by Karel Čapek
“I am not,” replied Pilate. “I believe. I believe passionately that truth exists and that we recognize it. It would be madness to think that truth is there only for us not to recognize it. We recognize it, yes, but which of us? I, or you, or perhaps all of us? I believe that each of us has his share of it, both he who says yes and he who says no. If those two joined together and understood each other, the whole of truth would be known. Of course, yes and no can’t join together, but people always can; there is more truth in people than in words. I have more understanding of people than of their truths, but there is faith even in that, Joseph of Arimathea, and it is necessary to sustain this faith with ardor and exaltation. I believe. Absolutely and unquestionably, I believe. But what is truth?”
December 1920
The Emperor Diocletian
This story would surely be more engaging if its heroine were Diocletian’s daughter or some other youthful, maidenly creature, but alas, for reasons of historical accuracy, it is Diocletian’s sister, a stately, respectable matron. In the emperor’s opinion, she was hysterical and highstrung, and the old tyrant was, to a certain extent, afraid of her. Consequently, when she was announced, he cut short an audience with the governor of Cyrenaica (to whom he made plain, in strong words, his displeasure) and went all the way over to the door to meet her.
“Well, what is it, Antonia?” he boomed jovially. “What would you like? Do you have some more fire victims? Or am I to do something about cruelty to animals in the Roman circus? Or do you want to introduce moral education in the Legions? Out with it, quickly, and do sit down.”
But Antonia remained standing. “Diocletian,” she began, almost ceremoniously, “there is something I must say to you.”
“Aha,” the emperor said with resignation, and he scratched the back of his neck. “But, by Jupiter, I’ve got so much to do today! Couldn’t it wait until some other time?”
“Diocletian,” his sister continued stubbornly, “I’ve come to tell you that you must stop this persecution of the Christians.”
“I beg your pardon,” muttered the old emperor, “but why now, all of a sudden, after something like three hundred years — ” He looked carefully at the agitated matron; she seemed rather pathetic with her rigid eyes and her stiffly clasped hands, which were contorted with gout. “Oh, all right,” he said hurriedly, “we can have a talk about it, but first be a good girl and sit down.”
Antonia reluctantly obeyed and sat down on the edge of a chair; in so doing, she lost some of her militant demeanor, seeming somewhat confused and diminished in size. The corners of her mouth softened and tears came to her eyes. “These people are so holy, Diocletian,” she burst out, “and they have such a beautiful faith — — I know that if you truly knew them — — Diocletian, you must get to know them! You’d see . . . you’d have an entirely different opinion of them — ”
“But I don’t have a bad opinion of them at all,” Diocletian protested mildly. “I know very well that what’s said about them is gossip and slander. The augurs invent all those tales about them — you know, professional jealousy and that sort of thing. I’ve had inquiries made, and I hear that these Christians are otherwise quite decent people. Very well behaved and self-sacrificing.”
“Then why do you persecute them so?”
Diocletian raised his eyebrows slightly. “Why? Please, what a question! It’s always been done, hasn’t it? And yet there’s no indication that there are any fewer of them. All this talk about persecution is terribly exaggerated. Of course, now and then we have to punish some of them as an example — ”
“Why?” Antonia repeated.
“For political reasons,” replied the old emperor. “Look, my dear, I could cite you a whole range of arguments in favor. For instance, it’s what the people want. Pro primo, it diverts their attention from other things. Pro secundo, it gives them the secure sense that they’re ruled by a strong hand. And pro tertio, it’s more or less a national custom here. Let me tell you, no sensible, responsible statesman tampers with matters of custom unless it’s absolutely necessary. It only stirs up feelings of uncertainty and — hm — disruptiveness of one kind or another. My dear girl, I’ve already introduced more innovations during my rule than anyone before me. But they were necessary. If something is not necessary, I will not do it.”
“But justice, Diocletian,” Antonia said softly, “justice is necessary. All I ask of you is justice.”
