{"collection":"scripture-revelation","full_text_available":true,"graph_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/api/page/gutenberg_67806/graph","html_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/page/gutenberg_67806","id":"gutenberg_67806","license":"Public Domain (US)","rights_basis":"gutenberg_metadata_copyright_false","source":"gutenberg","source_url":"https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/67806","summary":null,"tags":["Category: Plays/Films/Dramas","Category: Religion/Spirituality","Mary Magdalene, Saint -- Drama","Nobel Prizes in Literature"],"text":"Transcriber's note: Italic font is indicated by _underscores_.\n\nCharacters' names within italicised stage directions are intended\nto be read as upright font.\n\n\n\n\n  MARY MAGDALENE\n\n\n  _A Play in Three Acts_\n\n  BY\n  MAURICE MAETERLINCK\n\n  _Translated by_\n  ALEXANDER TEIXEIRA DE MATTOS\n\n  [Illustration]\n\n\n  NEW YORK\n  DODD, MEAD AND COMPANY\n  1910\n\n\n\n\n  COPYRIGHT, 1910,\n  BY MAURICE MAETERLINCK\n\n\n\n\n  AUTHOR\u2019S NOTE\n\n\nI have borrowed from Mr. Paul Heyse\u2019s drama, _Maria von Magdala_, the\nidea of two situations in my play, namely, at the end of the first\nact, the intervention of Christ, who stops the crowd raging against\nMary Magdalene with these words, spoken behind the scenes: \u201cHe that\nis without sin among you, let him cast the first stone;\u201d and, in the\nthird, the dilemma in which the great sinner finds herself, of saving\nor destroying the Son of God, according as she consents or refuses to\ngive herself to a Roman.\n\nBefore setting to work, I asked the venerable German poet, whom I\nhold in the highest esteem, for his permission to develop those two\nsituations, which, so to speak, were merely sketched in his play, with\nits incomparably richer plot than mine; and I offered to recognize his\nrights in whatever manner he thought proper. My respectful request\nwas answered with a refusal, none too courteous, I regret to say, and\nalmost threatening.\n\nFrom that moment, I was bound to consider that the words from the\nGospel, quoted above, are common property; and that the dilemma of\nwhich I speak is one of those which occur pretty frequently in dramatic\nliterature. It seemed to me the more lawful to make use of it inasmuch\nas I had happened to imagine it in the fourth act of _Joyzelle_, in the\nsame year in which _Maria von Magdala_ was published and before I was\nable to become acquainted with that play.\n\nI will add that, excepting the principle of these two situations, in\nall that concerns the subject of the play, the conduct of the action,\nthe persons, the characters, the evolution and the atmosphere, our two\nworks have absolutely nothing in common: not a phrase, not a cue of the\none will be found in the other.\n\nHaving said this, I am happy to express to the aged master my gratitude\nfor an intellectual benefit which is none the less great for being\ninvoluntary.\n\n  MAURICE MAETERLINCK.\n\n\n\n\n  ACT I\n\n(_The gardens of ANN\u0152US SILANUS at Bethany. A Roman terrace. A\n  quincunx. Marble benches, porticoes, statues. In the centre, a\n  basin with a fountain. Arbours. Orange-trees and laurel-trees\n  in stone vases. A balustrade on the right and left, overlooking\n  the valley. A balustrade at the back, open at the middle to give\n  access to a walk lined with plane-trees and statues and ending in\n  a thick hedge of laurels which closes the garden._)\n\n\n  SCENE I\n\n  (_ENTER ANN\u0152US SILANUS and LUCIUS VERUS_)\n\n  SILANUS\n\nHere is the terrace, the glory of my little domain: it reminds me of\nmy terrace at Pr\u00e6neste, which was the crown of my desires. Here are my\norange-trees, my cypresses and my oleanders. Here is the fish-pond,\nthe portico with the images of the gods: one of them is a statue of\nMinerva, discovered at Antioch. (_Pointing to the landscape on the\nleft._) And here you have the incomparable view over the valley, where\nspring already reigns. We hang midway in space. Admire the anemones\nstreaming down the slopes of Bethany. It is as though the earth were\nablaze beneath the olive-trees. Here I relish in peace the advantages\nof old age, which knows how to take pleasure in the past; for youth\nnarrows the enjoyment of good things, by considering only those which\nare present....\n\n  VERUS\n\nAt last! Here are trees and water and grass!... I had lost the memory\nof them since my arrival in this stony desert which men call Jud\u00e6a....\nBut how comes it, O my good master, that you have taken up your abode\nnear that dull and barren city, where the soil is abominable, where the\nmen are ugly, churlish, crafty and mischievous, unclean and barbarous?\n\n  SILANUS\n\nAs you know, I came with the Procurator Valerius Gratus to C\u00e6sarea;\nthen I returned to Rome, where you were for some time my faithful\nand favourite pupil. But soon I became ashamed of teaching a wisdom\nwhose certainties became more doubtful to my mind as the assurance\nwherewith I proclaimed them increased. I was brought back here, to\nthis barbarous Jud\u00e6a, by the strangest curiosity. During my first\nsojourn, I had begun to study the sacred books of the Jews. They are\ncrude and bloodthirsty; but they also contain beautiful myths and the\nearly efforts of an uncivilized but, at times, singular wisdom. They\nhave not yet wearied me.\n\n  VERUS\n\nYes, our friend Appius, whom I met at Antioch, told me of your studies\nand of your sudden and inordinate passion for old Jewish books....\n\n  SILANUS\n\nHe will be here shortly....\n\n  VERUS\n\nWho? Appius?... Is he at Jerusalem?\n\n  SILANUS\n\nDid you not know?... But how long have you yourself been in this\ncountry?... In your letter of two days since, you did not tell me....\n\n  VERUS\n\nNearly a week; and I wished to give my first leisure to you. I left\nAntioch to go to Jerusalem with the Procurator Pontius Pilate. He fears\ndisturbances and will probably need the help of my old legionaries....\n\n  SILANUS\n\nThe spacious, ample Appius, whose words are as rambling as his habits\nand bring together the most distant friends, spoke to me of you, even\nas he spoke to you of me. He told me that, when he had the good\nfortune to meet you at Antioch, you seemed a prey to some great unhappy\nlove....\n\n  VERUS\n\nWhich was that?\n\n  SILANUS\n\nWhat! Can the handsomest of military tribunes, in his magnificent\narray, know more than one love that is not happy?... It concerned a\nwoman of these regions, a Galilean, if I be not mistaken....\n\n  VERUS\n\nMary of Magdala?... Did he speak to you of her?... Where is she?... I\ndid not see her again; she left Antioch suddenly; and I lost trace of\nher....\n\n  SILANUS\n\nBut why did she not listen to you?... Appius declared to me that she\nsets the men of this country, it is true, at naught, but shows herself\nnot at all inexorable to the Roman knights....\n\n  VERUS\n\nIt is one of those riddles of womankind which our duties as soldiers\nhardly leave us time to solve. She did not appear to dislike me;\nat least, the dislike which she affected was not without a harsh\ngentleness.... But there was mingled with it a certain incomprehensible\ndread, which made her timidly avoid me.... Besides, she seemed lately\nto have suffered a great sorrow, for which she has already, I hear,\nconsoled herself more than once....\n\n  SILANUS\n\nI do not know; and all this does not seem to me so very discouraging.\nAfter all, why afflict one\u2019s self with what the gods created for\npleasure?... Appius, therefore, wished me to cure you, by my wise\ncounsels, of an ill that saddens you needlessly. But, first, do you\nlove her as much as Appius declares? His talk is often extravagant and\nheedless....\n\n  VERUS\n\nI desired her, I still desire her, as I have never desired any woman....\n\n  SILANUS\n\nYou speak wisely in not separating, from the outset, desire and love.\nBesides, I understand. She is certainly the loveliest of all the many\nwomen whom I have admired in my life.\n\n  VERUS\n\nWhat!... You have seen her?... Is she at Jerusalem then?\n\n  SILANUS\n\nShe is even nearer to us than Jerusalem, which is fifteen stadia from\nBethany.... (_Drawing him a little to the right_). Come to this portico\nand look over there, at the bottom of the valley.... What do you see?...\n\n  VERUS\n\nI see olive-trees, paths, tombs.... Then I see the pediments of palaces\nor temples, columns, cypresses.... One might think one\u2019s self in the\noutskirts of Rome.... But I do not perceive....\n\n  SILANUS\n\nIt was Herod the Great, a sort of raving lunatic, but given to\nbuilding, who filled this valley with splendid palaces more Roman than\nthose of Rome herself.... But look half-way down the hill, to the left\nof those three tall cypresses, three or four stadia from here.... Do\nyou espy one of the most beautiful marble villas?...\n\n  VERUS\n\nThe villa with the wide white steps leading to a semicircular colonnade\nadorned with statues?...\n\n  SILANUS\n\nThat is where she has retired....\n\n  VERUS\n\nMary Magdalene?... In that solitude, so far from the city?...\n\n  SILANUS\n\nShe told me that she was fleeing from the fanaticism of the Jews, the\ntumult and the sickening smells, which increase twofold at Jerusalem\nas the Passover approaches....\n\n  VERUS\n\nThen you see her?... You have spoken to her?...\n\n  SILANUS\n\nThe good Appius, knowing that the sight of a young and beautiful woman\ndelights my eyes without endangering them, did not dissuade her from\ncoming up to the house of a disarmed and harmless old man....\n\n  VERUS\n\nWhat did she say to you?... What impression did she make upon you?...\n\n  SILANUS\n\nShe was clad in a raiment that seemed woven of pearls and dew, in a\ncloak of Tyrian purple with sapphire ornaments, and decked with jewels\nthat rendered a little heavier this eastern pomp. As for her hair,\nsurely, unloosed, it would cover the surface of that porphyry vase with\nan impenetrable veil of gold....\n\n  VERUS\n\nI speak of her intelligence, her character.... Do not mistake: she is\nno vulgar courtezan.... She has other attractions, binding love more\nfirmly....\n\n  SILANUS\n\nI minded only her beauty, which is real and contents the eye....\nHowever, we can judge better presently: she will soon be coming....\n\n  VERUS\n\nShe is coming here?... But does she know that she will find me with\nyou?...\n\n  SILANUS\n\nMost certainly. It seemed to me that this meeting would do more to\nassuage your malady than the wise counsels threatened by Appius....\n\n  VERUS\n\nBut she?... What did she say when she learnt that....\n\n  SILANUS\n\nShe smiled with a quivering and pensive grace.... The other guests\nwill be our indispensable Appius and C\u0153lius, your fellow-pupil at\nPr\u00e6neste.... I hope that they will bring our poor friend Longinus,\nwho, three weeks ago, lost a little daughter two years old.... I will\ntry to console him, by good and persuasive arguments, for a sorrow\ncertainly disproportionate to his loss. We shall have, among other\ndishes--all excellent, I hope,--two fish from the Jordan, new to you,\nwhich, dressed by Davus, my old cook.... But I hear the sound of the\ndouble flute.... It must be the litter of the queen of Bethany and\nJerusalem at the threshold of my house.... Your eyes will soon behold\nthe soft light which they have missed and mine the smile that pleases\nthem ... unless the silver mirrors in the Atrium delay her longer than\nthey should....\n\n  VERUS\n\nShe is here....\n\n  (_ENTER, on the right, MARY MAGDALENE. She is followed by\n    some slaves, whom she dismisses with a harsh and imperious\n    gesture._)\n\n\n  SCENE II\n\n  THE SAME, MARY MAGDALENE\n\n  SILANUS (_going up to receive MARY MAGDALENE_)\n\n\u201cWho is this that cometh out of the wilderness like pillars of smoke,\nperfumed with myrrh and frankincense?... Who is she that looketh forth\nas the morning, fair as the moon, clear as the sun and terrible as an\narmy with banners,\u201d as your sacred books sing at the approach of the\nShulamite?...\n\n  MARY MAGDALENE\n\nDo not speak to me of my sacred books. I loathe them, as I loathe\neverything that comes from that deceitful and sordid, greedy and\nmischievous nation....\n\n  VERUS (_coming forward to greet her in his turn_)\n\nI will say then, in the Roman fashion, \u201cHail to the eldest daughter of\nAglaia, youngest and happiest of the Graces!\u201d\n\n  MARY MAGDALENE\n\nPity me, instead of praising me. I was robbed, last night, of my\nCarthaginian rubies, besides twelve of my finest pearls; and, what\nI feel even more, my Babylonian peacock and all the mur\u00e6n\u00e6 in my\nfish-pond....\n\n  VERUS\n\nWho dared commit such manifest sacrilege?...\n\n  MARY MAGDALENE\n\nI do not know.... I have had the slaves in charge of the aviary and the\nfish-pond beaten with rods and put to the torture: they have confessed\nnothing and I believe that they know nothing....\n\n  VERUS\n\nHave you no clue, no suspicion?\n\n  SILANUS\n\nThe theft amazes me, for the country is safe.... I have been living\nhere for nigh six years; and no one has ever tried to rob me of an\natom of my wisdom, which is never under lock and key and is the\nonly precious thing that I possess.... The Jew is crafty, sly and\nevil-minded; he practises cheating and usury as well as most of the\ncringing virtues and vices; but he nearly always avoids frank,\nstraightforward theft, honest theft, if one may say so....\n\n  MARY MAGDALENE\n\nI at first suspected some Tyrian workmen who are fitting one of the\nrooms in my villa with those movable panels which are changed at every\ncourse, so that the walls may harmonize with the dishes covering the\ntable....