The Silver Cross; Or, The Carpenter of Nazareth

'A man who was going to Jerusalem fell into the hands of robbers; they pillaged him, covered him with wounds, and went on their way leaving him half dead.

'It so happened afterwards that a Priest went the same road, who having perceived the wounded man, passed on.

'A Levite, who approached the same place, having noticed the wounded man, also passed on.

'But a Samaritan, who was travelling, came to the spot where the man was, and seeing him, he was moved with compassion, approached him, poured oil and wine upon his wounds, bandaged them, and having placed him on his horse, he led him to an hostelry and took care of him.

'The next morning the Samaritan drew two penny pieces from his pocket, gave them to the host, and said to him: 'Pay attention to this man; all that you expend beyond this, I will repay you.'

'Now,' inquired Jesus of his disciples, 'which of these three men, think you, was the neighbor of him who had fallen into the hands of the robbers?'

'It is he,' they replied to Jesus, 'who was merciful to the wounded man.'

'Go in peace, then, and do likewise,' replied Jesus, with a heavenly smile.

Genevieve the slave, on hearing this recital, could not restrain her tears, for Jane had accented with ineffable sweetness the last words of Jesus: 'Go, then, in peace, and do likewise.'

'You are right, Jane,' said Aurelia, musing; 'a child would comprehend the meaning of these words, and I feel myself moved.'

'And yet, this parable,' continued Jane, 'is one of those which have the most irritated the high priests and the doctors of law against the young man of Nazareth.'

'And why?'

'Because in this narrative he shows a Samaritan, a heathen, more humane than the Levite, than the Priest, since this idolator, seeing a brother in the wounded man, succored him, and thus renders himself more worthy of heaven than the two holy men of hard hearts. This, you see, is just what the enemies of Jesus call blasphemies, sacrileges!'

'Jane, let us go to the tavern. I have no longer any fear of entering this place. People for whom such narratives are invented, and who listen to them with avidity, cannot be wicked.'

'You see, my dear Aurelia, the words of the Nazarene already act upon you; they give you confidence and courage. Come, come.'

The young woman took the arm of her friend; both, followed by the slave Genevieve, turned their steps towards the tavern of the 'Wild Ass,' where they soon arrived.

This tavern, a square built house, like most in the East, was composed of an interior court surrounded with stout pillars, supporting a terrace and forming four galleries, beneath which the drinkers could retire in case of rain; but the night being mild and serene, the majority of the customers were at tables in the court, lighted by a large iron lamp in the middle of the court. This unique luminary, but feebly lighting the galleries, in which were also some drinkers, they remained completely obscured.

It was to one of these gloomy retreats that Jane, Aurelia and the slave Genevieve, directed their steps; they saw in passing through the crowd, then somewhat noisy, many persons in rags or poorly clad, women of immoral life, miserably attired, had as a turban, a scrap of white sackcloth; some others, on the contrary, wore robes and turbans of precious stuff, but faded; bracelets, ear-rings and necklaces in copper, ornamented with false stones; their cheeks were covered with a brilliant paint; their haggard and sorrowful countenance, and a stamp of bitterness, which revealed itself even in their noisy and intemperate joy, told quite enough of the miseries, the anguish, and the shame of their sad life as courtezans.

Amongst the men, some appeared dispirited by poverty, others had a bold and audacious air; several wore rusty weapons at their girdle, or leant upon their long sticks terminated by a ball of iron; elsewhere might be recognized by their iron collar and shaven head, the domestic slaves belonging to Roman officers; further on, the infirm, in rags, were seated on the ground in crutches.

Mothers held in their arms their infant children, pale and thin, whom they hugged with a regard tenderly anxious, no doubt also awaiting the arrival of the young Nazarene, so skilled in the healing art.

Genevieve, from some words exchanged between two men well dressed, but of harsh and disagreeable features, guessed that they were the secret emissaries whom the high priests and doctors of the law made use of to note the words of the Nazarene, and draw him into a snare of an imprudent confidence.

Jane, more bold than her friend, had made a passage for her through the crowd; seeing a table unoccupied, placed in the shade and behind one of the pillars of the galleries, the wife of the Seigneur Chusa seated herself at it with Aurelia, and demanded a jug of beer from one of the girls of the tavern, whilst Genevieve, standing by the side of her mistress, did not lose sight of the two emissaries of the pharisees, and greedily listened to all that was said round about her.

