“Quas Primas” Letter Encyclical by Pope Pius XI (translated into French)

De L'Institution d'une Fête du Christ-Roi.

Aux Patriarches, Primats, Archevêques, Evêques et autres ordinaires de lieu, en paix et communion avec le Siège apostolique.

1. Dans la première Encyclique qu'au début de Notre Pontificat Nous adressions aux évêques du monde entier, Nous recherchions la cause intime des calamités contre lesquelles, sous Nos yeux, se débat, accablé, le genre humain.

                Or, il Nous en souvient, Nous proclamions ouvertement deux choses: l'une, que ce débordement de maux sur l'univers provenait de ce que la plupart des hommes avaient écarté Jésus-Christ et sa loi très sainte des habitudes de leur vie individuelle aussi bien que de leur vie familiale et de leur vie publique; l'autre, que jamais ne pourrait luire une ferme espérance de paix durable entre les peuples tant que les individus et les nations refuseraient de reconnaître et de proclamer la souveraineté de Notre Sauveur. C'est pourquoi, après avoir affirmé qu'il fallait chercher la paix du Christ par le règne du Christ, Nous avons déclaré Notre intention d'y travailler dans toute la mesure de Nos forces; par le règne du Christ, disions-Nous, car, pour ramener et consolider la paix, Nous ne voyions pas de moyen plus efficace que de restaurer la souveraineté de Notre Seigneur.

2. Depuis, Nous avons clairement pressenti l'approche de temps meilleurs en voyant l'empressement des peuples à se tourner - les uns pour la première fois, les autres avec une ardeur singulièrement accrue - vers le Christ et vers son Eglise, unique dispensatrice du salut: preuve évidente que beaucoup d'hommes, jusque-là exilés, peut-on dire, du royaume du Rédempteur pour avoir méprisé son autorité, préparent heureusement et mènent à son terme leur retour au devoir de l'obéissance.

                Tout ce qui est survenu, tout ce qui s'est fait au cours de l'Année sainte, digne vraiment d'une éternelle mémoire, n'a-t-il pas contribué puissamment à l'honneur et à la gloire du Fondateur de l'Eglise, de sa souveraineté et de sa royauté suprême?

`               Voici d'abord l'Exposition des Missions, qui a produit sur l'esprit et sur le cœur des hommes une si profonde impression. On y a vu les travaux entrepris sans relâche par l'Eglise pour étendre le royaume de son Epoux chaque jour davantage sur tous les continents, dans toutes les îles, même celles qui sont perdues au milieu de l'océan; on y a vu les nombreux pays que de vaillants et invincibles missionnaires ont conquis au catholicisme au prix de leurs sueurs et de leur sang; on y a vu enfin les immenses territoires qui sont encore à soumettre à la douce et salutaire domination de notre Roi.

                Voici les pèlerins accourus, de partout, à Rome, durant l'Année sainte, conduits par leurs évêques ou par leurs prêtres. Quel motif les inspirait donc, sinon de purifier leurs âmes et de proclamer, au tombeau des Apôtres et devant Nous, qu'ils sont et qu'ils resteront sous l'autorité du Christ?

                Voici les canonisations, où Nous avons décerné, après la preuve éclatante de leurs admirables vertus, les honneurs réservés aux saints, à six confesseurs ou vierges. Le règne de notre Sauveur n'a-t-il pas, en ce jour, brillé d'un nouvel éclat? Ah! quelle joie, quelle consolation ce fut pour Notre âme, après avoir prononcé les décrets de canonisation, d'entendre, dans la majestueuse basilique de Saint Pierre, la foule immense des fidèles, au milieu du chant de l'action de grâces, acclamer d'une seule voix la royauté glorieuse du Christ: Tu Rex gloriae Christe!

                A l'heure où les hommes et les Etats sans Dieu, devenus la proie des guerres qu'allument la haine et des discordes intestines, se précipitent à la ruine et à la mort, l'Eglise de Dieu, continuant à donner au genre humain l'aliment de la vie spirituelle, engendre et élève pour le Christ des générations successives de saints et de saintes; le Christ, à son tour, ne cesse d'appeler à l'éternelle béatitude de son royaume céleste ceux en qui il a reconnu de très fidèles et obéissants sujets de son royaume terrestre.

                Voici encore le XVIe centenaire du Concile de Nicée qui coïncida avec le grand Jubilé. Nous avons ordonné de célébrer cet anniversaire séculaire; Nous l'avons Nous-même commémoré dans la basilique vaticane, d'autant plus volontiers que c'est ce Concile qui définit et proclama comme dogme de foi catholique la consubstantialité du Fils unique de Dieu avec son Père; c'est lui qui, en insérant dans sa formule de foi ou Credo les mots cuius regni non erit finis, affirma du même coup la dignité royale du Christ.

                Ainsi donc, puisque cette Année sainte a contribué en plus d'une occasion à mettre en lumière la royauté du Christ, Nous croyons accomplir un acte des plus conformes à Notre charge apostolique en accédant aux suppliques individuelles ou collectives de nombreux cardinaux, évêques ou fidèles; Nous clôturerons donc cette année par l'introduction dans la liturgie de l'Eglise d'une fête spéciale en l'honneur de Notre Seigneur Jésus-Christ Roi.

                Ce sujet, Vénérables Frères, Nous tient à ce point à cœur que Nous désirons vous en entretenir quelques instants; il vous appartiendra ensuite de rendre accessible à l'intelligence et aux sentiments de votre peuple tout ce que Nous dirons sur le culte du Christ-Roi, afin d'assurer, dès le début et pour plus tard, des fruits nombreux à la célébration annuelle de cette solennité.

4. Depuis longtemps, dans le langage courant, on donne au Christ le titre de Roi au sens métaphorique; il l'est, en effet, par l'éminente et suprême perfection dont il surpasse toutes les créatures. Ainsi, on dit qu'il règne sur les intelligences humaines, à cause de la pénétration de son esprit et de l'étendue de sa science, mais surtout parce qu'il est la Vérité et que c'est de lui que les hommes doivent recevoir la vérité et l'accepter docilement. On dit qu'il règne sur les volontés humaines, parce qu'en lui, à la sainteté de la volonté divine correspond une parfaite rectitude et soumission de la volonté humaine, mais aussi parce que sous ses inspirations et ses impulsions notre volonté libre s'enthousiasme pour les plus nobles causes. On dit enfin qu'il est le Roi des cœurs, à cause de son inconcevable charité qui surpasse toute compréhension humaine et à cause de sa douceur et de sa bonté qui attirent à lui tous les cœurs: car dans tout le genre humain il n'y a jamais eu et il n'y aura jamais personne pour être aimé comme le Christ Jésus.

5. Mais, pour entrer plus à fond dans Notre sujet, il est de toute évidence que le nom et la puissance de roi doivent être attribués, au sens propre du mot, au Christ dans son humanité; car c'est seulement du Christ en tant qu'homme qu'on peut dire: Il a reçu du Père la puissance, l'honneur et la royauté; comme Verbe de Dieu, consubstantiel au Père, il ne peut pas ne pas avoir tout en commun avec le Père et, par suite, la souveraineté suprême et absolue sur toutes les créatures.

6. Que le Christ soit Roi, ne le lisons-nous pas dans maints passages des Ecritures ! C'est lui le Dominateur issu de Jacob, le Roi établi par le Père sur Sion, sa montagne sainte, pour recevoir en héritage les nations et étendre son domaine jusqu'aux confins de la terre, le véritable Roi futur d'Israël, figuré, dans le cantique nuptial, sous les traits d'un roi très riche et très puissant, auquel s'adressent ces paroles: Votre trône, ô Dieu, est dressé pour l'éternité; le sceptre de votre royauté est un sceptre de droiture.

                Passons sur beaucoup de passages analogues; mais, dans un autre endroit, comme pour dessiner avec plus de précision les traits du Christ, on nous prédit que son royaume ignorera les frontières et sera enrichi des trésors de la justice et de la paix: En ses jours se lèvera la justice avec l'abondance de la paix... Il dominera, d'une mer à l'autre, du fleuve jusqu'aux extrémités de la terre.

                A ces témoignages s'ajoutent encore plus nombreux les oracles des prophètes et notamment celui, bien connu, d'Isaïe: Un petit enfant... nous est né, un fils nous a été donné. La charge du commandement a été posée sur ses épaules. On l'appellera l'Admirable, le Conseiller, Dieu, le Fort, le Père du siècle futur, le Prince de la paix. Son empire s'étendra et jouira d'une paix sans fin; il s'assoira sur le trône de David et dominera sur son royaume, pour l'établir et l'affermir dans la justice et l'équité, maintenant et à jamais.

                Les autres prophètes ne s'expriment pas différemment.

                Tel Jérémie, annonçant dans la race de David un germe de justice, ce fils de David qui régnera en roi, sera sage et établira la justice sur la terre. Tel Daniel, prédisant la constitution par le Dieu du ciel d'un royaume qui ne sera jamais renversé... et qui durera éternellement; et, peu après, il ajoute: Je regardais durant une vision nocturne, et voilà que, sur les nuées du ciel, quelqu'un s'avançait semblable au Fils de l'homme; il parvint jusqu'auprès de l'Ancien des jours et on le présenta devant lui. Et celui-ci lui donna la puissance, l'honneur et la royauté; tous les peuples, de toutes races et de toutes langues, le serviront; sa puissance est une puissance éternelle, qui ne lui sera pas retirée, et son royaume sera incorruptible. Tel Zacharie, prophétisant l'entrée à Jérusalem, aux acclamations de la foule, du juste et du sauveur, le Roi plein de mansuétude monté sur une ânesse et sur son poulain: les saints évangélistes n'ont-ils pas constaté et prouvé la réalisation de cette prophétie?

                Cette doctrine du Christ-Roi, Nous venons de l'esquisser d'après les livres de l'Ancien Testament; mais tant s'en faut qu'elle disparaisse dans les pages du Nouveau; elle y est, au contraire, confirmée d'une manière magnifique et en termes splendides.

                Rappelons seulement le message de l'archange apprenant à la Vierge qu'elle engendrera un fils; qu'à ce fils le Seigneur Dieu donnera le trône de David, son père; qu'il régnera éternellement sur la maison de Jacob et que son règne n'aura point de fin. Ecoutons maintenant les témoignages du Christ lui-même sur sa souveraineté. Dès que l'occasion se présente - dans son dernier discours au peuple sur les récompenses ou les châtiments réservés dans la vie éternelle aux justes ou aux coupables; dans sa réponse au gouverneur romain, lui demandant publiquement s'il était roi; après sa résurrection, quand il confie aux Apôtres la charge d'enseigner et de baptiser toutes les nations - il revendique le titre de roi, il proclame publiquement qu'il est roi, il déclare solennellement que toute puissance lui a été donnée au ciel et sur la terre. Qu'entend-il par là, sinon affirmer l'étendue de sa puissance et l'immensité de son royaume?

