After a moment’s silent meditation, Phrasilas coughed slightly, put his right hand into his left, raised his head, lifted his eyebrows, and drew near the crucified one, whose body shook with a continuous, horrible trembling.
“Although I am,” he said to her, “in divers circumstances, opposed to absolute theories so-called, yet I cannot blind myself to the fact that, in the conjuncture which has overtaken you, you would gain by being familiarised in more solid fashion with the maxims of the Stoics. Zeno, who does not seem to have had a spirit completely exempt from error, has left us several sophistries of no great general import, but, at the same time, you might derive profit from them to the particular end of calming your last moments.
“Pain”, he said, “is a word void of meaning, since our will transcends the imperfections of our perishable body. It is true that Zeno died at the age of ninety-eight, without ever having had, according to his biographers, any illness, however slight; but this circumstance cannot be used as an argument against him, for from the mere fact that he succeeded in maintaining an unimpaired good health, we cannot logically conclude that he would have been lacking in force of character had he fallen ill. Besides, it would be an abuse to compel the philosophers to practise in their persons the rules of conduct they profess, and to cultivate without respite the virtues they deem superior. In a word, not to prolong inordinately a discourse which might last longer than yourself, endeavour to lift up your soul, my dear, as far as possible, above your physical sufferings. However melancholy, however cruel they may appear to you, I beg you to believe that I have a real part in them. They are drawing to a close: be patient, forget. Between the various doctrines which attribute immortality to us, this is the moment for choosing the one most fitted to alleviate your regrets at having to disappear. If these doctrines are true, you will have lightened the bitter agony of the passage. If they lie, what does it matter? You will never know that you were mistaken.”
Having spoken thus, Phrasilas re-adjusted the folds of his garment over his shoulder and vanished with an unsteady gait.
Timon remained alone in the room with the woman hanging in the throes of death upon the cross.
The memory of a night passed on the poor wretch’s breast haunted his brain, and confounded itself with the atrocious vision of the imminent rottenness into which this splendid body that had burned in his arms was about to fall.
He pressed his hand over his eyes in order not to see her torture, but he heard the unceasing trembling of the body upon the cross.
Finally, he looked. Great threads of blood formed a network on the skin from the pins in the breast down to the curled-up heels. The head turned perpetually. All the hair, matted with blood, sweat, and perfume, hung over the left side.
“Aphrodisia! do you hear me! do you recognise me? It is I, Timon; Timon.”