Page:Lazarus, a tale of the world's great miracle.djvu/14

2 a money changer. The man's story had been a piteous one of sickness and bad crops, and a terrible overcharge on the part of the usurer; yet Caiaphas had but shrugged his shoulders at the tale.

"Thou hast thy remedy," he had said to the creditor. "He has houses and fields, he owes thee money; take them. Why come to me?"

Something, he knew not what, in the High Priest's tone, had fallen on his ear like a wrong note in a tune. Was this justice? For justice is ever man's measure-tape of right. To Lazarus the words of Moses came back: "If thou lend money to any of My people that is poor by thee, thou shalt not be to him as an usurer, neither shalt thou lay upon him usury."

Something in the man's despairing voice and look had seemed to open out new thoughts of grief to Lazarus. What was bitterness, where was healing for its sting? What was life? Why was life? What was he, Lazarus, doing, walking along that road? Who was he?

Suddenly earth appeared to him as but a hillock, and men mere creeping insects hurrying up and down it. Yet the ancients said that man's soul was immortal. God had appeared to Abraham and Moses. Would He appear again?

Surely David and all the prophets had sung of a Messiah. Surely there must be an ending somewhere to grief and trouble, such as that of the poor man he had seen that morning. Surely there was somewhere a justice not based on human moods, or swayed by human caprice.

Yes, like a flash of lightning on a darksome night,