                Dès lors, faut-il s'étonner qu'il soit appelé par saint Jean le Prince des rois de la terre ou que, apparaissant à l'Apôtre dans des visions prophétiques, il porte écrit sur son vêtement et sur sa cuisse: Roi des rois et Seigneur des seigneurs. Le Père a, en effet, constitué le Christ héritier de toutes choses; il faut qu'il règne jusqu'à la fin des temps, quand il mettra tous ses ennemis sous les pieds de Dieu et du Père.

7. De cette doctrine, commune à tous les Livres Saints, dérive naturellement cette conséquence: étant le royaume du Christ sur la terre, qui doit s'étendre à tous les hommes et tous les pays de l'univers, l'Eglise catholique se devait, au cours du cycle annuel de la liturgie, de saluer par des manifestations multiples de vénération, en son Auteur et Fondateur, le Roi, le Seigneur, le Roi des rois. Sous une admirable variété de formules, ces hommages expriment une seule et même pensée; l'Eglise les employait jadis dans sa psalmodie et dans les anciens sacramentaires; elle en fait le même usage à présent dans les prières publiques de l'Office qu'elle adresse chaque jour à la majesté divine et, à la sainte messe, dans l'immolation de l'hostie sans tache. En cette louange perpétuelle du Christ-Roi, il est facile de saisir le merveilleux accord de nos rites avec ceux des Orientaux, en sorte que se vérifie, ici encore, l'exactitude de la maxime:”Les lois de la prière établissent les lois de la croyance.”

8. Quant au fondement de cette dignité et de cette puissance de Notre-Seigneur, saint Cyrille d'Alexandrie l'indique très bien:”Pour le dire en un mot, dit-il, la souveraineté que Jésus possède sur toutes les créatures, il ne l'a point ravie par la force, il ne l'a point reçue d'une main étrangère, mais c'est le privilège de son essence et de sa nature”. En d'autres termes, son pouvoir royal repose sur cette admirable union qu'on nomme l'union hypostatique.

                Il en résulte que les anges et les hommes ne doivent pas seulement adorer le Christ comme Dieu, mais aussi obéir et être soumis à l'autorité qu'il possède comme homme; car, au seul titre de l'union hypostatique, le Christ a pouvoir sur toutes les créatures.

9. Mais quoi de plus délectable, de plus suave que de penser que le Christ, en outre, règne sur nous non seulement par droit de nature, mais encore par droit acquis, puisqu'il nous a rachetés? Ah! puissent tous les hommes qui l'oublient se souvenir du prix que nous avons coûté à notre Sauveur: Vous n'avez pas été rachetés avec de l'or ou de l'argent corruptibles, mais par le sang précieux du Christ, le sang d'un agneau sans tache et sans défaut. Le Christ nous a achetés à grand prix; nous ne nous appartenons plus. Nos corps eux-mêmes sont des membres du Christ.

                Nous voulons maintenant expliquer brièvement la nature et l'importance de cette royauté.

10. II est presque inutile de rappeler qu'elle comporte les trois pouvoirs, sans lesquels on saurait à peine concevoir l'autorité royale. Les textes des Saintes Lettres que Nous avons apportés en témoignage de la souveraineté universelle de notre Rédempteur le prouvent surabondamment. C'est, d'ailleurs, un dogme de foi catholique que le Christ Jésus a été donné aux hommes à la fois comme Rédempteur, de qui ils doivent attendre leur salut, et comme Législateur, à qui ils sont tenus d'obéir. Les évangélistes ne se bornent pas à affirmer que le Christ a légiféré, mais ils nous le montrent dans l'exercice même de son pouvoir législatif.

                A tous ceux qui observent ses préceptes, le divin Maître déclare, en diverses occasions et de diverses manières, qu'ils prouveront ainsi leur amour envers lui et qu'ils demeureront en son amour.

                Quant au pouvoir judiciaire, Jésus en personne affirme l'avoir reçu du Père, dans une réponse aux Juifs qui l'accusaient d'avoir violé le Sabbat en guérissant miraculeusement un malade durant ce jour de repos:”Le Père, leur dit-il, ne juge personne, mais il a donné au Fils tout jugement. Dans ce pouvoir judiciaire est également compris - car il en est inséparable - le droit de récompenser ou de châtier les hommes, même durant leur vie.

                Il faut encore attribuer au Christ le pouvoir exécutif: car tous inéluctablement doivent être soumis à son empire; personne ne pourra éviter, s'il est rebelle, la condamnation et les supplices que Jésus a annoncés.

11. Toutefois, ce royaume est avant tout spirituel et concerne avant tout l'ordre spirituel: les paroles de la Bible que Nous avons rapportées plus haut en sont une preuve évidente, que vient confirmer, à maintes reprises, l'attitude du Christ-Seigneur.

              Quand les Juifs, et même les Apôtres, s'imaginent à tort que le Messie affranchira son peuple et restaurera le royaume d'Israël, il détruit cette illusion et leur enlève ce vain espoir; lorsque la foule qui l'entoure veut, dans son enthousiasme, le proclamer roi, il se dérobe à ce titre et à ces honneurs par la fuite et en se tenant caché; devant le gouverneur romain, encore, il déclare que son royaume n'est pas de ce monde. Dans ce royaume, tel que nous le dépeignent les Evangiles, les hommes se préparent à entrer en faisant pénitence. Personne ne peut y entrer sans la foi et sans le baptême; mais le baptême, tout en étant un rite extérieur, figure et réalise une régénération intime. Ce royaume s'oppose uniquement au royaume de Satan et à la puissance des ténèbres; à ses adeptes il demande non seulement de détacher leur cœur des richesses et des biens terrestres, de pratiquer la douceur et d'avoir faim et soif de la justice, mais encore de se renoncer eux-mêmes et de porter leur croix. C'est pour l'Eglise que le Christ, comme Rédempteur, a versé le prix de son sang; c'est pour expier nos péchés que, comme Prêtre, il s'est offert lui-même et s'offre perpétuellement comme victime: qui ne voit que sa charge royale doit revêtir le caractère spirituel et participer à la nature supraterrestre de cette double fonction?

12. D'autre part, ce serait une erreur grossière de refuser au Christ-Homme la souveraineté sur les choses temporelles, quelles qu'elles soient: il tient du Père sur les créatures un droit absolu, lui permettant de disposer à son gré de toutes ces créatures.

                Néanmoins, tant qu'il vécut sur terre, il s'est totalement abstenu d'exercer cette domination terrestre, il a dédaigné la possession et l'administration des choses humaines, abandonnant ce soin à leurs possesseurs. Ce qu'il a fait alors, il le continue aujourd'hui. Pensée exprimée d'une manière fort heureuse dans la liturgie:”Il ne ravit point les diadèmes éphémères, celui qui distribue les couronnes du ciel.”

13. Ainsi donc, le souverain domaine de notre Rédempteur embrasse la totalité des hommes. Sur ce sujet, Nous faisons Volontiers Nôtres les paroles de Notre Prédécesseur Léon XIII, d'immortelle mémoire:”Son empire ne s'étend pas exclusivement aux nations catholiques ni seulement aux chrétiens baptisés, qui appartiennent juridiquement à l'Eglise même s'ils sont égarés loin d'elle par des opinions erronées ou séparés de sa communion par le schisme; il embrasse également et sans exception tous les hommes, même étrangers à la foi chrétienne, de sorte que l'empire du Christ Jésus, c'est, en stricte vérité, l'universalité du genre humain.”

                Et, à cet égard, il n'y a lieu de faire aucune différence entre les individus, les familles et les Etats; car les hommes ne sont pas moins soumis à l'autorité du Christ dans leur vie collective que dans leur vie privée. Il est l'unique source du salut, de celui des sociétés comme de celui des individus: Il n'existe de salut en aucun autre; aucun autre nom ici-bas n'a été donné aux hommes qu'il leur faille invoquer pour être sauvés.

                Il est l'unique auteur, pour l'Etat comme pour chaque citoyen, de la prospérité et du vrai bonheur:”La cité ne tient pas son bonheur d'une autre source que les particuliers, vu qu'une cité n'est pas autre chose qu'un ensemble de particuliers unis en société.”Les chefs d'Etat ne sauraient donc refuser de rendre - en leur nom personnel, et avec tout leur peuple - des hommages publics, de respect et de soumission à la souveraineté du Christ; tout en sauvegardant leur autorité, ils travailleront ainsi à promouvoir et à développer la prospérité nationale.

14. Au début de Notre Pontificat, Nous déplorions combien sérieusement avaient diminué le prestige du droit et le respect dû à l'autorité; ce que Nous écrivions alors n'a perdu dans le temps présent ni de son actualité ni de son à-propos:”Dieu et Jésus-Christ ayant été exclus de la législation et des affaires publiques, et l'autorité ne tenant plus son origine de Dieu mais des hommes, il arriva que... les bases mêmes de l'autorité furent renversées dès lors qu'on supprimait la raison fondamentale du droit de commander pour les uns, du devoir d'obéir pour les autres. Inéluctablement, il s'en est suivi un ébranlement de la société humaine tout entière, désormais privée de soutien et d'appui solides.”

                Si les hommes venaient à reconnaître l'autorité royale du Christ dans leur vie privée et dans leur vie publique, des bienfaits incroyables - une juste liberté, l'ordre et la tranquillité, la concorde et la paix -- se répandraient infailliblement sur la société tout entière.

                En imprimant à l'autorité des princes et des chefs d'Etat un caractère sacré, la dignité royale de Notre Seigneur ennoblit du même coup les devoirs et la soumission des citoyens. Au point que l'Apôtre saint Paul, après avoir ordonné aux femmes mariées et aux esclaves de révérer le Christ dans la personne de leur mari et dans celle de leur maître, leur recommandait néanmoins de leur obéir non servilement comme à des hommes, mais uniquement en esprit de foi comme à des représentants du Christ; car il est honteux, quand on a été racheté par le Christ, d'être soumis servilement à un homme: Vous avez été rachetés un grand prix, ne soyez plus soumis servilement à des hommes.

                Si les princes et les gouvernants légitimement choisis étaient persuadés qu'ils commandent bien moins en leur propre nom qu'au nom et à la place du divin Roi, il est évident qu'ils useraient de leur autorité avec toute la vertu et la sagesse possibles. Dans l'élaboration et l'application des lois, quelle attention ne donneraient-ils pas au bien commun et à la dignité humaine de leurs subordonnés!

15. Alors on verrait l'ordre et la tranquillité s'épanouir et se consolider; toute cause de révolte se trouverait écartée; tout en reconnaissant dans le prince et les autres dignitaires de l'Etat des hommes comme les autres, ses égaux par la nature humaine, en les voyant même, pour une raison ou pour une autre, incapables ou indignes, le citoyen ne refuserait point pour autant de leur obéir quand il observerait qu'en leurs personnes s'offrent à lui l'image et l'autorité du Christ Dieu et Homme.

