Quo Vadis - Henryk Sienkiewicz (best ereader under 100 .txt) 📗

the thought that he was saddening Lygia,

or the regret which that thought roused in him. After the first scene

of jealousy which Chrysothemis made because of two Syrian damsels whom

he purchased, he let her go in rude fashion. He did not cease at once

from pleasure and license, it is true, but he followed them out of

spite, as it were, toward Lygia. At last he saw that the thought of her

did not leave him for an instant; that she was the one cause of his evil

activity as well as his good; and that really nothing in the world

occupied him except her. Disgust, and then weariness, mastered him.

Pleasure had grown loathsome, and left mere reproaches. It seemed to

him that he was wretched, and this last feeling filled him with

measureless astonishment, for formerly he recognized as good everything

which pleased him. Finally, he lost freedom, self-confidence, and fell

into perfect torpidity, from which even the news of Cæsar’s coming could

not rouse him. Nothing touched him, and he did not visit Petronius till

the latter sent an invitation and his litter.

 

On seeing his uncle, though greeted with gladness, he replied to his

questions unwillingly; but his feelings and thoughts, repressed for a

long time, burst forth at last, and flowed from his mouth in a torrent

of words. Once more he told in detail the history of his search for

Lygia, his life among the Christians, everything which he had heard and

seen there, everything which had passed through his head and heart; and

finally he complained that he had fallen into a chaos, in which were

lost composure and the gift of distinguishing and judging. Nothing, he

said, attracted him, nothing was pleasing; he did not know what to hold

to, nor how to act. He was ready both to honor and persecute Christ; he

understood the loftiness of His teaching, but he felt also an

irresistible repugnance to it. He understood that, even should he

possess Lygia, he would not possess her completely, for he would have to

share her with Christ. Finally, he was living as if not living,—

without hope, without a morrow, without belief in happiness; around him

was darkness in which he was groping for an exit, and could not find it.

 

Petronius, during this narrative, looked at his changed face, at his

hands, which while speaking he stretched forth in a strange manner, as

if actually seeking a road in the darkness, and he fell to thinking.

All at once he rose, and, approaching Vinicius, caught with his fingers

the hair above his ear.

 

“Dost know,” asked he, “that thou hast gray hairs on thy temple?”

 

“Perhaps I have,” answered Vinicius; “I should not be astonished were

all my hair to grow white soon.”

 

Silence followed. Petronius was a man of sense, and more than once he

meditated on the soul of man and on life. In general, life, in the

society in which they both lived, might be happy or unhappy externally,

but internally it was at rest. Just as a thunderbolt or an earthquake

might overturn a temple, so might misfortune crush a life. In itself,

however, it was composed of simple and harmonious lines, free of

complication. But there was something else in the words of Vinicius,

and Petronius stood for the first time before a series of spiritual

snarls which no one had straightened out hitherto. He was sufficiently

a man of reason to feel their importance, but with all his quickness he

could not answer the questions put to him. After a long silence, he

said at last,—

 

“These must be enchantments.”

 

“I too have thought so,” answered Vinicius; “more than once it seemed to

me that we were enchanted, both of us.”

 

“And if thou,” said Petronius, “were to go, for example, to the priests

of Serapis? Among them, as among priests in general, there are many

deceivers, no doubt; but there are others who have reached wonderful

secrets.”

 

He said this, however, without conviction and with an uncertain voice,

for he himself felt how empty and even ridiculous that counsel must seem

on his lips.

 

Vinicius rubbed his forehead, and said: “Enchantments! I have seen

sorcerers who employed unknown and subterranean powers to their personal

profit; I have seen those who used them to the harm of their enemies.

But these Christians live in poverty, forgive their enemies, preach

submission, virtue, and mercy; what profit could they get from

enchantments, and why should they use them?”

 

Petronius was angry that his acuteness could find no reply; not wishing,

however, to acknowledge this, he said, so as to offer an answer of some

kind,—“That is a new sect.” After a while he added: “By the divine

dweller in Paphian groves, how all that injures life! Thou wilt admire

the goodness and virtue of those people; but I tell thee that they are

bad, for they are enemies of life, as are diseases, and death itself.

As things are, we have enough of these enemies; we do not need the

Christians in addition. Just count them: diseases, Cæsar, Tigellinus,

Cæsar’s poetry, cobblers who govern the descendants of ancient Quirites,

freedmen who sit in the Senate. By Castor! there is enough of this.

That is a destructive and disgusting sect. Hast thou tried to shake

thyself out of this sadness, and make some little use of life?”

 

“I have tried,” answered Vinicius.

 

“Ah, traitor!” said Petronius, laughing; “news spreads quickly through

slaves; thou hast seduced from me Chrysothemis!”

 

Vinicius waved his hand in disgust.

