“I hesitate not to avow,” said he, “that I feel a deep solicitude in behalf of my friend Mobilius. Would that I had the power to expound to him the unsatisfactory reliance of his faith, the feebleness of its supports, and the terms of its delusions. As the shivering reed trembles on the first assault of the rude wind, so does this perishable belief upon the first advance of swift-footed adversity; forsaking you when you most require the aid of ready guidance and bright-eyed consolation.
“Brought from Egypt by the crafty priest, that land of science, but of superstition, he planted it in a soil where he was certain it would thrive, and to make success more sure he mingled with it the gaudy ceremonies of Chaldea. Strange that so noxious a plant should flourish as well as in its native soil, and so near the walls of Bethlehem.
“They burn an offering of perpetual fires to the king of day—what a sorry imitation of his light when but a struggling ray shall quench it! They behold his blinding brightness, they feel his piercing heats, they see nature bloom beneath his smiles, and they forget he sprang from something. They look not beyond. Will the sun rescue us from affliction, and heal us in the hour of sickness? How,” he exclaimed, warming as he spoke, and felt the influence of rapt attention—“How shall glittering rites propitiate that which can neither feel nor see, which was created to rule the day, divide the light from darkness, and mark the rolling seasons, but has no power to save, to heal or vanquish? The throbbing pulse, the glistening eye, the kindly sympathy we feel in another’s anguish speaks to us of a soul, declares to us we sprang from some sublime and all wise original. Behold,” said he, rising from his couch with a commanding attitude, “yon temple, the boast of Syria, what symmetry, what grandeur!—as wise would it be to say it sprang from nothing, as that sun, which from time almost incalculable, has risen in the east and set beneath those mountains. It must have been the instrument of an all wise purpose. Then why not adore the source through whose command it blazed into existence?
“How is it, Mobilius, that the faithful follower in our faith, worn out by agonising pain, or hastening, hour after hour, toward certain dissolution, every thing, the bright skies, the anxious faces of those that gather round him, exposing to his fading eye—how is it he is yet more cheerful as his shattered frame sinks into increasing weakness—so that neither the stake, with its tortures, the amphitheatre, with its jeers and cruel glances, nor the silent chamber, where the last enemy of the good man approaches with slower step, and where he does not find the support or triumph of a martyrdom, shall shake his confidence?”
Here Mobilius seemed oppressed with affliction.
“What is it, my good friend,” said Lactantius, “that grieves you?”
“I will tell you: your words shoot anguish through my soul, but it is for memories that are past. My sister, she on whom I lavished every thought, and all that I possessed, was snatched from me in the midst of mutual happiness. She lingered, and was buoyed up by some sweet and hidden consolation she appeared anxious to impart, but the flickering flame of life burnt too feebly in the lamp. It was, it must have been this; would I had known it, that I might have whispered into her ear I knew it. Her last look was cast upon the blue depths of heaven, as if in earnest contemplation of some glorious spectacle, and she died with a sweet smile upon her features, as if listening to sweet music. ‘Mobilius,’ she said, pointing upward, ‘Mobilius, my dear brother, behold the—’ but the trembling syllables died into a whisper—she had fled! There were to me sweet smiles no longer to cheer the vigor of my desolation—I was alone in the world.”
“Console yourself,” replied Lactantius, “this was an evidence your sister died in peace. Trouble not yourself on this account, you may meet her again.”
At this communication his countenance, dull and heavy with grief, brightened as the sun through showers. You have seen a piece of marble carved into a coarse resemblance of the face. You have come again. The chisel of a master spirit has been busy in its god-like lineaments. It almost speaks; the dull, cold marble almost warms into a smile—such was the change. Mobilius, gathering his mantle about him, abruptly left us, nor did I see him again throughout that day.
The stars began to glimmer as the sunlight waned, and we felt in all its bounteous fulness the care-dispelling influence of this clime. The conversation was prolonged, and I found that Lactantius was as well skilled in the policy of existing governments, as in the peculiarities of all the prevailing theologies, in short, as competent for the duties of a statesman as a bishop; and it grieves me not a little that so many should be raised to this eminent station in the church so far inferior to Lactantius, while he, blessed with every natural gift, endowed with the quickest of intellects—enriched with all the learning—polished, fiery and overwhelming in speech, or if it please him, mild and winning as the softest Lydian measure, the Christian and the philosopher, should be thrust aside. This age will be signalised upon the page of the historian, as much because it gave birth to a Constantine as that on it there flourished a Lactantius.