"As the fool."
The martyr of truth dies privately in Herod's dungeon. We have no
record of his last words. There were no crowds to look on. We cannot
describe how he received his sentence. Was he calm? Was he agitated?
Did he bless his murderer? Did he give utterance to any deep
reflections on human life? All that is shrouded in silence. He bowed
his head, and the sharp stroke fell flashing down. We know that, we
know no more--apparently a noble life abortive.

And now let us ask the question distinctly, Was all this indeed
failure? No, my Christian brethren, it was sublimest victory. John's
work was no failure; he left behind him no sect to which he had given
his name, but his disciples passed into the service of Christ, and
were absorbed in the Christian church. Words from John had made
impressions, and men forgot in after years _where_ the impressions
first came from, but the day of judgment will not forget. John laid
the foundations of a temple, and others built upon it He laid it in
struggle, in martyrdom. It was covered up like the rough masonry below
ground, but when we look round on the vast Christian Church, we are
looking at the superstructure of John's toil.

There is a lesson for us in all that, if we will learn it. Work, true
work, done honestly and manfully for Christ, _never_ can be a failure.
Your own work, my brethren, which God has given you to do, whatever
that is, let it be done truly. Leave eternity to show that it has not
been in vain in the Lord. Let it but be work, it will tell. True
Christian life is like the march of a conquering army into a fortress
which has been breached; men fall by hundreds in the ditch. Was their
fall a failure? Nay, for their bodies bridge over the hollow, and over
them the rest pass on to victory. The quiet religious worship that we
have this day--how comes it to be ours? It was purchased for us by the
constancy of such men as John, who freely gave their lives. We are
treading upon a bridge of martyrs. The suffering was theirs--the
victory is ours. John's career was no failure.

Yet we have one more circumstance which _seems_ to tell of failure. In
John's prison, solitude, misgiving, black doubt, seem for a time to
have taken possession of the prophet's soul. All that we know of those
feelings is this:--John while in confinement sent two of his disciples
to Christ, to say to Him, "Art thou He that should come, or do we look
for an