hrough the ages,--when Judas betrayed him, Peter
denied him and they all forsook him and fled, do you suppose any other
pain was comparable to that? Only our friends have the power to wound
us, you know, and, 'he was wounded in the house of his friends.' When
people talk of the crucifixion they think of the nail-torn hands and
pierced side,--I think of his heart! Oh, my Lord, how _could_ they treat
thee so!"

Evadne looked wistfully at the rapt face, irradiated now by the
moonlight which was streaming in through the window. "_How_ you love
him, Aunt Marthe!"

"He is my all," she answered simply. The girl stroked the hand which
she still held in both her own. She is absolutely satisfied, she thought
sorrowfully, she wants nothing that I can give her. And then through the
stillness she heard the sweet voice singing,--

"I love thee because thou hast first loved me,
And purchased my pardon on Calvary's tree;
I love thee for wearing the thorns on thy brow,
If ever I loved thee, my Jesus, 'tis now."

CHAPTER XV.

"Dear Aunt Marthe," cried Evadne one afternoon, "what is love?"

"I will answer you in the words of one who for years has lived the
love-life," said Mrs. Everidge.

"'One must be himself infinite in knowledge to define it, infinite in
comprehension to fathom it, infinite in love to appreciate it. Love is
God in man, for "God is love," and "every one that loveth is born of
God;" but love is not merely veneration, nor respect, nor justice, nor
passion, nor jealousy, nor sympathy, nor pity, nor self-gratification;
to love something as our own is but a form of self-love; to love
something in order to win it for ourselves is just a perpetration of the
same mistake.' Dr. Karl Gerok wrote,--'Love is the fundamental law of
the world. First, as written in heaven, for God is love; second, as
written on the cross, for Christ is love; third, as written in our
hearts, for Christianity is love,' And Drummond tells us that 'Love--is
the rule for fulfilling all rules, the new commandment for keeping all
the old commandments, Christ's one secret of the Christian life.' And
another writer says,--'You are a personality only as your heart lives,
and the heart lives only as it loves. Love is all action, therefore the
amount of your active love measures the size of your personal heart.'"

"Love has been defined as 'the desire to bless.' That is like divine
love, for there can be no self thought in God. God's love