Julian remembered the interminable conflicts between Orthodox and Arians under Constantius at the council of Milan, and designing to profit by that animosity, he decided to follow the example of his Christian predecessors and convoke an œcumenical council.
On one occasion, in a private conversation, he had declared that, instead of persecuting the Galileans, he wished to give them full freedom of faith, and to call back from exile Donatists, Cæcilians, Marcionists, Montanists, and other heretics banished by the councils of Constantine and Constantius. He thought that there was no better means of abolishing Christianity.
"You will see, my friends, when all the sectaries shall have returned, such strife will be kindled between these brethren, that they will begin to torture each other like birds of prey loosed from their cage into the arena of the circus. They will bring shame upon their Master's name more quickly and effectually than I could by any persecutions and martyrdoms!"
And so Julian sent into all parts of the Empire edicts authorising the banished to return. The wisest Galilean teachers were at the same time invited to come to the palace at Constantinople for a religious discussion; but the majority of those invited were unaware of the subject to be discussed, the wording of the letters being skilfully vague. Guessing some trick, many, pleading sickness, failed to present themselves.
The blue morning sky seemed dark against the dazzling whiteness of the double colonnade surrounding the court known as the Atrium of Constantine. White pigeons were fluttering here and there in the sky, with gleeful beating of wings. In the centre of the court stood the statue of Venus Callipyge, in warm and beautiful marble. The monks, passing by her, turned away, hiding their eyes, but the tender temptress remained, for all that, in their midst. Not without purpose had Julian chosen this situation for the Galilean council. The dark robes of the religious appeared blacker still, their starvation-dulled faces more meagre. Each strove to wear an air of indifference and presumption, feigning not to see his enemy at his elbow, yet casting stealthy glances of curiosity and contempt.
"Holy Mother of God, what is this? Whither are we fallen?" said the old bishop Eustace, with profound emotion. "Let me pass out, soldiers!"
"Gently, gently, my friend," answered the centurion of the lance-bearers, the barbarian Dagalaïf, politely keeping him from the door.
"I'm choking in this pit of heresy! let me pass!"
"By the will of Augustus, everybody here has come to the council," responded Dagalaïf, inflexibly keeping him back.
"But this is not a council, it is a den of thieves!"
Among the Galileans some more cheerful persons began to laugh at the provincial manners and the strong Armenian accent of Eustace, who, losing courage, quieted down, and slipped into a corner, muttering—
"Lord, Lord, how have I offended Thee?"
Evander of Nicomedia also quickly repented of having come and of having led thither brother Juventinus,a disciple of Didimus, who had but newly arrived at Constantinople.
Evander was one of the greatest dogmatists of his time; a man of profound and lucid intellect. He had lost his health, and grown prematurely old, over his books; he was almost blind, and his short-sighted eyes worn out with fatigue. Innumerable heresies besieged his brain, leaving him no sleep, or tormenting him in dreams, ever tempting him by their dread subtleties. Evander used to collect heresies, as one might collect jewels or scientific rarities, in an immense manuscript entitledAgainst Heresy. He hunted for them greedily, imagined those that might be in existence, and the better he refuted the more he was attracted towards them.
Sometimes he would entreat God to grant him simple faith, and God would refuse him simplicity.
In ordinary life he was timid, simple, and offenceless as a child. For rascals to deceive Evander was as easy as breathing, and on this score the mockers told a hundred stories against him. Plunged in doctrinal dreams, the bishop continually found himself in awkward situations. In one of these fits of abstraction he had come to this singular council, without thinking why he went thither, but attracted by the hope of lighting on a new heresy. Now his face was twitching with annoyance, and he shaded his weak eyes against the too bright rays of the sun, longing to be back amongst his books in his little twilight chamber.
