es anticipated no great difficulty in securing from
him the necessary ratification of the death sentence. It surely would
not matter to him to add another to the long tale of robbers and
revolutionaries which are awaiting the cross, the more especially as
they were able to prefer a charge of treason against the Roman power
substantiated by the prisoner's own admissions made recently in their
presence.

It is an awful spectacle, and one over which we would fain draw a veil;
but let us dare to stay to watch the evolution of the diabolical plot
to the end. This, at least, will become manifest--that Jesus died,
because He claimed to be the Son of God, in the unique sense of oneness
with the Father; that made Him equal with God, and constituted
blasphemy in the eye of the Jewish law. And He who has taught the
world Truth could neither have been a deceiver, nor deceived, in this
high claim.

XXVIII

"Judas, which Betrayed Him"

"Judas, which betrayed Him."--JOHN xviii. 2.

On the Wednesday evening before our Lord died, He supped with His
disciples in Bethany at the House of Simon. Lazarus was there, and his
sisters--Martha, who served, and Mary, who anointed Him beforehand for
His burying. The Master's reception of this act of love, and His
rebuke of the parsimony which sought to check all such manifestations
of devotion, exasperated Judas beyond all bounds; so, after supper,
when Jesus and the rest had retired to their humble lodgment, he
crossed the intervening valleys and returned by the moonlight to
Jerusalem.

At that untimely hour the Sanhedrim may have been still in session,
plotting to destroy Jesus. At any rate, the chief priests and captains
were quickly summoned. Judas may have been in communication with some
of them before; but, in any case, he met with a glad welcome. They
were glad, and covenanted to give him money.

In the word, _communed_ with them, used by the evangelist Luke, it is
suggested that there was a certain amount of bargaining and haggling
before the sum was fixed. Perhaps he wanted more, and they offered
less, and at last he was induced to take less than he had hoped, but
more than they had offered; and the price of betrayal was fixed at
thirty pieces of silver, about 8 pounds, the price of a slave. From
that moment he sought opportunity to betray Him unto them.

At the Passover Supper provided on the next day by Peter and John in
the upper room, Judas must have reclin