A Struggle For Rome Volume Ii Part 28

"Cethegus sought me earlier than you," said the commander-in-chief, after a pause, "and he has been beforehand with you also--in accusations. You stand before me gravely accused, Silverius. Defend yourself before you attack others."

"I defend myself!" cried the Pope. "Who can be accuser or judge of the successor of St. Peter?"

"The judge am I; in the place of your master, the Emperor."

"And the accuser?" asked Silverius.

Cethegus half turned to Belisarius, and said:

"I am the accuser! I accuse Silverius, the Bishop of Rome, of the crime of lese-majesty and treachery to the Roman Empire. I will at once prove my accusation. Silverius intends to wrest the government of the city of Rome and a great part of Italy from the Emperor Justinian, and, ridiculous to say, to form a State of the Church in the fatherland of the Caesars. And he has already taken the first step in the execution of this--shall I say madness or crime? Here is a contract with his signature, which he concluded with Theodahad, the last of the barbarian princes. Thereby the King sells, for the sum of one thousand pounds'

weight of gold, the government of the city and district of Rome, and of thirty miles of country round, in case of Silverius becoming Bishop of Rome, to St. Peter and his successors. All the prerogatives of royalty are enumerated--jurisdiction, legislation, administration, customs, taxes, and even military power. According to the date, this doc.u.ment is three months old. Therefore, at the very moment that the pious archdeacon, behind Theodahad's back, was summoning the Emperor's army, he also, behind the Emperor's back, signed a contract which would rob the latter of all the fruits of his efforts, and insure the Pope under all circ.u.mstances. I leave it to the representative of the Emperor to decide in what manner such wisdom should be appreciated. By the chosen of the Lord the morals of the serpent are looked upon as high wisdom; amongst us laymen such acts are----"

"The most shameful treachery!" thundered Belisarius, as he sprang from his seat and took the doc.u.ment from the Prefect.

"Look here, priest, your name! Can you deny it?"

The impression made upon all present by this accusation and proof was overpowering.

Suspicion and indignation, mixed with eager expectation of the Pope's defence, was written upon each man's countenance; and Scaevola, the short-sighted republican, was the most taken by surprise at this revelation of the ambitious plan of his dangerous colleague. He hoped that Silverius would victoriously refute the calumny. The position of the Pope was indeed highly dangerous; the accusation appeared to be undeniable, and the angry countenance of Belisarius would have intimidated many a bolder heart.

But Silverius showed that he wag no unworthy adversary of the Prefect and the hero of Byzantium.

He had not lost his presence of mind for a moment; only when Cethegus had taken the doc.u.ment from the folds of his dress, had he closed his eyes as if in pain. But he met the thundering voice and flas.h.i.+ng eyes of Belisarius with a composed and steady countenance.

He felt that he must now fight for the ideal of his life, and this feeling nerved him; not a muscle of his face twitched.

"How long will you keep me waiting?" asked Belisarius angrily.

"Until you are capable and worthy of listening to me. You are possessed by Urchitophel, the demon of anger."

"Speak! Defend yourself!" cried Belisarius, reseating himself.

"The accusation of this G.o.dless man," began Silverius, "only a.s.serts, sooner than I had intended, a right of the Holy Church, which I did not wish to insist upon during these unquiet times. It is true that I concluded this contract with the barbarian King."

A movement of indignation escaped the Byzantines present.

"Not from love of worldly power, not to acquire any new privileges, did I treat with the King of the Goths, at that time master of this country. No! the saints be my witness! I did it merely because it was my duty to prevent the lapse of an ancient right of the Church."

"An ancient right?" asked Belisarius impatiently.

"An ancient right!" repeated Silverius, "which the Church has neglected to a.s.sert until now. Her enemies oblige her to declare it at this moment. Know then, representative of the Emperor! hear it, generals and soldiers! that which the Church demanded of Theodahad has been her right for two centuries; the Goth only confirmed it. In the same place whence the Prefect, with sacrilegious hand, took this doc.u.ment, he might also have found that which originally established our right. The pious Emperor Constantinus--who, first of all the predecessors of Justinian, received the teaching of the Gospel--moved by the prayers of his blessed mother, Helena, and after having trampled his enemies under foot by the help of the saints, and particularly by that of St. Peter, did, in thankful acknowledgment of such help, and to prove to all the world that crown and sword should bow before the Cross of Christ, bestow the city of Rome and its district, with all the neighbouring towns and their boundaries, with jurisdiction and police, taxes and duties, and all the royal prerogatives of earthly government, upon St.

Peter and his successors for all time, so that his Church might have a secular foundation for the furtherance of her secular tasks. This donation is conferred in all form by a legal doc.u.ment; the curse of Gehenna is laid upon all who dispute it. And I ask the Emperor Justinian, in the name of the Trinity, whether he will acknowledge this legal act of his predecessor, the blessed Emperor Constantinus, or if, in worldly avarice, he will overthrow it, and thereby call down upon his head the curse of Gehenna and eternal d.a.m.nation?"

This speech of the Bishop of Rome, spoken with all the power of ecclesiastical dignity and all the art of worldly rhetoric, was of irresistible effect.

Belisarius, Procopius, and the generals, who, a moment before, would willingly have pa.s.sed an angry judgment upon the treacherous priest, now felt as if they themselves were judged. The heart of Italy seemed to be irrecoverably lost to the Emperor, and delivered into the power of the Church.

An anxious silence overcame the lately so masterful Byzantines, and the priest stood triumphantly as victor in their midst.

At last Belisarius, who wished to avoid a dispute and the shame of defeat, said:

"Prefect of Rome, what have you to reply?"

With a scarcely visible quiver of mockery upon his fine lips, Cethegus bowed and began:

"The accused refers to a doc.u.ment. I believe I could embarra.s.s him greatly if I denied its existence, and demanded the immediate production of the original. However, I will not meet the man who calls himself the head of Christendom, with the wiles of a spiteful advocate.

I admit that the doc.u.ment exists."

Belisarius made a movement of helpless vexation.

"Still more! I have saved the Holy Father the trouble of producing it, which would have been very difficult for him to do, and have brought the doc.u.ment itself with my own sacrilegious hands."

He drew forth a yellow old parchment from his bosom, and looked smilingly now at the lines thereon, now at the Pope, and now at Belisarius, evidently enjoying their suspense.

"Yes, still more! I have examined the doc.u.ment for many days with hostile eyes, and, with the help of still greater jurists than I can boast of being--such as my young friend, Salvius Julia.n.u.s--have tried to invalidate every letter. In vain. Even the penetration of my learned and honourable friend, Scaevola, could have found no flaw. All legal forms, all the clauses in the act of donation, are sharply defined with indisputable accuracy; and indeed I should like to have been acquainted with the protonotary of Emperor Constantinus, for he must have been a jurist of the first rank."

He paused--his eyes rested sarcastically upon the countenance of Silverius, who wiped the sweat off his brow.

"Therefore," asked Belisarius, in great excitement, "the doc.u.ment is formally quite correct, and can be proved?"

"Yes, certainly," sighed Cethegus, "the act of donation is faultlessly drawn up. It is only a pity that----"

"Well!" interrupted Belisarius.

"It is only a pity that it is false."

A general cry arose. Belisarius and Antonina sprang from their seats; all present pressed nearer to Cethegus. Silverius alone fell back a step.

"False!" cried Belisarius in a tone that sounded like a shout of joy.

"Prefect--friend--can you prove that?"

"I should otherwise have taken care not to a.s.sert it. The parchment upon which the act of donation is written shows all the signs of great age: worm-eaten, cracked, spots of every kind--everything that one can expect from such an ancient doc.u.ment, so that, sometimes, it is difficult to decipher the letters. Notwithstanding, the doc.u.ment only _appears_ to be old; with as much art as many women employ to give themselves the appearance of youth does it ape the sanct.i.ty of great age. It is real parchment from the old and still existing parchment manufactory at Byzantium, founded by Constantinus."

"Keep to the matter!" cried Belisarius.

"But it is not known to every one--and it appears, unfortunately for him, to have escaped the notice of the Bishop--that these parchments, on the lower edge to the left, are always marked with the stamp of the year of their manufacture, by the names of the then consuls, in, certainly, almost invisible characters. Now pay attention, general. The doc.u.ment pretends, as it says in the text, to have been prepared in the sixteenth year of the reign of Constantinus, the same year that he closed the heathen temples, as the pious doc.u.ment observes, and a year after the naming of Constantinopolis as the capital city; and it rightly names the right consuls of that year, Dalmatius and Xenophilos.

Now it can only be explained by a miracle--but in this case it would be a miracle _against_ the Church--that, in that year, therefore in the year three hundred and thirty-five after the birth of Christ, it was already known who would be consul in the year after the death of Emperor Justinus and King Theodoric; for look, here on the lower edge the stamp says--the writer had not noticed it--it is really very difficult to make out, unless one holds the parchment against the lights so--do you see, Belisarius?--and had blindly painted the cross upon it; but I, with my--what did he call it?--sacrilegious, but clever, hand have wiped it off; do you see? there stand stamped the words, 'VI. Indiction: Justinia.n.u.s Augustus, sole consul in the first year of his reign.'"

Silverius staggered, and was obliged to support himself by the chair which had been placed for him.

"The parchment of the doc.u.ment," continued Cethegus, "upon which the protonotary of Emperor Constantinus had written down the act of donation two hundred years ago, has therefore been taken from the ribs of an a.s.s only a year ago at Byzantium! Confess, O general, that the reign of the conceivable ends here and the supernatural begins; that here a miracle has happened; and revere the mysterious ways of Heaven."

He gave the doc.u.ment to Belisarius.

"This is also a famous piece of history, holy and profane, which we are now experiencing," said Procopius aside.