This reminds me that you asked for news of Probus, my 'Christian pedagogue,' as you are wont to name him. He is here, adorning, by a life of severe simplicity and divine benevolence, the doctrine he has espoused. He is a frequent inmate of our house, and Julia, not less than myself, ever greets him with affectionate reverence, as both friend and instructor. He holds the chief place in the hearts of the Roman Christians; for even those of the sect who differ from him in doctrine and in life, cannot but acknowledge that never an apostle presented to the love and imitation of his followers an example of rarer virtue. Yet he is not, in the outward rank which he holds, at the head of the Christian body. Their chiefs are, as you know, the bishops, and Felix is Bishop of Rome, a man every way inferior to Probus. But he has the good or ill fortune to represent more popular opinions, in matters both of doctrine and practice than the other, and of course easily rides into the posts of trust and honor. Ho represents those among the Christians—for, alas! there are such among them—who, in seeking the elevation and extension of Christianity, do not hesitate to accommodate both doctrine and manner to the prejudices and tastes of both Pagan and Jew. They seek converts, not by raising them to the height of Christian principle and virtue, but by lowering these to the level of their grosser conceptions. Thus it is easy to see that in the hands of such professors, the Christian doctrine is undergoing a rapid process of deterioration. Probus, and those who are on his part, see this, are alarmed, and oppose it; but numbers are against them, and consequently power and authority. Already, strange as it may seem, when you compare such things with the institution of Christianity, as effected by its founder, do the bishops, both in Rome and in the provinces, begin to assume the state and bearing of nobility. Such is the number and wealth of the Christian community, that the treasuries of the churches are full; and from this source the pride and ambition of their rulers are luxuriously fed. If, as you walk through the street which crosses from the Quirinal to the Arch of Titus, lined with private dwellings of unusual magnificence, you ask whose is that with a portico, that for beauty and costliness rather exceeds the rest, you are told, 'That is the dwelling of Felix, the Bishop of Rome;' and if it chance to be a Christian who answers the question, it is done with ill-suppressed pride or shame, according to the party to which he belongs. This Felix is the very man, through the easiness of his dispositions, and his proneness to all the arts of self-indulgence, and the imposing graciousness of his carriage, to keep the favor of the people, and at the same time sink them, without suspicion on their part, lower and lower toward the sensual superstitions, from which, through so much suffering and by so many labors, they have but just escaped, and accomplish an adulterous and fatal union between Christianity and Paganism; by which indeed Paganism may be to some extent purified and exalted, but Christianity defiled and depressed. For Christianity, in its essence, is that which beckons and urges onward, not to excellence only, but to perfection. Of course its march is always in advance of the present. By such union with Paganism then, or Judaism, its essential characteristic will disappear; Christianity will, in effect, perish. You may suppose, accordingly, that Probus, and others who with him rate Christianity so differently, look on with anxiety upon this downward tendency, and with mingled sorrow and indignation upon those who aid it—oftentimes actuated, as is notorious, by most corrupt motives.
I am just returned from the shop of the learned Publius, where I met Probus, and others of many ways of thinking. You will gather from what occurred, better than from anything else I could say, what occupies the thoughts of our citizens, and how they stand affected.
I called to Milo to accompany me, and to take with him a basket in which to bring back books, which it was my intention to purchase.
'I trust, noble master,' said he, 'that I am to bear back no more Christian books.'
'Why so?'
'Because the priests say that they have magical powers over all who read them, or so much as handle them; that a curse sticks wherever they are or have been. I have heard of those who have withered away to a mere wisp; of others who have suddenly caught on fire, and vanished in flame and smoke; and of others, whose blood has stood still, frozen, or run out from all parts of the body, changed to the very color of your shoe, at their bare touch. Who should doubt that it is so, when the very boys in the streets have it, and it is taught in the temples? I would rather Solon, noble master, went in my stead. Mayhap his learning would protect him.'
I, laughing, bade him come on. 'You are not withered away yet, Milo, nor has your blood run out; yet you have borne many a package of these horrible books. Surely the gods befriend you.'
'I were else long since with the Scipios.' After a pause of some length, he added, as he reluctantly, and with features of increased paleness, followed in my steps:
'I would, my master, that you might be wrought with to leave these ways. I sleep not for thinking of your danger. Never, when it was my sad mischance to depart from the deserted palace of the great Gallienus, did I look to know one to esteem like him. But it is the truth when I affirm, that I place Piso before Gallienus, and the lady Julia before the lady Salonina. Shall I tell you a secret?'