freemen. They were strong of body and bold of spirit, and in these past twoscore years they have had the courage to face death with willingness and defiance.
Think you that these men were slaves or outcasts?
And think you that the proud princes of Lebanon and Armenia have forgotten their station in accepting Jesus as a prophet of God?
Or think you the highborn men and women of Antioch and Byzantium and Athens and Rome could be held by the voice of a leader of slaves?
Nay, the Nazarene was not with the servant against his master; neither was He with the master against his servant. He was with no man against another man.
He was a man above men, and the streams that ran in His sinews sang together with passion and with might.
If nobility lies in being protective, He was the noblest of all men. If freedom is in thought and word and action, He was the freest of all men. If high birth is in pride that yields only to love and in aloofness that is ever gentle and gracious, then He was of all men the highest born.
Forget not that only the strong and the swift shall win the race and the laurels, and that Jesus was crowned by those who loved Him, and also by His enemies though they knew it not.
Even now He is crowned every day by the priestesses of Artemis in the secret places of her temple.
Matthew
Upon an evening Jesus passed by a prison that was in the Tower of David. And we were walking after Him.
Of a sudden He tarried and laid His cheek against the stones of the prison wall. And thus He spoke:
“Brothers of my ancient day, my heart beats with your hearts behind the bars. Would that you could be free in my freedom and walk with me and my comrades.
“You are confined, but not alone. Many are the prisoners who walk the open streets. Their wings are not shorn, but like the peacock they flutter yet cannot fly.
“Brothers of my second day, I shall soon visit you in your cells and yield my shoulder to your burden. For the innocent and the guilty are not parted, and like the two bones of the forearm they shall never be cleaved.
“Brothers of this day, which is my day, you swam against the current of their reasoning and you were caught. They say I too shall swim against that current. Perhaps I shall soon be with you, a lawbreaker among the lawbreakers.
“Brothers of a day not yet come, these walls shall fall down, and out of the stones other shapes shall be fashioned by Him whose mallet is light, and whose chisel is the wind, and you shall stand free in the freedom of my new day.”
Thus spoke Jesus and He walked on, and His hand was upon the prison wall until He passed by the Tower of David.
Andrew
The bitterness of death is less bitter than life without Him. The days were hushed and made still when he was silenced. Only the echo in my memory repeats His words. But not His voice.
Once I heard Him say: “Go forth in your longing to the fields, and sit by the lilies, and you shall hear them humming in the sun. They weave not cloth for raiment, nor do they raise wood or stone for shelter; yet they sing.
“He who works in the night fulfils their needs and the dew of His grace is upon their petals.
“And are not you also His care who never wearies nor rests?”
And once I heard Him say: “The birds of the sky are counted and enrolled by Your Father even as the hairs of your head are numbered. Not a bird shall lie at the archer’s feet, neither shall a hair of your head turn grey or fall into the emptiness of age without His will.”
And once again He said: “I have heard you murmur in your hearts: ‘Our God shall be more merciful unto us, children of Abraham, than unto those who knew Him not in the beginning.’
“But I say unto you that the owner of the vineyard who calls a labourer in the morning to reap, and calls another at sundown, and yet renders wages to the last even as to the first, that man is indeed justified. Does he not pay out of his own purse and with his own will?
“So shall my Father open the gate of His mansion at the knocking of the Gentiles even as at your knocking. For His ear heeds the new melody with the same love that it feels for the oft-heard song. And with a special welcome because it is the youngest string of His heart.”
And once again I heard Him say: “Remember this: a thief is a man in need, a liar is a man in fear; the hunter who is hunted by the watchman of your night is also hunted by the watchman of his own darkness.
“I would have you pity them all.
“Should they seek your house, see that you open your door and bid them sit at your board. If you do not accept them you shall not be free from whatever they have committed.”
And on a day I followed Him to the marketplace of Jerusalem as the others followed Him. And He told us the parable of the prodigal son, and the parable of the merchant who sold all his possessions that he might buy a pearl.
But as He was speaking the Pharisees brought into the midst of the crowd a woman whom they called a harlot. And they confronted Jesus and said to Him: “She defiled her marriage vow, and she was taken in the act.”
And He gazed at her; and He placed His hand upon her forehead and looked deep into her eyes.
Then He turned to the men who had brought her to Him, and He looked long at them;
