Page:Lazarus, a tale of the world's great miracle.djvu/39

Rh Then, while she thanked him, Satan, with a sardonic grin, closed up once more and followed in their wake.

With the comfort of Lazarus's presence came a sense of safety, and terror flew away. Gradually the words of the Saviour lost their hold on the sandy soil on which they had fallen. Love and the presence of the loved one, two forces stronger than life or death, even than eternity to some, regained their sway, and the beautiful Rebekah's good angel fled forever. And Lazarus? Lazarus began to feel the magnetic influence of her presence. The power of evil he knew was close, appealing to him in the form of a lovely woman, whose soul he longed to save. Chained to his post by the claims of courtesy and chivalry, he could still cry out to the white-robed figure descending the hill, "Lord, save me, Lord, save me." Words that Rebekah's lips had never learned. "Take no thought for the morrow, take no thought for the morrow."

Surely 't was Satan who thus misused the injunctions of the Messiah. Why did they ring thus? Why, why should he, a ruler of the Synagogue, in the vigour of his manhood, surrounded by wealth, sighed after by the most beautiful woman in Judæa—why should he wander footsore and tired, hurryng hither and thither after a man who preached impossible doctrines, surrounded by a vociferating crowd of illiterate, uneducated fanatics? and for what? To attain a crown, of whose value he knew nothing, to enter a kingdom, of whose existence, even, he was not sure. Earthly life, what joyous, moving excitements it presented to one young and