lineaments the imprint of the Father’s glory, and avers that, unless they can counteract and defeat the Son’s ends, they will forfeit all they have gained.  Realizing, however, that this task is far greater than the one he undertook centuries before,—­when he winged his way through chaos to discover the new world and tempt our first parents,—­he volunteers to undertake it in person, and all the evil spirits applaud him.  This settled, Satan departs to carry out the second temptation.

Meantime another assembly has been held in heaven, where, addressing the archangel Gabriel, the Almighty informs him he will soon see the fulfilment of the message he bore some thirty years previously to Mary.  He adds that his Son, whom he has publicly recognized, is about to be tempted by Satan, who, although he failed in the case of Job, is undertaking this new task confident of success.  The Almighty also predicts that Satan will again be defeated, but declares Christ is as free to yield or resist as Adam when first created, and that before sending him out to encounter Sin and Death he means to strengthen him by a sojourn in the desert.  On hearing that Satan’s evil plans will be frustrated, the angels burst into a hymn of triumph with which heaven resounds.

  So spake the eternal Father, and all Heaven
  Admiring stood a space; then into hymns
  Burst forth, and in celestial measures moved,
  Circling the throne and singing, while the hand
  Sung with the voice; and this the argument: 
  “Victory and triumph to the Son of God
  Now entering his great duel, not of arms,
  But to vanquish by wisdom hellish wiles. 
  The Father knows the Son; therefore secure
  Ventures his filial virtue, though untried,
  Against whate’er may tempt, whate’er seduce,
  Allure, or terrify, or undermine. 
  Be frustrate, all ye stratagems of Hell,
  And devilish machinations come to nought.”

During this time the Son of God, after lingering three days by the Jordan, is driven by the Holy Spirit into the wilderness, where he spends his time meditating upon the great office he had undertaken as Saviour of mankind.  In a grand soliloquy we hear how since early youth he has been urged onward by divine and philosophical influences, and how, realizing he was born to further truth, he has diligently studied the law of God.  Thanks to these studies, our Lord at twelve could measure his learning with that of the rabbis in the temple.  Ever since that time he has longed to rescue his people from the Roman yoke, to end brutality, to further all that is good, and to win all hearts to God.  He recalls the stories his mother told him in regard to the annunciation, to his virgin birth, and to the Star of Bethlehem, and comments upon the fact that the precursor immediately recognized him and that a voice from heaven hailed him as the Son of God!

Although Christ realizes he has been sent into the wilderness by divine power, and that his future way lies “through many a hard assay” and may lead even to death, he does not repine.  Instead he spends the forty days in the wilderness fasting, preparing himself for the great work which he is called upon to accomplish, and paying no heed to the wild beasts which prowl around him without doing him any harm.