                Alors les peuples goûteraient les bienfaits de la concorde et de la paix. Plus loin s'étend un royaume, plus il embrasse l'universalité du genre humain, plus aussi - c'est incontestable - les hommes prennent conscience du lien mutuel qui les unit. Cette conscience préviendrait et empêcherait la plupart des conflits; en tout cas, elle adoucirait et atténuerait leur violence. Pourquoi donc, si le royaume du Christ s'étendait de fait comme il s'étend en droit à tous les hommes, pourquoi désespérer de cette paix que le Roi pacifique est venu apporter sur la terre? Il est venu tout réconcilier; il n'est pas venu pour être servi, mais pour servir; maître de toutes créatures, il a donné lui-même l'exemple de l'humilité et a fait de l'humilité, jointe au précepte de la charité, sa loi principale; il a dit encore: Mon joug est doux à porter et le poids de mon autorité léger.

16. Oh! qui dira le bonheur de l'humanité si tous, individus, familles, Etats, se laissaient gouverner par le Christ!”Alors enfin - pour reprendre les paroles que Notre Prédécesseur Léon XIII adressait, il y a vingt-cinq ans, aux évêques de l'univers - il serait possible de guérir tant de blessures; tout droit retrouverait, avec sa vigueur native, son ancienne autorité; la paix réapparaîtrait avec tous ses bienfaits; les glaives tomberaient et les armes glisseraient des mains, le jour où tous les hommes accepteraient de bon cœur la souveraineté du Christ, obéiraient à ses commandements, et où toute langue confesserait que”le Seigneur Jésus-Christ est dans la gloire de Dieu le Père”.

17. Pour que la société chrétienne bénéficie de tous ces précieux avantages et qu'elle les conserve, il faut faire connaître le plus possible la doctrine de la dignité royale de notre Sauveur. Or, aucun moyen ne semble mieux assurer ce résultat que l'institution d'une fête propre et spéciale en l'honneur du Christ-Roi.

                Car, pour pénétrer le peuple des vérités de la foi et l'élever ainsi aux joies de la vie intérieure, les solennités annuelles des fêtes liturgiques sont bien plus efficaces que tous les documents, même les plus graves, du magistère ecclésiastique. Ceux-ci n'atteignent, habituellement, que le petit nombre et les plus cultivés, celles-là touchent et instruisent tous les fidèles; les uns, si l'on peut dire, ne parlent qu'une fois; les autres le font chaque année et à perpétuité; et, si les derniers s'adressent surtout à l'intelligence, les premières étendent leur influence salutaire au cœur et à l'intelligence, donc à l'homme tout entier.

                Composé d'un corps et d'une âme, l'homme a besoin des manifestations solennelles des jours de fête pour être saisi et impressionné; la variété et la splendeur des cérémonies liturgiques l'imprègnent abondamment des enseignements divins; il les transforme en sève et en sang, et les fait servir au progrès de sa vie spirituelle.

                Du reste, l'histoire nous apprend que ces solennités liturgiques furent introduites, au cours des siècles, les unes après les autres, pour répondre à des nécessités ou des avantages spirituels du peuple chrétien. Il fallait, par exemple, raffermir les courages en face d'un péril commun, prémunir les esprits contre les pièges de l'hérésie, exciter et enflammer les cœurs à célébrer avec une piété plus ardente quelque mystère de notre foi ou quelque bienfait de la bonté divine.

                C'est ainsi que, dès les premiers temps de l'ère chrétienne, alors qu'ils étaient en butte aux plus cruelles persécutions, les chrétiens introduisirent l'usage de commémorer les martyrs par des rites sacrés, afin, selon le témoignage de saint Augustin, que”les solennités des martyrs”fussent”des exhortations au martyre”.

                Les honneurs liturgiques qu'on décerna plus tard aux saints confesseurs, aux vierges et aux veuves contribuèrent merveilleusement à stimuler chez les chrétiens le zèle pour la vertu, indispensable même en temps de paix.

                Les fêtes instituées en l'honneur de la bienheureuse Vierge eurent encore plus de fruit: non seulement le peuple chrétien entoura d'un culte plus assidu la Mère de Dieu, sa Protectrice la plus secourable, mais il conçut un amour plus filial pour la Mère que le Rédempteur lui avait laissée par une sorte de testament.

                Parmi les bienfaits dont l'Eglise est redevable au culte public et légitime rendu à la Mère de Dieu et aux saints du ciel, le moindre n'est pas la victoire constante qu'elle a remportée en repoussant loin d'elle la peste de l'hérésie et de l'erreur. Admirons, ici encore, les desseins de la Providence divine qui, selon son habitude, tire le bien du mal.

                Elle a permis, de temps à autre, que la foi et la piété du peuple fléchissent, que de fausses doctrines dressent des embûches à la vérité catholique; mais toujours avec le dessein que, pour finir, la vérité resplendisse d'un nouvel éclat, que, tirés de leur torpeur, les fidèles s'efforcent d'atteindre à plus de perfection et de sainteté.

                Les solennités récemment introduites dans le calendrier liturgique ont eu la même origine et ont porté les mêmes fruits. Telle la Fête-Dieu, établie quand se relâchèrent le respect et la dévotion envers le Très Saint Sacrement; célébrée avec une pompe magnifique, se prolongeant pendant huit jours de prières collectives, la nouvelle fête devait ramener les peuples à l'adoration publique du Seigneur.

                Telle encore la fête du Sacré Cœur de Jésus, instituée à l'époque où, abattus et découragés par les tristes doctrines et le sombre rigorisme du jansénisme, les fidèles sentaient leurs cœurs glacés et en bannissaient tout sentiment d'amour désintéressé de Dieu ou de confiance dans le Rédempteur.

18. C'est ici Notre tour de pourvoir aux nécessités des temps présents, d'apporter un remède efficace à la peste qui a corrompu la société humaine. Nous le faisons en prescrivant à l'univers catholique le culte du Christ-Roi. La peste de notre époque, c'est le laïcisme, ainsi qu'on l'appelle, avec ses erreurs et ses entreprises criminelles.

                Comme vous le savez, Vénérables Frères, ce fléau n'est pas apparu brusquement; depuis longtemps, il couvait au sein des Etats. On commença, en effet, par nier la souveraineté du Christ sur toutes les nations; on refusa à l'Eglise le droit - conséquence du droit même du Christ - d'enseigner le genre humain, de porter des lois, de gouverner les peuples en vue de leur béatitude éternelle. Puis, peu à peu, on assimila la religion du Christ aux fausses religions et, sans la moindre honte, on la plaça au même niveau. On la soumit, ensuite, à l'autorité civile et on la livra pour ainsi dire au bon plaisir des princes et des gouvernants. Certains allèrent jusqu'à vouloir substituer à la religion divine une religion naturelle ou un simple sentiment de religiosité. Il se trouva même des Etats qui crurent pouvoir se passer de Dieu et firent consister leur religion dans l'irréligion et l'oubli conscient et volontaire de Dieu.

                Les fruits très amers qu'a portés, si souvent et d'une manière si persistante, cette apostasie des individus et des Etats désertant le Christ, Nous les avons déplorés dans l'Encyclique Ubi arcano. Nous les déplorons de nouveau aujourd'hui. Fruits de cette apostasie, les germes de haine, semés de tous côtés; les jalousies et les rivalités entre peuples, qui entretiennent les querelles internationales et retardent, actuellement encore, l'avènement d'une paix de réconciliation; les ambitions effrénées, qui se couvrent bien souvent du masque de l'intérêt public et de l'amour de la patrie, avec leurs tristes conséquences: les discordes civiles, un égoïsme aveugle et démesuré qui, ne poursuivant que les satisfactions et les avantages personnels, apprécie toute chose à la mesure de son propre intérêt. Fruits encore de cette apostasie, la paix domestique bouleversée par l'oubli des devoirs et l'insouciance de la conscience; l'union et la stabilité des familles chancelantes; toute la société, enfin, ébranlée et menacée de ruine.

19. La fête, désormais annuelle, du Christ-Roi Nous donne le plus vif espoir de hâter le retour si désirable de l'humanité à son très affectueux Sauveur. Ce serait assurément le devoir des catholiques de préparer et de hâter ce retour par une action diligente; mais il se fait que beaucoup d'entre eux ne possèdent pas dans la société le rang ou l'autorité qui siérait aux apologistes de la vérité. Peut-être faut-il attribuer ce désavantage à l'indolence ou à la timidité des bons; ils s'abstiennent de résister ou ne le font que mollement; les adversaires de l'Eglise en retirent fatalement un surcroît de prétentions et d'audace. Mais du jour où l'ensemble des fidèles comprendront qu'il leur faut combattre, vaillamment et sans relâche, sous les étendards du Christ-Roi, le feu de l'apostolat enflammera les cœurs, tous travailleront à réconcilier avec leur Seigneur les âmes qui l'ignorent ou qui l'ont abandonné, tous s'efforceront de maintenir inviolés ses droits.

                Mais il y a plus. Une fête célébrée chaque année chez tous les peuples en l'honneur du Christ-Roi sera souverainement efficace pour incriminer et réparer en quelque manière cette apostasie publique, si désastreuse pour la société, qu'a engendrée le laïcisme. Dans les conférences internationales et dans les Parlements, on couvre d'un lourd silence le nom très doux de notre Rédempteur; plus cette conduite est indigne et plus haut doivent monter nos acclamations, plus doit être propagée la déclaration des droits que confèrent au Christ sa dignité et son autorité royales.

                Ajoutons que, depuis les dernières années du siècle écoulé, les voies furent merveilleusement préparées à l'institution de cette fête.

                Chacun connaît les arguments savants, les considérations lumineuses, apportés en faveur de cette dévotion par une foule d'ouvrages édités dans les langues les plus diverses et sur tous les points de l'univers. Chacun sait que l'autorité et la souveraineté du Christ ont déjà été reconnues par la pieuse coutume de familles, presque innombrables, se vouant et se consacrant au Sacré Cœur de Jésus. Et non seulement des familles, mais des Etats et des royaumes ont observé cette pratique. Bien plus, sur l'initiative et sous la direction de Léon XIII, le genre humain tout entier fut consacré à ce divin Cœur, au cours de l'Année sainte 1900.

                Nous ne saurions passer sous silence les Congrès eucharistiques, que notre époque a vus se multiplier en si grand nombre. Ils ont servi merveilleusement la cause de la proclamation solennelle de la royauté du Christ sur la société humaine. Par des conférences tenues dans leurs assemblées, par des sermons prononcés dans les églises, par des expositions publiques et des adorations en commun du Saint Sacrement, par des processions grandioses, ces Congrès, réunis dans le but d'offrir à la vénération et aux hommages des populations d'un diocèse, d'une province, d'une nation, ou même du monde entier, le Christ-Roi se cachant sous les voiles eucharistiques, célèbrent le Christ comme le Roi que les hommes ont reçu de Dieu. Ce Jésus, que les impies ont refusé de recevoir quand il vint en son royaume, on peut dire, en toute vérité, que le peuple chrétien, mû par une inspiration divine, va l'arracher au silence et, pour ainsi dire, à l'obscurité des temples, pour le conduire, tel un triomphateur, par les rues des grandes villes et le rétablir dans tous les droits de sa royauté.

