cause, and say: 'Thou art my Priest and my
Confessor.'"

The fate of martyrdom that befell John was awarded also to Savonarola.
Through the impetuosity of his followers, he was involved in a
challenge to ordeal by fire. But by the manoeuvres of his foes, the
expectations of the populace in this direction were disappointed, and
their anger aroused. "To San Marco!" shouted their leaders. To San
Marco they went, fired the buildings, burst open the doors, fought
their way into the cloisters and church, dragged Savonarola from his
devotions, and thrust him into a loathsome dungeon. After languishing
there, amid every indignity and torture, for some weeks, on May 23,
1498, he was led forth to die. The bishop, whose duty it was to
pronounce his degradation, stumbled at the formula declaring--"I
separate thee from the Church, militant and triumphant." "From the
militant thou mayest, but from the triumphant thou canst not," was the
martyr's calm reply. He met his end with unflinching fortitude. He
was strangled, his remains hung in chains, burned, and the ashes flung
into the river. When the commissioners of the Pope arrived at his
trial, they brought with them express orders that he was to die, "even
though he were a _second John the Baptist_." It is thus that the
apostate Church has always dealt with her noblest sons. But Truth,
struck to the ground, revives. Hers are the eternal years. Within a
few years, Luther was nailing his theses at the door of the church at
Wittenberg, and the Reformation was on its way.

There is a legend, which at least contains a true suggestion, that when
Savonarola was on his way to Florence from Genoa, as a young man, his
strength failed him as he was crossing the Apennines, but that a
mysterious stranger appeared to him, restored his courage, led him to a
hospice, compelled him to take food, and afterwards accompanied him to
his destination; but on reaching the San Gallo gate he vanished, with
the words, _Remember to do that for which God hath sent thee!_

The story recalls forcibly the words with which the evangelist John
introduces his notice of the Forerunner--"There was a man sent from
God, whose name was John." Men are always coming, sent from God,
specially adapted to their age, and entrusted with the message which
the times demand. See to it that thou too realize thy divine mission;
for Jesus said, "As the Father hath sent Me, even so send I you."
Every true life is a mis