Then Scaurus passed to the structure of the work which, he said, under appearance of great simplicity, and of an iteration that might sometimes seem almost garrulous or senile, conformed to certain Jewish rules of twofold and threefold attestation. He shewed how the book—describing a new creation of the world—begins and ends with six days. He also shewed how the author takes pleasure in refrains of words, and cycles or repetitions of events. For example, he describes Christ as being baptized at the beginning in one Bethany and anointed at the end in another Bethany. “I could give you,” he said, “other instances of this sort of thing. The book is a poem, not a history.”
About this I was not yet able to judge; but I felt that by “poem” he did not mean “mere fiction.” For he had already admitted that the book contained historical as well as spiritual truth. And knowing his deep love of goodness, I was not altogether surprised at what came next: “O my dear Quintus, while reading this extraordinary book I have been more than once tempted to say, ‘Along with a great deal that I do not want, this man almost gives me what I do want—what I have been long desiring.’ I have told you how, years ago, I craved for a city of truth and justice. Well, I knew the Jews were a narrow, bigoted, and uncharitable race. No Jewish philosopher or prophet was likely to be my guide to such a city. But Isaiah was an exception. And somehow I fancied that this Jesus might be a developed Isaiah, and that his new city would have over its gates, ‘Entrance free. Not even Roman patricians excluded.’ But what did I find in some of the earliest gospels? In effect, this, ‘None but the lost sheep of the House of Israel admitted here!’
“Now comes this latest of all the evangelists and says, ‘We have changed all that. The old inscription is taken down. See the new inscription, ROOM FOR ALL! We welcome the universe. Read me, and see what I say about other sheep, and about one flock, one shepherd.’ To all which I reply, ‘Alas, my unknown but well-intentioned friend, I see, too clearly, that your friendliness exceeds your judgment. You honestly think that your gospel is so good that it must be true. You are not, I feel sure, decoying me—not consciously at least. You are the decoy bird. You have been decoyed yourself to decoy others. But Scaurus is too old a bird to be caught in such a manifest net. Whence this new doctrine? Why was it not in the earliest gospels?’ I think John would find it hard to answer that question! If I had come to Jesus the Nazarene and said to him, ‘What shall I do to inherit eternal life?’ I doubt not that he would have replied to me, ‘Marcus Æmilius Scaurus, you doubtless think yourself a great person, as much superior to the low born Pontius Pilate as Pilate thinks himself superior to me. Understand, then, that I have no message for you. You know what name I gave to the Syrophœnician woman. I give the same to you’.”
This passage was written in very large irregular characters, especially towards the close, quite unlike my old friend’s usual hand. Then followed these words, in his own neat regular writing—as though he had been interrupted and resumed his pen in a cooler mood—“Let me try to be honest. I may have said rather more than I meant. I meant this fifteen years ago. Perhaps I mean it still. But after reading this new gospel, I feel somewhat less certain. Still, I fear that the truth may be as I have said.”
CHAPTER XXXIV
THE LAST WORDS OF SCAURUS
Had I read to the end of Scaurus’s letter I should not have been so startled by this sudden outburst. As it was, I had but a faint perception of the cause. I did not give weight enough to the indications—slight to others but they ought to have been clear to me—that the old man was writing under a great mental strain. Striving to be fair to the evangelists, he desired also to do justice to himself, half repenting that he had rejected the Saviour, half vindicating the rejection on the ground that truth constrained it. The whole tone of his letter—the handwriting itself, if I had only noted it more closely—should have made me perceive that he was passing rapidly through many transient phases, and that this outburst of passionate indignation—not with Christ but with what he supposed to be Mark’s Christ—was but one of them. I did not notice these things. I was too much wrapped up in my own thoughts, and in imaginations of what I could have said, and how I could have pleaded with him for Christ.
It was now late, and I could read no more. I retired to rest—but not at first to peaceful rest. Thoughts and dreams, fancies and phantoms, passed indistinguishably before me: Scaurus and Clemens opposing one another, Hermas mediating, while Epictetus looked on; Troy, Rome, Jerusalem, and the City of Truth and Justice coming down from heaven; sunset and sunrise ushered by Hesper and Phosphor—with snatches of familiar utterances about “perceiving,” “believing,” and “deceiving,” and mocking repetitions of “logos,” “logos”—a confused, shifting, and multitudinous medley that resolved itself at last into one vast and dizzying whirlpool, in which all existence seemed endlessly revolving round a central abyss, when suddenly I heard “In the beginning was the Logos.” Then the whirlpool was drawn up to the sky as though it had been a painted curtain; and we were standing below, Scaurus and I, and Clemens, and Epictetus, and Hermas—all of us gazing upwards to an unspeakable glory ascending and descending between heaven and earth. Then I fell into a peaceful sleep.
Next morning I continued reading the letter. “About the marvels or miracles in this gospel,” said Scaurus, “it is worth noting that the author mentions only seven, that is to say, seven before the resurrection. This, I believe, is the number assigned to Elijah, whereas Elisha has fourteen—having ‘a double portion’ of Elijah’s spirit. This selection of seven is one among many indications that the work uses Jewish symbolism. I have shewn above that the Jewish genealogies are sometimes adapted in that way, as with Matthew’s ‘fourteen generations.’ A more important fact is that this writer calls the miracles ‘signs’—not ‘mighty works,’ which is the term in the three gospels. This is very interesting and I like him for it. He hates the words ‘strong,’ and ‘mighty,’ and ‘mighty work.’ For the matter of that, so does Epictetus. Both would agree that it is only slaves that obey ‘the stronger.’