Chapter XXX.

But what a spectacle is that fast-approaching advent31    [Kaye, p. 20. He doubtless looked for a speedy appearance of the Lord: and note the apparent expectation of a New Jerusalem, on earth, before the Consummation and Judgment.] of our Lord, now owned by all, now highly exalted, now a triumphant One! What that exultation of the angelic hosts! What the glory of the rising saints! What the kingdom of the just thereafter! What the city New Jerusalem!32    [This New Jerusalem gives Bp. Kaye (p. 55) “decisive proof” of Montanism, especially as compared with the Third Book against Marcion. I cannot see it, here.] Yes, and there are other sights: that last day of judgment, with its everlasting issues; that day unlooked for by the nations, the theme of their derision, when the world hoary with age, and all its many products, shall be consumed in one great flame! How vast a spectacle then bursts upon the eye! What there excites my admiration? what my derision?  Which sight gives me joy? which rouses me to exultation?—as I see so many illustrious monarchs, whose reception into the heavens was publicly announced, groaning now in the lowest darkness with great Jove himself, and those, too, who bore witness of their exultation; governors of provinces, too, who persecuted the Christian name, in fires more fierce than those with which in the days of their pride they raged against the followers of Christ. What world’s wise men besides, the very philosophers, in fact, who taught their followers that God had no concern in ought that is sublunary, and were wont to assure them that either they had no souls, or that they would never return to the bodies which at death they had left, now covered with shame before the poor deluded ones, as one fire consumes them! Poets also, trembling not before the judgment-seat of Rhadamanthus or Minos, but of the unexpected Christ! I shall have a better opportunity then of hearing the tragedians, louder-voiced in their own calamity; of viewing the play-actors, much more “dissolute” in the dissolving flame; of looking upon the charioteer, all glowing in his chariot of fire; of beholding the wrestlers, not in their gymnasia, but tossing in the fiery billows; unless even then I shall not care to attend to such ministers of sin, in my eager wish rather to fix a gaze insatiable on those whose fury vented itself against the Lord. “This,” I shall say, “this is that carpenter’s or hireling’s son, that Sabbath-breaker, that Samaritan and devil-possessed! This is He whom you purchased from Judas! This is He whom you struck with reed and fist, whom you contemptuously spat upon, to whom you gave gall and vinegar to drink! This is He whom His disciples secretly stole away, that it might be said He had risen again, or the gardener abstracted, that his lettuces might come to no harm from the crowds of visitants!” What quæstor or priest in his munificence will bestow on you the favour of seeing and exulting in such things as these? And yet even now we in a measure have them by faith in the picturings of imagination. But what are the things which eye has not seen, ear has not heard, and which have not so much as dimly dawned upon the human heart? Whatever they are, they are nobler, I believe, than circus, and both theatres,33    Viz., the theatre and amphitheatre. [This concluding chapter, which Gibbon delights to censure, because its fervid rhetoric so fearfully depicts the punishments of Christ’s enemies, “appears to Dr. Neander to contain a beautiful specimen of lively faith and Christian confidence.” See Kaye, p. xxix.] and every race-course.

CAPUT XXX.

Quale autem spectaculum in proximo est adventus Domini jam indubitati, jam superbi, jam triumphantis! Quae illa exsultatio angelorum, quae gloria resurgentium sanctorum! quale regnum exinde justorum! qualis civitas nova Hierusalem ! At enim supersunt alia spectacula, ille ultimus et perpetuus judicii dies, ille nationibus insperatus, ille derisus, 0660C cum tanta saeculi vetustas, et tot ejus nativitates uno igni haurientur. Quae tunc spectaculi latitudo ! quid admirer? quid rideam? ubi gaudeam, ubi exsultem, spectans tot ac tantos reges , qui in 0661A coelum recepti nuntiabantur, cum ipso Jove et ipsis suis testibus in imis tenebris congemiscentes? item praesides, persecutores dominici nominis, saevioribus, quam ipsi contra christianos saevierunt, flammis insultantibus, liquescentes? praeterea sapientes illos philosophos coram discipulis suis una conflagrantibus erubescentes, quibus nihil ad Deum pertinere suadebant, quibus animas aut nullas, aut non in pristina corpora redituras affirmabant, etiam poetas non ad Rhadamanti, nec ad Minois, sed ad inopinati Christi tribunal palpitantes? Tunc magis tragoedi audiendi, magis scilicet vocales in sua propria calamitate. Tunc histriones cognoscendi solutiores multo per ignem: tunc spectandus auriga in 0661B flammea rota totus rubens : tunc xystici contemplandi non in gymnasiis , sed in igne jaculati, nisi quod nec tunc quidem illos velim visos, ut qui 0662A malim ad eos potius conspectum insatiabilem conferre, qui in Dominum desaevierunt. Hic est ille (dicam) fabri aut quaestuariae filius , sabbati destructor, Samarites et daemonium habens. Hic est quem a Juda redemistis, hic est ille arundine et colaphis diverberatus, sputamentis dedecoratus, felle et aceto potatus. Hic est quem clam discentes subripuerunt, ut resurrexisse dicatur, vel hortulanus detraxit , ne lactucae suae frequentia commeantium laederentur . Ut talia spectes, ut talibus exsultes, quis tibi praetor aut consul, aut quaestor, aut sacerdos de sua liberalitate praestabit? et tamen haec jam quodammodo habemus per fidem spiritu imaginante repraesentata. Caeterum qualia illa sunt quae nec oculus 0662B vidit, nec auris audivit, nec in cor hominis ascenderunt? Credo, circo et utraque cavea et omni stadio gratiora.