will not let us do the good
we would.

But, if a man has thus committed himself by an evil past, what is he to
do? What ought Pilate to have done? There is only one course. It is
to summon together the resources of his manhood, defy consequences, and
do the right forthwith, come what may. One step taken in loyalty to
conscience, one word of confession spoken, and in a moment the power of
the tyranny is broken, and the spellbound man is free to issue forth
from the inglorious prison of the past.

Alas, Pilate was not equal to any such effort. For the sake of
righteousness, for the sake of this impressive and innocent but obscure
and friendless Galilean, to face a complaint at Rome and run the risk
of exile and poverty--the man of the world's philosophy could not rise
to any such height. He belonged to the world, whose fashion and
favour, pleasures and comforts were the breath of his nostrils; and,
when he heard the menace of his subjects, he surrendered at discretion.

Thus Jewish passion and persistency triumphed. Pilate resisted, but he
was forced to yield inch by inch. He wished to do right; he felt the
spell of Jesus; and it irritated him to have to go against his
conscience, but his subjects compelled him to obey their wicked will.
Yet the true reason of his failure was in himself--in the shallowness
and worldliness of his own character, which this occasion laid bare to
the very foundations.[4]

IV.

There was little more to do. The mind of Pilate was very savage and
his heart very sore. He had been beaten and humiliated; and he would
gladly inflict some humiliation on his opponents, if he could find a
way. He ascended the judgment-seat, "in a place that is called the
Pavement, but in the Hebrew Gabbatha"--an act similar in significance,
I suppose, with our judges' habit, before pronouncing a death sentence,
of putting on the black cap. Pointing to Jesus, he exclaimed, "Behold
your King!" It was as much as to say that he believed this really to
be their Messiah--this poor, bleeding, mishandled Man. He was trying
to cut them with a taunt. And he succeeded: smarting with pain they
shouted, "Away with Him! away with Him! crucify Him!" "What," he
proceeded, "shall I crucify your King?" And, borne away with fury,
they responded, "We have no king but Caesar." What a word to come from
the representatives of a nation to which pertained "the adoption and
the glory and the covenants and the giving o