SILANUS
It was said and it was written that, on this most propitious day, I should behold two marvels, not the lesser of which is to see thus promptly reunited two lovers who, according to love’s ancient custom, should have fled from each other the more obstinately the more they yearned to meet....
APPIUS
By Metrodorus, Hermachus and Zeno, there are other things on hand than the too-long-expected happiness of two lovers cutting short their quarrels!... Tell them at once what has happened; shout it to them, with all your throat and all your soul: death no longer exists! The graves are about to open, the spirits of the dead to show themselves; the gods are shaken, all the laws of life are overturned!... We have just admired an unequalled, unspeakable, unheard-of phenomenon, that has never been seen since light first rose upon the world, that will not be seen again before the death of the gods!...
SILANUS
The more extraordinary it seems to you, Appius, the less should it trouble the perfect composure of your soul, considering that a phenomenon that will not be seen again could not well shake the laws of the universe nor the stability of the gods!
VERUS
But what has happened? Appius seems to be the victim of a greater exaltation than usual; and you yourself, my worthy master, despite your even mind....
APPIUS
I will tell you what has happened: he has brought a dead man to life!...
MARY MAGDALENE
Who?...
SILANUS
The Nazarene, whose return I have come to announce to you, as I promised.
MARY MAGDALENE
He has come back? Since when? Where is he?... Have you seen him?...
SILANUS
To reply to your questions in order, lady, I will tell you that he returned this morning, that I saw him with my eyes and that, at this moment, he is with my neighbour Simon the Leper. I am surprised, however, that the absolute frenzy which has shaken the country for two or three hours has not yet spread as far as here. It is true that your dwelling is separated by a high hill and some olive-woods from the spot where the sepulchre lies hidden.
MARY MAGDALENE
I have heard nothing, learned nothing.... In spite of my orders, no one has told me.... But, after all, what has happened?... Appius is as pale as a ghost.... What is it? What has he said, what has he done?...
APPIUS
He has done a thing which no man, no god, has done before him; a thing which I would not have believed if ten thousand witnesses had come to swear it in the name of the immortals, but in which I believe as firmly as I am bound to believe in my own existence, having seen it with my eyes, as I see you now, and almost touched it with my hands, as I touch this vase. He said, “Rise, come forth and walk.” And the dead man rose, came forth and began to walk among us!
VERUS
It was apparently a dead man whose health left nothing to be wished for?...
SILANUS
No, I am convinced that it was really a dead man.
APPIUS
It was a real, a terrible dead man!... If not, my senses can no longer declare that the sun shines in the blue or that human flesh decays!... He had been four days in the grave!...
MARY MAGDALENE
But who? How? Where?... And the Nazarene?... I want to know.... Speak for him, Silanus: he has not yet recovered his senses....
SILANUS
Here, in a few words, is what happened. Nevertheless, it is right that I should tell you that I do not entirely share Appius’ amazement. It should astonish us no more to see a man return to life than to see a child come to life or an old man leave it. (MAGDALENE makes a movement of impatience.) But I understand your impatience. I spoke to you the other day of my neighbour Simon. He lives in the little house that touches my property, with his wife, his sister-in-law and his brother-in-law, named Lazarus. This Lazarus, whom I saw only two or three times, for he was often away from home, had been ailing for some weeks and died four days ago....
APPIUS
Four days, do you understand?... That is what nobody would dare deny....
SILANUS
Nor does any one think of doing so, Appius. They were a very united family; and the sorrow of those poor people was great. From my terrace, I could hear the lamentations of the women. According to the custom of the Jews, Lazarus was buried on the night that followed after his death. They laid him in a new grave, dug in the rocks that form the other side of that hill, and closed the grave with an enormous stone. This morning, suddenly, the rumour spread that the Nazarene had returned and that he was going to restore to life the dead man, who was his friend. Appius, who was at my house, persuaded me to go down with him; and we followed the crowd into the valley of the tombs.
MARY MAGDALENE
I knew that he was to return to-day; but why did you not send word to me at once, as you promised?...