                Pour l'exécution de Notre dessein, dont Nous venons de vous entretenir, l'Année sainte qui s'achève offre une occasion favorable entre toutes. Elle vient de rappeler à l'esprit et au cœur des fidèles ces biens célestes qui dépassent tout sentiment naturel; dans son infinie bonté, Dieu a enrichi les uns, à nouveau, du don de sa grâce; il a affermi les autres dans la bonne voie, en leur accordant une ardeur nouvelle pour rechercher des dons plus parfaits. Que Nous prêtions donc attention aux nombreuses suppliques qui Nous ont été adressées, ou que Nous considérions les événements qui marquèrent l'année du grand Jubilé, Nous avons certes bien des raisons de penser que le jour est venu pour Nous de prononcer la sentence si attendue de tous: le Christ sera honoré par une fête propre et spéciale comme Roi de tout le genre humain.

                Durant cette année, en effet, comme Nous l'avons remarqué au début de cette Lettre, ce Roi divin, vraiment”admirable en ses Saints”, a été”magnifiquement glorifié”par l'élévation aux honneurs de la sainteté d'un nouveau groupe de ses soldats; durant cette année, une exposition extraordinaire a, en quelque sorte, montré à tout le monde les travaux des hérauts de l'Evangile, et tous ont pu admirer les victoires remportées par ces champions du Christ pour l'extension de son royaume; durant cette année, enfin, Nous avons commémoré, avec le centenaire du Concile de Nicée, la glorification, contre ses négateurs, de la consubstantialité du Verbe Incarné avec le Père, dogme sur lequel s'appuie, comme sur son fondement, la royauté universelle du Christ.

                En conséquence, en vertu de Notre autorité apostolique, Nous instituons la fête de Notre-Seigneur Jésus-Christ-Roi.

                Nous ordonnons qu'elle soit célébrée dans le monde entier, chaque année, le dernier dimanche d'octobre, c'est-à-dire celui qui précède immédiatement la solennité de la Toussaint. Nous prescrivons également que chaque année, en ce même jour, on renouvelle la consécration du genre humain au Sacré Cœur de Jésus, consécration dont Notre Prédécesseur Pie X, de sainte mémoire, avait déjà ordonné le renouvellement annuel. Toutefois, pour cette année, Nous voulons que cette rénovation soit faite le 31 de ce mois.

                En ce jour, Nous célébrerons la messe pontificale en l'honneur du Christ-Roi et Nous ferons prononcer en Notre présence cette consécration. Nous ne croyons pas pouvoir mieux et plus heureusement terminer l'Année sainte ni témoigner plus éloquemment au Christ,”Roi immortel des siècles”, Notre reconnaissance - comme celle de tout l'univers catholique, dont Nous Nous faisons aussi l'interprète - pour les bienfaits accordés en cette période de grâce à Nous-même, à l'Église et à toute la catholicité.

                Il est inutile, Vénérables Frères, de vous expliquer longuement pourquoi Nous avons institué une fête du Christ-Roi distincte des autres solennités qui font ressortir et glorifient, dans une certaine mesure, sa dignité royale. Il suffit pourtant d'observer que, si toutes les fêtes de Notre-Seigneur ont le Christ comme objet matériel, suivant l'expression consacrée par les théologiens, cependant leur objet formel n'est d'aucune façon, soit en fait, soit dans les termes, la royauté du Christ.

                En fixant la fête un dimanche, Nous avons voulu que le clergé ne fût pas seul à rendre ses hommages au divin Roi par la célébration du Saint Sacrifice et la récitation de l'Office, mais que le peuple, dégagé de ses occupations habituelles et animé d'une joie sainte, pût donner un témoignage éclatant de son obéissance au Christ comme à son Maître et à son Souverain. Enfin, plus que tout autre, le dernier dimanche d'octobre Nous a paru désigné pour cette solennité: il clôt à peu près le cycle de l'année liturgique; de la sorte, les mystères de la vie de Jésus-Christ commémorés au cours de l'année trouveront dans la solennité du Christ-Roi comme leur achèvement et leur couronnement et, avant de célébrer la gloire de tous les Saints, la Liturgie proclamera et exaltera la gloire de Celui qui triomphe, en tous les Saints et tous les élus.

                Il est de votre devoir, Vénérables Frères, comme de votre ressort, de faire précéder la fête annuelle par une série d'instructions données, en des jours déterminés, dans chaque paroisse. Le peuple sera instruit et renseigné exactement sur la nature, la signification et l'importance de cette fête; les fidèles régleront dès lors et organiseront leur vie de manière à la rendre digne de sujets loyalement et amoureusement soumis à la souveraineté du divin Roi.

20. Au terme de cette Lettre, Nous voudrions encore, Vénérables Frères, vous exposer brièvement les fruits que Nous Nous promettons et que Nous espérons fermement, tant pour l'Eglise et la société civile que pour chacun des fidèles, de ce culte public rendu au Christ-Roi.

                L'obligation d'offrir les hommages que Nous venons de dire à l'autorité souveraine de Notre Maître ne peut manquer de rappeler aux hommes les droits de l'Eglise. Instituée par le Christ sous la forme organique d'une société parfaite, en vertu de ce droit originel, elle ne peut abdiquer la pleine liberté et l'indépendance complète à l'égard du pouvoir civil. Elle ne peut dépendre d'une volonté étrangère dans l'accomplissement de sa mission divine d'enseigner, de gouverner et de conduire au bonheur éternel tous les membres du royaume du Christ.

                Bien plus, l'Etat doit procurer une liberté semblable aux Ordres et aux Congrégations de religieux des deux sexes. Ce sont les auxiliaires les plus fermes des pasteurs de l'Eglise; ceux qui travaillent le plus efficacement à étendre et à affermir le royaume du Christ, d'abord, en engageant la lutte par la profession des trois vœux de religion contre le monde et ses trois concupiscences; ensuite, du fait d'avoir embrassé un état de vie plus parfait, en faisant resplendir aux yeux de tous, avec un éclat continu et chaque jour grandissant, cette sainteté dont le divin Fondateur a voulu faire une note distinctive de la véritable Eglise.

21. Les Etats, à leur tour, apprendront par la célébration annuelle de cette fête que les gouvernants et les magistrats ont l'obligation, aussi bien que les particuliers, de rendre au Christ un culte public et d'obéir à ses lois. Les chefs de la société civile se rappelleront, de leur côté, le dernier jugement, où le Christ accusera ceux qui l'ont expulsé de la vie publique, mais aussi ceux qui l'ont dédaigneusement mis de côté ou ignoré, et punira de pareils outrages par les châtiments les plus terribles; car sa dignité royale exige que l'État tout entier se règle sur les commandements de Dieu et les principes chrétiens dans l'établissement des lois, dans l'administration de la justice, dans la formation intellectuelle et morale de la jeunesse, qui doit respecter la saine doctrine et la pureté des mœurs.

22. Quelle énergie encore, quelle vertu pourront puiser les fidèles dans la méditation de ces vérités pour modeler leurs esprits suivant les véritables principes de la vie chrétienne! Si tout pouvoir a été donné au Christ Seigneur dans le ciel et sur la terre; si les hommes, rachetés par son sang très précieux, deviennent à un nouveau titre les sujets de son empire; si enfin cette puissance embrasse la nature humaine tout entière, on doit évidemment conclure qu'aucune de nos facultés ne peut se soustraire à cette souveraineté.

                Il faut donc qu'il règne sur nos intelligences: nous devons croire, avec une complète soumission, d'une adhésion ferme et constante, les vérités révélées et les enseignements du Christ. Il faut qu'il règne sur nos volontés: nous devons observer les lois et les commandements de Dieu.

                Il faut qu'il règne sur nos cœurs: nous devons sacrifier nos affections naturelles et aimer Dieu par-dessus toutes choses et nous attacher à lui seul. Il faut qu'il règne sur nos corps et sur nos membres: nous devons les faire servir d'instruments ou, pour emprunter le langage de l'Apôtre saint Paul, d'armes de justice offertes à Dieu pour entretenir la sainteté intérieure de nos âmes. Voilà des pensées qui, proposées à la réflexion des fidèles et considérées attentivement, les entraîneront aisément vers la perfection la plus élevée.

                Plaise à Dieu, Vénérables Frères, que les hommes qui vivent hors de l'Eglise recherchent et acceptent pour leur salut le joug suave du Christ! Quant à nous tous, qui, par un dessein de la divine miséricorde, habitons sa maison, fasse le ciel que nous portions ce joug non pas à contrecœur, mais ardemment, amoureusement, saintement! Ainsi nous récolterons les heureux fruits d'une vie conforme aux lois du royaume divin. Reconnus par le Christ pour de bons et fidèles serviteurs de son royaume terrestre, nous participerons ensuite, avec lui, à la félicité et à la gloire sans fin de son royaume céleste.

                Agréez, Vénérables Frères, à l'approche de la fête de Noël, ce présage et ce vœu comme un témoignage de Notre paternelle affection; et recevez la Bénédiction apostolique, gage des faveurs divines, que Nous vous accordons de grand cœur, à vous, Vénérables Frères, à votre clergé et à votre peuple.

Donné à Rome, près Saint-Pierre, le 11 décembre de l'Année sainte 1925,

 la quatrième de Notre Pontificat.

Tuesday's Serial: "BEN-HUR: a tale of the Christ." by Lew Wallace - the end (in English)

CHAPTER IX

                Next morning, about the second hour, two men rode full speed to the doors of Ben-Hur's tents, and dismounting, asked to see him. He was not yet risen, but gave directions for their admission.

                "Peace to you, brethren," he said, for they were of his Galileans, and trusted officers. "Will you be seated?"

                "Nay," the senior replied, bluntly, "to sit and be at ease is to let the Nazarene die. Rise, son of Judah, and go with us. The judgment has been given. The tree of the cross is already at Golgotha."

                Ben-Hur stared at them.

                "The cross!" was all he could for the moment say.

                "They took him last night, and tried him," the man continued. "At dawn they led him before Pilate. Twice the Roman denied his guilt; twice he refused to give him over. At last he washed his hands, and said, 'Be it upon you then;' and they answered -”

                "Who answered?"

                "They - the priests and people - 'His blood be upon us and our children.'"

                "Holy father Abraham!" cried Ben-Hur; "a Roman kinder to an Israelite than his own kin! And if - ah, if he should indeed be the son of God, what shall ever wash his blood from their children? It must not be - 'tis time to fight!"

                His face brightened with resolution, and he clapped his hands.

                "The horses - and quickly!" he said to the Arab who answered the signal. "And bid Amrah send me fresh garments, and bring my sword! It is time to die for Israel, my friends. Tarry without till I come."

                He ate a crust, drank a cup of wine, and was soon upon the road.

                "Whither would you go first?" asked the Galilean.

                "To collect the legions."

                "Alas!" the man replied, throwing up his hands.

                "Why alas?"

                "Master" - the man spoke with shame -”master, I and my friend here are all that are faithful. The rest do follow the priests."

                "Seeking what?" and Ben-Hur drew rein.

                "To kill him."

                "Not the Nazarene?"

                "You have said it."

