'Little alike? But it is the same face—fifteen years older, that is all! However, it may be you are right. They may be two Christs, but as like each other as a man and his own phantom.'
'As a man and his own phantom!' echoed Giovanni, shuddering and stopping. 'What say you, Cesare? A man and his own phantom?'
'Well, what is so alarming in those words? Don't you agree with me?'
They walked on.
'Cesare!' cried Boltraffio suddenly and impulsively, 'do you not see what I mean? How could He, the Omnipotent, the Omniscient, whom Leonardo has painted in the Cenacolo, how could He have been tortured on the Mount of Olives, not a stone's throw away, till He sweated blood and prayed a human prayer for a miracle? "Let not that take place, to accomplish which I came into the world, that which I know cannot fail to be! Father, let this cup pass from me!" Cesare, everything is contained in that prayer! Without it there is no Christ, and I would not relinquish it for all the wisdom of Solomon! The Christ who prayed not that prayer was never a man; He did not suffer and die like us!'
'I see your meaning,' replied Cesare slowly; 'certainly the Christ of the Cenacolo never prayed that prayer.'
The darkness was falling around them, and Giovanni could not accurately see the face of his companion, which, however, seemed strangely illuminated. Suddenly Cesare stopped, raised his hand, and spoke in a low solemn voice.
'You wish to know whom he has painted, if 'tis not the weaker Christ who prayed for a hopeless miracle in the garden of Gethsemane? Well, I will tell you. Remember that beautiful invocation of Leonardo's when he spoke of the laws of the mechanical sciences, "O divine justice of Thee, Thou Prime Mover!" His Christ is the Prime Mover, who, principle and centre of every movement, is Himself moveless. His Christ is the eternal necessity, which is divine justice, which is the Father's will. "O righteous Father, the world hath not known Thee, but I have known Thee and I have declared unto these Thy name, that the love wherewith Thou hast loved Me may be in them, and I in them." Do you see? Love born of knowledge. 'Grande amore è figlio di grande sapienza.' Great love is the child of great knowledge. And Leonardo, who alone of men has understood this saying of the Lord's, has incarnated it in his Christ, who loves all because he knows all.'
Cesare ceased, and for long they walked silently in the profound calm of the winter twilight. At last Boltraffio said:—
'Do you remember, Cesare, how four years ago, you and I, walking along this path together, were discussing the Cenacolo? Then you mocked at the Master, and said he would never finish the face of the Christ, and I contradicted you. Now it is you who defend him against me. Of a surety I should never have believed that you—you! would one day speak of him as now you have spoken!'