Evander kept Juventinus at his side, and warned him against temptation by criticising various heresies. In the centre of the hall a vigorous old man was striding up and down. He had high cheek-bones and thick grey hair. It was the septuagenarian bishop Purpuris,recalled from exile by Julian. Neither Constantine nor Constantius had succeeded in stifling the Donatist heresy. For fifty years past streams of blood had flowed in Africa, by reason of the unjust deposition of a Donatist in favour of a Cæcilian, or of a Cæcilian in favour of a Donatist. Nor could any augury be made as to the final issue of this fratricidal strife.
Juventinus noticed that the Cæcilian bishop who was passing in front of Purpuris brushed the vestments of the Donatist with the corner of his chasuble. The latter turned fiercely round, with a growl of disgust, and, taking the stuff between two fingers, shook it several times before the eyes of everybody.
Evander informed Juventinus in a low voice that when a Cæcilian happened to enter a Donatist congregation he was hunted out and the flags touched by his feet were washed with salt water.
Behind Purpuris, dogging him step by step, walked his faithful bodyguard, an enormous half-savage African, brown-skinned, terrible, flat-nosed, and thick-lipped, the deacon Leona. He was armed with a cudgel, gripped tightly in his nervous hands. He was an Ethiopian peasant, belonging to the self-mutilating sect called Circumcellions. Weapon in hand, these sectaries would run along the high-roads offering money to passers-by, in return for destruction, adding, "Kill us, or we will kill you!" In the name of Christ the Circumcellions mutilated themselves, burned themselves, drowned themselves, but never would hang themselves, because Judas was hanged. They declared that suicide for God's glory washed all sin from the soul, and the people looked on them as martyrs. Before death, they abandoned themselves to all pleasures; ate, drank, and offered violence to women. A greatnumber refrained from using swords, Christ having forbidden it, but on the other hand they felled heretics and pagans with huge bludgeons, "according to the Scriptures," and with consciences at ease. While spilling blood they would cry "Glory be to God!"
And the peaceful inhabitants lived more in terror of this religious cry than of war-trumpets or the roarings of a lion. The Donatists considered the Circumcellions as their guardians, and these Ethiopian peasants finding theological controversies hard to understand, the Donatists would point out beforehand those whom they were to strike according to the Scriptures.
Evander directed the attention of Juventinus on a handsome youth, whose tender and ingenuous expression seemed almost that of a young girl. He was a Caïnite.
"Blessed be our tameless brothers, Cain, Shem, the inhabitants of Sodom and Gomorrah!" preached the Caïnites. "They are seeds of high wisdom, of reason divine!... Come to us, all ye hunted, reprobate, revolted! Blessed be Judas! he alone among the apostles was initiated in the higher knowledge!... He betrayed Christ that He might die and rise again, because he knew the death of Christ would save the world! He who is initiated in our wisdom can transgress all limits, daring all, despising matter, trampling all fear under foot; and giving himself up to all sins and delight of the sense, attain that disgust for matter which is the final purity of the soul!"
"Look, Juventinus, there is a man who believes himself above archangels and seraphim," said Evander, waving his hand towards a young and sprightly Egyptian, who held himself aloof from everyone, an ironic smile on his lips, which were painted, like those of acourtesan. He was dressed in the latest Byzantine vogue, his white hands loaded with rings. His name was Cassiodorus, and he was a Valentinian. "In the Christians," affirmed the arrogant Valentinians, "there is a soul, as in animals; but there is no mind, as in us. We alone are initiated into the mysteries of the Gnosis and of the divine Plenum. It follows, therefore, that we alone are worthy to call ourselves human. All others are, as it were, pigs and dogs."
Cassiodorus would say to his disciples: "You should know everyone, but no one should understand you. Before the profane, deny the Gnosis, be dumb, and despise evidences of the gospel. Despise professions of faith and martyrdoms; love silence and mystery. Be for your enemy as invisible, elusive, inviolable, as the immaterial forces. Ordinary Christians need good actions for their salvation; but those who possess the highest knowledge of God, the Gnosis, need not perform these actions. We are the sons of light, they the sons of darkness. We fear not sin, because we know that sin is needful to the material body, and even to the immaterial soul. We are placed so high that, let our faults be what they will, we cannot err. Our heart remains chaste in the delights of matter, as pure gold keeps its brightness in the mud."