SILANUS
It seemed to me that the spectacle at hand was not one of those on which the eyes of a woman in the hour of her beauty love to rest. Moreover, there was cause to fear lest your arrival among the excited crowd should cause a repetition of the violence of the other day. For an enormous crowd, silent, but quivering like a swarm of bees, escorted the Nazarene, in front of whom walked the two sisters of Lazarus. We, Appius and I, climbed on to a block of stone hidden behind some bushes, whence we could see and hear everything without arousing the suspicion of the Jews. They showed the grave to the Nazarene, who stopped and lowered his head.
APPIUS
He wept. They whispered in the crowd, “Behold how he loved him!” But nobody dared approach. They formed a circle at a distance, as though round a dread being....
SILANUS
“Take ye away the stone,” said the Nazarene; and two men stepped toward the grave.
APPIUS
You forget that, at that moment, one of the sisters of the dead man, alarmed and all in tears, seized the Nazarene by the arm and said, “Lord, by this time he stinketh; for he hath been dead four days.” The Nazarene answered—I have not forgotten a single one of his words—“Said I not unto thee that, if thou wouldest believe, thou shouldest see the glory of God? Take ye away the stone.”
MARY MAGDALENE
Who is this sister of Lazarus? Is she Simon’s wife?
SILANUS
No, it is the other one: her name is Mary and, when the Nazarene stays at Bethany, she never leaves him.
MARY MAGDALENE
Is she young?
SILANUS
She is younger than Simon’s wife.
MARY MAGDALENE
Have you seen her? Do you know her?...
SILANUS
I have spoken to her more than once. But to return to the stone, which was enormous, flat and fastened into the walls of the cave: two men attacked it with levers. It resisted at first and then, suddenly, fell down all of a piece....
APPIUS
We were quite close, hanging aslant over the cave. By all the gods who from heaven rule the earth and men, I swear that, at that moment, I felt the terrible breath of the dead man strike me in the face!...
MARY MAGDALENE
Did you see the dead man?...
APPIUS
As I see you now, lady!...
VERUS
I do not understand how you can seriously interest yourselves in these things which happen in an incongruous, mad world, where all is witchcraft, coarse illusions and barbarous lies....
APPIUS
By Hades and Persephone, what my senses perceived was no illusion, I assure you!... We nearly fell from our rock!... The corpse was there, in the greedy light that devoured the cave, lying like a stiff and shapeless statue, closely bound in grave-clothes, the face covered with a napkin. The crowd, heaped up in a semicircle, irresistibly attracted and repelled, leaned forward, stretched its thousand necks, without daring to approach. The Nazarene stood alone, in front. He raised his hand, spoke a few words which I did not catch and then, addressing the corpse in a voice whose pent-up force I shall never forget, he cried, “Lazarus, come forth!”
MARY MAGDALENE
Did he come forth?...
APPIUS
We heard only the sound of the wind moving the garments of the multitude and the buzzing of the flies that swarmed into the grave. All eyes were so firmly fixed upon the corpse that I saw, so to speak, their motionless beams, as one sees the sunbeams in a dark room.... Suddenly, it became plain, terrifying, superhuman! The dead man, obeying the order, slowly bent in two; then, snapping the bandages that fastened his legs, he stood up erect, like a stone, all white, with his arms bound and his head veiled. With small, almost impossible steps, guided by the light, he came forth from the grave. The affrighted crowd gradually fell back, without being able to turn away its gaze. “Loose him and let him go,” said the Nazarene. And the two sisters of the dead man, releasing themselves from the human hedge, rushed to their brother.
MARY MAGDALENE
And he?...
APPIUS
He staggered, he stumbled at every step....
MARY MAGDALENE
But the Nazarene?...
APPIUS
He went away without a word and withdrew into Simon’s house.
VERUS
And the dead man, how did he go?...
APPIUS
The two sisters, wild-eyed, mechanically, blindly fumbled and cut the napkin and the grave-clothes; then, supporting the dead man and helping him to walk, they led him away to the same house. The crowd dared not follow them save with their eyes. No one uttered a word; even the two women did not yet speak to the dead man.