Diocletian shrugged his shoulders. “The persecution of Christians is just, because it is in accordance with the law. I know what you’re going to say: that I could abolish the law. I could, but I’m not going to. My dear Toni, remember, minima non curat praetor; I can’t concern myself with such trifles. Kindly keep in mind that I bear the entire administration of the empire on my shoulders, and I have overhauled it from the ground up, my girl. I’ve reframed the constitution, I’ve reformed the Senate, centralized governance, reorganized the entire bureaucracy, divided the provinces along new lines, revised their administrative codes — all these are things which had to be done, in the interest of the state. You’re a woman and you don’t understand this, but the gravest, most critical tasks of a statesman are administrative. Tell me: what do these Christians matter compared with — with — well, compared with the establishment of imperial financial controls? It’s nonsense.”
“But Diocletian,” sighed Antonia, “you could so easily arrange — ”
“I could. And then again I couldn’t,” the emperor said decisively. “I have restructured the entire empire — and the people have hardly noticed it. Because I have left them their customs. When I give them a few Christians, they have the impression that everything is just like it’s always been and they don’t cause any trouble. Dear heart, a statesman must know exactly how far he dares go with his reforms. That’s how it is.”
“Then it’s only,” Antonia said bitterly, “it’s only so you won’t have any trouble from the local layabouts and rabble-rousers — ”
Diocletian grimaced. “If you like, yes. But I can tell you this, I’ve read books by these Christians of yours and I’ve given them some thought.”
“And what have you found in them that was bad?” Antonia demanded fiercely.
“Bad?” the emperor replied thoughtfully. “On the contrary, they make some very good points. Love and things like that — contempt for worldly vanity, for instance — altogether quite beautiful ideals, and if I weren’t emperor — As a matter of fact, Toni, some things in their teachings appeal to me very much indeed; if only I had more time — and could think about my soul — ” The old emperor banged his hands on the table in irritation. “But it’s absurd. Politically, it’s absolutely impossible. It could never become a reality. However would you go about creating a Kingdom of God? How would it be administered? By love? By the word of God? I understand something about people, don’t I? Politically, the Christian doctrine is so immature and impracticable that — that — that it’s downright criminal.”
“But the Christians don’t have anything to do with politics,” Antonia maintained passionately. “There’s not even a single word about politics in their holy books!”
“For a practical statesman,” replied Diocletian, “everything is politics. Everything has political significance. Every idea must be appraised politically to see how it might be carried out, what might be accomplished with it, where it might lead. Day and night, night and day, I’ve racked my brains to figure out how the Christian doctrine could be implemented politically, and I see that it’s impossible. I tell you, a Christian state couldn’t hold its own for a month. Now you tell me: could you organize an army in accordance with Christian beliefs? Could you collect taxes in accordance with Christian beliefs? Could there be any slaves in a Christian society? I know what I’m talking about, Toni: it wouldn’t be possible to govern for a year, not even for a month, on Christian principles. That’s why Christianity will never take root here. It can be the faith of working people and slaves, but neve
r, never can it be the state religion. That’s out of the question. You see, those ideas of theirs about private property, about one’s neighbors, about the renunciation of violence and all the rest of it: they’re beautiful, but in practical terms they’re impossible. In real life, Toni, they won’t work. So tell me, what use are they?”
“They may be impossible,” whispered Antonia, “but that still doesn’t make them criminal.”
“Criminal,” said the emperor, “is whatever harms the state. And Christianity would undermine the sovereign power of the state. That won’t do. The supreme power, dear heart, must be in this world, not the next. If I say that a Christian state is not possible in principle, it follows as a logical conclusion that the state cannot tolerate Christianity. A responsible statesman must take a sober stand against unsound and unrealizable dreams. In any case, they’re merely the illusions of madmen and slaves — ” Antonia rose to her feet, breathing heavily. “Diocletian, I must tell you: I have become a Christian.”
