e school of Ain Warka,
I will do that. "No, I cannot have you go to Ain Warka, to corrupt the
minds of those who are studying science, and to contradict my opinions."
But I will instruct in grammar. "No, the youths of the college are now
attending to _moral_ science." Well, I only beg you will let me know
what I am to do, and if you have no employment for me, I wish to return
home. The bishop here broke in upon the conversation, saying, I will not
suffer you to go back among my flock to deceive them, and turn them away
to heresy. Will you then debar me, said I, from my home? If so, let me
know where I shall go, what I shall do? The bishop then said to the
patriarch, "Indeed I will not suffer this man to go abroad among my
people, for he is even attempting to make heretics of us also." Yes
replied the patriarch, it will not do after this, to afford him a
residence in any part of the land. The bishop then turned to me, in the
bitterest anger and rage, reviling me and saying, "If you go among my
people again, I will send and take your life, though it be in the bosom
of your own house." I said, "Well, what would you have me to do, and
what will you do with me? If you wish to kill me, or shut me up in
prison, or give me up to the government, or whatever it may be, I wish
to know it." "You must wait here till spring or summer," said the
patriarch, "and then we shall see how you are." I answered him in the
words of that christian who was given by his judge ten days to
deliberate whether he would worship an image: "_Consider the time
already past, and do what you please._"

I asked the bishop his reasons for wishing to kill me. What evil had I
done? He was filled with high and bitter indignation, saying, "What,
miscreant! Shall we let you go forth to corrupt my flock for me? Is not
what has passed enough?" I rose and said to them, "God at least is with
me," and left them. The patriarch sent after me his nephew, requesting
me, in soothing words to return, and saying that he would do what I
wished.

But when I contemplated the hardness of heart manifested by the bishop,
I could not restrain myself from reproving him, hoping that he would
grow mild. I said, therefore, "Our Lord Jesus Christ said, _out of the
abundance of the heart the mouth speaketh_, and that Satan, who was in
his heart, wished to kill me, for Satan was a murderer from the
beginning." I told him, moreover, that he was not a true disciple of
Christ. And when I h