He not risen His claims would have been unintelligible and
His whole appearance and life a mystery, suggesting a greatness not
borne out--different from other men, yet subject to the same defeat. Had
He not risen the very significance of His life would have been obscured;
and if for a time a few friends cherished His memory in private, His
name would have fallen back to an obscure, possibly a dishonoured,
place.

It is not at once obvious what we are to make of the physical sufferings
of Christ. Certainly it is very easy to make too much of them. For, in
the first place, they were very brief and confined to one part of His
life. He was exempt from the prolonged weakness and misery which many
persons endure throughout life. Born, as we may reasonably suppose,
with a healthy and vigorous constitution, carefully reared by the best
of mothers, finding a livelihood in His native village and in His
father's business, His lot was very different from the frightful doom of
thousands who are born with diseased and distorted body, in squalid and
wicked surroundings, and who never see through the misery that
encompasses them to any happy or hopeful life. And even after He left
the shelter and modest comforts of the Nazareth home His life was spent
in healthy conditions, and often in scenes of much beauty and interest.
Free to move about through the country as He pleased, passing through
vineyards and olive-groves and cornfields, talking pleasantly with His
little company of attached friends or addressing large audiences, He
lived an open-air life of a kind in which of necessity there must have
been a great deal of physical pleasure and healthful enjoyment. At times
He had not where to lay His head; but this is mentioned rather as a
symptom of His want of friends than as implying any serious physical
suffering in a climate like that of Palestine. And the suffering at the
close of His life, though extreme, was brief, and was not to be compared
in its cruelty to what many of His followers have endured for His sake.

Two things, however, the physical sufferings of Christ do secure: they
call attention to His devotedness, and they illustrate His willing
sacrifice of self. They call attention to His devotedness and provoke a
natural sympathy and tenderness of spirit in the beholder, qualities
which are much needed in our consideration of Christ. Had He passed
through life entirely exempt from suffering, in high position, with
every wan