be their tool. He is not in too good odour with his betters, and is squeezable. He proves subservient, and is party to the hideous crime of the judicial murder of a man whom he knows to be innocent. Thus the end comes and their victim is destroyed. And significant of finales:

"And Pilate wrote a title, and put it on the cross. And the writing was JESUS OF NAZARETH, KING OF THE JEWS.

"This title then read many of the Jews: for the place where Jesus was crucified was nigh to the city: and it was written in Hebrew, and Greek, and Latin.

"Then said the chief priests of the Jews to Pilate, Write not, The King of the Jews, but that He said I am King of the Jews.

"Pilate answered, What I have written I have written." "'*

57. Thus we reach the tragic end. Grant tradition alone, details may be inconclusive, but the masses are written in fire. Pilate has no doubt as to the standing of Christ. It is more than possible that politically it pleased him that His own people should murder Him. With Herod he also may well have feared any leader the nation might rally round. And this Jesus of Galilee, of Galilee ever in a ferment, was evidently of tremendous power and personal magnetism; He drew all men to Him; they heard Him gladly, and He was undoubted scion of a great stock. The very extravagance of His enemies' animosity put this beyond doubt. We see the point of view of Pilate. Maybe for the time being this Christ was in no hostility to Rome: but He was of the stuff that carried through successful revolutions. He was as well out of the way. Also it was as well His followers should be in no doubt in the matter. And the resulting incidents were all such as would stir the popular imagination and remain as memories when many a more formal record might pass away or be lost. But the results hardly answer the expectations of Pilate. The "cause" again falls * John xix. 19-22.

into the hands of the "wild men," the fanatics, the irreconcilables. And they have yet another wrong to add to those they have in reckoning against Rome. Rome has murdered their leader, their king. Their leader who was faithful in His allegiance to her; their King, who respected her authority and honoured her rule. And she had murdered Him with every ignominy, crucified Him between two thieves. Yes, their leader, whose mission was to teach peace and goodwill, and whose heart was overflowing with love for all the distracted sons of earth. A leader whose every hour was spent in the service of His "Father" and the uplifting of His fellow men. And murdered as a criminal! Murdered that His pitiless enemies might satisfy their lust of hate and indulge their loathsome superstitions. A priestly consciousness still had lingering confidence in human sacrifice. Now Caiaphas was he, which gave counsel to the Jews, that it was expedient that one man should die for the people.* And Rome was party to their venom. And this the reward of fidelity to Rome.

And their emissaries are in every city of the empire, to stir up enmity against Rome. And the story of this foul deed is echoed throughout the world. Where better text for propaganda? In life Christ had been an asset to this party: in death He is a mighty power. Both in His church-to-be, amongst those in more direct spiritual relationship with Him, there was great accession of numbers, and on the political side the party from now so increased that they soon became the dominant power of the nation. Maybe His teaching was not altogether that of this fierce brotherhood; but they knew a common Lord. Here, if there is one undoubted historical fact, it is that from henceforth this terrible band, alike with the more peaceful enthusiasts of days to come, are to be known as Christians throughout the length and breadth of the pagan world.

But storm clouds are gathering. The present is * John xviii. 14.

with the irreconcilables. Peace is to sink into the background. Horrors are again to overwhelm society. The man of war is the man of the times. But in the homeland of their Master there are those of His elect, His intimates, and His disciples, who still sorrow that He is gone, still weep that He suffered, still cherish His words, still make note of His sayings and dwell on His memory, and who are to preserve the records of a teaching that is to transform a world. Jerusalem destroyed, the Jewish world in hideous ruin, it is to come into its kingdom. But meantime it is seed buried in the hearts of a faithful few, and the harvesting is not yet to hand. The story of such teaching is to be the story of another period in the history of

man.