\n\n  VERUS\n\nI have seen some like them in the house of our Governor, Pomponius\nFlaccus, at Antioch; but I did not know that this fashion, so new to\nRome herself, had already made its way into this remote country....\n\n  MARY MAGDALENE\n\nNor will you find it, except in my house; and the last palace of\nthe Tetrarch Antipas is still without it.... Therefore I began by\nsuspecting those workmen; but I have proofs that they are innocent.\nI now feel sure that the thieves must be sought among that band of\nvagrants and prowlers who have been infesting the country for some\ntime....\n\n  SILANUS\n\nThe famous band of the Nazarene....\n\n  MARY MAGDALENE\n\nEven so. Their leader, I hear, is a sort of unwashed brigand who\nentices the crowds with a rude kind of sorcery and, on the pretence\nof preaching some new law or doctrine, lives by plunder and surrounds\nhimself with fellows capable of everything.... Besides, I have other\ncauses to complain of them.... Two days ago, when I was walking in my\ngardens, under the portico that divides them from the road, a dozen\nwretches, belonging to that band, insulted me foully and threatened\nme with stones.... It is becoming intolerable; and it is time that the\ncountryside were rid of them....\n\n  VERUS\n\nI have heard about those people.... I know that the authorities have\ntheir eyes upon them.... I will have them watched more closely. For\nthat matter, if you wish, it would be easy for me to arrest their\nleader....\n\n  MARY MAGDALENE\n\nDo so, I pray you, and as soon as possible.... I should be especially\ngrateful to you....\n\n  SILANUS\n\nI believe that you are misled. The robbers, in my opinion, must\nnot be looked for there. I am in a fairly good position to know the\nband, seeing that, for five or six days, it has been gathered near my\nhouse. I have even had the pleasure--for everything turns to pleasure\nat my age--I have even had the pleasure of attending one of their\nmeetings. It was near the old road to Jericho. The leader was speaking\nin the midst of a crowd covered with dust and rags, among whom I\nobserved a large number of rather repulsive cripples and sick. They\nseem extremely ignorant and exalted. They are poor and dirty, but I\nbelieve them to be harmless and incapable of stealing more than a cup\nof water or an ear of wheat.... They were listening greedily to a more\nor less silly anecdote, the story of a son who returns to his father\nafter squandering his patrimony.... I did not hear the end, for they\nlooked upon me with a certain suspicion.... But the Galilean, or the\nNazarene, as they call him here, is rather curious; and his voice is of\na penetrating and peculiar sweetness.... He appears to be the son of\na carpenter.... I will tell you more of him, I know many interesting\nthings about him; but permit me first to go to the other side of the\nhouse, which commands the road, to see if my belated guests are not in\nsight....\n\n  (_He GOES OUT on the left_.)\n\n\n  SCENE III\n\n  MARY MAGDALENE, VERUS\n\n  VERUS\n\nI was not prepared for the joy of seeing you again, of your own\nconsent, after your cruel words. They deprived me even of the hope\nthat is sometimes left to those whom one would drive to despair....\n\n  MARY MAGDALENE\n\nI was stupid and foolish; but reason has returned; and I now know that\nthe best love is not worth a tear....\n\n  VERUS\n\nInasmuch as it is hardly the best, nor even a good love, as soon as it\ncauses tears to be shed....\n\n  MARY MAGDALENE\n\nThere is no more best or worst love for me. Until lately, I lived among\nfalsehoods by which others profited; for the past six months, I have\nlived among truths by which I myself profit.\n\n  VERUS\n\nWhat do you mean?...\n\n  MARY MAGDALENE\n\nThat I sell myself more skilfully and dearer than before.\n\n  VERUS\n\nMagdalene!... You slander yourself!...\n\n  MARY MAGDALENE\n\nYou would see, if your desire prompted you to try your fortune, that,\non the contrary, I rate myself very highly.\n\n  VERUS\n\nYou will always rate yourself less highly than I do. You will not\nsucceed in degrading yourself in my eyes; and I see in what you say\nno more than the just rebellion of a deeply wounded soul struggling\nagainst pain....\n\n  MARY MAGDALENE\n\nYou are wrong: it is not a soul struggling, but one that is finding\nitself.\n\n  VERUS\n\nI do not believe a word of it. However, I would rather spite or hatred\ngave you to me than lose you for the noblest of reasons; and, as it is\na question only of rating you very highly, know, Magdalene, that from\nthis moment you are mine....\n\n  MARY MAGDALENE\n\nMay be.... But here is our host returning. We have nothing more to say\nto each other, for the moment....\n\n  (_ENTER, on the left, SILANUS, APPIUS and C\u0152LIUS._)\n\n\n  SCENE IV\n\n  THE SAME, SILANUS, APPIUS, C\u0152LIUS\n\n  APPIUS (_going to MARY MAGDALENE_)\n\n\u201cVenus has left Cyprus and soars above Jerusalem!\u201d Or, rather, it is\nthe fair Techmessa, who already brings back the smile to the lips of\nthe son of Telamon!... Admire, O C\u0153lius, the magnificent image raised\nunder this portico by Love and Beauty!\n\n  C\u0152LIUS\n\nIt is as though the azure sky were spread for them between those two\ncolumns.\n\n  SILANUS\n\nThe azure and the light seem happy only when environing youth and\nlove.... But, to return to less dazzling images, better-suited to my\nhead burdened with years, I observed that it must have been a sort\nof presentiment that urged us to speak, but a moment ago, of the\nNazarene\u2019s band, for it was that same band which delayed our guests....\n\n  APPIUS\n\nYes, imagine, when we approached the last cross-road down there, we\nfound the whole country in a stir and the way blocked by a shouting,\ngesticulating throng, which was crowding round a blind man who saw!...\n\n  VERUS\n\nYes, that is one of those phenomena which one meets with nowhere except\nin Jud\u00e6a....\n\n  C\u0152LIUS\n\nIt was extraordinary!... The poor man, crushed against an old wall,\nrolled two drunk and virgin eyes, crying, \u201cHe is a prophet! He is a\nprophet! I see men as trees, walking!\u201d And the crowd stamped all around\nfor joy. He seemed dazed with the light....\n\n  APPIUS\n\nOr rather with wine, for he was plainly staggering.\n\n  VERUS\n\nAnd the Nazarene, did you see him?...\n\n  APPIUS\n\nNo, he had just gone away, taking with him the most turbulent part of\nthe crowd; but for that, we should never have been able to pass....\n\n  MARY MAGDALENE\n\nYes, it appears that, when those ruffians crowd round their leader,\nthey would not trouble to make way for C\u00e6sar.\n\n  C\u0152LIUS\n\nWhere did he go?... I should be curious to see him....\n\n  SILANUS\n\nHe cannot be very far.... Do you see that laurel-hedge, at the bottom\nof my garden?... It divides my little domain from the orchard of my\nneighbour, known as Simon the Leper....\n\n  MARY MAGDALENE (_starting_)\n\nWhat, your next neighbour is a leper?... You should have told us....\n\n  SILANUS\n\nBe reassured, lady, he has no leprosy now....\n\n  APPIUS\n\nI thought that one became a leper for life, just as one becomes a\nsenator.... This is another of the surprises of this monstrous\nJud\u00e6a....\n\n  SILANUS\n\nThe Nazarene healed him.\n\n  C\u0152LIUS\n\nIs he really healed?... As his next neighbour, you must know the\ntruth....\n\n  SILANUS\n\nI know that he is as healthy in the face as the rose of Magdala and\nlily of Bethany whom you see before you; but I do not know if he was\never sick, not having seen him before his recovery....\n\n  APPIUS\n\nI thought so.... Besides, I have seen much more extraordinary magicians\nin Thrace and Egypt.... But, to return to this leper without leprosy,\nwhat happens behind that hedge and in the house of your mysterious\nneighbour?\n\n  SILANUS\n\nThe Nazarene has been his guest for the past three days. This Simon,\nhis sister, his wife and, I believe, his brother-in-law are common\npeople, who live on the produce of their olive-trees. They were\ntimorous, peaceable neighbours; but, since the arrival of the Nazarene,\neverything is in commotion. It is a perpetual coming and going, a\nperpetual tumult. Their orchard is filled incessantly with a multitude\nof sick, of vagrants, of cripples, issuing from all the rocks in Jud\u00e6a\nto beseech him whom, with loud cries, they call the Saviour of the\nWorld, the Son of David and King of the Jews. There are sometimes so\nmany of them that they overflow into my garden. The hedge, as you\nsee, has been trampled, crushed and even torn in certain places.\nFortunately, the Nazarene\u2019s appearances are few and brief. Besides,\nthis picturesque spectacle, despite its inconveniences, amuses and\npuzzles me.\n\n  (_ENTER, on the left, five or six POOR FOLK._)\n\n  C\u0152LIUS\n\nWho are those people?\n\n  SILANUS\n\nWhat did I tell you?... Here are half-a-dozen coming to ask for\nbread....\n\n  APPIUS\n\nDo they belong to this famous band?\n\n  MARY MAGDALENE\n\nThey are hateful and loathsome!... One of them has his face gnawed with\nan ulcer, another is almost naked, another is starving!...\n\n  APPIUS\n\nThey certainly lack shame, thus to flaunt ugliness and dread....\n\n  SILANUS\n\nDo not be uneasy: these will not long mar the pleasing grace of the\nporticoes that refresh our eyes. My gardener has discovered them; he is\narmed with a stout hoe and is driving them back uncivilly.... You see,\nthey do not insist, they walk away in silence, hanging their heads....\nAnd, now that we have occupied ourselves long enough with these\nunfortunate people, with their great leader and their maladies, let us\nthink a little of ourselves and enjoy the delightful afternoon which\nspring-time sets before us.... My pleasure at seeing you here would\nbe flawless, if only our old friend Longinus had yielded to Appius\u2019\nentreaties and consented to accompany you....\n\n  APPIUS\n\nI never felt more keenly the vanity of the great eloquence which he\nhimself taught me. To all my most convincing and well-stated arguments\nhe replied with a sullen silence, or shook his head, repeating that\nhe did not wish to throw a gloom over our happy party with his dismal\npresence....\n\n  C\u0152LIUS\n\nAnd yet it is quite three weeks since that child died.... I should not\nhave thought that grief could have affected him so much....\n\n  APPIUS\n\nThe more so as it concerned a child of tender years, whom her father\nknew less well than did her nurse!...\n\n  SILANUS\n\nThere is something more astonishing yet, which clearly shows that\nthe greatest wisdom is not so much to know as to conform to what one\nknows!... When, more than fifteen years ago, I lost a little boy\nwho must have been of about the same age as the child whom he now\nmourns, Longinus undertook to console me. He wrote me an eloquent\nletter, wherein, relying on the authority of Metrodorus, Pan\u00e6tius and\nHermachus, he proved that sorrow is not only useless, but ungrateful. I\nfound and read the letter again this morning; and so striking are its\nmore important passages that I know them almost by heart.... They were\nthe loftiest words that human wisdom could utter against death and\nsorrow.... They protected me once....\n\n  MARY MAGDALENE\n\nWhat were the words? It is well to know anything that can relieve\nsorrow....\n\n  SILANUS\n\n\u201cYou expect consolation,\u201d he said; \u201cyou shall receive only reproaches.\nIf you bear the death of a child with so little patience, what would\nyou do if you had lost a friend? You ought to bring yourself to this\nframe of mind, that you were more pleased at having had him than\ngrieved that you had him no longer. But most men reckon past advantages\nand pleasures as of no account. They bury friendship with their\nfriend....\u201d\n\n  APPIUS\n\nI recognize and hail the mighty wisdom of our venerable master.\n\n  SILANUS\n\nWhy does he not remember it, when misfortune strikes him? But why did I\nforget it myself, when I needed it most?... \u201cI assure you,\u201d he added,\n\u201cthat of those whom we have loved, much remains to us after death has\nremoved them. The time that is past is ours; and I see nothing of\nwhich we are more certain than of that which has been. The hope of the\nfuture makes us ungrateful for the benefits which we have received, as\nthough the favours which we expect were not bound soon to be ranked\namong things past. Death has deprived you of a son so young that he\ncould be of no promise to you yet; it is only a little time lost. There\nare instances without end of fathers losing infant children without\nshedding a single tear and returning to the senate after laying them\nin the grave. This is not unreasonable; for, in the first place, it is\nidle to give way to grief when grief can serve no purpose. And then it\nis unjust to complain of a misfortune that has befallen one person and\nstill threatens all the others. Moreover, it is madness to complain,\nwhen there is so little distance between the one who is dead and the\none who mourns him. Consider that all mankind, destined to one and the\nsame end, is divided only by little intervals, even when they appear\nvery great. He whom you think lost has only gone before. Since we must\nall travel the same road, is it not unworthy of a wise man to weep for\none who has set out earlier than ourselves? To complain that the friend\nor the child is dead is to complain that he was ever born. We are all\nlinked to the same fate. He who has come into the world must also leave\nit. His stay may be longer, but the end is always alike. The time that\nelapses between the first day and the last is uncertain and variable.