Early next morning Quintus made his way to the Flamen’s house. The great sitting of the Senate, which was to determine the fate of the edict against the Nazarenes, had been fixed for this forenoon; until he should join it, Titus Claudius was spending the morning with his family. The weather was unusually mild for the late season, and Octavia had ordered that breakfast should be served in the peristyle, and here, comfortably extended on his couch, the high-priest was enjoying his favorite dish, fresh eggs with garum.[20] The ladies, attended only by Baucis and a little girl, were sitting in easy-chairs, sipping milk cooled with ice[21] out of pale, gleaming Murrhine cups. Perfect silence reigned in the cavaedium; not even a slave stole across the marble flags, and the very tree-tops, golden in the morning sunshine, were motionless in the mild autumn air.
As Quintus came in from the arcade, and saw this party of those who were near and dear to him, his heart sank within him. A longing, which even in his sleep had haunted his dreams, and had driven him from his bed before daybreak, came over him now with almost irresistible force; his impulse was to throw himself at his father’s feet, and kiss the hands that had so often rested lovingly on his head and brow. But he controlled himself. He went up to the high-priest, and gave him an affectionate kiss as usual, pressed his hand warmly, and then greeted the rest of the party gaily enough.
The previous day Quintus had come to a conclusion, which must open an impassable gulf between himself and his father. At the very time, when Titus Claudius was putting the finishing strokes to the great plan of attack against the Nazarenes, Quintus had made up his mind, that nothing less than the doctrine of that contemned sect could quench the thirst of his yearning soul. This consciousness had started into being suddenly, like a plant which springs up in a night; but the soil whence it made its way towards the light was—as we already know—ready long since, up-turned, as it were, by the ploughshare of doubt and dissatisfaction. The germ of his new views of life had long been slumbering as a dim craving, a longing, deep but aimless, for some saving certainty; it had needed no more than a fertilizing shower to develop it. Quintus was not disposed to bring a critical philosophy to bear on each of the various mysteries of the new faith, which, indeed, were as yet only known to him in part; but he grasped the kernel of the matter, and the more he investigated it, the deeper his conviction grew. The grand principle of the brotherly equality of all men, impressed him as strongly as the simple and yet consoling metaphysics of Christianity. To a naturally-creative imagination like his, the doctrine of an universal spirit embracing all time and space in sempiternal love was intrinsically clear and intelligible. He found in it the happy half-way term between the bewildering superstitions of popular belief and the cold abstractions of systematic philosophy. Added to this, was the ineffaceable impression made on his feelings by the high-souled nature of the wounded slave. The figure of Eurymachus shed a heavenly light on the source, whence he could have derived his invincible strength and lofty contempt of suffering and death.
Late the evening before, Quintus had sought out old Thrax, and had told him that Eurymachus at last was safe. Then they had all sat together for a long time—Quintus, Thrax, Glauce, Euterpe, and Diphilus—and the old man had not wearied of talking of the carpenter’s Son, of his wanderings through the land of Palestine, and the agonizing death he had suffered on the cross to redeem mankind. The impressive story of that life and passion, which has touched and stirred so many million hearts since, had an extraordinary effect on Quintus. And, in fact, Thrax told his story well; the glow of conviction seemed to sparkle from his eyes. His was not the calm inspiration of Eurymachus—it was the language of a vehement and excited nature, of a soul full of suppressed energy and enthusiasm; not John, who leaned on the bosom of Jesus, but Peter drawing his sword in passionate zeal.
As Barbatus ceased speaking, Quintus started up, threw his arms round him, and exclaimed through his tears: “Receive me among you.... I too, am one of you!”
So it was agreed that Quintus Claudius, the son of the Flamen, Titus Claudius Mucianus, should, next day, be baptized in a quarry not far from the river Almo.
It was the thought of this privilege, and of the contradictory aspects of his position, which all through the night had pursued him in a thousand different forms, and now, in his father’s hall, filled him with unutterable confusion. He felt that he must for a moment forget the abyss that lay between them, and once more hear his father’s voice in loving tones, before their parting was an accomplished fact—forever.
The sense of an imperative duty was added to this sentiment. He felt that, hoping against hope, he must, even at the eleventh hour, try to weaken his father’s position.—The final details of the edict, he knew, were virtually in the Flamen’s hands. The Senate had long been accustomed to vote for whatever the Emperor wished, without any alterations, and Titus Claudius spoke in Caesar’s name. Domitian, amply satisfied of his representative’s inexorable temper, had not even taken the trouble to look through the sketch of the edict; the whole tenor of the law, in fact, lay in the high-priest’s hands.
How gladly would Quintus have poured out his heart to his father, and have told him without reserve all that he held to be true, fair, and good! How willingly would he have gone up to him, and have said: “Caesar’s government is groping in darkness; these Christians, whom you are condemning to destruction, are not criminals, but noble, virtuous, high-souled men—as noble, and virtuous, and high-souled as you yourself, father, who persecute them with such vindictive fury.”
But such boldness, alas! was out of the question; Quintus knew his father too well. He knew, that the rigid convictions of a mind like his were impervious to all that was new or strange, that even the logic of facts could only reach him by a long and circuitous route. His convictions had been the slow growth of years of unresting activity, and now they were immovable—a part of his very self. Thus Quintus had not the smallest doubt, that Titus Claudius, like a second Brutus, would not spare his own son, if duty and paternal feeling should come into conflict. So it was not his own peril only, which dictated moderation and silence, but regard for his father’s situation; and he never had felt a more tender reverence for him, than in this terrible hour. He could not speak as an adherent, nor even as a defender of the persecuted creed; only as a looker-on from the point of view of abstract justice. In speech and in silence alike he must betray no impatience, and seem only to have acquired his more exact knowledge of the Christian creed by accident. He could do no more than represent the Nazarenes as harmless folks, who neither deserved persecution nor were worth the trouble.