'No, truly; he is a stranger to me, as he appears to be to all.'
'Nevertheless, you have been in his company. You forget not the Mediterranean voyage?'
'By no means. I enjoyed it highly, and recall it ever with delight.'
'Do you not remember, at the time I narrated to you the brief story of my life, that, as I ended, a rough voice from among the soldiers exclaimed, 'Where now are the gods of Rome?' This is that man, the soldier Macer; then bound with fellow soldiers to the service in Africa, now a Christian preacher.'
'I see it now. That man impressed me then with his thin form and all-devouring eyes. But the African climate, and the gash across his left cheek, and which seems to have slightly disturbed the eye upon that side, have made him a different being, and almost a terrific one. Is he sound and sane?'
'Perfectly so,' replied Probus, 'unless we may say that souls earnestly devoted and zealous, are mad. There is not a more righteous soul in Rome. His conscience is bare, and shrinking like a fresh wound. His breast is warm and fond as a woman's—his penitence for the wild errors of his pagan youth, a consuming fire, which, while it redoubles his ardor in doing what he may in the cause of truth, rages in secret, and, if the sword or the cross claim him not, will bring him to the grave. He is utterly incapable of fear. All the racks and dungeons of Rome, with their tormentors, could not terrify him.'
'You now interest me in him. I must see and know him. It might be of service to him and to all, Probus, methinks, if he could be brought to associate with those whose juster notions might influence his, and modify them to the rule of truth.'
'I fear not. What he sees, he sees clearly and strongly, and by itself. He understands nothing of one truth bearing upon another, and adding to it, or taking from it. Truth is truth with him—and as his own mind perceives it—not another's. His conscience will allow him in no accommodations to other men's opinions or wishes; with him, right is right, wrong is wrong. He is impatient under an argument as a war-horse under the rein after the trumpet sounds. It is unavoidable therefore but he should possess great power among the Christians of Rome. His are the bold and decisive qualities that strike the common mind. There is glory and applause in following and enduring under such a leader. Many are fain to believe him divinely illuminated and impelled, to unite the characters of teacher and prophet; and from knowing that he is so regarded by others, Macer has come almost to believe it himself. He is tending more and more to construe every impulse of his own mind into a divine suggestion, and I believe honestly experiences difficulty in discriminating between them. Still, I do not deny that it would be of advantage for him more and more to come in contact with sober and enlightened minds. I shall take pleasure, at some fitting moment, to accompany you to his humble dwelling; the rather as I would show you also his wife and children, all of whom are like himself Christians.'
'I shall not forget the promise.'
Whereupon we separated.