“No, have you really?” the emperor remarked, mildly astonished. “Well, why not? I still say there’s something to it, and provided it remains your own personal affair — — You mustn’t think, Toni, that I have no sympathy for such things. I myself would like to be a kindly soul once again; I would love it, Toni, if I could cast aside my imperial office and politics and everything, and hang it all up on a hook — — that is, once I’ve finished the reform of the imperial government and that sort of rubbish. And then, then I’d go off somewhere in the countryside — — and study Plato — Christ — Marcus Aurelius — and that Paul of theirs, or whatever his name is — But you must excuse me now, I have some political business to attend to.”
May 15, 1932
Attila
Early that morning a messenger brought news from the forest’s edge that a great billow of flame had blazed all night to the southeast. Once again a bone-chilling drizzle was falling; the sodden firewood refused to ignite; three of those hiding out in the ravine had died of a bloody flux. Because there was nothing left to eat, two men set off towards the herdsmen on the other side of the forest. Late that afternoon they returned, soaking wet and utterly exhausted; they managed only to report that things were bad: the sheep were dying of convulsions and the cows were bloated. The herdsmen had fallen upon the men with cudgels and knives when one of them wanted to bring back his own heifer, which he had placed in their care before fleeing into the forest.
“Let us pray,” said the parish priest, who was suffering from dysentery. “The Lord is merciful.”
“Kriste eleison,” the dispirited people began mumbling in response. At that moment a screeching quarrel broke out among the women over a tattered scrap of woolen cloth.
“What’s the matter now, you damned old hags,” roared the mayor, and he strode off to lash the women with his whip. The tension from their embarrassing sense of impotence thus relieved, the men began to feel like men again.
“Those flatlanders won’t get this far,” declared a shaggy-bearded man. “They’ll never make it into these narrow ravines, with all this tangled scrub — People say their horses are small and scrawny as goats.”
“What I say is,” argued a short, irritable man, “we should’ve stayed in town. Given what we paid for those fortifications... For that kind of money those walls should be pretty goddamn strong, am I right?”
“Shows what you know,” jeered the town clerk, coughing heavily. “For that kind of money they could have made those walls out of cake. Go bite off a piece for yourself — plenty of people got fat off that scheme, friend; maybe there’s something left for you.”
The mayor gave a cautionary snort; clearly this kind of talk was not to his liking.
“What I say is,” the short, irritable fellow persisted, “men on horses against fortifications like that . . . Keep them from getting into the town, and that’s all there is to it. We’d be home high and dry.”
“Then go back to town and crawl into bed,” the shaggy-bearded man advised him.
“What could I do if I’m the only one there?” protested the irritable man. “I’m only saying we should have stayed in town and defended ourselves . . . I have a right to say we made a mistake, don’t I? Those walls cost us a bundle, and now we hear they’re worthless! I ask you!”
“Be that as it may,” said the priest, “we must trust in God’s help. After all, people, this Attila is a mere heathen — ”
“The scourge of God,” rose the voice of a monk who was shaking with ague. “The chastisement of God.”
The men fell silent in resentment; this feverish monk would only go on preaching at them, and he didn’t even belong to their parish. What do we have our own parish priest for? thought the men. He’s one of us, he puts up with us and doesn’t scold us too much for our sins. As if we sinned that much, the men thought dejectedly.
The rain stopped momentarily, but heavy drops continued to stream from the treetops. Lord, Lord, Lord, moaned the priest, plagued by his sickness.
Towards evening the sentries dragged in a wretched youth, who said he was a refugee from enemy-occupied territory to the east.
The mayor puffed out his chest and began to interrogate the refugee; he was obviously of the opinion that an official matter of this sort must be handled with the utmost severity. Yes, said the youth, the Huns are already something like eleven miles from here and slowly advancing. They’d occupied his town, he’d seen them, no, not Attila — he’d seen some other general, though, a fat one. Had they burned the town? No, they hadn’t burned it; this fat general, he’d issued a proclamation that nothing would happen to the civilian inhabitants, but that the town was to provide food, fodder and things like that. And that the inhabitants mustn’t make any hostile moves against the Huns, otherwise they’d be subject to the severest of reprisals.