Elsewhere Juventinus saw an old man, with a hang-dog expression and a squint, the Adamite Prodick, explaining his teaching in a loud voice. He believed in restoring the innocence of the first Adam. The Adamites performed their mysteries in a church warmed like a bath and called the "Eden." Like our first ancestors, they evinced no shame in the absence of clothes, and assevered that among themselves all men and women were noted for lofty modesty, although theinnocence of these paradisiac assemblies had sometimes been questioned.
At the elbow of the Adamite Prodick a woman—pale-faced, grey-haired, and proud, her eyes half-shut with fatigue—was sitting on the ground. She wore episcopal garb. She was the prophetess of the Montanists. Yellow-skinned Copts were tending her devotedly, gazing on her with solicitude, and calling her "Heavenly Dove." Consuming themselves for years in ecstasies of impossible love, they preached the duty of bringing humanity to an end, through the practice of continence. Scattered in numerous bands on the burning hills of Phrygia, near the ruins of Papusa, these pallid dreamers would remain sitting motionless, day after day, their eyes fixed on the horizon, on which the Saviour was to appear. On foggy evenings, above the grey plain, in the clouds, in rays of melting gold they would catch visions of the glory of God—the new Zion descending upon earth. Year after year they would wait, dying at last in the hope that the celestial kingdom was just about to descend upon the ruins of Papusa. Sometimes lifting her wearied eyelids, and with troubled gaze fixed in the distance, the prophetess was murmuring in Syriac—
"Maran Atha"—"The Lord is coming!"
And her Coptic servants bowed towards her, the better to hear.
Juventinus listened to the explanations of Evander. All this resembled some wild and torturing dream. His heart shivered, under a bitter flood of pity.
Silence was at last restored; all looks turned towards the same spot, at the opposite extremity of the court, where Julian was standing. His face was clear and firm, and he wore an air of assumed indifferenceHis garb was the simple white chlamys of the philosophers.
"Old men and masters," said Augustus, addressing the assembly, "we have thought it well to give evidence of our indulgence and compassion to all our subjects who profess the Galilean teaching. For those who are gone astray it is better to feel compassion than hatred; better to lead the obstinate to the truth by exhortation, and in no wise by harryings, blows, or corporeal tortures. Wishing to restore peace to the world, so long troubled by religious discord, I have called you, O learnéd Galileans, together. We shall hope that under our protection you will give an example of those lofty virtues which befit your wisdom and your spiritual divinity."
So, with the easy gestures of a practised speaker, he began a speech prepared beforehand. But the benevolent words were not lacking in ironic allusion.
He made it clear he had not forgotten the stupid and coarse altercations that had taken place under Constantius, at the council of Milan. He mentioned, with an evil smile, those audacious persons who, regretting that they were no longer allowed to persecute or martyrise their brethren, had urged the ignorant populace into rebellion, poured oil on fire, and attempted to fill the world with fratricidal madness. These were the real enemies of humanity, and guilty of the greatest evil of all, namely, anarchy.
And he finished his harangue by the following unexpected words—
"We have called back from banishment your brothers, who had been hunted forth from the councils of Constantine and Constantius, because we desired to give liberty to all citizens of the Roman Empire. And forthe complete suppression of discord, we confide to you, wise teachers, the duty of settling for Galileans a single and unique profession of faith. It is to this end that we have convoked you in our palace. Judge now, and authoritatively decide. In order to afford you full freedom of speech we will withdraw, and await your wise decision."
Before anyone had time to grasp the situation, or to answer this strange discourse, Julian, surrounded by his philosophic friends, left the court and disappeared.
Everybody was dumb. Someone uttered a long sigh, and in the general silence the beating of pigeons' wings and the rippling of the fountain alone were audible. Suddenly, on the raised marble daïs, which had served as tribune for Julian, appeared the kindly old man at whose provincial bearing and Armenian accent everybody had laughed.