\nIf you consider the wretchedness of life, it is long, even for a child;\nif you regard the duration, it is short, even for an old man.\u201d\n\n  MARY MAGDALENE\n\nThat would not have consoled me....\n\n  SILANUS\n\nTo console, lady, is not to do away with sorrow, but to teach one how\nto overcome it.\n\n  (_At this moment, there is heard rising from the roads, the\n    paths and all the invisible country commanded by the terrace\n    a noise, at first dull and confused, which gradually becomes\n    more positive and precise. Sounds of a crowd forming and\n    hurrying, stones rolling, children crying, dogs barking; shouts\n    that grow more and more distinct: \u201cThis way! This way!... Come\n    quickly!... Come down!... To the right, to the right!... He is\n    there!... We saw him!... He is leaving the house!... To Simon\u2019s\n    orchard!... Carry the palsied there!... Lead the blind!...\n    Quick, quick, this way!... They say he is going to speak!\u201d\n    etc._)\n\n  APPIUS\n\nWhat is this? What is happening?...\n\n  VERUS\n\nThey are hurrying from every side!...\n\n  C\u0152LIUS\n\nAll the roads are covered with people running like madmen!...\n\n  APPIUS\n\nThey seem to spring from the stones!...\n\n  C\u0152LIUS\n\nBut what is happening?... They are disappearing behind those\nolive-trees....\n\n  VERUS\n\nHere come two sick men carried on their beds....\n\n  C\u0152LIUS\n\nA blind man falling!...\n\n  APPIUS\n\nWhat is the matter with them?... Are they mad?...\n\n  VERUS\n\nWho are those extraordinary creatures leaping among the rocks?...\n\n  SILANUS\n\nThey are the men possessed by devils, coming out of the tombs....\n\n  APPIUS\n\nBut, after all, what is happening?...\n\n  SILANUS\n\nThey have seen the Nazarene....\n\n  MARY MAGDALENE\n\nThe Nazarene?... Where is he?...\n\n  SILANUS\n\nHe has probably just come out of Simon\u2019s house. They watch all his\nmovements. As soon as he is seen, they bring the sick; and the fanatics\ncome rushing up.... He must be walking in the neighbouring orchard....\n(_Listening._) Yes.... Do you hear the crowd humming like bees?... It\nis close to my laurel-hedge....\n\n  APPIUS\n\nLet us go and see....\n\n  SILANUS\n\nI do not advise you to. In the first place, those people are mostly\nvery poor, extremely dirty and very unpleasant to come into touch\nwith.... Then, you know the Jewish fanaticism.... In these moments of\nexaltation, the most inoffensive become dangerous; and the sight of the\nRoman toga and arms enrages them strangely.... Besides, we shall hear\nwhat happens quite well from where we stand.... Listen!... The cries\nare coming nearer still and increasing....\n\n  (_Behind the hedge that closes the end of the garden rise cries\n    that sound nearer and nearer: \u201cHosannah! Hosannah!... Son of\n    Man!... Lord, Lord, have pity! Lord, Son of David, heal the\n    sick man!... Master! Master! Lord!... Jesus of Nazareth, have\n    pity on me!... Make way!... Silence, silence!... He is going\n    to speak!\u201d At these words, the tumult suddenly subsides. An\n    incomparable silence, in which it seems as though the birds\n    and the leaves of the trees and the very air that is breathed\n    take part, falls with all its supernatural weight upon the\n    countryside; and, in this silence, which weighs upon people on\n    the terrace also, there rises, absolute sovereign of space and\n    the hour, a wonderful voice, soft and all-powerful, intoxicated\n    with ardour, light and love, distant and yet near to every\n    heart and present in every soul._)\n\n  THE VOICE\n\nBlessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven!...\nBlessed are they that mourn, for they shall be comforted!... Blessed\nare the meek, for they shall inherit the earth!...\n\n  APPIUS\n\nWhat is he saying?...\n\n  SILANUS\n\nListen!... It is rather curious....\n\n  THE VOICE\n\nBlessed are they which do hunger and thirst after righteousness, for\nthey shall be filled!... Blessed are the merciful, for they shall\nobtain mercy!...\n\n  MARY MAGDALENE\n\nI want to see!... (_She rises and, as though irresistibly drawn by the\ndivine voice, goes as if to descend the steps of the terrace and to\nmake for the bottom of the garden._)\n\n  SILANUS (_in a low voice, trying to hold her back_)\n\nDo not go there!...\n\n  THE VOICE\n\nBlessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God!...\n\n  MARY MAGDALENE\n\nI will go!...\n\n  VERUS\n\nI shall go with you....\n\n  MARY MAGDALENE (_fiercely, imperiously_)\n\nNo! Nobody!... Let me be!... (_She goes down towards the hedge, as\nthough fascinated._)\n\n  THE VOICE\n\nBlessed are the peacemakers, for they shall be called the children of\nGod!... Blessed are they which are persecuted for righteousness\u2019 sake,\nfor theirs is the kingdom of heaven!...\n\n  VERUS\n\nWhere is she going....\n\n  APPIUS\n\nWhat is she doing?... She is mad!... She is trying to pass through the\nhedge!...\n\n  THE VOICE\n\nBlessed are ye when men shall revile you and persecute you!... Rejoice\nand be exceeding glad, for great is your reward in heaven!...\n\n  VERUS\n\nShe has opened the gate of the garden!... She is in the orchard!...\n\n  SILANUS\n\nWomen sometimes have thoughts which wise men do not understand....\n\n  VERUS\n\nI shall go and join her; and, if I have to protect her against those....\n\n  SILANUS\n\nDo no such thing.... They are listening to the voice and will not\nperceive her presence, whereas the sight and sound of your arms....\nListen, listen to what he is saying: it is rather singular....\n\n  THE VOICE\n\nBut I say unto you, Love your enemies, bless them that curse you, do\ngood to them that hate you and pray for them which despitefully use\nyou!...\n\n  (_At that moment, cries, at first scattered, rise among\n    the invisible crowd behind the hedge. A few words are\n    distinguishable: \u201cIt Is the Roman woman! The Roman woman!...\n    The adulteress!... Shame!... Shame! Shame!... Magdalene!... The\n    strumpet!... Drive her away, drive her away!...\u201d Immediately\n    afterwards, these cries are lost in a violent and formidable\n    shout of reprobation, in which only a few resounding words\n    are, with difficulty, perceived: \u201cShame! Shame!... Stone her!\n    Stone her!... Death! Death!... Stone her!\u201d etc. All this is\n    accompanied by a noise of flight, of hurrying footsteps, of\n    sticks and pebbles clashing, of broken branches, etc._)\n\n  SILANUS\n\nThey have seen her!...\n\n  VERUS\n\nBut what is happening?... Is it she whom they are attacking?...\n\n  SILANUS\n\nIt is what I feared.... We must take care....\n\n  VERUS (_rushing to the bottom of the garden_)\n\nThis way!... Follow me!... Appius, C\u0153lius, your swords!...\n\n  (_At the moment when he rushes down, the laurel-hedge is burst\n    through in every part by the yelling and gesticulating crowd\n    pursuing MARY MAGDALENE. She makes a frenzied attempt to reach\n    the terrace. VERUS and his two friends run towards her, to try\n    to protect her against the invading multitude. Stones fly.\n    VERUS, standing in front of the others, brandishes his bare\n    sword. Just as the fighting is about to begin, when already\n    branches are broken, a statue overturned and so forth, suddenly\n    a loud call of the supernatural voice rings under the nearer\n    olive-trees. All cease, struck with stupor. A word of command\n    is passed from mouth to mouth: \u201cSilence! Silence!... Listen!\n    Listen!... He is speaking! He is going to speak!... The Master\n    has made a sign!... Listen! Listen!...\u201d Then, in the silence\n    thus suddenly produced, the divine voice rises, calm, august,\n    profound and irresistible._)\n\n  THE VOICE\n\nHe that is without sin among you, let him first cast a stone at her!...\n\n  (_The stones are heard to drop to the ground. The crowd sways to\n    and fro, abashed, and disappears gradually, in silence, through\n    the hedge. VERUS comes forward to support MARY MAGDALENE, who\n    has stopped and is standing erect and motionless in the middle\n    of the walk. She rejects the proffered aid, with a harsh and\n    fierce gesture, and, staring in front of her, alone among the\n    others, who look at her without understanding, slowly she\n    climbs the steps of the terrace._)\n\n\n  CURTAIN\n\n\n\n\n  ACT II\n\n(_The Tablinum [or large room behind the Atrium] of MARY\n  MAGDALENE\u2019S villa at Bethany. At the back, leading one into the\n  other, the Atrium and a long vestibule with marble columns._)\n\n\n  SCENE I\n\n  MARY MAGDALENE, LUCIUS VERUS\n\n  (_Enter LUCIUS VERUS. MARY MAGDALENE runs up to him and throws\n    herself into his arms._)\n\n  MARY MAGDALENE\n\nYou at last, my Verus!... For three days I have awaited you, for three\ndays I have called you. Men grant me my beauty when its triumph brings\nme nothing but regret and disgust. And I ask myself, is that beauty\nreally powerless when, at last, there is a question of the happiness\nwhich every woman has the right to expect in her life?...\n\n  VERUS\n\nI know not if I shall be able to give you the happiness that is your\ndue, Magdalene; but be assured that your beauty never gained a more\ncomplete victory....\n\n  MARY MAGDALENE\n\nWhat care I now for its victory!... It is I who am vanquished, utterly\nvanquished beforehand, without daring to confess it to myself, without\nbeing able to hide it from my indifference, so odiously acquired, or\nfrom my vanity, which has never been more than the shameful crown\nof my shame!... But why keep me waiting so long?... I thought that\neverything was abandoning me, that all was lost because of the\ndreadful words which I spoke at our good Silanus\u2019 and which were not\ntrue, which were only a profounder lie then my other lies, because\nI was mad, because I did not know, because I did not wish for an\nimpossible happiness....\n\n  VERUS\n\nYou well know, Magdalene, that I never believed you the woman you\ndepicted.... But now neither do I dare believe in the happiness that\napproaches.... I am quite dazzled, I doubt, I grope in the dark.... I\ndo not recognize the voice that has so often and so harshly repelled me.\n\n  MARY MAGDALENE (_in VERUS\u2019 arms_)\n\nIt is not the same voice, it is not the same soul....\n\n  VERUS\n\nAnd yet it is really you whom I hold in my arms, it is every parcel\nof you whom I have implored so long!... I ask myself still if all\nis indeed real, if all is indeed possible, if you are not trifling\nwith a too-credulous happiness which you will fling aside among all\nthose which beauty shatters when testing its power.... But no, when I\nquestion, when I follow your eyes that plunge into mine, I see that it\nis indeed true, that it was always true....\n\n  MARY MAGDALENE\n\nYes, yes, it is true, it is true and it was always true.... I did not\nknow it, I searched my heart in vain and I was ignorant of all my\nfeelings until these days of anguish.... I refused to see that you were\ncoming towards me and that everything was awaiting you.... And yet I\nought to have known it.... Already, at Antioch, do you remember, Verus,\nhow I avoided you?... I received so many others; and you alone, the\ncomeliest, the purest, I tried to ignore, to blot out, to destroy....\nAs soon as you appeared, I withdrew, like a shy and distrustful animal,\nto my lair; and, only the other day, at our good Silanus\u2019, I felt all\nthe evil, all the cruelty, or all the despair that fills my heart rise\nto my lips.... But, to-day, I see; I am no longer the same; I no longer\nknow myself, because I am myself once more.... All that used to resist\nis broken within my soul.... I no longer understand myself and I did\nnot know that happiness is so strange a thing.... I, who never wept in\nmy worst moments of distress, am sobbing to-day when happiness awaits\nme.... I am glad and light-hearted and yet more shattered than if all\nthe misfortunes that hover in the skies were about to burst over me....\n(_Embracing him more passionately_) Help me, my Verus, help me, support\nme, you whom nothing threatens, you who have nothing to fear!...\n\n  VERUS\n\nBut what has happened? Can any one have dared, in my absence...?\n\n  MARY MAGDALENE\n\nNo, no, nobody; and it is not that; and I myself do not know the danger\nthat surrounds me.... But I have no other shelter than your arms; and\nI feel myself lost if I lose you too.... Take me, bear me away on that\nheart to which I am listening, far from myself, far from this place and\nfrom my anxiety.... You alone can save me and I have no life but that\nwhich you give me.... But why did you forsake me so long in my tears,\nwhy did you not come until after the third day, abandoning me thus,\nwithout a word of pity, without a sign of hope?...\n\n  VERUS\n\nYou are mistaken, Magdalene, or else your slaves did not acquaint you\nwith the truth.... The very day after our meeting at Silanus\u2019, I came\nto Bethany to tell you that, by order of the Procurator, I was suddenly\nsent, at the head of a cohort, to suppress a curious riot that had\nbroken out near Jericho. The slaves who keep your door would not allow\nme to approach you and replied to me in such a way that I dared not\nwell insist.... I understood that they were obeying orders so precise\nand so stern that I must not try to thwart them....\n\n  MARY MAGDALENE\n\nIt is true.... I forgot.... I was mad and worn out, incapable of\nseeing, willing or hearing.... I was not yet awake.... It seemed to\nme that I was still struggling amid the hideous crowd in Simon\u2019s\ngarden, where I called in vain upon him who had delivered me.... He was\nabandoning me, he too.... I sent in search of him to no purpose. No one\ncould tell me where he was hiding.... Have you not seen him since?...