“What I have written I have written,” said Pilate.
They had brought the sentence with them and pointed out to him that he had condemned “il Re dei Giudei” the King of the Jews and, inasmuch as condemning a king is a serious step and might get him into trouble,
suggested that for his own safety he should add the letter “o” to the word “Re.” This would make it that he had condemned “Il Reo dei Giudei,” the Criminal of the Jews. Pilate was persuaded and agreed to add the letter. He went away and fetched his pen, which looked like a feather from the tail of a hawk, and Annas held the paper; but Pilate’s pen refused to write, it was wafted from his hand by a power stronger than his, it hung in the air before their eyes and fluttered away to heaven.
This miracle was accompanied by music; and, if I had been consulted, I should not have advised the Marcia Reale Italiana, because that composition, on account of its inherent frivolity, has always seemed to me unfit for the accompaniment of any manifestation of power. To despise Bellini because he is not Schubert would be to adopt the attitude of the buffo’s critic who escaped from Paris in the teatrino at Palermo; nevertheless the countrymen of Schubert have known how to appear before the world clothed in the solemn splendour of Haydn’s majestic Hymn to the Emperor, while the Italians come mountebanking along in an ill-fitting, machine-made suit of second-hand flourishes, as though that were the best they could lay their hands on. They have not done themselves justice. But this is not the place for a digression; before returning to Pilate and his visitors, however, let me say distinctly that the music was the Italian Marcia Reale played, not as the other scraps were played, but with a loud and jaunty heartlessness as though the miraculous pen were jeering at the priests:
“There! you didn’t expect that; now, did you?”
Joseph and Nicodemus also came to Pilate begging the body of Jesus. The priests objected, for they had not forgotten the prophecy about building the Temple of God in three days, and they feared trickery. Pilate compromised, granting the request but setting a guard.
Next we saw the Descent from the Cross, effected by Joseph and Nicodemus; and while the body lay on a
couch, a melancholy Miserere was sung behind. The Entombment followed, the Madonna in black lamenting and weeping.
The last scene was in a wood, where Judas came to finish his remorse. He refused all comfort and all the benevolent suggestions of the angels who visited him. They told him that God is ever willing to pardon the sinner who sincerely repents and freely confesses his sin. It is with God always as it is with men at the season of the Gloria. But the wretched Judas could not think of repentance and confession; his cowardly soul was not torn by sorrow for past sin, it was paralysed by fear of future punishment; or we may have been intended to understand that the road to perdition lies through madness. He spoke three sentences, and the last word of each was echoed by a diabolical voice and then appeared written in letters of blood and fire:—Giuda:—Dio:—Stesso. These words made a sentence by themselves and signified: “Judas is against God and against Himself.” Faith, Hope, and Charity appeared to him separately; he would have nothing to do with any of them and they all deserted him. A devil approached and Judas trembled, knowing his time had come. He went and fetched a rope, and with the devil’s help accomplished his fatal destiny by hanging himself to one of the trees of the wood, and as his wicked soul came out of his mouth the devil greedily snatched it away and carried it down to be eternally tormented in hell. It was like an untidy black hen.