                Ben-Hur looked slowly from one man to the other. He was hearing again the question of the night before: "The cup my Father hath given me, shall I not drink it?" In the ear of the Nazarene he was putting his own question, "If I bring thee rescue, wilt thou accept it?" He was saying to himself, "This death may not be averted. The man has been travelling towards it with full knowledge from the day he began his mission: it is imposed by a will higher than his; whose but the Lord's! If he is consenting, if he goes to it voluntarily, what shall another do?" Nor less did Ben-Hur see the failure of the scheme he had built upon the fidelity of the Galileans; their desertion, in fact, left nothing more of it. But how singular it should happen that morning of all others! A dread seized him. It was possible his scheming, and labor, and expenditure of treasure might have been but blasphemous contention with God. When he picked up the reins and said, "Let us go, brethren," all before him was uncertainty. The faculty of resolving quickly, without which one cannot be a hero in the midst of stirring scenes, was numb within him.

                "Let us go, brethren; let us to Golgotha."

                They passed through excited crowds of people going south, like themselves. All the country north of the city seemed aroused and in motion.

                Hearing that the procession with the condemned might be met with somewhere near the great white towers left by Herod, the three friends rode thither, passing round southeast of Akra. In the valley below the Pool of Hezekiah, passage-way against the multitude became impossible, and they were compelled to dismount, and take shelter behind the corner of a house and wait.

                The waiting was as if they were on a river bank, watching a flood go by, for such the people seemed.

                There are certain chapters in the First Book of this story which were written to give the reader an idea of the composition of the Jewish nationality as it was in the time of Christ. They were also written in anticipation of this hour and scene; so that he who has read them with attention can now see all Ben-Hur saw of the going to the crucifixion - a rare and wonderful sight!

                Half an hour - an hour - the flood surged by Ben-Hur and his companions, within arm's reach, incessant, undiminished. At the end of that time he could have said, "I have seen all the castes of Jerusalem, all the sects of Judea, all the tribes of Israel, and all the nationalities of earth represented by them." The Libyan Jew went by, and the Jew of Egypt, and the Jew from the Rhine; in short, Jews from all East countries and all West countries, and all islands within commercial connection; they went by on foot, on horseback, on camels, in litters and chariots, and with an infinite variety of costumes, yet with the same marvellous similitude of features which to-day particularizes the children of Israel, tried as they have been by climates and modes of life; they went by speaking all known tongues, for by that means only were they distinguishable group from group; they went by in haste - eager, anxious, crowding - all to behold one poor Nazarene die, a felon between felons.

                These were the many, but they were not all.

                Borne along with the stream were thousands not Jews - thousands hating and despising them - Greeks, Romans, Arabs, Syrians, Africans, Egyptians, Easterns. So that, studying the mass, it seemed the whole world was to be represented, and, in that sense, present at the crucifixion.

                The going was singularly quiet. A hoof-stroke upon a rock, the glide and rattle of revolving wheels, voices in conversation, and now and then a calling voice, were all the sounds heard above the rustle of the mighty movement. Yet was there upon every countenance the look with which men make haste to see some dreadful sight, some sudden wreck, or ruin, or calamity of war. And by such signs Ben-Hur judged that these were the strangers in the city come up to the Passover, who had had no part in the trial of the Nazarene, and might be his friends.

                At length, from the direction of the great towers, Ben-Hur heard, at first faint in the distance, a shouting of many men.

                "Hark! they are coming now," said one of his friends.

                The people in the street halted to hear; but as the cry rang on over their heads, they looked at each other, and in shuddering silence moved along.

                The shouting drew nearer each moment; and the air was already full of it and trembling, when Ben-Hur saw the servants of Simonides coming with their master in his chair, and Esther walking by his side; a covered litter was next behind them.

                Peace to you, O Simonides - and to you, Esther," said Ben-Hur, meeting them. "If you are for Golgotha, stay until the procession passes; I will then go with you. There is room to turn in by the house here."

                The merchant's large head rested heavily upon his breast; rousing himself, he answered, "Speak to Balthasar; his pleasure will be mine. He is in the litter."

                Ben-Hur hastened to draw aside the curtain. The Egyptian was lying within, his wan face so pinched as to appear like a dead man's. The proposal was submitted to him.

                "Can we see him?" he inquired, faintly.

                "The Nazarene? yes; he must pass within a few feet of us."

                "Dear Lord!" the old man cried, fervently. "Once more, once more! Oh, it is a dreadful day for the world!"

                Shortly the whole party were in waiting under shelter of the house. They said but little, afraid, probably, to trust their thoughts to each other; everything was uncertain, and nothing so much so as opinions. Balthasar drew himself feebly from the litter, and stood supported by a servant; Esther and Ben-Hur kept Simonides company.

                Meantime the flood poured along, if anything, more densely than before; and the shouting came nearer, shrill up in the air, hoarse along the earth, and cruel. At last the procession was up.

                "See!" said Ben-Hur, bitterly; "that which cometh now is Jerusalem."

                The advance was in possession of an army of boys, hooting and screaming, "The King of the Jews! Room, room for the King of the Jews!"

                Simonides watched them as they whirled and danced along, like a cloud of summer insects, and said, gravely, "When these come to their inheritance, son of Hur, alas for the city of Solomon!"

                A band of legionaries fully armed followed next, marching in sturdy indifference, the glory of burnished brass about them the while.

                Then came the NAZARENE!

                He was nearly dead. Every few steps he staggered as if he would fall. A stained gown badly torn hung from his shoulders over a seamless undertunic. His bare feet left red splotches upon the stones. An inscription on a board was tied to his neck. A crown of thorns had been crushed hard down upon his head, making cruel wounds from which streams of blood, now dry and blackened, had run over his face and neck. The long hair, tangled in the thorns, was clotted thick. The skin, where it could be seen, was ghastly white. His hands were tied before him. Back somewhere in the city he had fallen exhausted under the transverse beam of his cross, which, as a condemned person, custom required him to bear to the place of execution; now a countryman carried the burden in his stead. Four soldiers went with him as a guard against the mob, who sometimes, nevertheless, broke through, and struck him with sticks, and spit upon him. Yet no sound escaped him, neither remonstrance nor groan; nor did he look up until he was nearly in front of the house sheltering Ben-Hur and his friends, all of whom were moved with quick compassion. Esther clung to her father; and he, strong of will as he was, trembled. Balthasar fell down speechless. Even Ben-Hur cried out, "O my God! my God!" Then, as if he divined their feelings or heard the exclamation, the Nazarene turned his wan face towards the party, and looked at them each one, so they carried the look in memory through life. They could see he was thinking of them, not himself, and the dying eyes gave them the blessing he was not permitted to speak.

                "Where are thy legions, son of Hur?" asked Simonides, aroused.

                "Hannas can tell thee better than I."

                "What, faithless?"

                "All but these two."

                "Then all is lost, and this good man must die!"

                The face of the merchant knit convulsively as he spoke, and his head sank upon his breast. He had borne his part in Ben-Hur's labors well, and he had been inspired by the same hopes, now blown out never to be rekindled.

                Two other men succeeded the Nazarene bearing cross-beams.

                "Who are these?" Ben-Hur asked of the Galileans.

                "Thieves appointed to die with the Nazarene," they replied.

                Next in the procession stalked a mitred figure clad all in the golden vestments of the high-priest. Policemen from the Temple curtained him round about; and after him, in order, strode the sanhedrim, and a long array of priests, the latter in their plain white garments, overwrapped by abnets of many folds and gorgeous colors.

                "The son-in-law of Hannas," said Ben-Hur, in a low voice.

                "Caiaphas! I have seen him," Simonides replied, adding, after a pause during which he thoughtfully watched the haughty pontiff, "And now am I convinced. With such assurance as proceeds from clear enlightenment of the spirit - with absolute assurance - now know I that he who first goes yonder with the inscription about his neck is what the inscription proclaims him - KING OF THE JEWS. A common man, an impostor, a felon, was never thus waited upon. For look! Here are the nations - Jerusalem, Israel. Here is the ephod, here the blue robe with its fringe, and purple pomegranates, and golden bells, not seen in the street since the day Jaddua went out to meet the Macedonian - proofs all that this Nazarene is King. Would I could rise and go after him!"

                Ben-Hur listened surprised; and directly, as if himself awakening to his unusual display of feeling, Simonides said, impatiently,

                "Speak to Balthasar, I pray you, and let us begone. The vomit of Jerusalem is coming."

                Then Esther spoke.

                "I see some women there, and they are weeping. Who are they?"

                Following the pointing of her hand, the party beheld four women in tears; one of them leaned upon the arm of a man of aspect not unlike the Nazarene's. Presently Ben-Hur answered,

                "The man is the disciple whom the Nazarene loves the best of all; she who leans upon his arm is Mary, the Master's mother; the others are friendly women of Galilee."

                Esther pursued the mourners with glistening eyes until the multitude received them out of sight.

                It may be the reader will fancy the foregoing snatches of conversation were had in quiet; but it was not so. The talking was, for the most part, like that indulged by people at the seaside under the sound of the surf; for to nothing else can the clamor of this division of the mob be so well likened.

                The demonstration was the forerunner of those in which, scarce thirty years later, under rule of the factions, the Holy City was torn to pieces; it was quite as great in numbers, as fanatical and bloodthirsty; boiled and raved, and had in it exactly the same elements - servants, camel-drivers, marketmen, gate-keepers, gardeners, dealers in fruits and wines, proselytes, and foreigners not proselytes, watchmen and menials from the Temple, thieves, robbers, and the myriad not assignable to any class, but who, on such occasions as this, appeared no one could say whence, hungry and smelling of caves and old tombs - bareheaded wretches with naked arms and legs, hair and beard in uncombed mats, and each with one garment the color of clay; beasts with abysmal mouths, in outcry effective as lions calling each other across desert spaces. Some of them had swords; a greater number flourished spears and javelins; though the weapons of the many were staves and knotted clubs, and slings, for which latter selected stones were stored in scrips, and sometimes in sacks improvised from the foreskirts of their dirty tunics. Among the mass here and there appeared persons of high degree - scribes, elders, rabbis, Pharisees with broad fringing, Sadducees in fine cloaks - serving for the time as prompters and directors. If a throat tired of one cry, they invented another for it; if brassy lungs showed signs of collapse, they set them going again; and yet the clamor, loud and continuous as it was, could have been reduced to a few syllables - King of the Jews! Room for the King of the Jews! - Defiler of the Temple! - Blasphemer of God! - Crucify him, crucify him! And of these cries the last one seemed in greatest favor, because, doubtless, it was more directly expressive of the wish of the mob, and helped to better articulate its hatred of the Nazarene.

                "Come," said Simonides, when Balthasar was ready to proceed -”come, let us forward."