'The night advances,' said a young and handsome woman mournfully to one of her companions seated at a table before her, and whose cheeks were like her own, covered with paint, as was customary with courtezans.'

'Jesus of Nazareth will not come here to-night.'

'‘Twas scarcely worth while to come here; we could have taken a walk in the neighborhood of the Pool: and there some Roman officer, half drunk, or some doctor of law, hugging the walls, his nose in his cloak, would have given us a supper. You must not complain, Oliba, if we go to our couch supperless: 'twas your wish.'

'That sort of bread seems to me now so bitter, that I do not regret it.'

'Bitter or not, it was bread, and when we are hungry, we must eat.'

'In listening to the words of Jesus,' replied the other courtezan, mildly, 'I should have forgotten hunger.'

'Oliba, you will become mad. To feed upon words!'

'The words of Jesus always say: pardon, mercy, love; and hitherto for us there was nothing but words of scorn and contempt!' And the courtezan remained pensive, her forehead resting upon her hand.

'You are a strange girl, Oliba,' continued the other, 'but however, empty as it is, we shall not have even this supper of words; for the Nazarene will not come now: it is too late.'

'On the contrary, I trust the all powerful God may direct him here!' said a poor woman seated on the ground near the two courtezans, and holding in her arms a sickly child: —

'I am come from Bethlehem on foot to pray our good Jesus to cure my poor little babe; he is unparalleled for the cure of diseases of children, and far from being paid for his advices, he often gives you something wherewith to purchase the balsams he prescribes.'

'By the body of Solomon! I, too, hope that our friend Jesus will come here to-night,' observed a tall man, with a ferocious face, and a long stiff beard, dressed in a red rag of a turban, and a short robe of camel's hair, almost in rags, confined at the waist by a cord supporting a large rusty cutlass without a sheath. This man also held in his hand a long stick with an iron knob at the point.

'If our worthy friend of Nazareth does not come to-night, I shall have lost my time for nothing, for I had engaged to escort a traveller who feared going alone from Jerusalem to Bethlehem lest he should meet with unpleasant encounters.'

'Just look at that bandit, with his hang-dog face and his grand cutlass! Does he not look like a very safe escort?' quietly said to his companion one of the two emissaries, seated not very far from Genevieve.

'What a daring villain!'

'He would have murdered and robbed the too confident traveller in the first bye way!' said the other emissary.

'As true as my name is Banaias!' continued the man with the cutlass, 'I should have lost without regret this little godsend of escorting a traveller if our friend of Nazareth had come, I like the man. I must say! he consoles you not a little for wearing rags, by showing that since they can no more enter into paradise than a camel can pass through the eye of a needle, all the wicked rich will one day be roasted like capons in Beelzebub's kitchen. This neither fills our belly or our purse, it's true, but it is a consolation; so I shall pass whole days and nights listening to his overhauling the priests, the doctors of law and the other pharisees! And our friend does well, for we must hear these pharisees. If you are brought before their tribunal for some trifle, they can only say, 'Quick to gaol or to the lash! thief! villain! firebrand of hell! son of Satan!' and other paternal remonstrances. By the nose of Ezekiel! do they think thus to ruin men? The cursed fools don't know, then, that many a horse, restive to the whip, will obey the voice. But our friend of Nazareth knows it well, when he said to us the other day, 'If your brother has sinned against you, take him back; if he repents, pardon him.' That's talking; for, by the ear of Melchisedeck! I am not as tender and benign as the pascal lamb. No, no: I have had time to harden my heart, my head and my skin. – Twenty years ago, my father drove me from his house for a youthful folly. Since then I have lived at loggerheads with the devil. I am just as difficult to bridle as a wild ass. And yet, on the faith of Banaias! by a single word of his gentle voice, our friend of Nazareth could make me go to the end of the world.'

'If Jesus cannot come,' said another drinker, 'he will send one of his disciples to inform us, and to preach to us good news in the name of his master.'

'For want of a cake of fine wheaten flour kneaded with honey, we eat barley bread,' said an old mendicant bent with age.

'The words of the disciples are good: that of the master is better.'

