Sometimes he would
convey him cautiously outside the precincts of the sacred place, and
show him, in the suburbs of the city, silent, pale, melancholy men,
gliding suspiciously through the gay, crowded streets. Those fugitive
figures, he would declare, were the enemies of the temple and all that
it contained; conspirators against the Emperor and the gods; wretches
who were to be driven forth as outcasts from humanity; whose appellation
was 'Christian'; and whose impious worship, if tolerated, would deprive
him of the uncle whom he loved, of the temple that he reverenced, and of
the priestly dignity and renown which it should be his life's ambition
to acquire.
Thus tutored in his duties by his guardian, and in his recreations by
himself, as time wore on, the boy gradually lost every remaining
characteristic of his age. Even the remembrance of his mother and his
mother's love grew faint on his memory. Serious, solitary, thoughtful,
he lived but to succeed in the temple; he laboured but to emulate the
high priest.
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