This formidable hypocrite, the most of whose wealth had been obtained by secret frauds, and was not unstained with blood, had his dwelling in the centre of an immense area surrounded by lofty walls and concealed by a dense grove of trees. He received no visitors but those who came to him at night, and for no good purpose. He had the character of a recluse, devoted to sacrifice and prayer. He thus indulged his secret vices and carried on his diabolical incantations unsuspected. The dark shadows of his princely mansion enveloped a degree of Assyrian luxury scarcely exceeded by the Caprean court of the emperor Tiberius. Caiaphas, the priest, was his best friend, who shared his private pleasures and maintained by constant applause his public reputation for sanctity and honor. The influence of evil spirits who possess us is at first gentle and subtile, coinciding with our own inclination. Thinking to lead, we are led. When a man is chained so that he can no longer resist, they urge him headlong to a crisis. They fire his evil passions; they blind his perverted intellect; they inflate his pride and self-conceit; they make him scornful and regardless of others, impatient of all barriers to his self-gratification, and assure him of boundless immunity and protection. In this state of horrible fantasy and inflamed passion, he is ready to trample upon all laws human and divine. To this fearful point in his spiritual life had Magistus arrived. When my father was driven into the wilderness, Caiaphas and my uncle plotted together how to get speedy and sole possession of his great wealth. To get rid of or destroy his children was the first, and, indeed, the only thing necessary. But they resolved to allow some months to elapse—to let our misfortunes die out from the public memory, and even ourselves be quite forgotten. Hence the seclusion, the solitude, the systematic neglect to which we were subjected. The plan was finally matured. The boy was to be decoyed into the wilderness and murdered by Barabbas. It was to be given out that he was a wild, incorrigible lad, who had run away from home and joined a band of robbers. After a few months a letter was to be received from Barabbas, whose fame as an outlaw was widespread, giving the particulars of his death in an attack of the party upon some caravan. This was to settle the matter for ever in the public mind.