“You shall have a guide.” “Say whether right or left; then I can help myself.” “Keep to the left.” “And if you lie.” “I cannot lie! Do you see, that is the difference.” “Why do you not lie? I should have done so.” “Keep to the left.” The Emperor believed him, and went. But after going some steps, he stood still and turned round. “Out upon you, slaves! Now I shall help myself.” It was a terribly stormy night, when Nero, accompanied by the boy Sporus, and a few slaves, reached the estate of his freedman Phaon. Phaon did not dare to receive him, but advised him to hide in a clay-pit. But the Emperor did not wish to creep into the earth, but sprang into a pond, when he heard the pursuers approaching, and remained standing in the water. From this place he heard those who were going by seeking him, say that he was condemned to be flogged to death. Then, after some hesitation, he thrust a dagger into his breast. His nurse Acte, who had also been his paramour, buried him in a garden on Monte Pincio. The Romans loved him after his death, and brought flowers to his grave. But the Christians saw in him the Wild Beast and the Antichrist of the Apocalypse. THE APOSTATE At a date rather more than three hundred years after the Birth of Christ, the stage of the world’s history had shifted from the Mediterranean to the East. Greece was sunk in everlasting sleep, Rome lay in ruins and had become a tributary state. Jerusalem was destroyed, Alexandria at the mouth of the Nile in a state of decay. The world’s metropolis lay on the Black Sea, and was a half-oriental colony called Byzantium, or, after Constantine the Great, Constantinople. The heathen world was a waste, and Christianity had become the State religion. But the spirit of Christianity had not penetrated the empire. Doctrine indeed there was--plenty of doctrine--but those at court lived worse lives than the heathen, and the way to the throne in Byzantium was generally through a murder. But while the centre of gravity in Europe had shifted to the East, new conquests had been made in the West and in the North. The Romans had founded fifty cities on the Rhine, and, since Julius Caesar’s time, all Gaul lay under Roman ploughs and worshipped Roman gods in Roman temples. But now that Christianity was to be introduced into Gaul, it encountered great difficulties. The original religion of the country, Druidism, had been proscribed by the Emperor Claudius, and the Roman cult of the gods substituted. And now that a second alteration of their religion was proposed, the Gauls strongly resented it. Accordingly Gaul was in a state of disorganisation, which was likely to result in some new growth.