stians have reached at no
time fifty thousand. As for the conjecture touching the number of those
who secretly embrace this injurious superstition, I hold it utterly
baseless. It may serve a dying cause to repeat such statements, but they
accord not with obvious fact.'

'Suspect me not, Varus,' hastily rejoined the agitated Publius, 'of
setting forth such statements with the purpose to advance the cause of
the Christians. I take no part in this matter. Thou knowest that I am a
Roman of the old stamp. Not a Roman in my street is more diligently
attentive to the services of the temple than I. I simply say again, what
I hear as news of my customers. The story which one rehearses, I retail
to another.'

'I thank the gods it is so,' replied the man of power.

'During these few words, I had stood partly concealed by a slender
marble pillar. I now turned, and the usual greetings passed with the
Prefect.

'Ah! Piso! I knew not with certainty my hearer. Perhaps from
you'--smiling as he spoke--'we may learn the truth. Rome speaks loudly
of your late desertion of the religion and worship of your fathers, and
union with the Galileans. I should say, I hoped the report ill founded,
had I not heard it from quarters too authentic to permit a doubt.'

'You have heard rightly, Varus,' I rejoined. 'After searching through
all antiquity after truth, I congratulate myself upon having at last
discovered it, and where I least expected, in a Jew. And the good which
I have found for myself, I am glad to know is enjoyed by so many more of
my fellow-citizens. I should not hesitate to confirm the statement made
by Publius, from whatever authority he may have derived it, rather than
that which has been made by yourself. I have bestowed attention not only
upon the arguments which support Christianity, but upon the actual
condition of the Christian community, here and throughout the empire.
It is prosperous at this hour, beyond all former example. If Pliny could
complain, even in his day, of the desertion of the temples of the gods,
what may we now suppose to be the relative numbers of the two great
parties? Only, Varus, allow the rescript of Gallienus to continue in
force, which merely releases us from oppressions, and we shall see in
what a fair trial of strength between the two religions will issue.'

'That dull profligate and parricide,' replied Varus, 'not content with
killing himself with his vices, and his father by connivance, must need