, the hurrying of feet, the clash of arms, and all the exciting accompaniments of a bloody contest between two enraged factions. From the triumphant cries and the great flare of torches which came in at my window, I perceived that one party had driven the other before it, and now occupied the ground in front of the building in which I was imprisoned.

I put the table against the wall and the stool on the table. Mounting thus to one of the windows, I could see partially what was going on in the street.

XXV.

WHAT HAD HAPPENED.

Pontius Pilate fulfilled his promise; and I told him my whole story from the time of my resurrection until my happy release by his good centurion. When I was speaking about the invisible friend, the flower let down in the basket, and the parchment with its rude letters, his face grew sad. When I finished by asking him to inform me how and from whom he learned my condition, so that I could discover, reward and love my deliverer as he deserved, he drew a deep sigh and said:

“I fear I have done a very hasty and cruel thing!

“The man who informed me of your condition was the African who accompanied you to Rome, and who endeavored to rescue the slave from the fish-pond of Hortensius.”

“My brave and good Anthony!” I exclaimed eagerly.

“He eluded my guards; and although wounded by one of them for his temerity, he rushed into my presence as I was finishing my morning meal. The words he spoke were substantially these:

“ ‘Lazarus, whom you brought from Rome, is confined in a dungeon underneath the house of Magistus, in Bethany. They have starved him nearly to death, and [pg 293]he has been without water for a day and a night. Send help to him speedily, or it will be too late.’ ”

“Noble, courageous Anthony!” I exclaimed. “He shall have half of my possessions!” but I was disquieted by the darkening brow of Pilate.

“I asked him,” continued the Roman governor, “if he had been in your employ since our return from Rome.

“ ‘No!’ he replied, ‘I have seen him but once, and that was in prison.’ ”

“He spoke the truth,” said I; “he always spoke the truth!”

“I thought he was a messenger sent by some friend of yours. I remembered him immediately, and I remembered also my promise to Hortensius. I saw in him only an audacious criminal, returning without leave from an exile which had been decreed perpetual.”

“And you threw him into prison?”

“If I had known of his beautiful and heroic devotion to you, his fate would have been different.”

The evident remorse of Pilate startled me.

“And his fate? What was his fate? He is not dead,” said I, elevating my voice.

“He was beheaded immediately.”

“O cruel, cruel, cruel fate!” I exclaimed; and regardless of ceremony, I mourned for my dead friend with bitter tears and bitter words in the presence of his august murderer.

“I feel,” said Pilate, when he bade me a friendly adieu—“I feel that I have discharged a severe duty in this matter; but the generous conduct of this African,[pg 294]—for he certainly must have known that he endangered his own life by appearing before me,—would have entitled him to a full pardon, which I would have given with pleasure for his own merits as well as for your sake.”

As soon as my Christian friends heard of my reappearance, they crowded to see me. From them I learned the sorrows and trials my sisters had undergone, as well as the strange events which preceded, accompanied and followed the crucifixion of Jesus.

Magistus and Caiaphas had set afloat the story that I was engaged in the raid upon the city of Jerusalem, made for the double purpose of robbery and murder, by Barabbas and his party; many of whom were deluded into the enterprise under the idea that it was a patriotic rebellion against the Roman yoke. They also suborned witnesses to prove that I was killed in the night attack, and was buried by them with a crowd of other rioters who fell by the Roman arms.

This led to the confiscation of our estates; and as Mary and Martha were helpless and beautiful young women without relatives to protect them, they were assigned to the special guardianship of Magistus. Caiaphas approved in strong terms this decree of the Sanhedrim, eulogized Magistus for his generous character and patriarchal virtues, and congratulated the sisters of a vile robber, themselves the disciples of a base impostor, on their extraordinary good fortune in being placed under the enviable protection of one of the shining lights of Israel.

The wickedness and duplicity of this high priest will be almost incredible to future times. But the age was [pg 295]evil; the church was corrupt; and public and private morality reduced to the lowest ebb. The priesthood was a matter of bargain and sale. The office of high priest, the holiest and highest in the Jewish theocracy, was obtained by bribery and fraud and in more than one instance by murder. Caiaphas was one of the most consummate hypocrites that ever entered the holy of holies. He might have changed places with Barabbas, and justice and religion would not have fared the worse for it.