“But those heathens slaughter even the women and children,” the shaggy-bearded man insisted in no uncertain tones.
No, they didn’t, or anyway not that he’d heard of, said the youth. Not in his town. He himself had hidden under the straw, but when his mother told him that the Huns — or so people said — were going to carry off the young men to tend their flocks and herds, he ran away that night. This, apparently, was all he knew.
The men were not satisfied. “But everybody knows they cut off the hands of babies,” declared one of them, “and what they do to women is too horrible to talk about.”
“I don’t know about anything like that,” said the youth, almost as if he were apologizing. At least it wasn’t that bad in his town. And how many of these Huns were there? People said maybe two hundred, there wouldn’t be any more than that.
“You’re lying!” shouted the shaggy-bearded man. “Why, everybody knows there’s more than five hundred thousand of them. And wherever they go, they massacre everybody and burn everything down.”
“They lock people up in barns and burn them alive,” said one of the others.
“And they toss infants on the ends of their spears,” a third man called out angrily.
“And roast them over a fire,” added a forth, snuffling through a bad cold. “Accursed heathens!”
“Lord, Lord,” groaned the priest. “Lord have mercy on us!”
“You’re an odd one,” the shaggy-bearded man said to the youth. “You seem pretty suspicious to me. How can you say you’ve seen the Huns when you were hiding in the straw?”
“Mother saw them,” stammered the youth, “and she brought me food up in the hayloft — ”
“You’re lying!” bellowed the shaggy-bearded man. “We know all about the Huns: everywhere they go, they eat up everything in sight, just like locusts. There’s not a leaf left on a tree once they’ve come through, you understand?”
“God in heaven, God in heaven,” the irritable townsman began wailing uncontrollably. “Why, why is this happening? Whose fault is it? Who sent them here? After paying all that money for troops . . . God in heaven!”
“Who sent them here?” th
e town clerk echoed derisively. “Don’t you know that? Ask His Majesty the Byzantine Emperor who got those yellow monkeys to come here! Everybody knows by now who’s paying these tribes to move from land to land! It’s called high-level politics, see?”
The mayor gave a pompous snort. “Nonsense. It’s something different altogether. Like as not, those Huns were dropping dead from hunger back home . . . lazy trash . . . don’t know how to work . . . no civilization at all . . . and what they mean to do is gorge themselves like pigs. That’s why they came here . . . so they can grab . . . well, the fruits of our labor. Just steal, split the plunder . . . and then move on, the worthless scum!”
“They are illiterate heathens,” said the priest. “A savage and unenlightened people. The Lord is merely testing us; let us pray and give thanks, and all will be well again.”
“The scourge of God,” the feverish monk began to preach excitedly. “God is punishing you for your sins, God is leading the Huns, and He’ll wipe you from the face of the earth like the Sodomites. For your fornication and blasphemy, for the hardness and ungodliness of your hearts, for your greed and gluttony, for your sinful wealth and your worship of Mammon, God has cast you off and delivered you into the hands of your enemies!”
The mayor’s voice rattled as he threatened: “Watch your mouth, Domine; you’re not in church now, understand? They’ve come to stuff their gullets. They’re nothing but starving, draggletail vermin . . . ”
“It’s politics,” insisted the town clerk. “Byzantium has its fingers in this.”
At which a man whose skin was stained black, a pewterer by trade, burst out passionately: “No, not Byzantium! It’s the tinkers who did this, and nobody else! Three years ago this roving tinker came to town, and he had a small, scrawny horse, just like the Huns.”
“And what of it?” asked the mayor.
“Why, it stands to reason,” cried the black-smudged man. “Tinkers come through beforehand so they can look everything over in advance . . . they’re spies . . . only tinkers plot like that! Who knows where they come from? And what they really want? What . . . what was the point, when there was already a pewterer living right in town? Just to spoil things for our trade . . . and spy. They never once went to church . . . they practiced witchcraft . . . put the evil eye on our sheep and cattle . . . dragged whores along behind them . . . Oh, it’s the tinkers, all right!”