Chapter LIV.--Excitement in Antioch.
And while he was thus speaking, one of those returned who had gone before to Antioch, and said to Peter: "I wish you to know, my lord Peter, that Simon at Antioch, doing many signs and prodigies in public, has inculcated upon the people nothing but what tends to excite hatred against you, calling you a magician, a sorcerer, a murderer; and to such an extent has he stirred up hatred against you, that they greatly desire, if they can find you anywhere, even to devour your flesh. And therefore we who were sent before, seeing the city greatly moved against you, met together in secret, and considered what ought to be done.
Chapter LV.--A Stratagem.
"And when we saw no way of getting out of the difficulty, there came Cornelius the centurion, being sent by Cæsar to the president of Cæsarea on public business. Him we sent for alone, and told him the reason why we were sorrowful, and entreated him that, if he could do anything, he should help us. Then he most readily promised that he would straightway put him to flight, if only we would aid his plans. And when we promised that we would be active in doing everything, he said, Cæsar has ordered sorcerers to be sought out and destroyed in the city of Rome and through the provinces, and a great number of them have been already destroyed. I shall therefore give out, through my friends, that I am come to apprehend that magician, and that I am sent by Cæsar for this purpose, that he may be punished with the rest of his fraternity. Let your people, therefore, who are with him in disguise, intimate to him, as if they had heard it from some quarter, that I am sent to apprehend him; and when he hears this, he is sure to take to flight. Or if you think of anything better, tell me. Why need I say more?' It was so done by those of ours who were with him, disguised for the purpose of acting as spies on him. And when Simon learned that this was come upon him, he received the information as a great kindness conferred upon him by them, and took to flight. He therefore departed from Antioch, and, as we have heard, came hither with Athenodorus.
Chapter LVI.--Simon's Design in the Transformation.
"All we, therefore, who went before you, considered that in the meantime you should not go up to Antioch, till we see if the hatred of you which he has sown among the people be in any degree lessened by his departure." When he who had come from Antioch had imparted this information, Peter, looking to our father, said, "Faustinianus, your countenance has been transformed by Simon Magus, as is evident; for he, thinking that he was being sought for by Cæsar for punishment, has fled in terror, and has placed his own countenance upon you, if haply you might be apprehended instead of him, and put to death, that so he might cause sorrow to your sons." But my father, when he heard this, crying out, said with tears: "You have judged rightly, O Peter: for Anubion also, who is very friendly with me, began to inform me in a certain mysterious way of his plots; but unhappily I did not believe him, because I had done him no harm."
Chapter LVII.--Great Grief.
And when all of us, along with my father, were agitated with sorrow and weeping, meantime Anubion came to us, intimating to us that Simon had fled during the night, making for Judæa. But seeing our father lamenting and bewailing himself, and saying, "Wretch that I am, not to believe when I heard that he is a magician! What has befallen wretched me, that on one day, being recognised by my wife and my sons, I have not been able to rejoice with them, but have been rolled back to the former miseries which I endured in my wandering!"--but my mother, tearing her dishevelled hair, bewailed much more bitterly,--we also, confounded at the change of our father's countenance, were, as it were, thunderstruck and beside ourselves, and could not understand what was the matter. But Anubion, seeing us all thus afflicted, stood like one dumb. Then Peter, looking at us his sons, said: "Believe me that this is your very father; wherefore also I charge you that you respect him as your father. For God will afford some opportunity on which he shall be able to put off the countenance of Simon, and to recover the manifest figure of your father--that is, his own."