CHAPTER XIV
Adventures in the person of a monk.

"Fortune now placed me in the character of a younger brother of a
good house, and I was in my youth sent to school; but learning

was now at so low an ebb, that my master himself could hardly
construe a sentence of Latin; and as for Greek, he could not read

it. With very little knowledge therefore, and with altogether as
little virtue, I was set apart for the church, and at the proper

age commenced monk. I lived many years retired in a cell, a life
very agreeable to the gloominess of my temper, which was much

inclined to despise the world; that is, in other words, to envy
all men of superior fortune and qualifications, and in general to

hate and detest the human species. Notwithstanding which, I
could, on proper occasions, submit to flatter the vilest fellow

in nature, which I did one Stephen, an eunuch, a favorite of the
emperor Justinian II, one of the wickedest wretches whom perhaps

the world ever saw. I not only wrote a panegyric on this man,
but I commended him as a pattern to all others in my sermons; by

which means I so greatly ingratiated myself with him, that he
introduced me to the emperor's presence, where I prevailed so far

by the same methods, that I was shortly taken from my cell, and
preferred to a place at court. I was no sooner established in

the favor of Justinian than I prompted him to all kind of
cruelty. As I was of a sour morose temper, and hated nothing

more than the symptoms of happiness appearing in any countenance,
I represented all kind of diversion and amusement as the most

horrid sins. I inveighed against cheerfulness as levity, and
encouraged nothing but gravity, or, to confess the truth to you,

hypocrisy. The unhappyemperor followed my advice, and incensed
the people by such repeated barbarities, that he was at last

deposed by them and banished.
"I now retired again to my cell (for historians mistake in saying

I was put to death), where I remained safe from the danger of the
irritated mob, whom I cursed in my own heart as much as they

could curse me.
"Justinian, after three years of his banishment, returned to

Constantinople in disguise, and paid me a visit. I at first
affected not to know him, and without the least compunction of

gratitude for his former favors, intended not to receive him,
till a thought immediately suggested itself to me how I might

convert him to my advantage, I pretended to recollect him; and,
blaming the shortness of my memory and badness of my eyes, I

sprung forward and embraced him with great affection.
"My design was to betray him to Apsimar, who, I doubted not,

would generouslyreward such a service. I therefore very
earnestly requested him to spend the whole evening with me; to

which he consented. I formed an excuse for leaving him a few
minutes, and ran away to the palace to acquaint Apsimar with the

guest whom I had then in my cell. He presently ordered a guard
to go with me and seize him; but, whether the length of my stay

gave him any suspicion, or whether he changed his purpose after
my departure, I know not; for at my return we found he had given

us the slip; nor could we with the most diligent search discover
him.

"Apsimar, being disappointed of his prey, now raged at me; at
first denouncing the most dreadfulvengeance if I did not produce

the deposed monarch. However, by soothing his passion when at
the highest, and afterwards by canting and flattery, I made a

shift to escape his fury.
"When Justinian was restored I very confidently" target="_blank" title="ad.有信心地；自信地">confidently went to wish him

joy of his restoration: but it seems he had unfortunately heard
of my treachery, so that he at first received me coldly, and

afterwards upbraided me openly with what I had done. I
persevered stoutly in denying it, as I knew no evidence could be

produced against me; till, finding him irreconcilable, I betook
myself to reviling him in my sermons, and on every other

occasion, as an enemy to the church and good men, and as an
infidel, a heretic, an atheist, a heathen, and an Arian. This I

did immediately on his return, and before he gave those flagrant
proofs of his inhumanity which afterwards sufficiently verified

all I had said.
"Luckily I died on the same day when a great number of those

forces which Justinian had sent against the Thracian Bosphorus,
and who had executed such unheard-of cruelties there, perished.

As every one of these was cast into the bottomless pit, Minos was
so tired with condemnation, that he proclaimed that all present

who had not been concerned in that bloodyexpedition might, if
they pleased, return to the other world. I took him at his word,

and, presently turning about, began my journey."
CHAPTER XV

Julian passes into the character of a fiddler.
"Rome was now the seat of my nativity. My mother was an African,

a woman of no great beauty, but a favorite, I suppose from her
piety, of pope Gregory II. Who was my father I know not, but I

believe no very considerable man; for after the death of that
pope, who was, out of his religion, a very good friend of my

mother, we fell into great distress, and were at length reduced
to walk the streets of Rome; nor had either of us any other

support but a fiddle, on which I played with pretty tolerable
skill; for, as my genius turned naturally to music, so I had been

in my youth very early instructed at the expense of the good
pope. This afforded us but a very poor livelihood: for, though

I had often a numerous crowd of hearers, few ever thought
themselves obliged to contribute the smallest pittance to the

poor starving wretch who had given them pleasure. Nay, some of
the graver sort, after an hour's attention to my music, have gone

away shaking their heads, and crying it was a shame such
vagabonds were suffered to stay in the city.

"To say the truth, I am confident the fiddle would not have kept
us alive had we entirely depended on the generosity of my

hearers. My mother therefore was forced to use her own industry;
and while I was soothing the ears of the crowd, she applied to

their pockets, and that generally with such good success that we
now began to enjoy a very comfortable subsistence; and indeed,

had we had the least prudence or forecast, might have soon
acquired enough to enable us to quit this dangerous and

dishonorable way of life: but I know not what is the reason that
money got with labor and safety is constantly preserved, while

the produce of danger and ease is commonly spent as easily, and
often as wickedly, as acquired. Thus we proportioned our

expenses rather by what we had than what we wanted or even
desired; and on obtaining a considerable booty we have even

forced nature into the most profligate extravagance, and have
been wicked without inclination.

"We carried on this method of thievery for a long time without
detection: but, as Fortune generally leaves persons of

extraordinary ingenuity in the lurch at last, so did she us; for
my poor mother was taken in the fact, and, together with myself,

as her accomplice, hurried before a magistrate.
"Luckily for us, the person who was to be our judge was the

greatest lover of music in the whole city, and had often sent for
me to play to him, for which, as he had given me very small

rewards, perhaps his gratitude now moved him: but, whatever was
his motive, he browbeat the informers against us, and treated

their evidence with so little favor, that their mouths were soon
stopped, and we dismissed with honor; acquitted, I should rather

have it said, for we were not suffered to depart till I had given
the judge several tunes on the fiddle.

"We escaped the better on this occasion because the person robbed
happened to be a poet; which gave the judge, who was a facetious

person, many opportunities of jesting. He said poets and
musicians should agree together, seeing they had married sisters;

which he afterwards explained to be the sister arts. And when
the piece of gold was produced he burst into a loud laugh, and

said it must be the golden age, when poets had gold in their
pockets, and in that age there could be no robbers. He made many

more jests of the same kind, but a small taste will suffice.
"It is a common saying that men should take warning by any signal

delivery; but I cannot approve the justice of it; for to me it
seems that the acquittal of a guilty person should rather inspire

him with confidence, and it had this effect on us: for we now
laughed at the law, and despised its punishments, which we found