                Ben-Hur did not hear the call. The appearance of the part of the procession then passing, its brutality and hunger for life, were reminding him of the Nazarene - his gentleness, and the many charities he had seen him do for suffering men. Suggestions beget suggestions; so he remembered suddenly his own great indebtedness to the man; the time he himself was in the hands of a Roman guard going, as was supposed, to a death as certain and almost as terrible as this one of the cross; the cooling drink he had at the well by Nazareth, and the divine expression of the face of him who gave it; the later goodness, the miracle of Palm-Sunday; and with these recollections, the thought of his present powerlessness to give back help for help or make return in kind stung him keenly, and he accused himself. He had not done all he might; he could have watched with the Galileans, and kept them true and ready; and this - ah! this was the moment to strike! A blow well given now would not merely disperse the mob and set the Nazarene free; it would be a trumpet-call to Israel, and precipitate the long-dreamt-of war for freedom. The opportunity was going; the minutes were bearing it away; and if lost! God of Abraham! Was there nothing to be done - nothing?

                That instant a party of Galileans caught his eye. He rushed through the press and overtook them.

                "Follow me," he said. "I would have speech with you."

                The men obeyed him, and when they were under shelter of the house, he spoke again:

                "You are of those who took my swords, and agreed with me to strike for freedom and the King who was coming. You have the swords now, and now is the time to strike with them. Go, look everywhere, and find our brethren, and tell them to meet me at the tree of the cross making ready for the Nazarene. Haste all of you! Nay, stand not so! The Nazarene is the King, and freedom dies with him."

                They looked at him respectfully, but did not move.

                "Hear you?" he asked.

                Then one of them replied,

                "Son of Judah" - by that name they knew him -”son of Judah, it is you who are deceived, not we or our brethren who have your swords. The Nazarene is not the King; neither has he the spirit of a king. We were with him when he came into Jerusalem; we saw him in the Temple; he failed himself, and us, and Israel; at the Gate Beautiful he turned his back upon God and refused the throne of David. He is not King, and Galilee is not with him. He shall die the death. But hear you, son of Judah. We have your swords, and we are ready now to draw them and strike for freedom; and so is Galilee. Be it for freedom, O son of Judah, for freedom! and we will meet you at the tree of the cross."

                The sovereign moment of his life was upon Ben-Hur. Could he have taken the offer and said the word, history might have been other than it is; but then it would have been history ordered by men, not God - something that never was, and never will be. A confusion fell upon him; he knew not how, though afterwards he attributed it to the Nazarene; for when the Nazarene was risen, he understood the death was necessary to faith in the resurrection, without which Christianity would be an empty husk. The confusion, as has been said, left him without the faculty of decision; he stood helpless - wordless even. Covering his face with his hand, he shook with the conflict between his wish, which was what he would have ordered, and the power that was upon him.

                "Come; we are waiting for you," said Simonides, the fourth time.

                Thereupon he walked mechanically after the chair and the litter. Esther walked with him. Like Balthasar and his friends, the Wise Men, the day they went to the meeting in the desert, he was being led along the way.

CHAPTER X

                When the party - Balthasar, Simonides, Ben-Hur, Esther, and the two faithful Galileans - reached the place of crucifixion, Ben-Hur was in advance leading them. How they had been able to make way through the great press of excited people, he never knew; no more did he know the road by which they came or the time it took them to come. He had walked in total unconsciousness, neither hearing nor seeing anybody or anything, and without a thought of where he was going, or the ghostliest semblance of a purpose in his mind. In such condition a little child could have done as much as he to prevent the awful crime he was about to witness. The intentions of God are always strange to us; but not more so than the means by which they are wrought out, and at last made plain to our belief.

                Ben-Hur came to a stop; those following him also stopped. As a curtain rises before an audience, the spell holding him in its sleep-awake rose, and he saw with a clear understanding.

                There was a space upon the top of a low knoll rounded like a skull, and dry, dusty, and without vegetation, except some scrubby hyssop. The boundary of the space was a living wall of men, with men behind struggling, some to look over, others to look through it. An inner wall of Roman soldiery held the dense outer wall rigidly to its place. A centurion kept eye upon the soldiers. Up to the very line so vigilantly guarded Ben-Hur had been led; at the line he now stood, his face to the northwest. The knoll was the old Aramaic Golgotha - in Latin, Calvaria; anglicized, Calvary; translated, The Skull.

                On its slopes, in the low places, on the swells and higher hills, the earth sparkled with a strange enamelling. Look where he would outside the walled space, he saw no patch of brown soil, no rock, no green thing; he saw only thousands of eyes in ruddy faces; off a little way in the perspective only ruddy faces without eyes; off a little farther only a broad, broad circle, which the nearer view instructed him was also of faces. And this was the ensemble of three millions of people; under it three millions of hearts throbbing with passionate interest in what was taking place upon the knoll; indifferent as to the thieves, caring only for the Nazarene, and for him only as he was an object of hate or fear or curiosity - he who loved them all, and was about to die for them.

                In the spectacle of a great assemblage of people there are always the bewilderment and fascination one feels while looking over a stretch of sea in agitation, and never had this one been exceeded; yet Ben-Hur gave it but a passing glance, for that which was going on in the space described would permit no division of his interest.

                Up on the knoll so high as to be above the living wall, and visible over the heads of an attending company of notables, conspicuous because of his mitre and vestments and his haughty air, stood the high priest. Up the knoll still higher, up quite to the round summit, so as to be seen far and near, was the Nazarene, stooped and suffering, but silent. The wit among the guard had complemented the crown upon his head by putting a reed in his hand for a sceptre. Clamors blew upon him like blasts - laughter - execrations - sometimes both together indistinguishably. A man - ONLY a man, O reader, would have charged the blasts with the remainder of his love for the race, and let it go forever.

                All the eyes then looking were fixed upon the Nazarene. It may have been pity with which he was moved; whatever the cause, Ben-Hur was conscious of a change in his feelings. A conception of something better than the best of this life - something so much better that it could serve a weak man with strength to endure agonies of spirit as well as of body; something to make death welcome - perhaps another life purer than this one - perhaps the spirit-life which Balthasar held to so fast, began to dawn upon his mind clearer and clearer, bringing to him a certain sense that, after all, the mission of the Nazarene was that of guide across the boundary for such as loved him; across the boundary to where his kingdom was set up and waiting for him. Then, as something borne through the air out of the almost forgotten, he heard again, or seemed to hear, the saying of the Nazarene,

                "I AM THE RESURRECTION AND THE LIFE."

                And the words repeated themselves over and over, and took form, and the dawn touched them with its light, and filled them with a new meaning. And as men repeat a question to grasp and fix the meaning, he asked, gazing at the figure on the hill fainting under its crown, Who the Resurrection? and who the Life?

                "I AM,"

                the figure seemed to say - and say it for him; for instantly he was sensible of a peace such as he had never known - the peace which is the end of doubt and mystery, and the beginning of faith and love and clear understanding.

                From this dreamy state Ben-Hur was aroused by the sound of hammering. On the summit of the knoll he observed then what had escaped him before - some soldiers and workmen preparing the crosses. The holes for planting the trees were ready, and now the transverse beams were being fitted to their places.

                "Bid the men make haste," said the high-priest to the centurion. "These" - and he pointed to the Nazarene -”must be dead by the going-down of the sun, and buried that the land may not be defiled. Such is the Law."

                With a better mind, a soldier went to the Nazarene and offered him something to drink, but he refused the cup. Then another went to him and took from his neck the board with the inscription upon it, which he nailed to the tree of the cross - and the preparation was complete.

                "The crosses are ready," said the centurion to the pontiff, who received the report with a wave of the hand and the reply,

                "Let the blasphemer go first. The Son of God should be able to save himself. We will see."

                The people to whom the preparation in its several stages was visible, and who to this time had assailed the hill with incessant cries of impatience, permitted a lull which directly became a universal hush. The part of the infliction most shocking, at least to the thought, was reached - the men were to be nailed to their crosses. When for that purpose the soldiers laid their hands upon the Nazarene first, a shudder passed through the great concourse; the most brutalized shrank with dread. Afterwards there were those who said the air suddenly chilled and made them shiver.

                "How very still it is!" Esther said, as she put her arm about her father's neck.

                And remembering the torture he himself had suffered, he drew her face down upon his breast, and sat trembling.

                "Avoid it, Esther, avoid it!" he said. "I know not but all who stand and see it - the innocent as well as the guilty - may be cursed from this hour."

                Balthasar sank upon his knees.

                "Son of Hur," said Simonides, with increasing excitement -”son of Hur, if Jehovah stretch not forth his hand, and quickly, Israel is lost - and we are lost."

                Ben-Hur answered, calmly, "I have been in a dream, Simonides, and heard in it why all this should be, and why it should go on. It is the will of the Nazarene - it is God's will. Let us do as the Egyptian here - let us hold our peace and pray."

                As he looked up on the knoll again, the words were wafted to him through the awful stillness -

                "I AM THE RESURRECTION AND THE LIFE."

                He bowed reverently as to a person speaking.

                Up on the summit meantime the work went on. The guard took the Nazarene's clothes from him; so that he stood before the millions naked. The stripes of the scourging he had received in the early morning were still bloody upon his back; yet he was laid pitilessly down, and stretched upon the cross - first, the arms upon the transverse beam; the spikes were sharp - a few blows, and they were driven through the tender palms; next, they drew his knees up until the soles of the feet rested flat upon the tree; then they placed one foot upon the other, and one spike fixed both of them fast. The dulled sound of the hammering was heard outside the guarded space; and such as could not hear, yet saw the hammer as it fell, shivered with fear. And withal not a groan, or cry, or word of remonstrance from the sufferer: nothing at which an enemy could laugh; nothing a lover could regret.

                "Which way wilt thou have him faced?" asked a soldier, bluntly.

                "Towards the Temple," the pontiff replied. "In dying I would have him see the holy house hath not suffered by him."

                The workmen put their hands to the cross, and carried it, burden and all, to the place of planting. At a word, they dropped the tree into the hole; and the body of the Nazarene also dropped heavily, and hung by the bleeding hands. Still no cry of pain - only the exclamation divinest of all recorded exclamations,

                "Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do."

                The cross, reared now above all other objects, and standing singly out against the sky, was greeted with a burst of delight; and all who could see and read the writing upon the board over the Nazarene's head made haste to decipher it. Soon as read, the legend was adopted by them and communicated, and presently the whole mighty concourse was ringing the salutation from side to side, and repeating it with laughter and groans,

                "King of the Jews! Hail, King of the Jews!"

                The pontiff, with a clearer idea of the import of the inscription, protested against it, but in vain; so the titled King, looking from the knoll with dying eyes, must have had the city of his fathers at rest below him - she who had so ignominiously cast him out.

                The sun was rising rapidly to noon; the hills bared their brown breasts lovingly to it; the more distant mountains rejoiced in the purple with which it so regally dressed them. In the city, the temples, palaces, towers, pinnacles, and all points of beauty and prominence seemed to lift themselves into the unrivalled brilliance, as if they knew the pride they were giving the many who from time to time turned to look at them. Suddenly a dimness began to fill the sky and cover the earth - at first no more than a scarce perceptible fading of the day; a twilight out of time; an evening gliding in upon the splendors of noon. But it deepened, and directly drew attention; whereat the noise of the shouting and laughter fell off, and men, doubting their senses, gazed at each other curiously: then they looked to the sun again; then at the mountains, getting farther away; at the sky and the near landscape, sinking in shadow; at the hill upon which the tragedy was enacting; and from all these they gazed at each other again, and turned pale, and held their peace.

