The studies in which Bononius had been engaged contradicted the truth of such a hypothesis; they did not yield the smallest fact that could be construed in favor of it. Yet,--it is the brain most free from prejudice, the brain that has learned how often the impossible proves true, which is therefore the first to be ready to examine impartially what is strange and contradictory instead of unceremoniously refusing it authority with the cheap cleverness of average minds. The true thinker does not reject what lies beyond the pale of experience, but simply what is logically inconceivable.
Thus Olbasanus would have obtained undisputed success with Caius Bononius if instead of _three_ amazing miracles he had displayed only one. But the instinct that was instantly aroused when Bononius detected the magician’s triumphant smile gave him no rest; with the zeal of the investigator who hopes to make a discovery that will move the world, the young philosopher strove to find the most natural and simple explanation possible for the bewildering phenomena.... A hundred times he fancied he had grasped the truth by the wing, but it constantly escaped him, and the joyous gleam of hope proved illusive.
There were two circumstances that gave him food for reflection.
In the first place, even with the most comprehensive knowledge of all the powers of nature, it was not to be explained how the answer to Lucius Rutilius’s question, which Olbasanus did not know, agreed so exactly with the reply to Hero’s. The second circumstance appeared no less perplexing. If this Olbasanus was really a juggler, who deceived his victims for his own selfish designs, what could have been more opportune than a final compliance with Lucius Rutilius’s wishes? The Chaldean might have imposed any penance on the sorrowing youth, and if he had only wanted money, named a very considerable sum by whose payment to the goddess’s representative the pretended fate could be averted. But there was nothing of the sort. Olbasanus’s goddess persisted, with the inexorable severity of Fate, in the prophecy already made by the writing on the entrails of the victim. This fact told very decidedly in the sorcerer’s favor. What interest could the man be pursuing when, against his better judgment, he destroyed a lover’s hopes, since their restoration undoubtedly promised to be far more profitable to the soothsayer.