Once more—­only once—­we find the names of James and John together.  One short sentence, full of pathos, of injustice and cruelty, of affection and sorrow, tells a story of the early Church:  Herod “killed James the brother of John with the sword.”  He was the first martyr of the Apostles.  The smaller circle of the three, and the larger one of the twelve, is broken.  For these brothers we may take up David’s lamentation over Saul and Jonathan, slightly changed, and say, “They were lovely and pleasant in their lives:  but in their death they were divided,”—­for through half a century John mourned the loss of his loved companion from childhood.

After James—­one of the three whom Paul named pillars—­had fallen, the other two, Peter and John, stood for awhile side by side in strength and beauty.  To each of them he might have given the name Jachin by which one of the pillars of Solomon’s temple was called, meaning, “whom God strengthens.”  Peter was the next to fall, after which John long stood alone, until at last the three whom first we saw by the Sea of Galilee, stood together by the glassy sea, in each of them fulfilled the promise made through John, by their Lord,—­“He that overcometh, I will make him a pillar in the Temple of my God, and he shall go out thence no more.”

[Illustration:  THE ISLE OF PATMOS Old Engraving Page 233]

CHAPTER XXXI

Last Days

“I John ... was in the isle that is called Patmos, for the word of God, and the testimony of Jesus....  And I heard behind me a great voice, as of a trumpet saying, What thou seest, write in a book, and send it to the seven churches.”—­Rev. i. 9-11.

      “Since I, whom Christ’s mouth taught, was bidden teach,
       I went, for many years, about the world,
       Saying, ‘It was so; so I heard and saw,’
       Speaking as the case asked; and men believed. 
       Afterward came the message to myself
       In Patmos Isle.  I was not bidden teach,
       But simply listen, take a book and write,
       Nor set down other than the given word,
       With nothing left to my arbitrament
       To choose or change; I wrote, and men believed.”

From Samaria John with Peter “returned to Jerusalem.”  This is the last record of him in the Acts.  We have but little information concerning him after that event.  He suddenly disappears.  We have two glimpses of him which are historic, and several through shadowy traditions.

There was a very important meeting in Jerusalem to settle certain questions in which the early Church was greatly interested, and about which there had been much difference in judgment and feeling.  St. Paul was present.  He says that St. John was there, one of the three Pillar-Apostles who gave to him and Barnabas “the right hands of fellowship.”  This is the only time of which we certainly know of the meeting of these two Apostles; though we have