My sisters, terrified at the thought of falling into the power of Magistus, their remembrance of whom was anything but pleasant, fled from our house and concealed themselves with some of the disciples of Jesus. The two chief miscreants of the Sanhedrim seemed determined to get possession of these unhappy and forlorn women; and they instituted the most rigorous search through the houses of all persons who were suspected of harboring them. Their evil passions seemed only half gratified by my destruction and the seizure of our property. Fearful would have been the fate of these angelic friends of Jesus, had they fallen at that time into the hands of his fiercest enemies.

Spies and detectives fully authorized to search, arrest, bribe, intimidate and even kill, were set upon their track in every direction. The country became so unsafe for them, that they were conveyed by stealthy night marches to the hut of some friendly fishermen away down on the sea of Galilee. Even there they were pursued; and Peter the apostle rowed them across the sea on a dark and stormy night, and concealed them in the very tombs [pg 296]whence issued the maniac out of whom Jesus cast a legion of devils.

After many sufferings and hair-breadth escapes, they were conveyed out of the country, and at that moment were living concealed in the city of Antioch, at the house of a poor but worthy man—himself a Christian, for Christ had cured him and nine others of the leprosy; and he alone of the ten had turned back to give thanks.

I wept when I thought of the unhappiness of my poor sisters; and I felt an urgent desire to regain my shattered strength and rejoin them.

The story of the crucifixion of the Lord struck me with wonder and awe. I was not surprised that Judas Iscariot had betrayed him. But the pathetic incidents of his last supper, his betrayal, his trial, his crucifixion, his resurrection, his appearance to his disciples, and his ascension, affected me to tears, and filled me with a spirit of humility, love and prayer.

“Those are pictures,” said I, to my friends, “which will be painted on the heart of the Christian Church in the colors of heaven, and which the powers of death and hell can never efface.

“If such,” thought I to myself—“if such is the effect of this divine history as it appears in the literal form to man, what must be the power and glory of the spiritual signification of these great and holy things, when they are studied by angels in the light of heaven!”

Barabbas and his bravest lieutenants, including the Son of the Desert, had fallen into the hands of the rulers. Barabbas conveyed to Magistus a threat, that if he were [pg 297]not released he would expose to the Sanhedrim his attempt to murder his nephew. Whether Magistus and Caiaphas, who acted always in concert, feared an exposure of this kind, which is not probable, considering the source whence the charge would come, or whether they followed spontaneously the wicked instincts of their own souls, they procured the release of Barabbas and the crucifixion of Christ.

The mercy extended to Barabbas was not given to his followers; and two of them were selected to be crucified with Jesus, to increase the ignominy of his execution. And so Christ was crucified between two thieves—or men so reputed.

One of these was the Son of the Desert.

This brave, wild man, strangely compounded of good and evil, was heavily ironed and cast into the deepest dungeon. Magistus had a habit, consistent with his cruel disposition, of visiting prisoners condemned to death, and enjoying the terrors with which they contemplated their approaching fate.

The Son of the Desert did not gratify his passion for witnessing the sufferings of abject misery. He was singularly cheerful and buoyant. He declared himself not only willing but anxious to die. He had nothing to contemplate with pleasure when he looked back; and as to the future, if the soul were really immortal and a second life were given him, he was determined to start upon it with new principles and motives.

Magistus was astonished at the calm, philosophic spirit of this poor wretch, who had never heard of philosophy.

XXVII.

HELENA AGAIN.

When my uncle came out to his morning meal, a strange transformation had taken place. He was buoyant and cheerful; his face was radiant with a pleasing vivacity. Indeed he was absolutely mirthful. Martha regarded him with profound astonishment, which gave way to fear that the dear old man had lost his reason, when he burst out into the following speech:

“Rejoice, my friends! rejoice, my children! I have got it fixed. I see our way clearly out of all our troubles. Get ready, as quickly but as quietly as you can, to leave this horrible place. Be silent as the grave. A ship will be ready for us on Sunday afternoon; and while these mad people are yelling in their vile amphitheatre, she will weigh anchor, slip her cable, and with Mary on board and angels smiling on the voyage, her prow will point steadily for the land of Gaul.”