                "It is only a mist or passing cloud," Simonides said soothingly to Esther, who was alarmed. "It will brighten presently."

                Ben-Hur did not think so.

                "It is not a mist or a cloud," he said. "The spirits who live in the air - the prophets and saints - are at work in mercy to themselves and nature. I say to you, O Simonides, truly as God lives, he who hangs yonder is the Son of God."

                And leaving Simonides lost in wonder at such a speech from him, he went where Balthasar was kneeling near by, and laid his hand upon the good man's shoulder.

                "O wise Egyptian, hearken! Thou alone wert right - the Nazarene is indeed the Son of God."

                Balthasar drew him down to him, and replied, feebly, "I saw him a child in the manger where he was first laid; it is not strange that I knew him sooner than thou; but oh that I should live to see this day! Would I had died with my brethren! Happy Melchior! Happy, happy Gaspar!"

                "Comfort thee!" said Ben-Hur. "Doubtless they too are here."

                The dimness went on deepening into obscurity, and that into positive darkness, but without deterring the bolder spirits upon the knoll. One after the other the thieves were raised on their crosses, and the crosses planted. The guard was then withdrawn, and the people set free closed in upon the height, and surged up it, like a converging wave. A man might take a look, when a new-comer would push him on, and take his place, to be in turn pushed on - and there were laughter and ribaldry and revilements, all for the Nazarene.

                "Ha, ha! If thou be King of the Jews, save thyself," a soldier shouted.

                "Ay," said a priest, "if he will come down to us now, we will believe in him."

                Others wagged their heads wisely, saying, "He would destroy the Temple, and rebuild it in three days, but cannot save himself."

                Others still: "He called himself the Son of God; let us see if God will have him."

                What all there is in prejudice no one has ever said. The Nazarene had never harmed the people; far the greater part of them had never seen him except in this his hour of calamity; yet - singular contrariety! - they loaded him with their curses, and gave their sympathy to the thieves.

                The supernatural night, dropped thus from the heavens, affected Esther as it began to affect thousands of others braver and stronger.

                "Let us go home," she prayed - twice, three times - saying, "It is the frown of God, father. What other dreadful things may happen, who can tell? I am afraid."

                Simonides was obstinate. He said little, but was plainly under great excitement. Observing, about the end of the first hour, that the violence of the crowding up on the knoll was somewhat abated, at his suggestion the party advanced to take position nearer the crosses. Ben-Hur gave his arm to Balthasar; yet the Egyptian made the ascent with difficulty. From their new stand, the Nazarene was imperfectly visible, appearing to them not more than a dark suspended figure. They could hear him, however - hear his sighing, which showed an endurance or exhaustion greater than that of his fellow-sufferers; for they filled every lull in the noises with their groans and entreaties.

                The second hour after the suspension passed like the first one. To the Nazarene they were hours of insult, provocation, and slow dying. He spoke but once in the time. Some women came and knelt at the foot of his cross. Among them he recognized his mother with the beloved disciple.

                "Woman," he said, raising his voice, "behold thy son!" And to the disciple, "Behold thy mother!"

                The third hour came, and still the people surged round the hill, held to it by some strange attraction, with which, in probability, the night in midday had much to do. They were quieter than in the preceding hour; yet at intervals they could be heard off in the darkness shouting to each other, multitude calling unto multitude. It was noticeable, also, that coming now to the Nazarene, they approached his cross in silence, took the look in silence, and so departed. This change extended even to the guard, who so shortly before had cast lots for the clothes of the crucified; they stood with their officers a little apart, more watchful of the one convict than of the throngs coming and going. If he but breathed heavily, or tossed his head in a paroxysm of pain, they were instantly on the alert. Most marvellous of all, however, was the altered behavior of the high-priest and his following, the wise men who had assisted him in the trial in the night, and, in the victim's face, kept place by him with zealous approval. When the darkness began to fall, they began to lose their confidence. There were among them many learned in astronomy, and familiar with the apparitions so terrible in those days to the masses; much of the knowledge was descended to them from their fathers far back; some of it had been brought away at the end of the Captivity; and the necessities of the Temple service kept it all bright. These closed together when the sun commenced to fade before their eyes, and the mountains and hills to recede; they drew together in a group around their pontiff, and debated what they saw. "The moon is at its full," they said, with truth, "and this cannot be an eclipse." Then, as no one could answer the question common with them all - as no one could account for the darkness, or for its occurrence at that particular time, in their secret hearts they associated it with the Nazarene, and yielded to an alarm which the long continuance of the phenomenon steadily increased. In their place behind the soldiers, they noted every word and motion of the Nazarene, and hung with fear upon his sighs, and talked in whispers. The man might be the Messiah, and then - But they would wait and see!

                In the meantime Ben-Hur was not once visited by the old spirit. The perfect peace abode with him. He prayed simply that the end might be hastened. He knew the condition of Simonides' mind - that he was hesitating on the verge of belief. He could see the massive face weighed down by solemn reflection. He noticed him casting inquiring glances at the sun, as seeking the cause of the darkness. Nor did he fail to notice the solicitude with which Esther clung to him, smothering her fears to accommodate his wishes.

                "Be not afraid," he heard him say to her; "but stay and watch with me. Thou mayst live twice the span of my life, and see nothing of human interest equal to this; and there may be revelations more. Let us stay to the close."

                When the third hour was about half gone, some men of the rudest class - wretches from the tombs about the city - came and stopped in front of the centre cross.

                "This is he, the new King of the Jews," said one of them.

                The others cried, with laughter, "Hail, all hail, King of the Jews!"

                Receiving no reply, they went closer.

                "If thou be King of the Jews, or Son of God, come down," they said, loudly.

                At this, one of the thieves quit groaning, and called to the Nazarene, "Yes, if thou be Christ, save thyself and us."

                The people laughed and applauded; then, while they were listening for a reply, the other felon was heard to say to the first one, "Dost thou not fear God? We receive the due rewards of our deeds; but this man hath done nothing amiss."

                The bystanders were astonished; in the midst of the hush which ensued, the second felon spoke again, but this time to the Nazarene:

                "Lord," he said, "remember me when thou comest into thy kingdom."

                Simonides gave a great start. "When thou comest into thy kingdom!" It was the very point of doubt in his mind; the point he had so often debated with Balthasar.

                "Didst thou hear?" said Ben-Hur to him. "The kingdom cannot be of this world. Yon witness saith the King is but going to his kingdom; and, in effect, I heard the same in my dream."

                "Hush!" said Simonides, more imperiously than ever before in speech to Ben-Hur. "Hush, I pray thee! If the Nazarene should answer -”

                And as he spoke the Nazarene did answer, in a clear voice, full of confidence:

                "Verily I say unto thee, To-day shalt thou be with me in Paradise!"

                Simonides waited to hear if that were all; then he folded his hands and said, "No more, no more, Lord! The darkness is gone; I see with other eyes - even as Balthasar, I see with eyes of perfect faith."

                The faithful servant had at last his fitting reward. His broken body might never be restored; nor was there riddance of the recollection of his sufferings, or recall of the years embittered by them; but suddenly a new life was shown him, with assurance that it was for him - a new life lying just beyond this one - and its name was Paradise. There he would find the Kingdom of which he had been dreaming, and the King. A perfect peace fell upon him.

                Over the way, in front of the cross, however, there were surprise and consternation. The cunning casuists there put the assumption underlying the question and the admission underlying the answer together. For saying through the land that he was the Messiah, they had brought the Nazarene to the cross; and, lo! on the cross, more confidently than ever, he had not only reasserted himself, but promised enjoyment of his Paradise to a malefactor. They trembled at what they were doing. The pontiff, with all his pride, was afraid. Where got the man his confidence except from Truth? And what should the Truth be but God? A very little now would put them all to flight.

                The breathing of the Nazarene grew harder, his sighs became great gasps. Only three hours upon the cross, and he was dying!

                The intelligence was carried from man to man, until every one knew it; and then everything hushed; the breeze faltered and died; a stifling vapor loaded the air; heat was superadded to darkness; nor might any one unknowing the fact have thought that off the hill, out under the overhanging pall, there were three millions of people waiting awe-struck what should happen next - they were so still!

                Then there went out through the gloom, over the heads of such as were on the hill within hearing of the dying man, a cry of despair, if not reproach:

                "My God! my God! why hast thou forsaken me?"

                The voice startled all who heard it. One it touched uncontrollably.

                The soldiers in coming had brought with them a vessel of wine and water, and set it down a little way from Ben-Hur. With a sponge dipped into the liquor, and put on the end of a stick, they could moisten the tongue of a sufferer at their pleasure. Ben-Hur thought of the draught he had had at the well near Nazareth; an impulse seized him; catching up the sponge, he dipped it into the vessel, and started for the cross.

                "Let him be!" the people in the way shouted, angrily. "Let him be!"

                Without minding them, he ran on, and put the sponge to the Nazarene's lips.

                Too late, too late!

                The face then plainly seen by Ben-Hur, bruised and black with blood and dust as it was, lighted nevertheless with a sudden glow; the eyes opened wide, and fixed upon some one visible to them alone in the far heavens; and there were content and relief, even triumph, in the shout the victim gave.

                "It is finished! It is finished!"

                So a hero, dying in the doing a great deed, celebrates his success with a last cheer.

                The light in the eyes went out; slowly the crowned head sank upon the laboring breast. Ben-Hur thought the struggle over; but the fainting soul recollected itself, so that he and those around him caught the other and last words, spoken in a low voice, as if to one listening close by:

                "Father, into thy hands I commend my spirit."

                A tremor shook the tortured body; there was a scream of fiercest anguish, and the mission and the earthly life were over at once. The heart, with all its love, was broken; for of that, O reader, the man died!

                Ben-Hur went back to his friends, saying, simply, "It is over; he is dead."

                In a space incredibly short the multitude was informed of the circumstance. No one repeated it aloud; there was a murmur which spread from the knoll in every direction; a murmur that was little more than a whispering, "He is dead! he is dead!" and that was all. The people had their wish; the Nazarene was dead; yet they stared at each other aghast. His blood was upon them! And while they stood staring at each other, the ground commenced to shake; each man took hold of his neighbor to support himself; in a twinkling the darkness disappeared, and the sun came out; and everybody, as with the same glance, beheld the crosses upon the hill all reeling drunken-like in the earthquake. They beheld all three of them; but the one in the centre was arbitrary; it alone would be seen; and for that it seemed to extend itself upwards, and lift its burden, and swing it to and fro higher and higher in the blue of the sky. And every man among them who had jeered at the Nazarene; every one who had struck him; every one who had voted to crucify him; every one who had marched in the procession from the city; every one who had in his heart wished him dead, and they were as ten to one, felt that he was in some way individually singled out from the many, and that if he would live he must get away quickly as possible from that menace in the sky. They started to run; they ran with all their might; on horseback, and camels, and in chariots they ran, as well as on foot; but then as if it were mad at them for what they had done, and had taken up the cause of the unoffending and friendless dead, the earthquake pursued them, and tossed them about, and flung them down, and terrified them yet more by the horrible noise of great rocks grinding and rending beneath them. They beat their breasts and shrieked with fear. His blood was upon them! The home-bred and the foreign, priest and layman, beggar, Sadducee, Pharisee, were overtaken in the race, and tumbled about indiscriminately. If they called on the Lord, the outraged earth answered for him in fury, and dealt them all alike. It did not even know wherein the high-priest was better than his guilty brethren; overtaking him, it tripped him up also, and smirched the fringimg of his robe, and filled the golden bells with sand, and his mouth with dust. He and his people were alike in the one thing at least - the blood of the Nazarene was upon them all!