\nDo you not know where he is?...\n\n  VERUS\n\nWho?\n\n  MARY MAGDALENE\n\nThe Nazarene....\n\n  VERUS\n\nLet us not speak of that wretched man: his hours are numbered....\n\n  MARY MAGDALENE\n\nHis hours are numbered?... What do you mean?...\n\n  VERUS\n\nNo matter: that does not interest us now and soon we shall know nothing\nof aught that does not touch our love; for it is wonderful to see how\nthe thoughts of those who love each other meet and unite in spite of\nthe distance and of the ill-natured speeches that come between them.\nIs it not astonishing that, after leaving you at Silanus\u2019, where I had\nheard words that should have deprived me of all hope, I for the first\ntime felt our young happiness swell and blossom in all its strength\nand all its certainty?... While you were calling me, I called you also\nwith all the deep and wonderful voices of my heart. I was kept far from\nyou by a duty unworthy of a soldier; for that expedition to Jericho,\nthe last, I trust, upon which I shall be sent, was almost odious and\noften ridiculous. I counted with rage the minutes stolen from our new\nlife, which was already beginning in a soul that feared none of my\nreasons for fearing....\n\n  MARY MAGDALENE\n\nIt will not really begin until we are far from this land where I\nsuffocate, where everything darkens and threatens happiness, where\nI can no longer live.... Verus, I beseech you, if you love me as I\nlove you, let us hasten, let us leave everything; there is no time to\nlose....\n\n  VERUS\n\nYou are right: a joy so long awaited must not be born among these\nsinister rocks, where floats an odour of death and madness.... And\nyet, even here, our thoughts came to an understanding long before our\nwords.... Like you, I have resolved to leave this hated city, where\nreally my obedience is abused.... I am at the orders of the Procurator,\nbut not at the venomous service of the Jewish priests, nor of the\nclamorous and perfidious nation whom my old legionaries have conquered.\nI have had enough of this ambiguous life. Before to-night, I shall find\na pretext for evading an order which I was to execute this very day, an\norder of which I but too well know the origin.... If the pretext appear\ninsufficient, let Caiaphas and Annas go and complain to C\u00e6sar....\nNothing counts in the presence of our love; and the inglorious errand\nwhich they claim the right to impose upon me repels me all the more\ninasmuch as it was to be accomplished, so to speak, before your eyes....\n\n  MARY MAGDALENE\n\nBefore my eyes?... Of what are you speaking?...\n\n  VERUS\n\nNothing that interests you; let us think only of our happy escape....\n\n  MARY MAGDALENE\n\nI know that some danger threatens him....\n\n  VERUS\n\nWhom do you mean?...\n\n  MARY MAGDALENE\n\nIt is impossible, after what he has done, that you should become the\ninstrument of his worst enemies.... You owe him my life and perhaps\nour happiness.... What do they want with him? What orders have you\nreceived?...\n\n  VERUS\n\nI am charged to arrest him before this evening, together with the\nprincipal leaders of his band. It is a vulgar constabulary measure,\ndirected against sick men and vagrants, of a kind that has never yet\nbeen exacted of the legionaries.... It shall not take place; do not let\nus speak of it....\n\n  MARY MAGDALENE\n\nBut why arrest him? What has he done? What is he accused of?... He is\ninnocent, I know; besides, one need but see him to understand.... He\nbrings a happiness that was not known before; and all those who come\nnear him are happy, it seems, like children at their awaking.... I\nmyself, who only caught a glimpse of him among the olive-trees, felt\nthat gladness was rising in my soul like a sort of light that overtook\nmy thoughts.... He fixed his eyes for but a moment on mine; and that\nwill be enough for the rest of my life.... I knew that he recognized\nme without ever having seen me and I knew that he wished to see me\nagain.... He seemed to choose me gravely, absolutely, for ever....\n\n  VERUS\n\nWhat does this mean? Are you speaking of him? What happened?... Have\nyou seen him again?... I was told, for that matter, that he is an\nintriguer, ready for everything; but I should never have believed that\nhe would have dared....\n\n  MARY MAGDALENE\n\nHe has dared nothing.... I have not seen him again, I shall never see\nhim again, now that we are about to leave everything, to be only we two\nalone....\n\n  VERUS (_clasping her more closely_)\n\nTo be one alone, Magdalene, in a happier land, where everything\nencourages happiness, smiles upon lovers and blesses beauty....\n\n  MARY MAGDALENE (_bursting into convulsive sobs on VERUS\u2019 breast_)\n\nI love you.... I know it....\n\n  VERUS\n\nCome, I know these tears that well at the same moment from our two\nhearts in our one joy.... But here, between the columns of the\nvestibule, come the greatest ornaments of that beautiful Rome which\nwe shall soon astonish with our love.... I am right: it is our good\nSilanus, accompanied by the faithful Appius; led by the immortal gods,\nthey descend the marble steps to hallow with their fraternal presence\nthe first smiles of a happiness born under their eyes....\n\n\n  SCENE II\n\n  THE SAME, SILANUS, APPIUS\n\n  SILANUS\n\nIt was said and it was written that, on this most propitious day, I\nshould behold two marvels, not the lesser of which is to see thus\npromptly reunited two lovers who, according to love\u2019s ancient custom,\nshould have fled from each other the more obstinately the more they\nyearned to meet....\n\n  APPIUS\n\nBy Metrodorus, Hermachus and Zeno, there are other things on hand than\nthe too-long-expected happiness of two lovers cutting short their\nquarrels!... Tell them at once what has happened; shout it to them,\nwith all your throat and all your soul: death no longer exists! The\ngraves are about to open, the spirits of the dead to show themselves;\nthe gods are shaken, all the laws of life are overturned!... We have\njust admired an unequalled, unspeakable, unheard-of phenomenon, that\nhas never been seen since light first rose upon the world, that will\nnot be seen again before the death of the gods!...\n\n  SILANUS\n\nThe more extraordinary it seems to you, Appius, the less should it\ntrouble the perfect composure of your soul, considering that a\nphenomenon that will not be seen again could not well shake the laws of\nthe universe nor the stability of the gods!\n\n  VERUS\n\nBut what has happened? Appius seems to be the victim of a greater\nexaltation than usual; and you yourself, my worthy master, despite your\neven mind....\n\n  APPIUS\n\nI will tell you what has happened: he has brought a dead man to life!...\n\n  MARY MAGDALENE\n\nWho?...\n\n  SILANUS\n\nThe Nazarene, whose return I have come to announce to you, as I\npromised.\n\n  MARY MAGDALENE\n\nHe has come back? Since when? Where is he?... Have you seen him?...\n\n  SILANUS\n\nTo reply to your questions in order, lady, I will tell you that he\nreturned this morning, that I saw him with my eyes and that, at this\nmoment, he is with my neighbour Simon the Leper. I am surprised,\nhowever, that the absolute frenzy which has shaken the country for two\nor three hours has not yet spread as far as here. It is true that your\ndwelling is separated by a high hill and some olive-woods from the spot\nwhere the sepulchre lies hidden.\n\n  MARY MAGDALENE\n\nI have heard nothing, learned nothing.... In spite of my orders, no one\nhas told me.... But, after all, what has happened?... Appius is as\npale as a ghost.... What is it? What has he said, what has he done?...\n\n  APPIUS\n\nHe has done a thing which no man, no god, has done before him; a thing\nwhich I would not have believed if ten thousand witnesses had come to\nswear it in the name of the immortals, but in which I believe as firmly\nas I am bound to believe in my own existence, having seen it with my\neyes, as I see you now, and almost touched it with my hands, as I touch\nthis vase. He said, \u201cRise, come forth and walk.\u201d And the dead man rose,\ncame forth and began to walk among us!\n\n  VERUS\n\nIt was apparently a dead man whose health left nothing to be wished\nfor?...\n\n  SILANUS\n\nNo, I am convinced that it was really a dead man.\n\n  APPIUS\n\nIt was a real, a terrible dead man!... If not, my senses can no longer\ndeclare that the sun shines in the blue or that human flesh decays!...\nHe had been four days in the grave!...\n\n  MARY MAGDALENE\n\nBut who? How? Where?... And the Nazarene?... I want to know.... Speak\nfor him, Silanus: he has not yet recovered his senses....\n\n  SILANUS\n\nHere, in a few words, is what happened. Nevertheless, it is right that\nI should tell you that I do not entirely share Appius\u2019 amazement.\nIt should astonish us no more to see a man return to life than to\nsee a child come to life or an old man leave it. (MAGDALENE _makes a\nmovement of impatience_.) But I understand your impatience. I spoke to\nyou the other day of my neighbour Simon. He lives in the little house\nthat touches my property, with his wife, his sister-in-law and his\nbrother-in-law, named Lazarus. This Lazarus, whom I saw only two or\nthree times, for he was often away from home, had been ailing for some\nweeks and died four days ago....\n\n  APPIUS\n\nFour days, do you understand?... That is what nobody would dare deny....\n\n  SILANUS\n\nNor does any one think of doing so, Appius. They were a very united\nfamily; and the sorrow of those poor people was great. From my\nterrace, I could hear the lamentations of the women. According to the\ncustom of the Jews, Lazarus was buried on the night that followed after\nhis death. They laid him in a new grave, dug in the rocks that form\nthe other side of that hill, and closed the grave with an enormous\nstone. This morning, suddenly, the rumour spread that the Nazarene had\nreturned and that he was going to restore to life the dead man, who was\nhis friend. Appius, who was at my house, persuaded me to go down with\nhim; and we followed the crowd into the valley of the tombs.\n\n  MARY MAGDALENE\n\nI knew that he was to return to-day; but why did you not send word to\nme at once, as you promised?...\n\n  SILANUS\n\nIt seemed to me that the spectacle at hand was not one of those on\nwhich the eyes of a woman in the hour of her beauty love to rest.\nMoreover, there was cause to fear lest your arrival among the excited\ncrowd should cause a repetition of the violence of the other day. For\nan enormous crowd, silent, but quivering like a swarm of bees, escorted\nthe Nazarene, in front of whom walked the two sisters of Lazarus. We,\nAppius and I, climbed on to a block of stone hidden behind some bushes,\nwhence we could see and hear everything without arousing the suspicion\nof the Jews. They showed the grave to the Nazarene, who stopped and\nlowered his head.\n\n  APPIUS\n\nHe wept. They whispered in the crowd, \u201cBehold how he loved him!\u201d But\nnobody dared approach. They formed a circle at a distance, as though\nround a dread being....\n\n  SILANUS\n\n\u201cTake ye away the stone,\u201d said the Nazarene; and two men stepped toward\nthe grave.\n\n  APPIUS\n\nYou forget that, at that moment, one of the sisters of the dead man,\nalarmed and all in tears, seized the Nazarene by the arm and said,\n\u201cLord, by this time he stinketh; for he hath been dead four days.\u201d\nThe Nazarene answered--I have not forgotten a single one of his\nwords--\u201cSaid I not unto thee that, if thou wouldest believe, thou\nshouldest see the glory of God? Take ye away the stone.\u201d\n\n  MARY MAGDALENE\n\nWho is this sister of Lazarus? Is she Simon\u2019s wife?\n\n  SILANUS\n\nNo, it is the other one: her name is Mary and, when the Nazarene stays\nat Bethany, she never leaves him.\n\n  MARY MAGDALENE\n\nIs she young?\n\n  SILANUS\n\nShe is younger than Simon\u2019s wife.\n\n  MARY MAGDALENE\n\nHave you seen her? Do you know her?...\n\n  SILANUS\n\nI have spoken to her more than once. But to return to the stone, which\nwas enormous, flat and fastened into the walls of the cave: two men\nattacked it with levers. It resisted at first and then, suddenly, fell\ndown all of a piece....\n\n  APPIUS\n\nWe were quite close, hanging aslant over the cave. By all the gods who\nfrom heaven rule the earth and men, I swear that, at that moment, I\nfelt the terrible breath of the dead man strike me in the face!...\n\n  MARY MAGDALENE\n\nDid you see the dead man?...\n\n  APPIUS\n\nAs I see you now, lady!...\n\n  VERUS\n\nI do not understand how you can seriously interest yourselves in\nthese things which happen in an incongruous, mad world, where all is\nwitchcraft, coarse illusions and barbarous lies....\n\n  APPIUS\n\nBy Hades and Persephone, what my senses perceived was no illusion, I\nassure you!... We nearly fell from our rock!... The corpse was there,\nin the greedy light that devoured the cave, lying like a stiff and\nshapeless statue, closely bound in grave-clothes, the face covered with\na napkin. The crowd, heaped up in a semicircle, irresistibly attracted\nand repelled, leaned forward, stretched its thousand necks, without\ndaring to approach. The Nazarene stood alone, in front. He raised his\nhand, spoke a few words which I did not catch and then, addressing the\ncorpse in a voice whose pent-up force I shall never forget, he cried,\n\u201cLazarus, come forth!\u201d\n\n  MARY MAGDALENE\n\nDid he come forth?...\n\n  APPIUS\n\nWe heard only the sound of the wind moving the garments of the\nmultitude and the buzzing of the flies that swarmed into the grave.