From such thoughts about my own desires and inabilities it was a relief to turn to some definite matter of fact. I had been spending several hours in attempting to find out what Paul’s gospel was. But what was Christ’s gospel, so far as it could be gathered from the epistles? This I had made no attempt to discover. “Epictetus,” I reflected, “though he does not profess to teach a gospel of Socrates or Diogenes, yet frequently quotes from them. Might I not expect to find at least a few words of Christ—whether uttered before or after the resurrection—quoted here and there in some at least of these numerous letters?” Hitherto I had met with none. But now, on rapidly unrolling the volume and searching onwards from the end of the epistle to the Romans, I came to a quotation that had escaped me. It was in the first of the Corinthian letters, following immediately after some details (not of great interest) about women’s head-covering. I had just time to note that the passage contained the words “the Lord Jesus said,” and “on the night on which he was delivered over,” when my servant announced that Glaucus wished to see me, and I put the book aside.

Ostensibly Glaucus had come to compare some of his lecture notes with mine. But I soon found that his real object was to forget his troubles in the society of a friend. To forget them, not to reveal them. He avoided anything that might lead to personal questions, and I respected his reticence. When, however, he rose to go, he made some remark on the difficulty of retaining the imperturbability on which Epictetus was always[152] insisting, “under the sword of Damocles.” Knowing vaguely that his alarm was not for himself but for others, I suggested that he might return at once to Corinth. “I would do so,” he said, “but my father expressly bids me remain at Nicopolis.” He said this uneasily, and with a wistful look, as though he suspected that something was amiss and longed for advice. “If action of any kind is possible,” said I, “take it. If not?.” Then I stopped. “Well,” said he, “‘if not’?.” He waited for me to complete my sentence. I would gladly have left it uncompleted. For the truth was that I had begun the sentence in one mood and was being called on to complete it in another. When I said, “If not,” I had a flash of faith coming with a sudden memory of Isaiah’s message about God as the Shepherd of the stars and his exhortation to “wait patiently on the Lord.” But it had vanished and left me in the dark. “‘If not’?,” repeated Glaucus for the second time. I ought to have replied, “Then at least keep yourself ready for action.” What I did say, or stammer out, was, something about “waiting and trusting.”

Glaucus looked hard at me. “‘Wait and trust!’ That is to say, ‘Wait and believe.’ That is not like you, Silanus. You don’t mean it, I see. It is not like you to say what you don’t mean. I would sooner have heard you repeat your old friend Scaurus’s advice, which was more like ‘Wake and disbelieve.’ ‘Wait,’ say you, ‘and trust.’ Trust whom? Wait for what? Wait for the river of time to run dry? I have kept you up too late. Sleep well, and may sleep bring you better counsel for me!” So saying, he departed, but turned at the door to fling a final jibe at me, “Silanus, you are a Roman and I am only a Greek. But you must not think we Greeks are quite ignorant of your Horace. And what says he about waiting? Rusticus expectat: ‘Hodge sits by the river.’ Farewell, and sleep well.”

This was bitter medicine; but I had deserved it, and it did me good. My cheeks burned with shame as I recalled his words “It is not like you to say what you don’t mean.” Had I come to this? Was this the result of my study of these Jewish writings? And yet, did I not “mean” it? Was not the fact rather this, that in my own mind I did to some extent mean[153] and believe it? But it was a dormant belief. And I had no power to communicate it to others. Then I perceived the reason. I had said “Wait and trust.” But Isaiah said “Wait thou upon the Lord.” In preaching my gospel to Glaucus I had left out “the Lord”—the life and soul of the precept! If “the Lord” had been in me, as He was in Isaiah and in Paul, I could not have left Him out. But I left Him out because He was not in me. The truth was that I had no true gospel to preach.

In great dejection I was on the point of retiring to rest when it occurred to me that I had left unfinished, and indeed hardly begun, the study of Christ’s words in the Corinthian epistle. Too weary to resume it now, I extinguished the light and flung myself down to forget in sleep all thought of study. But I could not forget. All through the dreams of a restless and troubled night ran threads of tangled imaginations about what those words would prove to be, intertwined with other imaginations about the words of Christ to Paul at his conversion. Along with these came shadows or shapes, with voices or voice-like sounds:—Epictetus gazing on the burning Christians in Rome, Paul listening to the voice of Christ near Damascus, Elijah on Horeb amid the roar of the tempest. Last of all, I myself, Silanus, stood at the door of a chamber in Jerusalem where Christ (I knew) was present with His disciples, and from this chamber there began to steal forth a still small voice, breathing and spreading everywhere an unspeakable peace—when a whirlwind scattered everything and hurried me away to the Neronian gardens in Rome.

There, someone, masked, took me by the hand and forced me to look at the Christian martyrs whom he was causing to be tortured. I thought it was Nero. But the mask fell off and it was Paul. The martyrs looked down on us and blessed us. Paul trembled but held me fast. I felt that I had become one with him, a persecutor and a murderer. They all looked up to heaven as though they saw something there. At that, Paul vanished, with a loud cry, leaving me alone. Fear fell upon me lest, if I looked up, I should see that which the martyrs saw. So I kept my eyes fixed on the ground. But[154] the blessings of those whom I had persecuted seemed to enter into me taking me captive and forcing me to do as they did. Then I too looked up. And I saw—that which they saw, Jesus the crucified. I tried to cry out “I see nothing, I see nothing,” but my voice would not speak. I struggled to regain control over my tongue, and in the struggle I awoke.

I had dreamed long past my usual hour for rising; and the lecture was already beginning when I took my seat next Glaucus. It was a relief to me to find him there; for his late outbreak of bitterness had made me fear that he might prove a deserter. Epictetus was describing man as being the work of a divine Artist, a wonderful sculpture, he said, superior to the Athene of Phidias. Appealing to us individually, “God,” he said, “has not only created you, but has also trusted you to yourself alone, and committed the guardianship of you to yourself, saying ‘I had no one more trustworthy than yourself to take charge of yourself. Preserve this person for me, such as he is by nature, modest, faithful, magnanimous’”—and he added many other eulogistic epithets. Here Glaucus passed me his notes with a bitter smile, pointing to the words “preserve me this person such as he is by nature.” He had marked them with a query. Nor could I help querying them in my mind. I felt that at all events they were liable to be interpreted in a ridiculous way. My thought was, “Paul bids us trust in God or in the Son of God. Epictetus never does this. But here he says that God trusts us to ourselves. Does He then trust babies to preserve themselves? And if not, when does He begin to trust us—whether as boys or as youths or as men—to preserve ourselves as we are by nature?” And here I may say that, as regards belief, or trust, or faith, Epictetus differed altogether from Paul. The former inveighed against babblers, who “trust” their secrets to strangers, and against the Academic philosopher for saying “Believe me it is impossible to find anything to be believed in.” But he never insisted (as Paul does) on the marvellous power possessed by a well-based belief or faith to influence men’s lives for good. For the most part Epictetus used the word “belief,” like the words “pity” and “prayer,” in a bad sense.

[155]

But to return to the lecture. In order to illustrate his favourite topic of the necessity of seeking happiness in oneself, Epictetus, as it were, called up Medea on the stage, expostulating with her for her want of self-control: “Do not desire your husband, then none of your desires will fail to be realised.” She complained that she was to be banished from Corinth. “Well,” said he, “Do not desire to remain in Corinth.” He concluded by advising her to desire ............