The Lost Chapter
Nero rules Rome in the first century AD and is destroying its best citizens with his ever-growing perversity, cruelty, and terrifying reprisals. Marius, a Roman centurion, agrees with several peers that Nero should be assassinated. While they are planning Nero’s demise, Nero’s mistress has his wife killed and banishes other artists whose skill surpasses Nero’s own endeavors in poetry, drama, and architecture. At the same time, many members of the new Christian sect (called Chrestians here) are in Rome with Paul of Tarsus, who is awaiting a legal hearing as he is a Roman citizen.
Marius is quite moved by this group who display much kindness, compassion, and mercy. Although Marius is not a believer in Jesus Christ, Marius plans to free Paul and gets the Christians to aid in the plan to start a fire that will eventually end Nero’s rule. When the fire begins, however, Nero is freed from blame as he helps put out the spreading fires and helps to rebuild Rome. The final horror includes confessions and horrible deaths of those accused in an assassination plot.
What is most intriguing throughout the story is the narrator’s ruminations about what drives human beings to such extremes of cruelty and evil to former friends and loyalists. These acts cause Marius to feel complicit while at the same time fearing exposure, especially when his friends become innocent victims based on the lies of others trying to protect their own interests. This is an astonishing read, a plausible explanation for real historical events. Riveting and recommended.