                When the sunlight broke upon the crucifixion, the mother of the Nazarene, the disciple, and the faithful women of Galilee, the centurion and his soldiers, and Ben-Hur and his party, were all who remained upon the hill. These had not time to observe the flight of the multitude; they were too loudly called upon to take care of themselves.

                "Seat thyself here," said Ben-Hur to Esther, making a place for her at her father's feet. "Now cover thine eyes and look not up; but put thy trust in God, and the spirit of yon just man so foully slain."

                "Nay," said Simonides, reverently, "let us henceforth speak of him as the Christ."

                "Be it so," said Ben-Hur.

                Presently a wave of the earthquake struck the hill. The shrieks of the thieves upon the reeling crosses were terrible to hear. Though giddy with the movements of the ground, Ben-Hur had time to look at Balthasar, and beheld him prostrate and still. He ran to him and called - there was no reply. The good man was dead! Then Ben-Hur remembered to have heard a cry in answer, as it were, to the scream of the Nazarene in his last moment; but he had not looked to see from whom it had proceeded; and ever after he believed the spirit of the Egyptian accompanied that of his Master over the boundary into the kingdom of Paradise. The idea rested not only upon the cry heard, but upon the exceeding fitness of the distinction. If faith were worthy reward in the person of Gaspar, and love in that of Melchior, surely he should have some special meed who through a long life and so excellently illustrated the three virtues in combination - Faith, Love, and Good Works.

                The servants of Balthasar had deserted their master; but when all was over, the two Galileans bore the old man in his litter back to the city.

                It was a sorrowful procession that entered the south gate of the palace of the Hurs about the set of sun that memorable day. About the same hour the body of the Christ was taken down from the cross.

                The remains of Balthasar were carried to the guest-chamber. All the servants hastened weeping to see him; for he had the love of every living thing with which he had in anywise to do; but when they beheld his face, and the smile upon it, they dried their tears, saying, "It is well. He is happier this evening than when he went out in the morning."

                Ben-Hur would not trust a servant to inform Iras what had befallen her father. He went himself to see her and bring her to the body. He imagined her grief; she would now be alone in the world; it was a time to forgive and pity her. He remembered he had not asked why she was not of the party in the morning, or where she was; he remembered he had not thought of her; and, from shame, he was ready to make any amends, the more so as he was about to plunge her into such acute grief.

                He shook the curtains of her door; and though he heard the ringing of the little bells echoing within, he had no response; he called her name, and again he called - still no answer. He drew the curtain aside and went into the room; she was not there. He ascended hastily to the roof in search of her; nor was she there. He questioned the servants; none of them had seen her during the day. After a long quest everywhere through the house, Ben-Hur returned to the guest-chamber, and took the place by the dead which should have been hers; and he bethought him there how merciful the Christ had been to his aged servant. At the gate of the kingdom of Paradise happily the afflictions of this life, even its desertions, are left behind and forgotten by those who go in and rest.

                When the gloom of the burial was nigh gone, on the ninth day after the healing, the law being fulfilled, Ben-Hur brought his mother and Tirzah home; and from that day, in that house the most sacred names possible of utterance by men were always coupled worshipfully together,

                GOD THE FATHER AND CHRIST THE SON.

-  -  -  -

About five years after the crucifixion, Esther, the wife of Ben-Hur, sat in her room in the beautiful villa by Misenum. It was noon, with a warm Italian sun making summer for the roses and vines outside. Everything in the apartment was Roman, except that Esther wore the garments of a Jewish matron. Tirzah and two children at play upon a lion skin on the floor were her companions; and one had only to observe how carefully she watched them to know that the little ones were hers.

                Time had treated her generously. She was more than ever beautiful, and in becoming mistress of the villa, she had realized one of her cherished dreams.

                In the midst of this simple, home-like scene, a servant appeared in the doorway, and spoke to her.

                "A woman in the atrium to speak with the mistress."

                "Let her come. I will receive her here."

                Presently the stranger entered. At sight of her the Jewess arose, and was about to speak; then she hesitated, changed color, and finally drew back, saying, "I have known you, good woman. You are -”

                "I was Iras, the daughter of Balthasar."

                Esther conquered her surprise, and bade the servant bring the Egyptian a seat.

                "No," said Iras, coldly. "I will retire directly."

                The two gazed at each other. We know what Esther presented - a beautiful woman, a happy mother, a contented wife. On the other side, it was very plain that fortune had not dealt so gently with her former rival. The tall figure remained with some of its grace; but an evil life had tainted the whole person. The face was coarse; the large eyes were red and pursed beneath the lower lids; there was no color in her cheeks. The lips were cynical and hard, and general neglect was leading rapidly to premature old age. Her attire was ill chosen and draggled. The mud of the road clung to her sandals. Iras broke the painful silence.

                "These are thy children?"

                Esther looked at them, and smiled.

                "Yes. Will you not speak to them?"

                "I would scare them," Iras replied. Then she drew closer to Esther, and seeing her shrink, said, "Be not afraid. Give thy husband a message for me. Tell him his enemy is dead, and that for the much misery he brought me I slew him."

                "His enemy!"

                "The Messala. Further, tell thy husband that for the harm I sought to do him I have been punished until even he would pity me."

                Tears arose in Esther's eyes, and she was about to speak.

                "Nay," said Iras, "I do not want pity or tears. Tell him, finally, I have found that to be a Roman is to be a brute. Farewell."

                She moved to go. Esther followed her.

                "Stay, and see my husband. He has no feeling against you. He sought for you everywhere. He will be your friend. I will be your friend. We are Christians."

                The other was firm.

                "No; I am what I am of choice. It will be over shortly."

                "But" - Esther hesitated -”have we nothing you would wish; nothing to - to -”

                The countenance of the Egyptian softened; something like a smile played about her lips. She looked at the children upon the floor.

                "There is something," she said.

                Esther followed her eyes, and with quick perception answered, "It is yours."

                Iras went to them, and knelt on the lion's skin, and kissed them both. Rising slowly, she looked at them; then passed to the door and out of it without a parting word. She walked rapidly, and was gone before Esther could decide what to do.

                Ben-Hur, when he was told of the visit, knew certainly what he had long surmised - that on the day of the crucifixion Iras had deserted her father for Messala. Nevertheless, he set out immediately and hunted for her vainly; they never saw her more, or heard of her. The blue bay, with all its laughing under the sun, has yet its dark secrets. Had it a tongue, it might tell us of the Egyptian.

                Simonides lived to be a very old man. In the tenth year of Nero's reign, he gave up the business so long centred in the warehouse at Antioch. To the last he kept a clear head and a good heart, and was successful.

                One evening, in the year named, he sat in his arm-chair on the terrace of the warehouse. Ben-Hur and Esther, and their three children, were with him. The last of the ships swung at mooring in the current of the river; all the rest had been sold. In the long interval between this and the day of the crucifixion but one sorrow had befallen them: that was when the mother of Ben-Hur died; and then and now their grief would have been greater but for their Christian faith.

                The ship spoken of had arrived only the day before, bringing intelligence of the persecution of Christians begun by Nero in Rome, and the party on the terrace were talking of the news when Malluch, who was still in their service, approached and delivered a package to Ben-Hur.

                "Who brings this?" the latter asked, after reading.

                "An Arab."

                "Where is he?"

                "He left immediately."

                "Listen," said Ben-Hur to Simonides.

                He read then the following letter:

                "I, Ilderim, the son of Ilderim the Generous, and sheik of the tribe of Ilderim, to Judah, son of Hur.

                "Know, O friend of my father's, how my father loved you. Read what is herewith sent, and you will know. His will is my will; therefore what he gave is thine.

                "All the Parthians took from him in the great battle in which they slew him I have retaken - this writing, with other things, and vengeance, and all the brood of that Mira who in his time was mother of so many stars.

                "Peace be to you and all yours.

                "This voice out of the desert is the voice of

                "Ilderim, Shiek."

                Ben-Hur next unrolled a scrap of papyrus yellow as a withered mulberry leaf. It required the daintiest handling. Proceeding, he read:

                "Ilderim, surnamed the Generous, sheik of the tribe of Ilderim, to the son who succeeds me.

                "All I have, O son, shall be thine in the day of thy succession, except that property by Antioch known as the Orchard of Palms; and it shall be to the son of Hur who brought us such glory in the Circus - to him and his forever.

                "Dishonor not thy father. ILDERIM THE GENEROUS, Sheik."

                "What say you?" asked Ben-Hur, of Simonides.

                Esther took the papers pleased, and read them to herself. Simonides remained silent. His eyes were upon the ship; but he was thinking. At length he spoke.

                "Son of Hur," he said, gravely, "the Lord has been good to you in these later years. You have much to be thankful for. Is it not time to decide finally the meaning of the gift of the great fortune now all in your hand, and growing?"

                "I decided that long ago. The fortune was meant for the service of the Giver; not a part, Simonides, but all of it. The question with me has been, How can I make it most useful in his cause? And of that tell me, I pray you."

                Simonides answered,

                "The great sums you have given to the Church here in Antioch, I am witness to. Now, instantly almost with this gift of the generous sheik's, comes the news of the persecution of the brethren in Rome. It is the opening of a new field. The light must not go out in the capital."

                "Tell me how I can keep it alive."

                "I will tell you. The Romans, even this Nero, hold two things sacred - I know of no others they so hold - they are the ashes of the dead and all places of burial. If you cannot build temples for the worship of the Lord above ground, then build them below the ground; and to keep them from profanation, carry to them the bodies of all who die in the faith."

                Ben-Hur arose excitedly.

                "It is a great idea," he said. "I will not wait to begin it. Time forbids waiting. The ship that brought the news of the suffering of our brethren shall take me to Rome. I will sail to-morrow."

                He turned to Malluch.

                "Get the ship ready, Malluch, and be thou ready to go with me.

                "It is well," said Simonides.

                "And thou, Esther, what sayest thou?" asked Ben-Hur.

                Esther came to his side, and put her hand on his arm, and answered,

                "So wilt thou best serve the Christ. O my husband, let me not hinder, but go with thee and help."

                If any of my readers, visiting Rome, will make the short journey to the Catacomb of San Calixto, which is more ancient than that of San Sebastiano, he will see what became of the fortune of Ben-Hur, and give him thanks. Out of that vast tomb Christianity issued to supersede the Caesars.