'Oh, yes!' observed another old mendicant; 'to us who have despaired since our birth, he gives eternal hope.'

'Jesus teaches us that we are not below our masters,' said a slave of gloomy appearance.

'Now, since we are as good as our masters, by what right do they keep us in slavery?'

'Is it because if there are a hundred masters on one side, we are ten thousand slaves on the other?' observed a second.

'Patience, patience! a day will come when we shall reckon our masters, and reckon ourselves afterwards; after which will be accomplished the words of Jesus, 'The first shall be last, and the last shall be first.' He has said to us artizans, who, by the burden of taxes and the avarice of sellers, are often in want of bread and garments, as also our wives and children, 'Be not disquieted; God, our father, provides apparel for the lilies of the valley, and food for the young sparrows: a day will come in which you shall want nothing.' Yes, for Jesus has also said this, 'Put neither gold, nor silver, nor money in your purse, nor sack for your journey, nor two coats, nor shoes, for he who works deserves to be maintained.'

'Here's the master! here's the master!' said several persons, placed near the door of the tavern; 'there's our friend!'

At these words there was a great movement in the tavern. Aurelia, not less curious than her slave Genevieve, mounted on a stool, the better to see the young man. Their expectation was disappointed; it was not yet him; it was Peter, one of his disciples.

'And Jesus!' they all demanded of him in one voice: 'where is he?'

'Will not the Nazarene come then?'

'Shall we not see our friend, the friend of the afflicted!'

'I, Judas and Simon, were accompanying him,' replied Peter, 'when at the door of the town, a poor woman seeing us pass, entreated the master to enter to see her sick daughter. He did so. He has kept Judas and Simon with him, and has sent me to you. Those who have need of him have only to wait here; he will soon come.'

The words of the disciple calmed the impatience of the crowd, and Banaias, the man with the long cutlass, said to Peter, 'Whilst talking of the master, talk to us of him: tell us the good news. Does the time approach when the gluttons, whose bellies grow fat in proportion as ours grow lean, will have nothing but the coals and brimstone of hell to fatten upon?'

'Yes, the time approaches!' said Peter mounting on a bench, 'yes, the time is coming, as comes the night of storm charged with the thunder and the lightning! Has not the Lord said, by the voice of his prophets, 'I will send my angel, who shall prepare the way before me?'

'Yes, yes,' cried several voices: 'yes, the prophets have announced it!'

'Who is this angel?' said Peter: 'who is this angel, unless Jesus our master, the Messiah, the only true Messiah.'

'Yes, ‘tis he!'

'He is the promised angel! he is the true Messiah!'

'And this angel having prepared the way, what says the Lord through his prophets?' continued Peter. 'And I will come near to you to judgment, and I will be a swift witness against the sorcerers, and against false swearers, and against those who oppress the workman in his wages, against those who oppress the widow, the orphan, and the stranger, without having fear of me.' Has not the Lord again said, 'There is a race whose teeth are thorns, and who use them as knives to devour those who have nothing on the earth, and who are poor amongst men?'

'If this race has knives for teeth,' said Banaias, placing his hand on his cutlass, 'we will bite with ours!'

'Oh, may the day come when those shall be judged who oppress the workman in his wages, and I will denounce to the vengeance of the Lord the banker Jonas!' said a workman.

'He made me work secretly on the panels of the Chamber of Festivals on the Sabbath days, and he withheld my wages on those days. I determined to complain. He threatened to denounce me to the high priest as a profaner of the holy days, and to have me thrown into prison!'

'And why did the banker Jonas unjustly withhold your salary?' continued Peter; 'because, as the prophet again says, 'Avarice is like the horse-leech; it hath two daughters, crying, 'give! give!'

'And these great bloodsuckers,' exclaimed Banaias, 'shall they not one day disgorge all the blood they have sucked from the poor workmen, widows and orphans?'

'Yes, yes,' replied the disciple, 'our prophets and Jesus have announced, 'For them shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth; but when once the tares, which stifle the grain, is separated, the wicked kings, the avaricious, and the usurers extirpated from the earth, all the juices of which they suck out, then shall come the day of happiness for all, justice for all; and this day arrived,' say the prophets, 'people shall no longer arm themselves against each other; their swords shall be turned into reaping hooks, their lances into spades; one nation shall no longer declare war against another nation; they shall no longer make war, but each shall sit beneath his own fig-tree or his vine, without fear of any one; the work of justice shall be the security, the peace and the happiness of every one. At that time, lastly, the wolf shall dwell with the lamb, the leopard shall lie down with the kid, and the lion and the sheep shall rest together, and a little child shall lead them all.'

