Some strong hope was needed--some "anchor of the soul, sure and steadfast."[75] Death lay in wait for the Christian at every turn, never certain, always probable. The daemons whom he had renounced took their revenge in exciting his neighbours against him.[76] The whim of a mob[77] or the cruelty of a governor[78] might bring him face to face with death in no man knew what horrible form. One writer spoke of "the burning that came for trial,"[79] and the phrase was not exclusively a metaphor. {165} "Away with the atheists--where is Polycarp?" was a sudden shout at Smyrna--the mob already excited with sight of "the right noble Germanicus fighting the wild beasts in a signal way." The old man was sought and found--with the words "God's will be done" upon his lips. He was pressed to curse Christ. "Eighty-six years I have been his slave," he said, "and he has done me no wrong. How can I blaspheme my King who saved me?"[80] The suddenness of these attacks, and the cruelty, were enough to unnerve anyone who was not "built upon the foundation." Nero's treatment of the Christians waked distaste in Rome itself. But it was the martyrdoms that made the church. Stephen's death captured Paul. "I delighted in Plato's teachings," says Justin, "and I heard Christians abused, but I saw they were fearless in the face of death and all the other things men count fearful."[81] Tertullian and others with him emphasize that "the blood of martyrs is the seed of the church." It was the death of Jesus over again--the last word that carried conviction with it.