t once, the boy who had been assisting in these proceedings,
moved by some swift inspiration, sprang from his knees and proclaimed a
text: '_I am the Resurrection and the Life!_' As if by magic,
consciousness revisited the prostrate form; the man opened his eyes; sat
up; stared about him; and then began to speak. A wondrous virtue seemed
to lurk in the majestic words that the boy recited. By that virtue
Sydney Carton, Frank Bullen, and a host of others passed from death into
life everlasting.

V

I began by saying that it is a great thing--a very great thing--to be
able to save those you love by dying for them.

I close by stating the companion truth. It is a great thing--a very
great thing--to have been died for.

On the last page of his book Dickens tells us what Sydney Carton would
have seen and said if, on the scaffold, it had been given him to read
the future.

'I see,' he would have exclaimed, 'I see the lives for which I lay down
my life--peaceful, useful, prosperous and happy--in that England which I
shall see no more. I see her with a child upon her bosom who bears my
name. I see that I hold _a sanctuary_ in all their hearts, and in the
hearts of their descendants, generations hence. I see her, an old woman,
weeping for me on the anniversary of this day. I see her and her
husband, their course done, lying side by side in their last earthly
bed; and I know that each was not more honored and held sacred in the
other's soul than I was in the souls of both!'

'I see that I hold _a sanctuary in all their hearts_!'--it is a lovely
phrase.

It is a great thing--a very great thing--to have been died for!

Wherefore let each man be at some pains to build in his heart a
sanctuary to Him who, for us men and for our salvation, laid down His
life with a song!

V

EBENEZER ERSKINE'S TEXT

I

It is a lovely Sunday afternoon in the early summer of the year 1690.
The graceful and heathery path that winds its way along the banks of the
Tweed, from the stately ruins of Melrose to the crumbling gables of
Dryburgh, is in its glory. The wooded track by the waterside is
luxuriating in bright sunshine, glowing colors and soft shadows. We are
traversing one of the most charming and romantic districts that even
Scotland can present. Here 'every field has its battle, every rivulet
its song.' More than a century hence, this historic neighborhood is
destined to furnish the home, and fire the fancy, of Sir Walter