This charming picture of universal peace and happiness appeared to make a deep impression on Peter's auditory. Many voices exclaimed:

'Oh! may these times come! for where is the use of people murdering people?'

'What bloodshed!'

'And who profits by it? The conquering Pharaohs! Men of blood, of battle, and of rapine.'

'Oh! may the time of happiness, justice and gentleness come; and, as the prophets say, 'a little child shall lead us all.'

'Yes, a little child will suffice; for we shall be gentle because we shall be happy,' said Banaias; 'whereas now we are so unhappy, so enraged, that a hundred giants would not be sufficient to restrain us.'

'And these times come,' continued Peter; 'all having a share in the good of the earth, fertilized by the labor of each, all being sure of living in peace and contentment, we shall no longer see the idle living on the fruits of another's labor. Has not the Lord said through the son of David, one of his elected:

"I hated all my labor which I have taken under the sun, because I should leave it to the man that should come after me.

"For there is a man who labors with wisdom, with science, and with industry, and he shall leave all he has acquired to a man who has given to it no labor: and who knows not if he will be prudent or foolish?

"Now, this is vanity and great affliction."

'You know,' added the apostle, 'the voice of the son of David is as sacred as justice. No, he who has not labored ought not to profit by the labor of another!'

'But suppose I have a child,' said a voice; 'suppose, by depriving myself of sleep, and a portion of my daily bread, I continue to spare something for him, that he might not know the miseries I have suffered, is it unjust, then?'

'Eh! who speaks to you of the present?' exclaimed Peter; 'who speaks to you of these times, in which the strong oppress the weak, the rich the poor, the unjust the just, the master the slave? In times of storm and tempest, each builds up as he can a shelter for him and his: this is but right. – But when the time promised by our prophets shall come, a divine time, when a benificent sun shall always blaze, when there shall be no more storms, when the birth of every child shall be welcomed by joyous songs, as a blessing from the Lord, instead of being lamented as an affliction, as at present; because, conceived in tears, man, in our time, lives and dies in tears; when, on the contrary, the child conceived in joy, shall live in joy; when labor, now crushing, shall be itself a joy, so shall the fruits of the promised land be abundant; each tranquil as to the prosperity of his children, shall no longer have to think for them, to lay up treasures for them, by depriving himself, and wasting away by over-fatigue. No, no: when Israel shall at length enjoy the kingdom of God, each shall labor for all, and all shall enjoy the labor of each.'

'Whereas now,' said the artizan, who had complained of the injustice of the banker Jonas, 'all labor for a few, these few labor for no one, and benefit from the labor of all.'

'But for those,' replied Peter, 'our master of Nazareth hath said: 'The son of man shall send his angels, who shall gather together and carry out of his kingdom all who are scandalous, and who commit iniquity; these shall be thrown into a fiery furnace, where there shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth.'

'And it will be justice,' said Oliba the courtezan; 'is it not they who force us to sell our bodies to escape the gnashing of teeth caused by hunger?'

'Is it not they who force mothers to make a traffic of their daughters rather than see them die of misery?' said another courtezan.

'Oh! when will the day of justice come?'

'It comes, it approaches,' replied Peter in a loud voice; 'for evil, and iniquity and violence are everywhere; not only here in Juda, but throughout the whole world, which is the Roman world. Oh! the woes of Israel are nothing; no, nothing in comparison to the woes that afflict the nations, her sisters! The whole universe groans and bleeds beneath the triple yoke of Roman ferocity, debauchery, and cupidity! From one end of the earth to the other, from Syria to oppressed Gaul, we hear nothing but the clank of chains and the groans of the slaves crushed with labor; unhappy amongst the unhappy! they sweat blood from every pore! More to be pitied than the wild beast dying in his den, or the beast of burthen dying on his litter; these slaves are tortured, are killed, or given at pleasure to the teeth of wild beasts! Do valiant peoples like the Gauls seek to break their chains, they are drowned in their own blood; and I, I speak the truth to you, in the name of Jesus, our master; yes, I tell you the truth, this cannot last.'

