to bear the prophet's lot. He was then in prison for the
crime of telling a king the truth, and was soon to die to please a
vindictive woman. The people, too, had wagged their heads over him. Like
pouting children on the public square, who "won't play," whether the game
proposed is a wedding or a funeral, the people had criticized John for
being a gloomy ascetic, and found fault with Jesus for his shocking
cheerfulness. There was no way of suiting them, and no way of making them
take the call of God to heart. Long before electricity was invented, human
nature knew all about interposing nonconductors between itself and the
truth.

_Have we ever noticed students interposing a general criticism between
themselves and a particular obligation?_

Can it be that one of the uses of a higher education is to furnish greater
facility in fuddling inconvenient truth?

Fourth Day: Looking Forward to the Cross

And it came to pass, when the days were well-nigh come that he
should be received up, he stedfastly set his face to go to
Jerusalem.--Luke 9:51.

In that very hour there came certain Pharisees, saying to him, Get
thee out, and go hence: for Herod would fain kill thee. And he
said unto them, Go and say to that fox, Behold, I cast out demons
and perform cures to-day and to-morrow, and the third day I am
perfected. Nevertheless I must go on my way to-day and to-morrow
and the day following; for it cannot be that a prophet perish out
of Jerusalem. O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, that killeth the prophets,
and stoneth them that are sent unto her! how often would I have
gathered thy children together, even as a hen gathereth her own
brood under her wings, and ye would not!--Luke 13:31-34.

Jesus early knew that the decision was going against him. He saw the cross
on the horizon of his life long before others saw it. Painters have
pictured him in his father's carpenter shop, with tools on his shoulder,
gazing down at his shadow shaped like a cross. He accepted death
consciously and "stedfastly set his face to go up to Jerusalem," though he
knew what was awaiting him. Jerusalem had acquired a sad preeminence as
the place where the struggles between the prophets and the heads of the
nation were settled. He saw his own death as part of the prophetic
succession. He went to it, not as a driven slave, but as a free spirit.
That jackal of a king, Herod, could not scare him out of Gali