MARY MAGDALENE
And the Nazarene? Has he been seen again?
SILANUS
He has not left Simon’s house. The swaying multitude is waiting for him in the orchard and along the roads; for, after the first long minutes of stupor, reaction set in and a general alacrity followed....
APPIUS
Which was as extraordinary as the miracle itself! First, a confused and almost dumb gladness, made up of whispers that seek and feel for one another, passed through the crowd. Then, as though the truth had suddenly burst forth under the skies, an unspeakable gaiety seized upon the mass. The whispers became cries that were not recognizable. The women, the children and especially the older men exulted frantically. It was as though they were trampling on death, which a god had just conquered and laid low, for the first time since man came into existence. At this moment, an inconceivable and dangerous exaltation still prevails in all the region round about the tombs; and, by Hercules, though we have escaped unscathed, I would not advise my worst enemy to risk the Roman toga and arms there!
VERUS
Is that all?...
APPIUS
What more would you have?...
VERUS
I should like to know what all this proves.
APPIUS
It proves that this man who has conquered death, which hitherto had conquered the world, is greater than we and our gods. It therefore behoves us to hear what he has to tell us and to conform our lives to it.
SILANUS
I will conform mine to it, Appius, if what he teaches is better than what I have learned. By awaking a dead man, in the depth of his grave, he shows us that he possesses a power greater than that of our masters, but not a greater wisdom. Let us await everything with an even mind. It is not difficult, even for a child, to discern that which, in men’s words, augments or decreases the love of virtue. If he can convince me that I have acted wrong until to-day, I will amend, for I seek only the truth. But, if all the dead who people these valleys were to rise from their graves to bear witness, in his name, to a truth less high than that which I know, I would not believe them. Whether the dead sleep or wake, I will not give them a thought unless they teach me to make a better use of my life....
MARY MAGDALENE (STARTING)
Listen!...
VERUS
What is it?...
APPIUS
I hear stones rolling....
VERUS
It is like the murmur of a crowd....
MARY MAGDALENE
He is coming!...
APPIUS (going to the first columns of the vestibule)
From here we overlook the wall of the first court.... I see them!...
MARY MAGDALENE (pale and staggering, takes a few steps toward the back of the Atrium and gazes into the distance)
Yes....
APPIUS
They are wrapped in a cloud of dust.... There are two or three thousand of them crowding toward the entrance.... I think it is those who were at the grave....
VERUS
They would not dare!...
MARY MAGDALENE
Verus!...
VERUS
Fear nothing, Magdalene: this time, I alone will defend you.
APPIUS
They are following, at a distance, a man clad in white, who is entering the court....
VERUS
But what is the janitor of the first courtyard doing?... Will he not stop him?...
APPIUS
Yes.... He is coming now.... What is he doing?... One would think he was afraid!... He suddenly stops and lets him pass without a word....
VERUS
And the others follow him.... They are entering the second court.... The impudence of those Jews is really incredible!... In Rome, even during the Saturnalia, we should not allow the crowd to push its way like that.... What are the slaves doing?...
MARY MAGDALENE
Is it he?...
SILANUS
Who?...
MARY MAGDALENE
The Nazarene....
SILANUS
I think not.... It is not his walk.... I believe rather that it is....
APPIUS
There he is, in the plane-tree avenue!
SILANUS
He is coming straight in our direction....
VERUS
He is even taking the shortest way. He is coming up the steps under the boxwood arbour.... He seems at home.... Fortunately, the slaves are running from every side to bar his entrance to the vestibule....
MARY MAGDALENE
Hush, I entreat you!...
VERUS
What is the matter?...
APPIUS
He is coming nearer; he is terribly pale....
SILANUS
I believe it is....
MARY MAGDALENE
Who?...
SILANUS
The other one.... The one whom he brought forth from the....
MARY MAGDALENE
Lazarus?...
SILANUS
Yes, I recognize him....
VERUS
What does he want with us?... Ghosts do not walk like that, in broad daylight.... He is horrible!...
MARY MAGDALENE
Oh, hush, hush!...
SILANUS
Here he is.…