His face was red, his eyes burning with vehemence. The Emperor's speech had offended the old bishop. Filled with fearless religious zeal, Eustace advanced towards the members of the council—
"Fathers and brothers," he exclaimed, and his voice was so stern and unshaken that no one thought of laughing at it—"Fathers and brothers, let us part in peace! He who has called us here, to seduce and to insult us, knows neither the canons of the Church nor the rules of the councils. He hates even the name of Jesus! Let us not be a sport to our enemies, let us restrain all angry words! I entreat you, in the name of the eternal God, let us separate in silence!"
He pronounced these words in a loud and ringing voice, his eyes fixed on a raised gallery, curtained by purple hangings. The Emperor, surrounded by his Hellenist friends, had just appeared there. A murmurof fright and astonishment ran through the assembly. Julian gazed at Eustace, but the old man sustained his gaze. The Emperor's face grew dark.
At that moment the Donatist Purpuris brutally thrust off the bishop and took his place on the tribune.
"Do not listen to him," cried Purpuris; "do not let us separate, in scorn of the will of Augustus! The Cæcilians bear a grudge against him, because he has delivered us."
"No, in all truth, no, my brothers!" protested Eustace.
"Leave us, ye accursed! We are not your brothers! We are the wheat-ears of God—you the straw destined for the burning!..." And waving his hand towards the apostate Emperor Purpuris continued in a solemn tone, as if chanting a nuptial song—
"Behold our saviour! Look on him!... Glory, glory, to the most compassionate and learned Augustus!... Thou shalt trample on the snake and the reptile! Thou shalt conquer the lion, for the angels watch over thee in all thy doings.... Hail!"
The congregation became unsettled. Some declared that the advice of Eustace must be followed. Others asked to be heard, not wishing to lose the opportunity of expounding their doctrines before a general religious council. Faces kindled and voices rose.
"Let a Cæcilian enter one of our churches now" exulted Purpuris, "and we'll place our hands on his head, not to choose him as our shepherd, but to crack his skull!"
Many forgot the purpose of the meeting and engaged in subtle discussions, seeking converts. The Basilidian, Triphon, who hailed from Egypt, surrounded by curioushearers, exhibited a transparent chrysolith amulet, bearing the mysterious word "Abraxa."
"He who shall understand the meaning of the wordAbraxa," Triphon was saying to the group around him, "shall receive all freedom, shall become an immortal, and, tasting all sins, be sullied by none.Abraxarepresents by letters the number of the mountains in heaven, three hundred and sixty-five. Above the three hundred and sixty-five celestial spheres, above the hierarchies of angels and archangels, there is a certain Nothingness, nameless, and more beautiful than any light, a motionless and sterile Nothingness...."
"The motionless and sterile nothingness is in your own stupid head!" growled an Arian bishop, striding straight up to Triphon.
The Gnostic, according to his custom, became silent, locking his lips in a contemptuous smile, and raising a forefinger—
"Wisdom! Wisdom!" he ejaculated, and vanished in the crowd.
The prophetess of Papusa, among her anxious Copts, stood up, terrible, pale, half-swooning, and groaned, as if her troubled eyes saw nothing, as if her ears heard nothing—
"Maran Atha"—"The Lord is coming!"
The disciples of the youth Epiphanes, a Pagan demi-god or Christian martyr, worshipped in the oratories of Cephalonia, were declaiming brotherhood and equality—
"There are no laws but these: Destroy all; let all be in common—women, lands, riches, like earth, air, and sun!"
The Ophites, serpent-worshippers, raised above their heads a cross, round which a tame adder was coiling—
"The wisdom of the Serpent," they said, "givesman a knowledge of good and evil; behold the saviour, Ophiomorphos, the serpentiform! Fear nothing! Hearken to him! Taste the forbidden fruit, and ye shall be even as gods!"
A perfumed and curled Marcosianist, lifting on high a crystal cup full of water with the skilful gestures of a juggler, invited curiosity—
"Look at this miracle! the water's going to boil and be turned into blood!"
