have lost--death would not be death!

Such was the state of mind of this faithful band, in this short period
when Christianity seemed to return for a moment to his cradle and bid to
him an eternal adieu. The principal disciples, Peter, Thomas, Nathaniel,
the sons of Zebedee, met again on the shores of the lake, and henceforth
lived together; they had taken up again their former calling of
fishermen, at Bethsaida or at Capernaum. The Galilean women were no
doubt with them. They had insisted more than the others on that return,
which was to them a heartfelt love. This was their last act in the
establishment of Christianity. From that moment they disappear. Faithful
to their love, their wish was to quit no more the country in which they
had tasted their greatest delight. More than five hundred persons were
already devoted to the memory of Jesus. In default of the lost master
they obeyed the disciples, the most authoritative--Peter--in particular.

The activity of these ardent souls had already turned in another
direction. What they believed to have heard from the lips of the dear
risen One was the order to go forth and preach, and to convert the
world. But where should they commence? Naturally, at Jerusalem. The
return to Jerusalem was then resolved upon by those who at that time had
the direction of the sect. As these journeys were ordinarily made by
caravan at the time of the feasts, we now suppose, with all manner of
likelihood, that the return in question took place at the Feast of
Tabernacles at the close of the year 33, or the Paschal Feast of the
year 34. Galilee was thus abandoned by Christianity, and abandoned
forever. The little Church which remained there continued, no doubt, to
exist; but we hear it no more spoken of. It was probably broken up, like
all the rest, by the frightful disaster which then overtook the country
during the war of Vespasian; the wreck of the dispersed community sought
refuge beyond Jordan. After the war it was not Christianity which was
brought back into Galilee; it was Judaism.

Galilee thus counted but an hour in the history of Christianity; but it
was the sacred hour, _par excellence_; it gave to the new religion that
which has made it endure--its poetry, its penetrating charms. "The
Gospel," after the manner of the synoptics, was a Galilean work. But
"the Gospel" thus extended has been the principal cause of the success
of Christianity, and continues to be the surest guarantee of i