Page:God Manifest.djvu/228

218 higher—they would kill, kill, kill themselves and all: but they cannot, they cannot—and they fall down at length in stupor,—they lie moaning, miserable, miserable, O how miserable!

All this, and more, indefinitely more, must have been present to the foresight of Jesus, as He looked round sadly upon the fierce faces of the assembled crowd.—In comparison with these sufferings, what, what, to His disinterested soul, were all His own pains of body, about to be endured on the cross? He could not weep for Himself: for them He wept.—"Weep not for Me, daughters of Jerusalem," He said to the women who followed Him, uttering lamentations, as He bore His cross to Calvary—"weep not for Me, but weep for yourselves and for your children." He was fixed upon the cross. He forgot His own agonies: His thought still was for the souls of His murderers: "Father, forgive them," He cried, "for they know not what they do." A darkness came over the cross, and over the crowd—over the whole land. Three hours He hung in dreadful silence: what agonies of body and of spirit He was enduring in those long hours, man or angel knows not and will never fully know. At length a loud voice was heard from the high cross, amid the gloom: Eli, Eli, lama sabachthani,"—My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?" Presently, He cried again with a loud voice, "and yielded up the ghost."

He was gone—His work was done—He "had finished the work which was given Him to do." He had labored. He had struggled, He had suffered for mankind—He had completed the great work of redemption for all that were willing to be saved—He