\nAll eyes were so firmly fixed upon the corpse that I saw, so to speak,\ntheir motionless beams, as one sees the sunbeams in a dark room....\nSuddenly, it became plain, terrifying, superhuman! The dead man,\nobeying the order, slowly bent in two; then, snapping the bandages that\nfastened his legs, he stood up erect, like a stone, all white, with his\narms bound and his head veiled. With small, almost impossible steps,\nguided by the light, he came forth from the grave. The affrighted\ncrowd gradually fell back, without being able to turn away its gaze.\n\u201cLoose him and let him go,\u201d said the Nazarene. And the two sisters of\nthe dead man, releasing themselves from the human hedge, rushed to\ntheir brother.\n\n  MARY MAGDALENE\n\nAnd he?...\n\n  APPIUS\n\nHe staggered, he stumbled at every step....\n\n  MARY MAGDALENE\n\nBut the Nazarene?...\n\n  APPIUS\n\nHe went away without a word and withdrew into Simon\u2019s house.\n\n  VERUS\n\nAnd the dead man, how did he go?...\n\n  APPIUS\n\nThe two sisters, wild-eyed, mechanically, blindly fumbled and cut the\nnapkin and the grave-clothes; then, supporting the dead man and helping\nhim to walk, they led him away to the same house. The crowd dared not\nfollow them save with their eyes. No one uttered a word; even the two\nwomen did not yet speak to the dead man.\n\n  MARY MAGDALENE\n\nAnd the Nazarene? Has he been seen again?\n\n  SILANUS\n\nHe has not left Simon\u2019s house. The swaying multitude is waiting for him\nin the orchard and along the roads; for, after the first long minutes\nof stupor, reaction set in and a general alacrity followed....\n\n  APPIUS\n\nWhich was as extraordinary as the miracle itself! First, a confused\nand almost dumb gladness, made up of whispers that seek and feel for\none another, passed through the crowd. Then, as though the truth had\nsuddenly burst forth under the skies, an unspeakable gaiety seized upon\nthe mass. The whispers became cries that were not recognizable. The\nwomen, the children and especially the older men exulted frantically.\nIt was as though they were trampling on death, which a god had just\nconquered and laid low, for the first time since man came into\nexistence. At this moment, an inconceivable and dangerous exaltation\nstill prevails in all the region round about the tombs; and, by\nHercules, though we have escaped unscathed, I would not advise my worst\nenemy to risk the Roman toga and arms there!\n\n  VERUS\n\nIs that all?...\n\n  APPIUS\n\nWhat more would you have?...\n\n  VERUS\n\nI should like to know what all this proves.\n\n  APPIUS\n\nIt proves that this man who has conquered death, which hitherto had\nconquered the world, is greater than we and our gods. It therefore\nbehoves us to hear what he has to tell us and to conform our lives to\nit.\n\n  SILANUS\n\nI will conform mine to it, Appius, if what he teaches is better than\nwhat I have learned. By awaking a dead man, in the depth of his grave,\nhe shows us that he possesses a power greater than that of our masters,\nbut not a greater wisdom. Let us await everything with an even mind.\nIt is not difficult, even for a child, to discern that which, in men\u2019s\nwords, augments or decreases the love of virtue. If he can convince me\nthat I have acted wrong until to-day, I will amend, for I seek only the\ntruth. But, if all the dead who people these valleys were to rise from\ntheir graves to bear witness, in his name, to a truth less high than\nthat which I know, I would not believe them. Whether the dead sleep or\nwake, I will not give them a thought unless they teach me to make a\nbetter use of my life....\n\n  MARY MAGDALENE (_starting_)\n\nListen!...\n\n  VERUS\n\nWhat is it?...\n\n  APPIUS\n\nI hear stones rolling....\n\n  VERUS\n\nIt is like the murmur of a crowd....\n\n  MARY MAGDALENE\n\nHe is coming!...\n\n  APPIUS (_going to the first columns of the vestibule_)\n\nFrom here we overlook the wall of the first court.... I see them!...\n\n  MARY MAGDALENE (_pale and staggering, takes a few steps toward\n    the back of the Atrium and gazes into the distance_)\n\nYes....\n\n  APPIUS\n\nThey are wrapped in a cloud of dust.... There are two or three thousand\nof them crowding toward the entrance.... I think it is those who were\nat the grave....\n\n  VERUS\n\nThey would not dare!...\n\n  MARY MAGDALENE\n\nVerus!...\n\n  VERUS\n\nFear nothing, Magdalene: this time, I alone will defend you.\n\n  APPIUS\n\nThey are following, at a distance, a man clad in white, who is entering\nthe court....\n\n  VERUS\n\nBut what is the janitor of the first courtyard doing?... Will he not\nstop him?...\n\n  APPIUS\n\nYes.... He is coming now.... What is he doing?... One would think he\nwas afraid!... He suddenly stops and lets him pass without a word....\n\n  VERUS\n\nAnd the others follow him.... They are entering the second court....\nThe impudence of those Jews is really incredible!... In Rome, even\nduring the Saturnalia, we should not allow the crowd to push its way\nlike that.... What are the slaves doing?...\n\n  MARY MAGDALENE\n\nIs it he?...\n\n  SILANUS\n\nWho?...\n\n  MARY MAGDALENE\n\nThe Nazarene....\n\n  SILANUS\n\nI think not.... It is not his walk.... I believe rather that it is....\n\n  APPIUS\n\nThere he is, in the plane-tree avenue!\n\n  SILANUS\n\nHe is coming straight in our direction....\n\n  VERUS\n\nHe is even taking the shortest way. He is coming up the steps under the\nboxwood arbour.... He seems at home.... Fortunately, the slaves are\nrunning from every side to bar his entrance to the vestibule....\n\n  MARY MAGDALENE\n\nHush, I entreat you!...\n\n  VERUS\n\nWhat is the matter?...\n\n  APPIUS\n\nHe is coming nearer; he is terribly pale....\n\n  SILANUS\n\nI believe it is....\n\n  MARY MAGDALENE\n\nWho?...\n\n  SILANUS\n\nThe other one.... The one whom he brought forth from the....\n\n  MARY MAGDALENE\n\nLazarus?...\n\n  SILANUS\n\nYes, I recognize him....\n\n  VERUS\n\nWhat does he want with us?... Ghosts do not walk like that, in broad\ndaylight.... He is horrible!...\n\n  MARY MAGDALENE\n\nOh, hush, hush!...\n\n  SILANUS\n\nHere he is....\n\n\n  SCENE III\n\n  _THE SAME, LAZARUS. At the back of the vestibule, the SLAVES.\n    Further away, imagined rather than perceived, the crowd of\n    JEWS._\n\n  (_A great silence. LAZARUS advances slowly from the back of the\n    vestibule. He looks neither to the right nor to the left.\n    The SLAVES of the villa, who have hastened up among the last\n    columns, form a group for a moment as though to block his\n    way. But, at the approach of the man risen from the dead, who\n    seems unaware of their presence, they fall back silently, one\n    after the other. LAZARUS ENTERS by the back of the Atrium\n    and stops on the threshold, which is raised by three steps.\n    MARY MAGDALENE moves backwards to one of the columns in the\n    foreground, against which she crushes herself, motionless. But\n    VERUS, breaking the silence, with his hand on the hilt of his\n    sword, goes up to LAZARUS._)\n\n  VERUS (_in a hectoring voice_)\n\nWho are you?... (_LAZARUS does not reply._) You do not answer?... It is\nindeed easier to cover with silence what one dare not confess. But, if\nyou have nothing to say, you have no business here. It is well for you\nthat my pity is stronger than my indignation. Go!\n\n  (_A new and profound silence._)\n\n  LAZARUS (_in a voice that does not seem yet to have recovered its\n    human note, to MAGDALENE_)\n\nCome. The Master calls you.\n\n  (_MAGDALENE leaves the column against which she is leaning and\n    takes four or five steps towards LAZARUS, as though walking in\n    her sleep._)\n\n  VERUS (_barring the road_)\n\nWhere are you going?...\n\n  MARY MAGDALENE (_as though recovering consciousness with\n    difficulty, in a stifled, hesitating voice, which she vainly\n    tries to render firmer_)\n\nWherever he wishes....\n\n  VERUS\n\nNo, not while I am here!...\n\n  MARY MAGDALENE (_throwing herself convulsively into VERUS\u2019 arms_)\n\nVerus!...\n\n  VERUS (_clasping her violently_)\n\nHave no fear, Magdalene. Nothing can touch you in these arms which\nclose round you. The madness of this land seems more contagious than\nits pestilence and more tenacious than its leprosy; but Roman reason\ndoes not waver, like the rest, at the first foul breath that issues\nfrom a tomb. We will cut this matter short. (_To LAZARUS_) You I will\nnot touch with my sword. It shrinks from corpses, even when they\nwalk and drive the trade which you do. It is for the slaves to show\nyou the road back to the sepulchre.... Where are the slaves?... But,\nbefore going, look at this and tell your master that the woman whom he\ncovets--by the gods, he lacks neither taste nor daring!--has sought a\nrefuge in these arms, which will know how to defend her against his\nbarbarous witchcraft and his childish spells. Above all, repeat to him\nwhat I am about to say: he will perhaps understand. His life, which\nwill not be a long one, after what he has done, lies wholly in this\nhand which drives you hence. I have spoken. Go. She will not follow\nyou....\n\n  MARY MAGDALENE (_struggling to escape from VERUS\u2019 embrace, while,\n    in the effort, her hair becomes loosened and falls over her\n    shoulders_)\n\nYes!...\n\n  VERUS (_holding her back by force_)\n\nWhat does this mean?... Then you wish to...? (_MAGDALENE nods her\nhead._) I no longer understand.... Or rather I begin to understand too\nwell.... You were at one.... And it was he whom you were awaiting with\nthat impatience which seemed so sweet to me?... For who could be made\nto believe that the fairest, richest and proudest woman in all Jud\u00e6a\nwould thus, without a previous understanding, obey the first word, the\nfirst sign of the grotesque and repulsive messenger sent by one whom\nshe had seen but once in her life!... It is too much.... I see, I know:\ngo, since you love him!...\n\n  MARY MAGDALENE\n\nNo, no!... I love you, but he....\n\n  VERUS\n\nBut he?...\n\n  MARY MAGDALENE (_sinking in sobs at VERUS\u2019 feet_)\n\nIt is a different thing!...\n\n  VERUS\n\nIt is well, stand up.... I do not keep you by force. But I could not\nhave believed that you had come to this.... I have fallen into one\nof your Jewish traps. Do you see the crowd posted there, under the\nportico, spying upon its hostages?... I will not have Roman property\ndefiled.... I bear you no grudge, Magdalene. Love, in me, is not\nextinguished in a moment; and I possess more constancy than woman....\nI shall watch over you. I know now that, by destroying him, I can save\nher whom he wished to destroy. He does not suspect that he owes his\nlife to me; for hitherto, from pity or indifference, I had held back\nthe threats that were gathering over his head. But, since he himself\ncomes to attack me in my happiness, I add to those threats all the\nweight of flouted love.... And, now, go with your guide from the\ntombs.... We shall meet again before long.\n\n  (_LAZARUS GOES OUT slowly through the vestibule. MAGDALENE,\n    without a word, without a movement, without a look, GOES OUT\n    after him, amid the profound, still silence of all present._)\n\n  APPIUS (_after a long pause_)\n\nWe have this day seen more than one thing that we had not seen\nbefore....\n\n  SILANUS\n\nIt is true, Appius; and this is as surprising as the resurrection of a\ndead man....\n\n\n  CURTAIN\n\n\n\n\n  ACT III\n\n(_In the house of JOSEPH OF ARIMATH\u00c6A. The Supper-room in which the\n  Last Supper took place. Windows at the back. Doors to the right\n  and left. Jud\u00e6o-Roman architecture. The lamps are lit. It is the\n  end of the night of the sixth of April._)\n\n\n  SCENE I\n\n  _NICODEMUS. LEVI THE PUBLICAN. SIMON THE LEPER. LAZARUS, THE\n    MAN RISEN FROM THE DEAD. CLEOPHAS, ZACCH\u00c6US. THE MAN THAT WAS\n    BORN BLIND. BARTIM\u00c6US, THE BLIND MAN OF JERICHO. THE MAN OF\n    GERASA POSSESSED BY A DEVIL. THE IMPOTENT MAN OF BETHESDA.\n    THE MAN HEALED OF A DROPSY. THE MAN WHOSE HAND WAS WITHERED.\n    SIMON PETER\u2019S MOTHER-IN-LAW MARY CLEOPHAS. SALOME, THE WIFE\n    OF ZEBEDEE. SUSANNA. Several nameless MEN AND WOMEN CURED BY\n    MIRACLES. A few HUNCHBACKED, HALT, BLIND, LEPERS and PALSIED\n    waiting to be healed. Some BEGGARS, two or three HARLOTS, etc.\n    (All these people are struck with consternation and alarm at\n    the arrest of JESUS and at the bad news that is current. They\n    crowd at the back of the room, muttering and whispering. ENTER\n    MARTHA, the sister of LAZARUS._)\n\n  MARTHA (_affrighted, looking anxiously around her_)\n\nI have seen him!\n\n  (_Sensation. ALL gather eagerly round MARTHA._)\n\n  NICODEMUS\n\nWhere is he?...\n\n  MARY CLEOPHAS\n\nHas he suffered?...\n\n  SALOME\n\nWhat does he say?...\n\n  MARTHA\n\nWhere is my sister?...\n\n  MARY CLEOPHAS\n\nShe is with her mother, in our host\u2019s chamber.... Her mother was worn\nout with sorrow....\n\n  MARTHA (_going to one of the windows_)\n\nDid no one follow me?... No, the street is empty.... I went a long way\nround....\n\n  NICODEMUS\n\nWhere did you see him?...\n\n  MARTHA\n\nHe was coming out of Annas\u2019 palace.... I followed him to Caiaphas\u2019....\nIt seems they are looking for us.... They have a special grudge against\nLazarus, the man raised from the dead.... Where is he?...\n\n  NICODEMUS (_pointing to LAZARUS, in the shadow_)\n\nHere, among us....\n\n  MARTHA\n\nThey mean to arrest all those who went with him.... They mean to stone\nus according to the law.... They will persecute all those who come from\nGalilee....\n\n  CLEOPHAS\n\nWe are all Galileans....\n\n  A MAN CURED BY A MIRACLE\n\nNo, not I....\n\n  ANOTHER\n\nNor I: I am from Bethany.