'No, no!' exclaimed several voices; 'no, this cannot endure!'

'Our master is grieved,' continued the disciple; 'oh! grieved to the death in thinking of the horrible miseries, the vengeances, and fearful reprisals which so many ages of oppression and iniquity will let loose upon the earth. The day before yesterday, at Bethlehem, our master said to us:

"When you hear of sedition and wars, be not alarmed; these things must arrive first, but their end will not come so soon."

'Listen,' said several voices, 'listen.'

"We shall see," added Jesus, "people rise against people, kingdom against kingdom; so shall men pine away with fear in the expectation of all that is to happen in the universe, for the virtues of heaven shall be shaken."

A sullen murmur of fear circulated through the crowd at these prophecies of Jesus of Nazareth recounted by Peter, and several voices exclaimed: —

'Mighty storms, then, will burst forth in heaven.'

'So much the better; these clouds of iniquity must burst, that the heavens may be cleared and the eternal sun be resplendent.'

'And if they gnash their teeth on earth before grinding them in eternal fire, these rich, these high priests, these crowned king Pharaoh's, they have brought it on themselves,' exclaimed Banaias; 'they have brought it on themselves.'

'Yes, yes, it's true.'

'Oh!' continued Banaias, 'this is not the first time the prophets have shouted in their ears!

'Amend your lives! be good! be just! be merciful! Look down at your feet instead of admiring yourselves in your pride! What! reptiles that you are, you reject from your plates the most delicate meats!

'You fall down gorged with wine; next your cups filled to the very brims; you ask yourselves, shall I put on to-day my furred robe with the gold embroidery, or my robe of plush, embroidered with silver? And your neighbor, shivering with cold beneath his rags, cannot simply taste from your cup, or lick up the crumbs of your feasts? By the entrails of Jeremiah, can it endure for any length of time?'

'Yes, yes,' cried several voices, 'this has lasted long enough – the most patient weary toward the end!'

'The quietest bullock finishes by turning against the spur!'

'And what spur is there like hunger?'

'Yes,' continued Peter, 'yes, this has endured long enough; yes, it has endured too long; therefore, Jesus, our master, hath said:

"The spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he hath anointed me to preach the gospel to the poor – he hath sent me to heal the broken hearted, to preach deliverance to the captives, and recovering of sight to the blind; to preach the acceptable year of the Lord, and the day when he shall avenge himself on his enemies."

These words of the Nazarene, quoted by Peter, excited a fresh enthusiasm, and Genevieve heard one of the two secret emissaries of the law and the high-priests say to his companion:

'This time the Nazarene shall not escape us, such words are really too seditious and outrageous!'

But a new and loud rumor was soon heard outside the tavern of the 'Wild Ass,' and there was but one cry repeated by all:

'‘Tis he, ‘tis he!'

'‘Tis our friend!'

'Here is Jesus, here he is!'

CHAPTER III

The crowd that filled the tavern, now learning the arrival of Jesus of Nazareth, urged and pressed each other to go and meet the young master; mothers, who held their little infants in their arms, endeavored to arrive the first near Jesus, the infirm, resuming their crutches, begged their neighbors to open a passage for them. Such was already the penetrating and charitable influence of the words of the son of Mary, that the strong moved aside to allow the mothers and the suffering to approach him.

Jane, Aurelia and her slave shared the general emotion; Genevieve especially, daughter, wife, and, perhaps, one day a mother of slaves, experienced an unusual beating of the heart at the sight of him who came, he said, to announce to the captives their deliverance, and set at liberty those who were crushed beneath their chains. At length Genevieve perceived him.

The son of Mary, the friend of little children, of poor mothers, of the suffering and of slaves, was habited like the other Israelites, his countrymen; he wore a robe of white cloth, secured round his waist by a leathern belt from which hung his purse or money-bag; a square mantle of blue depended from his shoulders.

His long chestnut hair, bright as new-coined gold, fell on each side of his pale face of an angelic sweetness; his lips and chin were half shaded by a slight beard, with golden reflections like his hair. His manner was cordial and familiar; he affectionately shook the hands of all that were tendered him.