During this speech he was rubbing his hands with glee; and at the conclusion of it he waved them over his head in an excited manner. His listeners showed by their silence and the tears in their eyes what they thought of this singular conduct.

“Come, come!” said the old man, resuming his usual [pg 321]gravity, “I am in earnest. God has revealed what I must do, in a dream. I know exactly where Mary is. She is well and will soon be happy. You must obey me. Ask me no questions. Trust in me implicitly. All will be right.”

Seeing Beltrezzor so thoroughly in earnest, the little group became hopeful and cheerful, and proceeded with alacrity to make preparations for the sudden and strange journey. Beltrezzor went out into the city, and was incessantly occupied in arranging and working for his remarkable enterprise. He barely came home to sleep at night, so much had he to do in so little time.

He continued as vivacious as ever. His spirits, his hope, his assurance, seemed to rise every hour. At last, the evening before the Sabbath, the little party with their baggage were quietly transferred after nightfall from the house of Salothel to a beautiful new ship anchored away up at the very end of the long pier which adorns the river front of Antioch.

When they were all safe on board the vessel, Beltrezzor took Martha into the cabin, and opening a closet, he showed her several boxes of rosewood bound with brass bands.

“This,” he said, “is full of golden coins of various sizes and value. This contains jewels of incalculable splendor wrought by the greatest artificers in the East. This conceals precious stones of great beauty and high price. And this last contains some genuine diamonds, brought from the remotest India, and which would excite the envy of kings and queens.

“Here are the keys to them all. Take them.”

XXIX.

CHRISTIAN CANDLES.

Of all these things I was ignorant. I was bound and in prison, helpless, unfriended, unable to communicate with my friends. I bitterly repented having disobeyed my uncle’s orders. I cursed Demetrius and Simon Magus and Helena and Magistus. I cursed myself. Mary perhaps was devoured by the lion! Or if saved, she and Martha and Beltrezzor were out on the blue sea, and I left to perish in my folly.

A day or two afterward I observed that our prison ward had received a considerable accession of captives. I was then told by the keeper that a female heretic condemned to the lion had escaped, and that Lelius had ordered the arrest of all the Christians in the city, hoping to ferret out the parties who had assisted her. How my heart leaped for joy! My sister was saved!

My own captivity became a little more endurable. I delighted to think of my friends sailing away over the white-crested waves for the happy land of Gaul. I seemed to feel the fresh sea wind in my own hair and to hear the cool water dashing against the sides of their vessel. Alas! my own fate, how different!

I expected every hour to see the ugly and cunning face of Magistus peering in at my door. Several days and [pg 345]nights passed, and he did not come. I knew he had not forgotten me. I knew he was only preparing himself for some extraordinary villainy and cruelty against me. I was right.

Late one evening my door suddenly opened, and Magistus entered the dungeon, followed by Ethopus. The latter bore an immense roll of some kind of cloth under his arm.

Magistus stood contemplating me for several minutes with folded arms and the old diabolical sneer on his face. Ethopus stepped behind him with downcast eyes.

“Now,” he said, slowly, “for the greatest, sweetest revenge which any man in this world has ever enjoyed.

“You have been the bane, the curse, the evil genius of my life. I have always hated you; I know not why, but that it so pleased me. If you had perished in the desert as I designed, all would have been well. Simon would have procured the body of Mary, and we should have been gods in power and glory and pleasure. If you had not escaped my dungeon in Bethany, I would not be at this moment an exile and an outcast. You have eluded me twice. You are cunning. You have eluded the grave itself; but now, my amiable nephew, your time has really come.

“I respect my family too much, I respect your own distinguished merits too much, to doom you to any common ignoble death. Your friend Helena and I have put our brains together to devise something for your especial honor. We have achieved it. It is striking, original, charming. Listen.

XXX.

THE GREAT COMBAT.

Behold me then at the age of twenty-five, innocent of crime, sentenced to the life and labors of a convict! My associates were the lowest ruffians imaginable. My fare was coarse and sometimes revolting. I was locked up alone at night in a dark cell. I slept on a pallet of straw. From sunrise to sunset I was compelled to labor on the public works, chained by the leg to another creature as miserable as myself.

