terance of
despair, yet involved the strongest faith. See how He lays hold of the
Eternal with both hands: "My God, My God!" It is a prayer: a thousand
times He had turned to this resource In days of trial; and He does so
in this supreme trouble. To do so cures despair. No one is forsaken
who can pray, "My God." As one in deep water, feeling no bottom, makes
a despairing plunge forward and lands on solid ground, so Jesus, in the
very act of uttering His despair, overcame it. Feeling forsaken of
God, He rushed into the arms of God; and these arms closed round Him in
loving protection. Accordingly, as the darkness, which had brooded
over all the land, disappeared at the ninth hour, so His mind emerged
from eclipse; and, as we shall see, His last words were uttered in His
usual mood of serenity.

[1] "My God, My God, why hast Thou forsaken Me?"

[2] Some of the Fathers thought of the separation of the divine from
the human nature as taking place now.

CHAPTER XVIII.

THE FIFTH WORD FROM THE CROSS[1]

The fourth word from the cross we looked upon both as the climax of the
struggle which had gone on in the mind of the divine Sufferer during
the three hours of silence and darkness which preceded its utterance
and as the liberation of His mind from that struggle. This view seems
to be confirmed by the terms in which St. John introduces the Fifth
Word--"After this, Jesus, knowing that all things were now
accomplished,[2] that the Scripture might be fulfilled, saith, I
thirst."

The phrase, "that the Scripture might be fulfilled," is usually
connected with the words, "I thirst," as if the meaning were that He
had said this fifth word in fulfilment of some prediction that He would
do so; and the Old Testament is ransacked, without much result, for the
prophetic words which may be supposed to be alluded to. It is better,
however, to connect the phrase with what goes before--"Jesus, knowing
that all things were now accomplished." It was only when His work,
appointed by God and prescribed in Scripture, was completed, that He
became sufficiently conscious of His bodily condition to say, "I
thirst." Intense mental preoccupation has a tendency to cause the
oblivion of bodily wants. Even the excitement of reading a fascinating
book may keep at a distance for hours the sense of requiring sleep or
food; and it is only when the reader comes out of the trance of
absorption that he realises how spent he is. Dur