beforehand of
the miracles He would perform on the blind and the deaf and dumb, and
who finally declares that He will be 'a stone of stumbling' to the Jews.

"But it is when they speak of His Passion and Death that the prophecies
become mathematically exact, incredibly precise. The offering of palm
branches, the betrayal by Judas, and the price of thirty pieces of
silver appear in Zechariah; and Isaiah takes up the parable to describe
the rejection and opprobrium of Calvary: 'He was wounded for our
transgressions, He was bruised for our iniquities.... The Lord hath laid
on Him the iniquity of us all.... He was despised and rejected of men; a
man of sorrows, and acquainted with grief.... He was brought as a lamb
to the slaughter, and as a sheep before her shearers is dumb.'

"David expatiates on the dreadful scene: 'He was a worm and no man, a
very scorn of men and the outcast of the people.'

"Details are multiplied. The wounds in His hands are spoken of by
Zechariah; David enumerates the circumstances of the Passion, word for
word: the pierced hands, the division of His raiment, casting lots for
the robe. The hooting of the Jews, bidding Him to save Himself if He be
the Son of God, is mentioned in chapter ii. of the Book of Wisdom, and
again by David; the gall and the vinegar offered Him on the Cross and
the very words of Jesus giving up the ghost are to be found in the
Psalms.

"Nor is this the last of the prophecies to be found in the Old
Testament.

"Its prophetic mission is carried out to the end. The establishment of
the Church in the place of the Synagogue is foretold by Ezekiel, Isaiah,
Joel, and Micah; and the Mass, the Eucharistic Sacrament, is plainly
adumbrated by Malachi, who declared that for the offerings of the Old
Law offered only in the Temple at Jerusalem shall be substituted 'a pure
offering to be offered in every place and by all nations'--by priests
chosen from among all people, Isaiah adds, and David says after the
order of Melchizedec.

"Pascal very truly remarks that 'the fulfilment of the prophecies is a
perpetual miracle, and that no other proof is needed to show the divine
origin of the Christian Religion.'"

Durtal had gone closer to the statues, standing by Saint Anne, and was
looking at one on the left wearing a pointed cap, a sort of papal tiara
with a crown round the edge, robed in an alb girt round the middle with
knotted cord, and a large cope with a fringe; the features were