elpless turn of his restless head; when such a man,
under such circumstances, can rise above the wickedness, cowardice
and cheap treason that have nailed him to the cross, and pray (and
pray sincerely) that his guilty murderers, villainous detractors and
unscrupulous slanderers may be forgiven, that man bears witness that
he has, at least, a heart of good.

And it was just such a prayer which came from the parched, dry,
cracked lips of this man of Nazareth as he hung upon the cross and
cried out,

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

Again he spoke from the cross.

There was standing near, a woman who had been chosen of God to give
him birth. She was sobbing convulsively. She was realizing what had
been foretold of her more than thirty years before--"a sword shall
pierce through thy own soul, also." Mary, the mother of Jesus, stood
there, brokenhearted. Jesus turned his head and looked at John, his
cousin, bidding him take that weeping mother to his home, his heart
and care, and be unto her henceforth a loving son.

O the man who, in the hour of his own agony, shall remember his
mother, and crown her, make her the queen of his life, and ordain
that others shall love and reverence her, proclaims for himself the
lustre of a manhood without spot.

Once more he spoke from the place of anguish--that moment on the
edge of death. There his soul, rising from the depths of the
overwhelming waves of agony, cries:

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

He who in the hour and article of death can face God and eternity,
and commit himself to the hand of supreme justice as a confident
child to the arms of a loving father, bears witness that in his soul
there is no ghastly memory of sin, no sharp, remembered pang, no
fear of offended law. Such a confidence and such a committal of
triumphant calm bear witness that the heart is at rest with God, and
is conscious of its own good.

For two thousand years the world, without a dissenting voice, has
borne witness that he is the one man who came into the earth and
walked through it superlatively good.

Among the voices in the common consent of the world that Jesus
Christ was a good man, there are those who with equal insistence
deny that he was Almighty God.

They agree that he had the spirit of God; that he had it in measure
such as no other man before or since. They announce their belief
that he is the mightiest advance on humanity ever known; that