We were silent for a while. “Damis, you were recounting the conversation between our Master and the prisoners.”
“Oh, yes. He touched the arm of the thief, saying: ‘While we live, my friend, we are all prisoners, for the soul is bound to the body and suffers much.’
“ ‘Ah,’ remarked the thief, ‘but we are not all cast into jail. Some of us live in palaces.’
“ ‘He who builds a house,’ replied our master, ‘builds one more prison for himself. Cities are only common prisons and the earth is bound to the ocean as by a chain.’
“ ‘Ah, but life even in prison is very sweet,’ replied the murderer, who is to be quartered tomorrow.
“ ‘True freedom,’ replied our master, ‘consists in loving neither life nor death overmuch.’ The prisoner wept, paying no attention to his words.”
“The people marvel at the miracles of the master but they cannot grasp his thoughts.”
“The people clamor for miracles, not for truth.”
“A philosophy degenerates in proportion to the number of those who embrace it.”
“Still– —”
“I know, my friend. You would like to go among all the nations of the earth and preach the Master’s gospel.”
“I feel in me a great passion…a need to wander, Damis.”
They remained silent. I watched Damis. He was fair, and his traits were delicate. If his nose had not been perfectly Hellenic, his resemblance to John would have been startling. The sun receded until only one thin strip still remained on the threshold. In a few moments, it also slipped silently off.
Apollonius entered. He was tall and thin. His full snow-white beard, hung leisurely upon his chest. His eyes were large and black. He wore a white silk robe and a silver belt of exquisite design. Upon his left wrist he had a wide bracelet studded with a large emerald. He bowed and bade me welcome.
“Master! Master!” some voices shouted at the door.
Apollonius turned, unperturbed. “What is it, my friends?”
“Master!” An elderly woman in mourning, knelt before him. A young man remained standing on the threshold, his head bent.
“Master! Do a miracle!”
“There are no miracles, woman.”
“Master! Bring my daughter back to life. Only a little while ago she was talking to us, laughing, jesting, when suddenly she placed her hand upon her heart…and fell. We threw water upon her, called the physician, prayed to the gods!… She is dead, master! She is dead!”
“Is she not happier now?”
“No, master. She was to be married in a week. There is the young groom.”
“Master, give life again to my bride, I beg you! We loved each other as no one ever loved.”
The master smiled. “Do you like to be awakened rudely from a profound sleep, young man?”
“Awaken her, awaken her, Master!”
The woman embraced his legs. The young man knelt at the door, weeping.
“Give me back my daughter, Master!” she sobbed.
Apollonius meditated, his eyes half-closed, his left hand protruding from his belt. “Where is your daughter, woman?” he asked at last.
“She is in the cart, outside, Master,” the young man answered.
“Bring her in!”
The corpse was brought in.
Apollonius rubbed the girl’s forehead gently and pressed her limp hands.
The girl’s eyelids trembled; her chest heaved slightly.
“Master! Master!” the mother exclaimed.
Apollonius raised his forefinger, demanding silence. He continued rubbing the girl’s forehead and hands, whispering, “Awake!”
The girl opened her eyes, and. sighed deeply.
The people who had meanwhile gathered at the door, fell upon their faces.
The mother and the bridegroom knelt at the sides of the resurrected girl, mumbling words of endearment. Apollonius stretched out his right hand. His voice, as he spoke, was like the cool waters of a brook, tumbling softly over stones whose edges have been smoothed and rounded.
“Death and Life,” he remarked, addressing his pupils, “are two facets of the same jewel—sleeping—waking. What reason is there, then, to seek either Death or Life? …Seek rather freedom from both!”
The girl sobbed. Her mother and her lover helped her rise. She hid her face in her hands. The people dispersed. No one remained, save a dog, who wagged his tail lustily for a few moments, and ran away. Apollonius was walking silently, his hands clasped behind him. Damis walked on his right. The master looked at me.
“Master,” I said, “how can such a miracle be accomplished? How can you resurrect the dead?”
“To recall a person from death into life is no more miraculous than to arouse him from sleep. Dying and living are equally mysterious and equally simple,” Apollonius replied.
“But you are thwarting Nature, master. All living things must die.”
“Are you sure?” Apollonius responded, looking strangely at me. His eyes, like the eyes of Jesus, seemed to penetrate the core of my being. He added, “Life and death depend upon a slight readjustment-balance. The skillful merchant may lift or lower either side, by adding or subtracting a tiny weight.”
Apollonius had replied to my unspoken question.
My mysterious fate presented itself to me in a different angle, much simpler, much less marvelous. It was almost commonplace. I felt for the time being, neither sad nor joyous. I was neither a man in plight nor a man specially favored. Life and death were too much akin.
Apollonius said, guessing my thought, “Life and death, my son, are one. They are different beats of the same rhythm.”
We reentered.
“Master,” I asked, “can a man find his soul in the space of a single life?”
“It is not a question of finding, my friend, but of seeking.”
“Why seek, then, that which cannot be found?”
“That which can be found…is it worth the seeking?”
XIII: DAMIS, APOLLONIUS AND JESUS—THE DOUBLE BLOSSOM OF PASSION—“CARTAPHILUS DO YOU WANT TO DIE?”—“SEEK—AND PERHAPS—YOU SHALL FIND.”
BEYOND my name, the Master asked me nothing. Our minds met where the accidents of flesh were meaningless.
Damis was the favorite disciple. Apollonius considered him as a son. But he was as dear to me as he was to the Master. Hand in hand we walked for hours, discoursing on the remarks of Apollonius, trying to grasp his subtleties. Frequently, I would call him “John.” He would smile.
“Why do you call me John, Cartaphilus?”
“I can think of no name half as beautiful for you as John.” I preferred not to tell him my story—for the time being, at least. Damis had learnt from his master the art of discretion.
“Perhaps something of our ancient prejudices still linger in our souls,” Apollonius once said. “Perhaps we might be inconsiderate enough to judge a man by his race or ancestry. It is better to know nothing of him, except as he appears to us in manner and speech.”
Apollonius was fond of the full moon. “The sun is too strong for our eyes; the earth is beneath our feet, and we cannot see it; the moon allows us to understand the meaning of the cosmic harmony. She does not attempt to convince us of her glory by either scorching or blinding us.”
I looked at Apollonius. He squatted on his doorstep as radiant as the moon and as unperturbed.
“Master, have you ever heard of Jesus?”
“Yes, in our youth—we were of exactly the same age—we were both the disciples of the same master in Thibet.”
“In Thibet?” I asked surprised.
“Yes.”
This, then, accounted for the long absence of Jesus from Jerusalem. He never spoke about it even to his intimate friends. ‘A god,’ I thought, ‘must be mysterious.’ Addressing Apollonius, I said,—”Master, do you know that Jesus has become a god?”
Apollonius smiled. “He was always ambitious. Has he many followers, Cartaphilus?”