Colabasians were there, counting their fingers with inconceivable celerity, and demonstrating that all the numbers of Pythagoras, every mystery of heaven and earth, were comprised in the letters of the Greek alphabet—
"Alpha, Omega—the beginning and the end, and between them the Trinity; Beta, Gamma, Delta—the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit! You see how simple it is!"
Fabionites, gluttonous Carpocratians, debauched Barbelonites stood up, preaching such follies that hearers possessing a vestige of morality put their fingers in their ears. Many strove to move their audiences by the attractive force over the imagination possessed by madness and monstrosity. Every man was certain of his own gospel. Yet all were enemies. Even the minute sect, hidden in remote provinces of Africa, the Rogationists, were certain that Christ returning upon earth would find the true comprehension of the Gospel only amongst themselves, in a few Mauritanian villages, and nowhere else.
Evander of Nicomedia, forgetting Juventinus, could scarcely scribble down the new heresies on his tablets fast enough, happy as a collector who has lit upon a new set of trinkets.
And meantime, in the upper gallery, the young Emperor, surrounded by his white-robed philosophicfriends, was gazing down upon the maddened tumult with malign satisfaction. The Pythagorean Proclus, Nymphidian, Priscus, Ædesius, old Iamblicus, the pious bishop Hekobolis, were at his side. They neither laughed nor jested. Their faces remained almost impassive and their attitude a becoming one; only from time to time across their closed lips flitted a furtive and pitying smile. From the shadow of the purple hangings they looked down on the spectacle, as gods must regard the hostilities of men, or circus-lovers the beasts of the arena. It was indeed a banquet for Hellenic sages.
In the midst of the general confusion the effeminate young Caïnite leapt on the tribune and shouted, with such conviction in his voice that everybody turned round, overwhelmed at the impiety—
"Blessed be rebels against God! Blessed be Cain, Shem, Judas, the inhabitants of Sodom and Gomorrah! Blessed be their brother, the Angel of Infinite Darkness!"
The bishop Purpuris, who for an hour past had not been able to get a hearing, to relieve his feelings rushed at the Caïnite and raised his sinewy hand to close the lips of the blasphemer.
A crowd dragged him back.
"Father, it is unbecoming!"
"Let me be, let me be! I will not endure such abomination," roared Purpuris; "take this, seed of Cain!"
And the bishop spat in his face.
A general fray followed, which would have enlarged into a battle if Roman soldiers had not intervened. These parted the Galileans, with the words—
"You must not act so in this place! Have you not got enough churches to fight each other in?"
Purpuris was dragged off, and ordered to quit the atrium.
He called out—
"Leona, deacon Leona!"
The deacon thrust the soldiers aside, felled two of them to the earth, freed Purpuris, and set the terrible mace of the Circumcellions whirling above the heads of the heresiarchs.
"Glory to God!" shouted the African, seeking a victim.
Suddenly the club sank out of his loosened hands. All stood petrified. Then a sharp cry, uttered by one of the Coptic servants of the prophetess of Papusa, rent the general hush. Kneeling, his face transfigured by fear, he pointed to the tribune—
"The Devil! The Devil! Look at the Prince of Evil!"
It was Julian the Emperor, on the marble daïs above the crowd, in his white chlamys, his arms crossed on his breast. Terrible glee burned in his eyes; and to many indeed, at that moment, the recreant prince appeared dreadful as Satan, his brother.
"Is this how you fulfil the law of love, Galileans?" he said to the dumbfounded assembly. "How much your mercy and forgiveness are worth!... Verily the wild animals have more compassion than brethren like you! In the words of your Master: "Woe upon you, law-makers, because you have taken the key of the house, and, hindering others from entering, have not entered in yourselves! Woe to you, Pharisees!..."
And enjoying their silence he added after a pause—
"If you cannot rule yourselves, Galileans, I say to you, in order to prevent greater misfortunes, you shall now obey, and submit yourselves to me!"