“We know the breed,” replied Joseph, “and
so do you. But you are afraid of it. Our
Master would have made an end of it. But you
are a broken reed. Many of our great men have
been ruined by Roman arrogance, but it was Roman cowardice
that cost our Master His life.”
The Governor started, but remained impassive.
He signed with his hand: “Let me hear no
more of this affair. Do what you like with Him.
Sentries can be placed at the grave. I’ve
had more than enough of you and your Jews to-day.”
Thus the Arimathean was dismissed, ungraciously, it
is true, but with permission to bury the beloved corpse.
Meanwhile the torment of the two desert robbers had
ended. And Dismas was at last set free from
Barabbas, to whom a demoniacal fate had chained him
his whole life long. Jesus had come between them,
and had divided the penitent man from the impenitent.
It is true that their bodies were thrown into the
same grave, but the soul of Dismas had found the appointed
trysting-place.
As soon as the Arimathean returned from his interview
with the Governor, late as the hour was, Jesus was
unfastened from the cross and lowered to the ground
with cloths. Then the body was anointed with
precious oil, wrapped in white linen, and carried to
Joseph’s garden. They laid it in the grave
in the stillness of the night.
A holy peace breathed o’er the earth, and the
stars shone in the heavens like lamps at the repose
of the Lord.
In the night which followed this saddest of all sad
days, Mary, His mother, could not sleep. And
yet she saw a vision such as could not have been seen
by anyone awake.
Crouching down, leaning against the stone, her eyes
resting on the cross that rose tall and straight into
the sky, she seemed to see a tree covered with red
and white blossoms. It was as if that branch
of the Tree of Paradise which the angel had once handed
over the hedge had bloomed. It stood in the
midst of a beautiful rose-garden filled with pleasant
odours, running water, and songs of birds, with a wonderful
light over all. Innumerable companies of men
and women passed into that Eden from out a deep abyss.
They ascended slowly and solemnly out of the gloomy
depths to the shining heights. In front of all
came a couple, our first father, Adam, walking with
Eve. Just behind them Abel, arm-in-arm with
Cain. Then crowded up the patriarchs, the judges,
the kings, the prophets, and the psalmists, among
them Abraham and Isaac, Jacob, and Joseph, Solomon
and David, Zachariah and Josiah, Eleazar and Jehoiakim,
and quite at the back—an old man, walking
alone, supporting himself on a stick from which lilies
sprouted—Joseph, her husband. He was
in no hurry; he stopped and looked round at Mary.
So all passed into Paradise.
That was what Mary saw, and then day dawned.
