'That can make no change in my resolve, Varus.'
'Consider, Probus, well. As by thy renunciation thou couldst save thyself, I now tell thee that the lives of those whom thou holdest nearest, hang also upon thy word. Assent to what I have offered, and Piso and Julia live! Reject it, and they die!'
Varus paused; but Probus spoke not. He went on.
'Christian, are not these dear to thee? Demetrius too, and Felix? Where are the mercies of thy boasted faith, if thy heart is left thus hard? Truly thou mightest as well have lived and died a Pagan.'
'Again I say, Varus, thou knowest not what a Christian is. We put truth before life; and if by but a word that should deny the truth in Christ, or any jot or tittle of it, I could save the life of Piso, Julia, Felix, Demetrius, nay, and all in Rome who hold this faith, my tongue should be torn from my mouth before that word should be spoken. And so wouldst thou find every Christian here in Rome. Why then urge me more? Did Macer hear thee?'
'I hold thee, Probus, a wiser man than he. All Rome knew him mad. Cast not away thy life. Live, and tomorrow's sun shall see thee First in Rome!'
'Varus! why is this urgency? Think me not a fool and blind. Thou knowest, and Fronto and Aurelian know, that one apostate would weigh more for your bad cause than a thousand headless trunks; and so with cruel and insulting craft you weave your snares and pile to Heaven your golden bribes. Begone, Varus, and say to Aurelian, if in truth he sent thee on thy shameful errand, that, in the Fabrician prison, in the same dungeon where he cast Probus the Christian, there still lives Probus the Roman, who reveres what he once revered and loved, truth, and whom his bribes cannot turn from his integrity.'
'Die then, idiot, in thy integrity! Thou hast thrown scorn upon one, who has power and the will to pay it back in a coin it may little please thee to take it in. If there be one torment, Galilean, sharper than another, it shall be thine tomorrow; and for one moment that Macer passed upon my irons, there shall be hours for thee. Not till the flesh be peeled inch by inch from thy bones, and thy vitals look through thy ribs, and thy brain boil in its hot case, and each particular nerve be stretched till it break, shall thy life be suffered to depart. Then, what the tormentors shall have left, the dogs of the streets shall devour. Now, Christian, let us see if thy God, beholding thy distress, will pity and deliver thee.'
Saying these words, his countenance transformed by passion to that of a demon, he turned and left the cell.
Never, Fausta, I feel assured, did Aurelian commission Varus with such an errand. Fallen though he be, he has not yet fallen to that lowest deep. Varus doubtless hoped to prevail over Probus by his base proposals, and by such triumph raise his fortunes yet higher with Aurelian. It was a game worth playing—so he judged, and perhaps wisely—and worth a risk. For doubtless one apostate of the rank of Probus would have been of more avail to them, as Probus said to him, than a thousand slain. For nothing do the judges so weary themselves, and exhaust their powers of persuasion, as to induce the Christians who are brought before them to renounce their faith. So desirous are they of this, that they have caused, in many instances, those who were no Christians to be presented at their tribunals, who have then, after being threatened with torture and death, renounced a faith which they never professed. Once and again has this farce been acted before the Roman people. Their real triumphs of this sort have as yet been very few; and the sensation which they produced was swallowed up and lost in the glory—in the eyes even of the strangers who are in Rome—which has crowned us in the steadfast courage with which our people have remained quietly in their homes, throughout all this dreadful preparation, and then, when the hour of trial drew nigh, and they were placed at the bar of the judge, and were accused of their religion, confessed the charge, boasted of it, and then took their way to the prison, from which, they well knew, death only would deliver them.