\n\n  BARTIM\u00c6US\n\nAnd I from Jericho....\n\n  A MAN CURED BY A MIRACLE\n\nIt is not well that we should be found together....\n\n  NICODEMUS\n\nWhere will you go?...\n\n  A MAN CURED BY A MIRACLE\n\nNo matter where.... We shall be safer than here....\n\n  ANOTHER\n\nThey do not know us.... I have never been seen with him....\n\n  A WOMAN\n\nNor I either: he just simply healed me.... I was bowed together and he\nmade me straight....\n\n  A MAN\n\nI saw him only once: it was when he said to me, \u201cArise and take up\nthy bed and go thy way into thine house.\u201d I am he whom they let down\nthrough the roof upon a bed.... Now I walk like other men.... (_He\nturns to the door and GOES OUT, followed by THOSE CURED BY MIRACLES who\nspoke before him._)\n\n  A SICK MAN\n\nThey are right.... We are not known either.... I came to be healed of\na dysentery.... I have not had time to touch him. (_He also makes for\nthe door._)\n\n  MARTHA\n\nAre you not ashamed?...\n\n  THE SICK MAN (_stopping on the threshold_)\n\nOf what?... It serves no purpose that those whom he has healed should\nperish because of him.... (_He GOES OUT._)\n\n  ANOTHER MAN CURED BY A MIRACLE\n\nHe can do nothing for us, because he can do nothing for himself; and we\ncan do nothing for him....\n\n  A HUNCHBACK\n\nYes, why does he not protect us?... He is constantly speaking of his\nfather and the angels.... Where are those angels?\n\n  NICODEMUS\n\nIt is because his hour has not yet come.\n\n  THE HUNCHBACK\n\nWhen will his hour come?... When it is too late.... I have not the time\nto wait.... (_He GOES OUT._)\n\n  NICODEMUS\n\nLet those who do not love him go.... The Son of Man shall come in such\nan hour as you think not....\n\n  CLEOPHAS\n\nHis kingdom is not of this world....\n\n  A BLIND MAN\n\nHis kingdom is lost....\n\n  NICODEMUS\n\nHe said, \u201cAre not five sparrows sold for two farthings and not one of\nthem is forgotten before God?\u201d...\n\n  CLEOPHAS\n\nHe said, \u201cLive not in careful suspense.\u201d...\n\n  NICODEMUS\n\nHe said, \u201cIf a man keep my saying, he shall never see death.\u201d...\n\n  THE BLIND MAN\n\nBut he also said, \u201cLet the dead bury their dead.\u201d (_He gropes his way\nto the door and GOES OUT._)\n\n  A LAME MAN\n\nI am going away, not that I am afraid, but to go and look for him....\n\n  ANOTHER\n\nI also.... (_They GO OUT._)\n\n  A LEPER\n\nWho said that we must wait for him here?...\n\n  NICODEMUS\n\nSimon Peter.\n\n  THE LEPER\n\nWhere is Simon Peter?... He hardly shows himself.\n\n  MARTHA\n\nHe was by the fire, in the high-priest\u2019s hall....\n\n  NICODEMUS\n\nAnd John?...\n\n  MARTHA\n\nI heard that he was in Annas\u2019 house....\n\n  NICODEMUS\n\nAnd what was the Master doing when you saw him?...\n\n  MARTHA\n\nI saw him only for a moment, while he passed between the columns of the\nvestibule.... There was a great crowd around him....\n\n  MARY CLEOPHAS\n\nDid he see you?...\n\n  MARTHA\n\nYes. He looked at me....\n\n  NICODEMUS\n\nHe was not free?...\n\n  MARTHA\n\nHis hands were bound.... The Roman soldiers were striking him to make\nhim walk faster....\n\n  MARY SALOME\n\nOh!...\n\n  CLEOPHAS\n\nAnd the others, the twelve, where are they?...\n\n  MARTHA\n\nNobody knows.... They were seized with panic.... I have heard that\nThomas and Jude have fled to Galilee....\n\n  NICODEMUS\n\nAnd Mary Magdalene, did you see her?...\n\n  MARTHA\n\nNo, but James met her.... She is mad with grief, it seems.... She was\ncrying out, tearing her garments and dashing her head against the walls\nin Annas\u2019 palace.... The servants drove her away; and, since then,\nnobody knows what became of her.... A poor man told me that she was\nwandering in the Roman quarter....\n\n  NICODEMUS\n\nDoes she know that we are here?...\n\n  MARTHA\n\nYes, Simon Peter told her....\n\n  A SICK MAN\n\nWhen she comes, do not let her go out again.... She will bring\nmisfortune upon us. She is dangerous and does not know what she is\ndoing....\n\n  A MAN CURED BY A MIRACLE\n\nThere are men marching in the street.... I hear the sound of arms....\nThey are coming to arrest us!... Let all escape who can!... (_To\nNICODEMUS, who is going to a window_) Do not go to the windows, you\nwill be recognized!...\n\n  BARTIM\u00c6US\n\nI will go, I am not known, I am from Jericho.... (_He looks cautiously\ninto the street_). It is twelve soldiers, with a centurion.... Hush!...\nDo not speak!...\n\n  NICODEMUS\n\nAre they stopping?...\n\n  BARTIM\u00c6US\n\nNo.... They are passing.... There is no one in the street now....\nYes!... There is some one coming at the other end.... Do not make a\nnoise.... It is a woman and four men.... Why, I know them!... It is\nMary Magdalene, Joseph of Arimath\u00e6a, James, I believe, and Andrew\nand Simon Zelotes.... They are looking around them.... They are\nknocking.... Go down and open the door to them....\n\n\n  SCENE II\n\n  _THE SAME, MARY MAGDALENE, JOSEPH OF ARIMATH\u00c6A, JAMES, ANDREW and\n    SIMON ZELOTES_\n\n  MARY MAGDALENE (_beside herself, dishevelled, barefoot, with torn\n    garments_)\n\nHow many are you?... Are you ready?... What have you been doing while\nwaiting for me?... I have come from the Antonia Tower.... The military\ntribune was not in the Roman quarter.... But I have seen his friend\nAppius.... He will send him to us as soon as he returns.... Verus said\nthat it might be possible to save him.... I do not know how.... He will\nexplain it to us.... But, if he does not save him, we must.... James\nand Simon have swords under their cloaks. Where is Peter? Where is\nJohn?...\n\n  MARTHA\n\nI saw them in the hall of the high-priest\u2019s house....\n\n  MARY MAGDALENE\n\nThey ought to be here.... We must be many.... He is to pass through\nthis street, under that window, on his way to Pilate....\n\n  NICODEMUS\n\nWhen?...\n\n  MARY MAGDALENE\n\nTo-night, before the second watch.... Which of you has arms? Where are\nthey hidden?...\n\n  NICODEMUS\n\nWhat do you wish to do?...\n\n  MARY MAGDALENE\n\nTo deliver him, if Verus does not deliver him.... It is easy, you\nshall see.... They will let us do as we please, I know they will....\nThe Romans do not want to judge him.... Appius told me so, they are\nperplexed.... When they took him to Caiaphas, there were only two\nsoldiers to guard him and two sergeants from the Temple, armed with\nsticks.... If only there had been five or six men with me!... We would\nhave hidden him, I know where; and he would have been saved!... But I\nwas all alone!...\n\n  JOSEPH OF ARIMATH\u00c6A\n\nIt is not so easy as you think, Magdalene.... All the populace was\nthere, ready to stone him....\n\n  MARY MAGDALENE\n\nBut the populace is on his side and the crowd adores him!... You have\nforgotten his triumphal entry!...\n\n  JOSEPH OF ARIMATH\u00c6A\n\nIt is different now.... They were all shouting for his death outside\nCaiaphas\u2019 palace....\n\n  MARY MAGDALENE\n\nIt was a few servants of the Pharisees and Sadducees....\n\n  JOSEPH OF ARIMATH\u00c6A\n\nA few servants would not have been enough to cover a public place to\nthe very roofs.... It was indeed the same crowd as on the day of the\ntriumph.... No, believe me, Magdalene, he knows what he wishes.... He\nis determined to be destroyed.... He has confessed everything....\n\n  MARY MAGDALENE\n\nWhat can he have confessed, when he has done no wrong?...\n\n  JOSEPH OF ARIMATH\u00c6A\n\nHe admitted that he was the Son of God and the King of the Jews.\n\n  MARY MAGDALENE\n\nIs it not the truth?...\n\n  JOSEPH OF ARIMATH\u00c6A\n\nNo doubt, but it would have been better not to proclaim it to-night. In\nthe eyes of the priests and Romans, it is a crime punishable by law....\n\n  AN INFIRM MAN\n\nHe must be guilty, or they would not have arrested him....\n\n  NICODEMUS\n\nWe cannot do more than he wishes and commands; and he renounces his\ndefence.\n\n  MARY MAGDALENE\n\nBut you do not see that he does that to try your faith, your strength,\nyour love!...\n\n  NICODEMUS\n\nHe foretold all this many times....\n\n  MARY MAGDALENE\n\nThat was because he knew the cowardice of those who pretended to love\nhim!... Ah, men are great and heroic and proud!... The only men who\nhave not fled, those who tremble least, the best of you discuss and\nargue as though they had to do with a measure of wheat; and the women\nare silent and weep!... Well, what do you say, my sisters?... Is not\nthis the moment to show your love?... And those whom he has healed,\nwhere are they, what are they doing?... You there, who want to flee,\nblind Bartim\u00e6us, the other one from Jericho, the other from Siloam:\nthose eyes, which he has opened, you turn from me, because I have the\ncourage to speak to you of him!... You, Simon the Leper, you, the\nother from Samaria, have you forgotten that, before he came, you were\nmore hideous than death?... I see nothing around me but miracles in\nhiding!... The man whose hand was withered, the man who was healed of a\ndropsy on the Sabbath and the man of Gerasa possessed by a devil, who\ndares not lift up his head!... And, among the palsied, he of Bethesda\nwho is running to the door, using his legs only to forsake the God who\nhealed him!... Even those whom he raised from the dead are afraid!...\nWhy, look at Lazarus: he is more pale than any of you!... And yet you\nsaw death, you; you lay touching it for four long days.... Is it more\nterrible than men thought?... You do not answer?...\n\n  (_A long pause._)\n\n  JOSEPH OF ARIMATH\u00c6A\n\nListen, Magdalene.... I lack neither courage nor loyalty....\nNotwithstanding the power of the priests, I have thrown open my house\nto those who followed him. I know the price which I shall have to\npay.... I am prepared to sacrifice everything and life itself to him.\nBut I know his will and I cannot disobey him.... Peter wished to defend\nhim and drew his sword.... He made him put it up into the sheath.... I\nwas at Gethsemane....\n\n  MARY MAGDALENE\n\nSince you were there, why did you not help Peter?... We save those whom\nwe love; we listen to them afterwards!... But what will you do when you\nhave destroyed him?... Oh, I am delaying too long with those who are\nafraid!... What am I doing here, among men who will do nothing?... I\nam wasting his last chances and his last minutes.... I will go to meet\nVerus; after him, we shall see.... (_She turns to the door. JOSEPH OF\nARIMATH\u00c6A and NICODEMUS block her way._)\n\n  NICODEMUS\n\nDo not go out, Magdalene: it means destroying him and destroying us\nwith him....\n\n  MARY MAGDALENE\n\nAh, destroying you with him, that is the trouble!... Wait! (_She takes\nanother step towards the door. NICODEMUS stops her resolutely._)\n\n  NICODEMUS\n\nYou shall not go out.\n\n  MARY MAGDALENE\n\nI shall not go out?... True, you dare fight against a woman. I had not\nforeseen this great courage born of terror. You all shake your heads\nlike empty cornspikes; and the women rejoice in at last discovering the\ncowardice of the men, showing itself suddenly more signal than their\nown!...\n\n  JOSEPH OF ARIMATH\u00c6A\n\nTake counsel, Magdalene; think of him and reflect that, if he heard\nyou....\n\n  MARY MAGDALENE\n\nWell, if he heard me, it would be as on the day when that one among you\nwhom you all resemble reproached me with anointing his feet with too\ncostly an ointment!... Have you forgotten what he said?... Whom did he\ndeclare to be right?... You have understood nothing!... For months and\nyears, you have lived in his light; and not one of you has the least\nidea of what I saw because I loved him, I who did not come until the\neleventh hour, I whom he drew from lower than the lowest slave of the\nlowest among you all!...\n\n  NICODEMUS (_listening to the sounds outside_)\n\nHush!... Listen!... Some one is walking outside the house.... (_To\nBARTIM\u00c6US._) Go see who it is....\n\n  BARTIM\u00c6US (_at the window_)\n\nIt is a man wrapped in a cloak.... A Roman.... He has stopped.... He\nknocks at the door.... He is coming in.... The door was not closed....\n\n  MARY MAGDALENE (_running to the door of the Supper-room_)\n\nIt is he, it is Lucius Verus!... Open the door to him! Open quickly!...\nI hear him!...\n\n  (_They open the door of the Supper-room. LUCIUS VERUS appears in\n    the embrasure. At the sight of the strange assembly of PERSONS\n    CURED BY MIRACLES, CRIPPLES, BEGGARS and SICK, he stops and\n    stands dumbfoundered on the threshold._)\n\n\n  SCENE III\n\n  THE SAME, LUCIUS VERUS\n\n  MARY MAGDALENE (_running to VERUS with outstretched arms_)\n\nIt is you, my Verus, it is indeed you!... An eye that looks me in the\nface, a sword, shoulders, hands that do not tremble!... Come! Come!\nWhat are we to do?... Have you seen him?... Where are we going?... How\ncan we help him?... How many men do you need?... Where are yours? He is\nnot only innocent, as you well know, he is so pure, he stands so high\nthat the thoughts of men cannot reach him.... In his goodness he is\nbearing everything for the sins of the world; but we will not have him\nsacrifice himself for us.... A single glance from his eyes, a single\nword from his mouth, are worth all the lives of all other men....\n\n  VERUS (_icily_)\n\nIs this indeed the place where I was to meet you?... Who are these ...\nthese men ... surrounding you?...\n\n  MARY MAGDALENE\n\nThey can be trusted.... They love him as well as he loved them; but\nthey want a leader.... They were waiting for you.... They will follow\nyou everywhere....\n\n  VERUS (_ironically_)\n\nI have not come to command this ... foreign ... troop.... I do not know\nwhat you mean. There is some misunderstanding; and we should not, I\nthink, explain it here, before so many witnesses....\n\n  MARY MAGDALENE\n\nYou are right.... (_To the others_) Leave us.... I will call you when\nthe time comes for action....\n\n  (_ALL GO OUT, except MARY MAGDALENE and LUCIUS VERUS._)\n\n\n  SCENE IV\n\n  LUCIUS VERUS, MARY MAGDALENE\n\nVERUS (_sarcastically_)\n\nWho are those extraordinary persons?... I have never seen so many\ncripples, vagrants and evil-smelling sick people gathered together....\nWhat do they want with you?... I was told that you were living in the\nmidst of uncouth creatures, the oldest, the ugliest, the dirtiest and\nthe most pestilential of those Jews whom you mocked so pleasantly in\nthe house of the wise Silanus; but I could not have believed that they\nwere so intimate with you as this.... However, that no longer concerns\nme. But I told you that we should meet again before long.... Appius\ninformed me that you had been looking for me in the Roman quarter.\nI left everything to hasten at your first summons. I knew what was\nhappening and I was biding my time....\n\n  MARY MAGDALENE\n\nHow good and generous you are!... How reassuring and comforting your\npresence and your smile!... Those others ... if you only knew!... They\nwere trembling like the reeds of which our Master speaks; and I was\nhelpless and dying with shame.... But I knew that you would come back\nto us; and now this is you, your arms, your breast.... It seems to me\nthat Rome in her entirety is protecting us and that your arms, which\ncan do all things, cannot abandon him....\n\n  VERUS\n\nThey will not abandon you, Magdalene. The rest depends upon yourself\nalone.... I am good and generous, perhaps, but in my own manner; and\nwe must understand each other.... So they have arrested him in whom you\ntake so lively an interest, as I told you that they would?...\n\n  MARY MAGDALENE\n\nThey have not only arrested him: all the menials of the Temple, the\ngrooms, the herds, the meanest scullions in the kitchens rushed at him,\ninsulted, flouted and ill-treated him.... And, as they were afraid,\nas they were too cowardly to venture it alone, they made the Roman\nsoldiers help them!...\n\n  VERUS\n\nI know.... But had we not best be brief and to the point?...\n\n  MARY MAGDALENE\n\nYes, we have no time to lose....\n\n  VERUS\n\nEven so. It is not now a question of arrest nor of more or less\njustifiable ill-usage, but of imminent death. I have seen the\nProcurator Pontius Pilate.\n\n  MARY MAGDALENE\n\nGood. What did he say?...\n\n  VERUS\n\nI found him anxious, perplexed, at a loss. He is a mild, irresolute\nman, an enemy to quarrels and violence. He had to choose between\nthe inevitably bloody revolt of the priests and their sectaries and\nthe sacrifice of an agitator who was unquestionably troublesome and\ndangerous, but who has not, perhaps, incurred the death penalty in\nthe eyes of Roman law and justice. I spoke according to my duty and\nconscience. He did not hesitate. He chose the more humane and wiser\ncourse. And, as I am the armed guardian responsible for the Roman\npeace, he gave the fate of your Nazarene into my hands. However, I must\nadmit that, before our interview, I had purposely allowed events to\ntake the course they did....\n\n  MARY MAGDALENE\n\nHe is saved! I was sure of it! And how right I was to fear nothing and\nto hope all things in turning to you!...\n\n  VERUS\n\nDo not let us go too fast. There are many things to consider....\n\n  MARY MAGDALENE\n\nWhat do you say?...\n\n  VERUS\n\nI say that there are many things to consider.... Had I known nothing\nwhatever of your adventure, my choice would not have been in doubt: I\nshould, while more or less pitying him, have sacrificed the wretched\nman to the public tranquillity; it is the sovereign law of the empire;\nbut now....\n\n  MARY MAGDALENE\n\nBut now, it is different, you know him, you know everything.... There\nis no excuse for a moment\u2019s hesitation; it would be monstrous....\n\n  VERUS\n\nIndeed, there is no excuse for a moment\u2019s hesitation; it would be\nmonstrous, as you say.... Shall I, to snatch a favoured rival from a\nwell-merited death, for the second time lose the only woman whom I love\nor can love?... That certainly is impossible....\n\n  MARY MAGDALENE\n\nI do not quite understand....\n\n  VERUS\n\nYet it is simple enough: in saving him, I hand you over, without\ndefence, to the fellow who will drag you with him, by fall after fall,\nto the bottom of none can tell what pit of folly and wretchedness,\nwhence no human and reasoning power will be able to extricate you.\nMoreover, speaking for myself, I lose you irrevocably by thus giving\nyou, with my own simple, foolish hands, to one who robs me of my\nhappiness by methods against which a man who values the name does not\ntry to struggle. Whereas, if I abandon him to his fate, there remains\na chance of seeing you return to the light and for me some prospect of\nfinding you in my path; for our two lives have still, I hope, a long\nspace to cover; and many roads, as you well know, lead to Rome....\n\n  MARY MAGDALENE\n\nI understand.... I understand, since I needs must understand.... But I\ndo not yet believe.... No, it is not possible; and you, the man whom I\nknow, have not come to tell me coldly that you wish to destroy him and\nthus revenge yourself for an injury which he has not done you.... There\nis, there must be, something else....\n\n  VERUS\n\nYes, there is something else.... There remains to us, if you are\nabsolutely bent upon it, one means of saving him. But, at the point to\nwhich we have come and to which I have driven the adventure, saving\nhim probably means ruin to myself. Besides, time presses. The sentence\nis written, I have seen it. He will be put to death at daybreak; for\nthe hours are numbered because of the Passover....\n\n  MARY MAGDALENE\n\nWhat must I do?... Quick, quick, I will do it....\n\n  VERUS\n\nThe prisoner is guarded by my men; it is therefore not quite impossible\nto effect his escape....\n\n  MARY MAGDALENE\n\nWhy yes, why yes, it is simple; and that, of course, is what we must\ndo!... Once free, he will hide and he will be forgotten.... Let us lose\nno time.... But I do not understand why you came to say....\n\n  VERUS\n\nYou will soon understand.... I answer for the prisoner, therefore. Do\nyou know what I am doing, do you know what I risk by restoring him to\nliberty?...\n\n  MARY MAGDALENE\n\nYou are only doing your duty in freeing an innocent man....\n\n  VERUS\n\nIt is not for me to enquire into his innocence; that does not concern\nme. I am not his judge, but his keeper....\n\n  MARY MAGDALENE\n\nYour soldiers will hold their tongues and no one will know that....\n\n  VERUS\n\nMy soldiers will not be able to hold their tongues. They will have to\nchoose between silence and their lives. It will therefore be known\nthat they acted only on my orders. Now there is no instance of the\nhigh-priests\u2019 ever abandoning a prey, a revenge, a hatred. They will\ngo and complain, first, at Antioch, to the Governor of Syria, and,\nnext, to C\u00e6sar himself, whose anger is kindled at the very breath of a\nsuspicion. Do you know what C\u00e6sar is? The greatest, the most powerful\nmen in Rome tremble before his shadow.... For me, it means, if not\ndeath, at least exile far from Rome; and death, to us Romans, seems\nsweet compared with exile.... That is what I give; that is my stake; I\nam waiting for yours.\n\n  MARY MAGDALENE\n\nYou are waiting for mine?... What would you have me give?... I have\nnothing left.... I distributed all to the poor the other evening....\n\n  VERUS\n\nI do not ask for what one gives to the poor.... And, besides, I have\nhad enough of those evasions which lead to nothing and of those\nshuffling phrases.... Ah, much I care for justice and a vagrant more\nor less in the world and my own fate and my own exile!... Have you not\nunderstood that it is you I want, you alone and all of you; that I have\nwanted you for years; and that this is my hour?... It is not beautiful,\nI know, and it is not as I dreamt it!... But it is all I have; and a\nman takes what he can to make his life!... We stand here face to face,\nwith our two madnesses, which are more powerful than ourselves and\ncannot recede; we must come to an understanding!... The more you love\nhim, the more I love you, the more you wish to save him and the more I\nwish to destroy him! We must come to an understanding!... You want his\nlife, I want mine; and you shall have his life, but I shall have you,\nbefore he escapes his death.... Is it understood?... Are we agreed?...\nSay no, if you dare, and let his blood be upon her who has brought him\nto this pass and who is destroying him twice over!...\n\n  MARY MAGDALENE\n\nAh, so that was it!... Yes, yes, I know, I see.... I was not conscious\nand I no longer thought of it; but it was bound to be.... Ah, so it\nwas that which caused me just now, while you were speaking, to have no\nconfidence despite my confidence!... It is so strange, so monstrous, so\nremote from us!... One needs a little time to understand.... All one\u2019s\nthoughts become deranged and one\u2019s soul falls, falls, like a stone in\na well.... One grasps the meaning of nothing.... One no longer knows\nwhere one stands....\n\n  VERUS\n\nYou and I know quite well; and there is nothing extraordinary in all\nthis.... A few days ago, you would not have needed so much urging; and\nI do not understand that to-day, when the price of love is something\nquite different, to-day, when a life, dear to you among all lives....\n\n  MARY MAGDALENE\n\nAh, you do not understand!... And to think that scarcely any one, not\neven those who loved him, would understand better!... Am I then the\nonly being that has seen into his soul?... And yet it is not so very\ndifficult!... He has spoken to me only three times in my life, but I\nknow what he thinks. I know all that he wishes, I know all that he is\nas completely as though I were within him, or as though he were there,\nnear me, fixing upon my brow his glance in which the angels come down\nfrom heaven, as on the evening when I kissed his feet and wiped them\nwith my hair....\n\n  VERUS\n\nI well knew that I came too late, but I should never have believed\nthat you had gone so far.... If he has spoken to you only three times,\nhe has not wasted the minutes and has told you enough to remove my\ndoubts.... But let us be calm. It is a question other than of love; and\nyour lover himself, were he consulted, would judge that a kiss does not\nweigh much in the presence of death.... Since you love him so well,\nis his life not worth a slight displeasure, which but lately would not\nhave inspired you with such horror?... If there were a looking-glass\nin this room, I would go and gaze at myself with curiosity, to make\nout what, in a few days, has made me so repulsive that the torture of\nthe one man whom you adore is preferred to the touch of my lips!...\nBut what is the matter?... One would think that I was speaking of\nunimaginable things!... What have I said? What have I done?... Your\nface is distorted.... There is no need to look at me like that, with\nmad and terrified eyes, as though they beheld the fall of the sun or\nthe violation of a tomb!...\n\n  MARY MAGDALENE\n\nLet me be.... You cannot know.... I am only beginning to understand....\n\n  VERUS\n\nA few days since, you were not so slow in understanding....\n\n  MARY MAGDALENE (_in a soft and distant voice_)\n\nYes, yes.... For one sees only little by little.... (_Staring before\nher_) It is unfolded slowly, like a thing that has no beginning, no\nend, no name.... There are two deaths here, I hold two deaths in my\nhand; and that is too heavy a weight for a poor creature born upon this\nearth....\n\n  VERUS\n\nTwo deaths?... What do you mean?... You do not intend to follow him,\nsurely?... Your death, since he loves you, would only add a very\nuseless bitterness to his....\n\n  MARY MAGDALENE (_in the same soft and distant voice_)\n\nNo.... I am not speaking of mine.... It is two other deaths.... I still\nhave my senses.... I can see clearly in the abyss.... Let me look,\nwhere you can see nothing....\n\n  VERUS\n\nI should not have thought that, when I came to bring you his safety and\nthe great sacrifice which I am making to love....\n\n  MARY MAGDALENE (_with a sudden outburst_)\n\nThe sacrifice which you are making to love!... Ah, if you could see\nthe sacrifice which is being accomplished here and which the very\nangels dare not look upon!... But you cannot know what has happened on\nearth since he descended upon it!... It is no longer the same earth;\nand it is no longer possible!... Before he came, the purest would not\nhave hesitated!... Before he came! Before he came!... And, even then,\nto-day, I, who have been born again through him, if it were not he, if\nit were a question of another, I should not have the strength!... I\nshould perhaps sin against all that he loves, to save what I love!...\nBut he gives too much strength to love and to suffer!... I could save\nhim in spite of himself; but no longer in spite of myself!... If I\nbought his life at the price which you offer, all that he wished, all\nthat he loved would be dead!... I cannot plunge the flame into the mire\nto save the lamp! I cannot give him the only death that could touch\nhim!... But look at me with clearer eyes and you shall perhaps see all\nthat I perceive without being able to tell you!... Were I to yield but\nfor a moment under the weight of love, all that he has said, all that\nhe has done, all that he has given would sink back into the darkness,\nthe earth would be more deserted than if he had not been born and\nheaven would be closed to mankind for ever!... I should be destroying\nhim altogether, destroying more than himself, to gain for him days\nwhich would destroy everything....