THE ATHEISTS. 239 



lives, dreading the dark Nothingness, dreading the dis- 

 persal of our elements into cold unconscious space. As 

 drops in the ocean of water, as atoms in the ocean of 

 air, as sparks in the ocean of fire within the earth, 

 our minds do their appointed work and serve to build 

 \ip the strength and beauty of the one great Human 

 Mind which grows from century to century, from age 

 to age, and is perhaps itself a mere molecule within 

 some higher mind. 



Soon it was whispered that there was in Rome a 

 secret society which worshipped an unknown God. 

 Its members wore no garlands on their brows ; they 

 never entered the temples ; they were governed by 

 laws which strange and fearful oaths bound them ever 

 to obey ; their speech was not as the speech of ordi- 

 nary men ; they buried instead of burning the bodies 

 of the dead ; they married, they educated their 

 children after a manner of their own. The politicians 

 who regarded the Established Church as essential to 

 the safety of the State became alarmed. Secret 

 societies were forbidden by the law, and here was a 

 societjr in which the tutelary gods of Rome were de- 

 nounced as rebels and usurpers. The Christians, it is 

 true, preached passive obedience and the divine right 

 of kings ; but they proclaimed that all men were 

 equal before God, a dangerous doctrine in a com- 

 munity where more than half the men were slaves. 

 The idle and superstitious lazzaroni did not love the 

 gods, but they believed in them ; and they feared lest 

 the " atheists," as they called the Christians, would 

 provoke the vengeance of the whole divine federation 

 against the city, and that all would be involved in the 

 common ruin. Soon there came a time when every 

 public calamity, an epidemic, a fire, a famine, or a 



