The noble Pomponius was a Christian, but I am afraid in a very slovenly, lukewarm, semi-pagan sort of way. As there are yet in France some shrivelled old good-for-nothings whose sympathies are with Voltaire and d’Alembert--who sigh for the days of the Encyclopedia, the Esprits-forts, and the Baron d’Holbach’s witty, wicked suppers, so Pomponius furtively regretted the old bad era before creation heard the voice that cried out that the good Pan was dead[5]--the days when there were mysteries and oracles, sacrifices and haruspices, Lares and Penates, and when laziness and lust, dishonesty and superstition, were reduced into systems, and dignified with the name of philosophy. So Pomponius half believed in the five thousand gods he had lost, and was but a skin-deep worshipper of the One left. As for his wife, the Domina Flavia Pomponia, she came of far too noble a Roman family, was far too great a lady, thought far too much of crimping her tresses, perfuming her dress, painting her face, giving grand entertainments, and worrying her slaves, to give herself to piety and the practice of religion; and though Onesimus, that blessed though somewhat unclean hermit, did often come to the Pomponian house and take its mistress roundly to task for her mundane mode of life, she only laughed at the good man; quizzed his hair, shirt, and long thickly-peopled beard; and endeavoured to seduce him from his hermit fare of roots and herbs and spring-water, by pressing invitations to partake of dainty meals and draughts of hot wine. [Footnote 5: This is one of the earliest traditions of the Christian era. That at midnight on the first Christmas-Eve a great voice was heard all over the world, crying “The God Pan is dead.” Milton bursts into colossal melody on this key-note in his magnificent Christmas hymn.]