“Why, you see, as I have grown older, I have grown wiser! and I have come to the conclusion that Mr. Jupiter and Mrs. Juno are no more gods than you or I; so I summarily got rid of them.”
“Yes, that may be very well; and I, though neither old nor wise, have been long of the same opinion. But why not retain them as mere works of art?”
“Because they had been set up here, not in that capacity, but as divinities. They were here as impostors, under false pretences; and as you would turn out of your house, for an intruder, any bust or image found among those of your ancestors, but belonging to quite another family, so did I these pretenders to a higher connection with me, when I found it false. Neither could I run a risk of their being bought for the continuance of the same imposture.”
“And pray, my most righteous old friend, is it not an imposture to continue calling your villa Ad Statuas, after not a single statue is left standing in it?”
“Certainly,” replied Chromatius, amused at her sharpness, “and you will see that I have planted palm-trees all about; and, as soon as they show their heads above the evergreens, the villa will take the title of Ad Palmas[65] instead.”
“That will be a pretty name,” said Fabiola, who little thought of the higher sense of appropriateness which it would contain. She, of course, was not aware that the villa was now a training-school, in which many were being prepared, as wrestlers or gladiators used to be, in separate institutions, for the great combat of faith, martyrdom to death. They who had entered in, and they who would go out, might equally say they were on their way to pluck the conqueror’s palm, to be borne by them before God’s judgment-seat, in token of their victory over the world. Many were the palm-branches shortly to be gathered in that early Christian retreat.
But we must here give the history of the demolition of Chromatius’s statues, which forms a peculiar episode in the “Acts of St. Sebastian.”
When Nicostratus informed him, as prefect of Rome, of the release of his prisoners, and of the recovery of Tranquillinus from gout by baptism, Chromatius, after making every inquiry into the truth of the fact, sent for Sebastian, and proposed to become a Christian, as a means of obtaining a cure of the same complaint. This of course could not be; and another course was proposed, which would give him new and personal evidence of Christianity, without risking an insincere baptism. Chromatius was celebrated for the immense number of idolatrous images which he possessed; and was assured by Sebastian that, if he would have them all broken in pieces, he would at once recover. This was a hard condition, but he consented. His son Tiburtius, however, was furious, and protested that if the promised result did not follow, he would have Sebastian and Polycarp thrown into a blazing furnace: not perhaps so difficult a matter for the prefect’s son.
In one day two hundred pagan statues were broken in pieces, including, of course, those in the villa, as well as those in the house at Rome. The images indeed were broken; but Chromatius was not cured. Sebastian was sent for and sharply rebuked. But he was calm and inflexible. “I am sure,” he said, “that all have not been destroyed. Something has been withheld from demolition.” He proved right. Some small objects had been treated as works of art rather than religious things, and, like Achan’s coveted spoil,[66] concealed. They were brought forth and broken up; and Chromatius instantly recovered. Not only was he converted, but his son Tiburtius became also one of the most fervent of Christians; and, dying in glorious martyrdom, gave his name to a catacomb. He had begged to stay in Rome, to encourage and assist his fellow-believers, in the coming persecution, which his connection with the palace, his great courage and activity, would enable him to do. He had become, naturally, the great friend and frequent companion of Sebastian and Pancratius.
After this little digression, we resume the conversation between Chromatius and Fabiola, who continued her last sentence by adding: