Homo Sum | Page 9

the most difficult of
attainments. It requires sacrifice. And you? How long is it now since
you last showed your father a cheerful countenance?"

"I cannot be a hypocrite."
"Nor need you, but you must love. Certainly it is not by what his hand
does but by what his heart cheerfully offers, and by what he forces
himself to give up that a man proves his love."
"And is it no sacrifice that I waste all my youth here?" asked the boy.
Paulus stepped back from him a little way, shook his matted head, and
said, "Is that it? You are thinking of Alexandria! Ay! no doubt life runs
away much quicker there than on our solitary mountain. You do not
fancy the tawny shepherd girl, but perhaps some pretty pink and white
Greek maiden down there has looked into your eyes?"
"Let me alone about the women," answered Hermas, with genuine
annoyance. "There are other things to look at there."
The youth's eyes sparkled as he spoke, and Paulus asked, not without
interest, "Indeed?"
"You know Alexandria better than I," answered Hermas evasively.
"You were born there, and they say you had been a rich young man."
"Do they say so?" said Paulus. "Perhaps they are right; but you must
know that I am glad that nothing any longer belongs to me of all the
vanities that I possessed, and I thank my Saviour that I can now turn
my back on the turmoil of men. What was it that seemed to you so
particularly tempting in all that whirl?"
Hermas hesitated. He feared to speak, and yet something urged and
drove him to say out all that was stirring his soul. If any one of all those
grave men who despised the world and among whom he had grown up,
could ever understand him, he knew well that it would be Paulus;
Paulus whose rough beard he had pulled when he was little, on whose
shoulders he had often sat, and who had proved to him a thousand
times how truly he loved him. It is true the Alexandrian was the
severest of them all, but he was harsh only to himself. Hermas must
once for all unburden his heart, and with sudden decision he asked the

anchorite:
"Did you often visit the baths?"
"Often? I only wonder that I did not melt away and fall to pieces in the
warm water like a wheaten loaf."
"Why do you laugh at that which makes men beautiful?" cried Hermas
hastily. "Why may Christians even visit the baths in Alexandria, while
we up here, you and my father and all anchorites, only use water to
quench our thirst? You compel me to live like one of you, and I do not
like being a dirty beast."
"None can see us but the Most High," answered Paulus, "and for him
we cleanse and beautify our souls."
"But the Lord gave us our body too," interrupted Hermas. "It is written
that man is the image of God. And we! I appeared to myself as
repulsive as a hideous ape when at the great baths by the Gate of the
Sun I saw the youths and men with beautifully arranged and scented
hair and smooth limbs that shone with cleanliness and purification. And
as they went past, and I looked at my mangy sheepfell, and thought of
my wild mane and my arms and feet, which are no worse formed or
weaker than theirs were, I turned hot and cold, and I felt as if some
bitter drink were choking me. I should have liked to howl out with
shame and envy and vexation. I will not be like a monster!"
Hermas ground his teeth as he spoke the last words, and Paulus looked
uneasily at him as he went on: "My body is God's as much as my soul
is, and what is allowed to the Christians in the city--"
"That we nevertheless may not do," Paulus interrupted gravely. "He
who has once devoted himself to Heaven must detach himself wholly
from the charm of life, and break one tie after another that binds him to
the dust. I too once upon a time have anointed this body, and smoothed
this rough hair, and rejoiced sincerely over my mirror; but I say to you,
Hermas--and, by my dear Saviour, I say it only because I feel it, deep in
my heart I feel it--to pray is better than to bathe, and I, a poor wretch,

have been favored with hours in which my spirit has struggled free, and
has been permitted to share as an honored guest in the festal joys of
Heaven!"
While he spoke, his wide open eyes had turned towards Heaven and
had acquired a wondrous brightness. For a short time the