Book IV. With all the persistency of his kind, Satan refuses to acknowledge himself beaten, and, leading Christ to the western side of the mountain, reveals to him all the splendor of Rome, exhibiting its Capitol, Tarpeian Rock, triumphal arches, and the great roads along which hosts are journeying to the Eternal City.  After thus dazzling him, Satan suggests that Christ oust Tiberius (who has no son) from the imperial throne, and make himself master not only of David’s realm, but of the whole Roman Empire, establishing law and order where vice now reigns.

Although Satan eagerly proffers his aid to accomplish all this, our Lord rejoins such a position has no attraction for him, adding that, as long as the Romans were frugal, mild, and temperate, they were happy, but that, when they became avaricious and brutal, they forfeited their happiness.  He adds that he has not been sent to free the Romans, but that, when his season comes to sit on David’s throne, his rule will spread over the whole world and will dwell there without end.

  “Know, therefore, when my season comes to sit
  On David’s throne, it shall be like a tree
  Spreading and overshadowing all the earth,
  Or as a stone that shall to pieces dash
  All monarchies besides throughout the world,
  And of my kingdom there shall be no end: 
  Means there shall be to this, but what the means
  Is not for thee to know nor me to tell.”

Pretending that Christ’s reluctance is due to the fact that he shrinks from the exertions necessary to obtain this boon Satan offers to bestow it freely upon him, provided he will fall down and worship him.  Hearing this proposal, Christ rebukes the tempter, saying, “Thou shalt worship the Lord thy God and only him shalt serve,” and reviling him for his ingratitude.  To pacify his interlocutor, Satan then proposes to make him famous through wisdom, and exhibits Athens,—­that celebrated centre of ancient learning—­offering to make him master of all its schools of philosophy, oratory, and poetry, and thus afford him ample intellectual gratification.  But Jesus rejects this offer also, after proving the vanity and insufficiency of heathen philosophy and learning, and after demonstrating that many books are a weariness to the flesh, and that none compare with those which are the proudest boast of God’s Chosen People.

                  “However, many books,
  Wise men have said, are wearisome:  who reads
  Incessantly, and to his reading brings not
  A spirit and judgment equal or superior
  (And what he brings, what needs he elsewhere seek?),
  Uncertain and unsettled still remains,
  Beep versed in books and shallow in himself,
  Crude or intoxicate, collecting toys
  And trifles for choice matters, worth a sponge;
  As children gathering pebbles on the shore.”