\n\n  VERUS\n\nIt is not so much a question of gaining days for him as of sparing him\ntortures, the mere thought of which should make you reflect....\n\n  MARY MAGDALENE\n\nI know! I know!... Because I love him thus, as none has ever loved\nupon this earth where heaven had not yet poured forth its love, must\nI not sacrifice to him what no human soul has possessed before me?...\nBut you come to ask for all that he has given; and what he has given\nis much more than his life and lives more in our hearts than it lives\nin himself!... If I destroy him in myself, I destroy him in us!... I\nknow no more, I see no more, I understand no more.... I would do it,\nperhaps, if my soul were alone; but it is no longer possible and God\nwould not have it!...\n\n  VERUS\n\nThe gods always will what men will.... Be sure that, if he whom you\nare about to deliver to the torture could make his voice heard at this\nmoment, he would not hesitate....\n\n  MARY MAGDALENE\n\nAh, I know that he would not hesitate! And that is why I am struggling\nthus, like a blind beast, between two sacrifices!... It is my past\nshame that overwhelms me and prevents me from rising to the level of\nhis will!...\n\n  VERUS\n\nMan has but one will in the presence of death....\n\n  MARY MAGDALENE\n\nMy God! My God!... I am nothing, I am defiled with every defilement:\nwhat matters this one, which brings thee life?... But am I in\nquestion?... Is it not thou alone whom I defile to-day in defiling thy\nsalvation, thou, the very source whence the source of all purity and\nof every happiness and of every life will spring?... I no longer know\nwhere to thrust back my soul!... Nothing remains to me, if I lose it;\nnothing remains to us, if I save it!...\n\n  VERUS\n\nNothing is lost so long as life endures....\n\n  MARY MAGDALENE\n\nHush, I beseech you!... Leave me alone in his silence and his will....\nLet me contemplate, let me listen to other things.... I do not yet love\nhim as he would be loved!... In vain I raise my eyes to his heaven\nof light: I see only his death, his sorrows, his suffering ... his\nsteadfast face, his eyes that lit up all he looked upon, his mouth\nthat spoke unceasingly of happiness ... his feet which I have kissed,\nlifeless and icy cold!... Verus, Verus, have pity!... I cannot bear\nit, I cannot bear it! I am falling!... Do with me what you will!...\n\n  VERUS (_catching her in his arms_)\n\nMagdalene, Magdalene!... I knew....\n\n  MARY MAGDALENE (_springing back at his touch_)\n\nNo, you did not know! And it is not that!... There is something\nelse!... There is another outlet!... Verus, Verus, come, you are not\nwithout feeling, you are not a monster, you will understand also....\nIt depends on you.... For me it is impossible.... There is a wall\nthere defended by his angels.... I cannot pass it.... I must not\nthink of it.... But you, you can do everything!... To think that you\nhold there, in that human hand of yours, the life of the God of Gods\ndescended upon earth!... I know, I know, you do not believe it....\nBut you must at least believe in his innocence; and you know that he\nhas done no evil.... He does not even know what evil is, since he is\nall goodness.... He has done nothing but heal, console and pray....\nHe has done nothing but breathe over men\u2019s souls and flood them with\nhappiness.... If only you knew him, if he had spoken to you, were it\nbut once!... Because he is innocent and because you are just, because\nyou have strength and because you are brave, you cannot deliver him\ndefenceless to the executioners.... It would not be Roman, it would not\neven be manly....\n\n  VERUS\n\nEnough of this; and, as everything is useless, let him be treated as\nyou have decided.... It is not I who am leading him to the torture....\n\n  MARY MAGDALENE (_clinging to the garments of VERUS, who takes a\n    step to the door_)\n\nVerus! Verus!... I implore you!... That is not all!... All is not\nsaid!... It cannot be decided like this!... But do not ask the one\nimpossible thing.... I will be your slave, I will live at your feet,\nserve you on my knees for the rest of my days; but give me his life\nwithout destroying in my soul and throughout the earth that which is\nthe very life of our new life!...\n\n  VERUS\n\nEnough!... Besides, there is no time. My patience in saving a rival\nwhom I hate is as ridiculous as your persistent attempt to save your\nlover by singing his praises!... When you see him dead, in less than\nthree hours hence, do not weep over him, lest your tears should be\nflung back in your own face!... (_Perceiving JOSEPH OF ARIMATH\u00c6A, who\ndiscreetly opens the door, to the left, of the Supper-room._) Who\ngoes there?... Come in, come in, this is the very thing!... We need\nwitnesses. Where are the mountebanks, the monsters, the lepers? I want\nto tell them....\n\n  MARY MAGDALENE\n\nWhat?...\n\n  VERUS\n\nThey shall know who has betrayed their god!... We shall then see if you\nhave the heart to despatch him before their eyes and how they will take\nthe news!... Repugnant though they be, I want to see their ugly faces\nagain!... (_He reaches the door and throws it open wide._)\n\n  MARY MAGDALENE (_hurrying to stop his action_)\n\nVerus! Verus!... This is not worthy of you!...\n\n  VERUS\n\nI know! I know!... I am not worthy of anything, it appears! Not even of\nyou, harlot!... (_Calling in a loud voice_) Hi! Hi! The rest of you!...\nWhere are you?... Hasten this way, you halt and lame, you club-feet,\nyou cripples, you beggars, vagrants, lepers, paralytics!... I have\nsomething of importance to tell you!... (_Startled faces appear in the\nembrasures of the two doors._)\n\n\n  SCENE V\n\n  _VERUS, MARY MAGDALENE and nearly ALL THE CHARACTERS of_ SCENE III\n\n  VERUS\n\nCome in, come in, you have nothing to fear!... (_They ENTER, timidly._)\nAre you all there?... There seem to be fewer of you.... Where are the\nothers gone?...\n\n  JOSEPH OF ARIMATH\u00c6A\n\nSir, some of them fear lest the night....\n\n  VERUS\n\nI understand; they were afraid.... Their love and their faith do not\ntake any risk of blows.... However, these will do.... Do you see that\nwoman?... I came to offer to save your master. She had only to say\nyes. She has said no. She orders his death. He will therefore die at\nsunrise.\n\n  (_Sensation in the crowd._)\n\n  NICODEMUS\n\nWhat is he saying, Magdalene?...\n\n  (_MARY MAGDALENE does not reply._)\n\n  VERUS\n\nAsk her, you will learn....\n\n  NICODEMUS\n\nMagdalene, is it true?...\n\n  (_MARY MAGDALENE remains silent._)\n\n  JOSEPH OF ARIMATH\u00c6A\n\nBut come, answer!... What is the matter with you?...\n\n  VERUS\n\nShe is at the same time betraying and destroying all those who followed\nthe tempter. I have spoken. Farewell. Look to yourselves. (_He turns\nto the door._)\n\n  JOSEPH OF ARIMATH\u00c6A (_stopping him and beseeching him_)\n\nSir, I beg of you, do not go away like this.... She is mistaken, you\nwill see.... There is some terrible misunderstanding.... Magdalene,\ncome, what is he saying, what do you say?... Why, it is impossible!...\nWhat has happened?...\n\n  _SEVERAL SICK MEN and BEGGARS (surrounding MAGDALENE, who remains\n    motionless, gazing blindly into the distance_)\n\nMagdalene! Magdalene....\n\n  A HUNCHBACK\n\nShe also has sold him!... She was with the Iscariot!...\n\n  MARTHA (_putting her arms around MAGDALENE\u2019S neck_)\n\nMagdalene!... Listen to me!... You used to love me.... What has come to\nyou?... Tell me it is not true.... You have not heard....\n\n  MARY CLEOPHAS (_putting her hand on MAGDALENE\u2019S shoulder_)\n\nMagdalene, Magdalene!... No, it is impossible.... You cannot have\nforgotten....\n\n  A POOR MAN\n\nHow much did you receive?...\n\n  A MAN CURED BY A MIRACLE\n\nYes, how much?... Where is the money?...\n\n  ANOTHER\n\nGive back the gold! Give back the gold!... Search her!...\n\n  MARY SALOME\n\nMagdalene! Magdalene!... She is mad!...\n\n  A VAGRANT\n\nHarlot!... Soldiers\u2019 wench!...\n\n  ANOTHER\n\nStrumpet! Strumpet! Strumpet!\n\n  A MAN CURED BY A MIRACLE\n\nThe seven devils whom he cast out have entered her body again!...\n\n  ANOTHER\n\nShe has sold us like a herd of oxen!...\n\n  A SICK MAN\n\nWe shall all have to suffer!...\n\n  ANOTHER\n\nYes, but not before she does!...\n\n  THE MAN WHOSE HAND WAS WITHERED\n\nShe shall not go from here until....\n\n  A PALSIED MAN\n\nIn any case, she shall not go hence alive, take my word for it!...\n\n  (_Almost ALL, shouting, gesticulating, threatening, with clenched\n    fists, crowd round MAGDALENE, who remains motionless and dumb._)\n\n  JOSEPH OF ARIMATH\u00c6A (_intervening_)\n\nCome, come, do not forget who you are, where you are nor in whose name\nyou are speaking. (_To VERUS_) Sir, I beg of you, a little patience....\nI am a just and reasonable man; and everything will be explained....\nListen, Magdalene, I am speaking to you in his name.... There is still\ntime to say yes.... I am speaking as a father....\n\n  (_MAGDALENE maintains her motionless silence._)\n\n  THE HUNCHBACK\n\nYou see!... She has received the price!...\n\n  (_An explosion of hatred. ALL surround her more closely. The\n    cries, the threats, the imprecations, the entreaties, the moans\n    are redoubled. Suddenly, in the street, rises a tumult which\n    drowns that in the Supper-room. It is the shouting of an angry\n    crowd approaching swiftly, the sound of arms and horses. The\n    uproar in the room is at once lulled. ALL listen, anxiously._)\n\n  A MAN CURED BY A MIRACLE\n\nThe Romans!... The soldiers!... They are coming to arrest us!... She\nhas betrayed us!... Let us fly!... This way, this way!...\n\n  (_ALL lose their heads. Some run wildly round the room, seeking\n    for an outlet._)\n\n  A VAGRANT\n\nNo, no!... Do not go out!... There is only one door!... We cannot\nescape!... They would discover us!...\n\n  A MAN CURED BY A MIRACLE\n\nBe silent!... Hide yourselves!...\n\n  A CRIPPLE\n\nWhy do you not put out the lamps?... They will see the lights!...\nQuick! Quick! Put out the lamps!...\n\n(_The lamps are put out._)\n\n  ANOTHER\n\nDo not go to the windows!... Do not show yourselves at the windows!...\nLie down along the walls!...\n\n  VERUS\n\nIt is a noble spectacle and I long to see it out....\n\n  JOSEPH OF ARIMATH\u00c6A (_going up to VERUS_)\n\nSir, do not ruin them.... They are weak and poor.... Almost all of them\nare sick.... They know not what they do.... Have pity on men and do not\njudge them....\n\n  (_The shouts--\u201cCrucify him! Crucify him!... Tempter! Tempter!...\n    Galilean! Nazarene!... He would destroy the Temple!... He would\n    destroy the Law!... Blasphemer!... Crucify him! Crucify him!\n    Crucify him!\u201d--are redoubled in the street and are now heard\n    outside the house itself. The red light of the torches is cast\n    into the room. THE BLIND MAN OF JERICHO steals up to one of the\n    windows and looks out._)\n\n  A PANIC-STRICKEN VOICE\n\nDo not go to the windows!...\n\n  A LAME MAN (_going to another window_)\n\nWhat is happening?...\n\n  THE BLIND MAN OF JERICHO\n\nIt is he!...\n\n  (_Several PERSONS, irresistibly attracted, climb up to the\n    windows and look into the street, with infinite caution.\n    Occasionally ONE of them turns to those who remain at the back\n    of the room, to tell them what he sees._)\n\n  ONE OF THOSE AT THE WINDOWS\n\nThere are soldiers all around him!... There is a crowd of them!...\n\n  ANOTHER\n\nHe is coming! He is coming this way!... His hands are bound!... They\nare striking him!...\n\n  ANOTHER\n\nHe is weeping!... His eyes are bleeding!...\n\n  ANOTHER\n\nThey are taking him to Pilate!... There are Peter and John, hiding\nthemselves!...\n\n  ANOTHER\n\nThe blood is dripping on his feet!...\n\n  ANOTHER\n\nHe cannot walk any farther!... He staggers! He staggers!...\n\n  VERUS (_to MAGDALENE, who has not moved and who stands against a\n    column, in the middle of the room, staring before her, without\n    turning towards the windows_)\n\nMagdalene!...\n\n  (_In the street, suddenly, the tumult falls, as a huge, heavy\n    object might fall. A wonderful silence._)\n\n  A VOICE (_in the room_)\n\nWhat is it?...\n\n  THE BLIND MAN OF JERICHO (_at the window_)\n\nHe falls!... He has fallen!... He is looking at the house!...\n\n  VERUS\n\nMagdalene, I still promise you....\n\n  MARY MAGDALENE (_without stirring, without looking at VERUS,\n    without anger, simply, in a voice from another life, full of\n    peace, full of divine clarity and certainty_)\n\nGo!...\n\n  THE BLIND MAN OF JERICHO (_at the window_)\n\nHe rises to his feet!... They drag him along!...\n\n  (_The tumult, the shouts of \u201cCrucify him!\u201d are resumed and\n    redoubled in the street. VERUS GOES OUT slowly, with his eyes\n    on MAGDALENE, who remains motionless, as though in ecstasy and\n    all illumined with the light of the departing torches._)\n\n\n  CURTAIN\n\n\n\n\n  Transcriber's Notes\n\n\nThe following changes have been made to the text as printed:\n\n1. A close-bracket \")\" has been inserted after \"_to receive_ MARY\nMAGDALENE\" on Page 17.\n\n2. Two instances of punctuation after the speaker's name \"MAGDALENE\"\nhave been removed (Page 48, Page 59).\n\n3. \"THE SAME\" (below \"SCENE II\" on Page 74) has been placed in upright\ncapitals rather than italics.\n\n4. \"Judea\" (Page 104) has been changed to \"Jud\u00e6a\".\n\n5. Indentation and justification of stage directions have been made more\nconsistent.","title":"Mary Magdalene: A Play in Three Acts","tradition":"scripture-revelation","translated_text":null,"word_count":18448}