58. We now come to the reign of the madman Caligula. The spark is to be fired to explode the mine, and passions in uneasy slumber at best are to be aroused, never again to be even partially laid. This time the trouble originated in Alexandria. There the Jews were so favoured as even to have their own Ethnarch. This resulted in the natural hate and envy of their fellow citizens. With the Greeks in particular they were in bitter enmity, and these gladly brought charges against them that they were disloyal to the Emperor. Whilst all others paid him due honours they even refused to have his statue erected. A deputation of three or four Jews hastened to Rome to meet the charge. Amongst them was the celebrated philosopher Philo,* whose conception of the "Logos"

*Is it too wild a speculation to think that Christ, a child in Egypt, a royal child, the hope of his race, found in this self-same Philo the teacher or companion of his early years? In Watkins' Biographical Dictionary of 1822, before the subject became acutely controversial, we have as follows:PHILO--JUDEUS, a Greek writer of Alexandria, who was sent by the Jews of that city on an embassy to Rome to plead their cause against Apion about the year 42. He went a second time to Rome in the reign of Claudius, and while there is said to have turned Christian. Philo was so great an admirer of Plato as to neglect the Jewish rites and customs.

so closely approximated to that of the Christian Church. But he was to receive no hearing, and in fury the emperor would have nothing of his reply. Hitherto, as we have seen, the longheaded statesmen both of Rome and Jerusalem, mutually prized the welltried friendship between them, and the first serious break in this policy of the central authority, as distinguished from accidental incidents, is now when Caligula, in his lunacy, would be worshipped as a god throughout the empire. Following up his resentment against the Jews of Alexandria, he would have a colossal statue of himself erected in their temple at Jerusalem, and in its very Holy of Holies, and there be paid divine honours. His command served but one purpose to unite the Jewish world in horror at the command. In Jerusalem itself it was met with one blank stare of unqualified amazement and refusal. Destroy them he might, but erect his statue and pay him divine honours they absolutely refused. It gave further tremendous impulse to the Judas partyagainst the Roman rule in its entirety and easily established their pre-eminence in the city. And still further they increase their activities, and in every city in the empire their fiery emissaries have hearing, until, in his frenzy the governors of the provinces saw serious manace to their very rule. And Petronius, who had been commissioned by the Emperor to carry out his orders, staggered by the terrific upheaval the very announcement of them caused, paused before destroying a whole people. Instead, writing home particulars, he waited confirmation of the imperial decree. And now one of the brightest characters in history crosses the scene. The great friend of Caligula was Herod Agrippa. The fact of this intimacy, and what we know of Caligula's youth and earlier days of reign, corroborate the view that it was actual mental derangement

for the doctrines of that philosopher." We may add Philo was of a great Jew family; was brother of the Alabarch and uncle of the Tiberias Alexander who later on is to figure so largely in the misfortunes of his race.

that had overtaken him. But insane or not, Agrippa dared to intercede for his countrymen. He had given the emperor a magnificent entertainment, and he was delighted. "Ask me what you will "-he said in compliment—" and it is yours.' It was a terrible moment for Agrippa-to offend the tyrant in his weakest spot, his mad vanity. But true to his blood and true to his faith and kin, he never blenched. He asked for no further provinces, power or treasure, all far more readily granted, but withdrawal of the mandate. And can Caligula have been altogether the horrible thing we know him? We can realize his feelings. He hardly tried to hide them, but he kept his word. And more, neither did he bear Agrippa ill-will for his request. Altogether it was a pleasing incident on a background only too black, and the Jews had reason to be proud of their great champion. It is incidents such as these that tell a race.

man.

And meantime, Petronius. He also is a noble gentleIt is on him that all the pent-up fury of the humbled emperor is to burst. An example to the world, he should be taught what the anger of a master meant whose orders he had dared to so much as question. And it had gone ill with him, but happily for him and many another, Caligula was assassinated before he had time to wreak his vengeance on him or repent of his magnanimity to the Jews.

59. Caligula dead; Rome in a ferment; the senate hating all emperors; for that reason the people desiring them; the army divided; himself in weak health, Claudius was seized by some of the soldiers and led off-to be executed? No; to be offered the empire. In his confusion and the general confusion, Agrippa was the only one to accurately and calmly. weigh up the situation as a whole. Claudius was his friend, and he convinced him that there was no safety for one who had refused the purple, and that life as well as honour lay in accepting the dignity offered.

He proved correct, and Claudius became emperor. And in power his first acts were to lay the storm raised