 

“In every case I thank thee,” said Petronius. “I will send her a pair

of slippers embroidered with pearls. In my language of a lover that

means, ‘Walk away.’ I owe thee a double gratitude,—first, thou didst

not accept Eunice; second, thou hast freed me from Chrysothemis. Listen

to me! Thou seest before thee a man who has risen early, bathed,

feasted, possessed Chrysothemis, written satires, and even at times

interwoven prose with verses, but who has been as wearied as Cæsar, and

often unable to unfetter himself from gloomy thoughts. And dost thou

know why that was so? It was because I sought at a distance that which

was near. A beautiful woman is worth her weight always in gold; but if

she loves in addition, she has simply no price. Such a one thou wilt

not buy with the riches of Verres. I say now to myself as follows: I

will fill my life with happiness, as a goblet with the foremost wine

which the earth has produced, and I will drink till my hand becomes

powerless and my lips grow pale. What will come, I care not; and this

is my latest philosophy.”

 

“Thou hast proclaimed it always; there is nothing new in it.”

 

“There is substance, which was lacking.”

 

When he had said this, he called Eunice, who entered dressed in white

drapery,—the former slave no longer, but as it were a goddess of love

and happiness.

 

Petronius opened his arms to her, and said,—“Come.”

 

At this she ran up to him, and, sitting on his knee, surrounded his neck

with her arms, and placed her head on his breast. Vinicius saw how a

reflection of purple began to cover her cheeks, how her eyes melted

gradually in mist. They formed a wonderful group of love and happiness.

Petronius stretched his hand to a flat vase standing at one side on a

table, and, taking a whole handful of violets, covered with them the

head, bosom, and robe of Eunice; then he pushed the tunic from her arms,

and said,—

 

“Happy he who, like me, has found love enclosed in such a form! At

times it seems to me that we are a pair of gods. Look thyself! Has

Praxiteles, or Miron, or Skopas, or Lysias even, created more wonderful

lines? Or does there exist in Paros or in Pentelicus such marble as

this,—warm, rosy, and full of love? There are people who kiss off the

edges of vases, but I prefer to look for pleasure where it may be found

really.”

 

He began to pass his lips along her shoulders and neck. She was

penetrated with a quivering; her eyes now closed, now opened, with an

expression of unspeakable delight. Petronius after a while raised her

exquisite head, and said, turning to Vinicius,—“But think now, what are

thy gloomy Christians in comparison with this? And if thou understand

not the difference, go thy way to them. But this sight will cure thee.”

 

Vinicius distended his nostrils, through which entered the odor of

violets, which filled the whole chamber, and he grew pale; for he

thought that if he could have passed his lips along Lygia’s shoulders in

that way, it would have been a kind of sacrilegious delight so great

that let the world vanish afterward! But accustomed now to a quick

perception of that which took place in him, he noticed that at that

moment he was thinking of Lygia, and of her only.

 

“Eunice,” said Petronius, “give command, thou divine one, to prepare

garlands for our heads and a meal.”

 

When she had gone out he turned to Vinicius.

 

“I offered to make her free, but knowest thou what she answered?—‘I

would rather be thy slave than Cæsar’s wife!’ And she would not

consent. I freed her then without her knowledge. The pretor favored me

by not requiring her presence. But she does not know that she is free,

as also she does not know that this house and all my jewels, excepting

the gems, will belong to her in case of my death.” He rose and walked

through the room, and said: “Love changes some more, others less, but it

has changed even me. Once I loved the odor of verbenas; but as Eunice

prefers violets, I like them now beyond all other flowers, and since

spring came we breathe only violets.”

 

Here he stopped before Vinicius and inquired,—“But as to thee, dost

thou keep always to nard?”

 

“Give me peace!” answered the young man.

 

“I wished thee to see Eunice, and I mentioned her to thee, because thou,

perhaps, art seeking also at a distance that which is near. Maybe for

thee too is beating, somewhere in the chambers of thy slaves, a true and

simple heart. Apply such a balsam to thy wounds. Thou sayest that

Lygia loves thee? Perhaps she does. But what kind of love is that

which abdicates? Is not the meaning this,—that there is another force

stronger than her love? No, my dear, Lygia is not Eunice.”

 

“All is one torment merely,” answered Vinicius. “I saw thee kissing

Eunice’s shoulders, and I thought then that if Lygia would lay hers bare

to me I should not care if the ground opened under us next moment. But

at the very thought of such an act a certain dread seized me, as if I

had attacked some vestal or wished to defile a divinity. Lygia is not

Eunice, but I understand the difference not in thy way. Love has

changed thy nostrils, and thou preferrest violets to verbenas; but it

has changed my soul: hence, in spite of my misery and desire, I prefer

Lygia to be what she is rather than to be like others.”

 

“In that case no injustice is done thee. But I do not understand the

position.”

 

“True, true!” answered Vinicius, feverishly. “We understand each other

no longer.”

 

Another moment of silence followed.

 

“May Hades swallow thy Christians!” exclaimed Petronius. “They have

filled thee with disquiet, and destroyed thy sense of life. May Hades

devour them! Thou art mistaken in thinking that their religion is good,

for good is what gives people happiness, namely, beauty, love, power;