Young as I was, I had already met with strange adventures and made hairbreadth escapes. I was long buoyant and hopeful, and was constantly expecting some lucky turn of the wheel of fortune. There was, indeed, very little rational ground of hope. My uncle Beltrezzor was dead. My sisters had escaped to the other end of the world, and were not likely to return. Not one of the few Christians of the city knew anything about my being there, for I had seen no one but Beltrezzor. Demetrius alone knew my whereabouts, and by command of Simon he had entered a false name for me on the books of the prison. So I was lost and buried from the social world in which I had moved.

I did not believe that my imprisonment would be of long duration. Young, educated, wealthy, I thought I [pg 356]was needed by the infant Church. The subject of the greatest miracle of Christ, my very presence was an argument in favor of Christianity. Then my experiences in the spiritual world had given me knowledge superior to that of all the disciples; knowledge necessary to the organization of the faith upon truly rational principles. To suspect even that one so valuable to the holy cause could be imprisoned for life, without a future, without a mission, was to doubt the wisdom of Providence and the verity of my death and resurrection.

It was thus that the secret pride of my selfhood buoyed me up in the direst adversity, and that my own self-righteousness became the fountain of hope!

Notwithstanding all this, I remained a captive at hard labor for forty years of my manhood! As long as the children of Israel were in the wilderness, so long was I in the convict prison of Antioch! Terrible thought!

When I emerged from my prison-grave into the world and the Church again, I was old and feeble and bronzed and broken, forgotten by all men, a cipher in the sphere of thought and life in which I had expected to occupy so commanding a position.

The wicked and detestable emperors, those monsters of nature, Tiberius, Caligula, Claudius and Nero, had successively governed and cursed the Roman state. The Christian religion had spread into all countries; into Syria and Parthia and Arabia, into Egypt and Abyssinia, into Spain and Gaul and Britain, by the zealous labors and fiery devotion of Paul and Peter and Barnabas and Philip and James and hundreds of lesser lights of the new faith.

XXXII.

WHAT REMAINS?

I purchased some new clothes, and wandered all day about the streets of Antioch, astonished at my liberty. I dined at an eating-house where several languages were spoken by the different guests, and where every one stared at the long-bearded, long-haired old man, with the new robes and the rough, brown hands. Toward dark I began to feel very lonely and miserable, and at last returned to the prison like a dog to his kennel, and begged the favor of a night’s lodging in my old cell.

Free! Free like a plant whose roots are dead, and which, with no attachment to the earth, trembles at the mercy of the wind!

I met next day with some of the Christians of Antioch. They seemed glad that I had been released and spoke kindly to me, but remembered the visit of Paul and his belief that I was insane. If my opinions had been orthodox, what a cordial reception they would have given to the man whom Christ raised from the dead! As I had learned the divine philosophy of silence, I said nothing to them on spiritual subjects.

I was sixty-five years old and everything was new and strange. The pages of history during my long incarcera[pg 379]tion had been written in blood and tears. Vespasian occupied the throne of the Roman empire, assisted by his son Titus, who had besieged and taken Jerusalem. The holy temple was reduced to ashes and the city of David was a pile of ruins. The judgment in the world of spirits had descended upon the earth.

I was shocked by the horrible details of the persecution which the Christian world had suffered from the detestable Nero; and of the crucifixion of Peter, the murder of Paul and the martyrdom of many prominent disciples. What Lelius had begun at the private instigation of a sorcerer on the little stage of Antioch, too insignificant for historical notice, had been repeated by the butcher of Rome on the theatre of the world.

During this terrible persecution my sisters had been driven from Marseilles. Flying for their lives, they reached the bleak and distant shores of Britain. There they planted the gospel banner and preached Christ to the pagan natives. There they were still living at the last accounts, lights in the darkness, warmth in the coldness around them.

Mary Magdalen had refused to fly from the Roman tyrants. Roused to a wild pitch of religious enthusiasm by the atrocities perpetrated upon her fellow-Christians, she rushed defiantly into the presence of the heathen officers and demanded the pleasure and the glory of dying for the name of Christ. Seeking martyrdom, she escaped it. Astounded at this eloquent and brave woman with disheveled hair and face flashing a wild spiritual light, the persecutors pronounced her mad, and refused to put her to death.