Page:Jesus of Nazareth the story of His life simply told (1917).djvu/224

 XXVII.

"NEVER MAN SPAKE LIKE THIS MAN."

Preaching was the chief occupation of our Blessed Lord during His Public Life. He was always teaching, now on the seashore, now from a boat on the lake, on country roads, in houses, in the synagogues. And everywhere He was surrounded by huge crowds of men and women, boys and girls, fathers holding their children high to see and hear, mothers with their little brown babies in their arms, old folk bent and tottering, scarce able to keep their footing amidst the thousands that stood about Him, crowding and crushing "so that they trod upon one another," says St. Luke.

St. Mark tells us that "they ran flocking to Him from all the cities. And Jesus going out saw a great multitude, and He had compassion on them because they were as sheep not having a shepherd, and He began to teach them many things." The teaching and the Teacher were so delightful that the hearers never tired; fathers of families who had the daily bread to earn, mothers with their household cares upon them, little restless children, stood or sat about Him, silent, spell-*bound. There was a majesty and a grace in His look, and words, and gestures that held them captive.

He taught as a Master, with an authority none could gainsay, and when He prefaced His words with that solemn: "Amen, amen, I say unto you," there was not a wandering eye nor an inattentive ear in the crowd.

All could understand Him. He did not preach dry sermons like the Scribes and Pharisees, who made the Law harder by explaining it. He taught by parables,