Evening lowers its dark mantel over the faithful, as they gather at the home of Aunt Susanna again to discuss and consider the conditions.

"Where is Jesus?" his mother inquired.

"He is walking on the shore," replied John. "He requested to be alone."

Trembling and pale, Mary, the mother of Jesus, stood and looked down upon the Galilean shore as she murmured, "Oh, how peaceful." Then closing her eyes she continued, "Oh, that this generation was passed." Then Magdalene assisted her to a divan and was whispering softly to her, when James came and caressed her gray locks as he said, "Mother, kiss Magdalene; she is lovely, isn't she?"

"I," responded Magdalene, "am nothing but a briar," to which James replied, "Roses grow on briars."

Around and in Aunt Susanna's home a great crowd of men and women had assembled when Thomas stood up and began, "A strange problem lies before us for solution this day. For more than two years we have followed Jesus and listened to his teachings. We had understood that God, through Jesus, was doing this work. Today the aspect is changed, for he tells us he came forth from God to do God's will. This implies a consciousness of existence in a place he calls Heaven, before he came among men. Some of his most ardent admirers now believe he is beside himself. If such is the case, we ought to persuade him not to go up to Jerusalem to the feast of the Passover."

"Does his sermon on the mount portray derangement of the mind?" broke in Matthew, as he produced a bundle of parchment and began reading: "A good tree cannot bring forth evil fruit, neither can a corrupt tree bring forth good fruit."

"That is exactly the point," said John. "Either we must deny all, or admit his version of the source of his power. If you observe closely you will find his intimacy with God includes more than faith; it corresponds closely to acquaintance. Notice what he said today, 'Not that any man hath seen the Father, save he which is of God.' Then knowing that we could not understand, he followed by saying, 'He that believeth on me hath everlasting life.' The knowledge he possesses we cannot comprehend, and knowing this he simply requires faith."

Judas Iscariot, the burly disciple from Beersheba, now arose and after admitting his faith in the Master's claim, began to lay stress on the fact that as so many were falling away, it might be better for all to abandon the cause until such time as Jesus could pacify the Scribes and Pharisees by admitting their prescribed authority.

While Judas continued, two men were overheard conversing in an undertone as they looked in at the audience.

"Do you see that young woman there facing Judas? That is Mary Magdalene."

"Really, is that so! I have heard so much about her. I wish I could hear her speak or sing."

"Do not worry, you will hear her. See her bite her lip! There is a storm brewing in her soul, and I pity old Jude when she gets the floor."

"Does she believe in Jesus?"

"Believe! I should say she does; she exhorts every evening. That elderly woman beside her is Mary, the mother of Jesus, and the one with her hand on Magdalene's shoulder is Ruth, one of his sisters. Honestly, those two maids have done more thus far to convince the public than all of his sleepy disciples."

"She does not look like the tornado of Galilee."

"Tornado, nothing! Why, her folks lived near us before she came over here, and I do not believe she ever told a lie in her life, but she has an interesting way of enforcing her opinion. There! There! she has the floor now! Listen!"

"You, Judas Iscariot," she began, "virtually admit that you have faith in Jesus as to his sanity and that he is the Christ which was to come into the world, and still, for fear of apparent consequences, you advise abandonment. All lives and careers undergo encouraging and discouraging events, today the world enfolds you in her loving arms, tomorrow the cruel cold shoulder is turned, and experience teaches that the rebuff sometimes falls on the worthy, for the world often goes agog. Truly, the multitude is disappearing, thousands will return home on account of this 'Bread-of-life' sermon today, for they do not understand that evolution requires time; that large bodies move slowly. They may be blameless, but you—you, Judas Iscariot—you who have been with him more than two years, are you yet befogged, or are you a coward? Did you today think that Jesus intended to convey the idea that God was a baker and had sent a loaf of bread down to Capernaum, and that he, Jesus, was the loaf? I know you did not. I hope I do not understand you. I hope you are true. I cannot imagine a traitor among us. Oh, how my heart aches. See how low the lights burn tonight! All seems so far away."

At this juncture she scowled and looked downwards as though collecting her thoughts, and then continued: "You know that the priests at Jerusalem dread Jesus, thinking that his teachings, if not impeded, will revolutionize the religious world and for this reason they favor a ransom to have him out of the way. Inasmuch as you are aware of this, you can imagine my surprise when today I overheard you with the others say to Jesus, 'Depart then and go into Judaea.'" As she quoted his words she hesitated, biting her lip nervously, then as though a thought struck her, she raised her head smilingly and continued, as she turned from Judas to the audience:

"In the upper corner of our garden nearby, one can see an old cactus. Some one sowed the seed from which it sprang before any one of us was born. I used to try to twist and break it when I first came here, for it seemed to cast no blossoms and bear no fruit. Other plants and shrubs blossomed, yielded their fruit, but the old cactus seemed just to live and that was all. One day, as some of you know, Ruth was here and we discovered a bud on it, called the gardener, who decided it was a century plant which might blossom soon, but it did not. Evening after evening all the neighbors came to behold the wonderful blossom which was expected to come forth from the seed sown nearly one hundred years ago. It was so slow that we became discouraged, but at last one evening, when we all stood around, the gardener applied warm water to the roots and in a few moments the largest and most beautiful blossom known to the Orient came forth, and think of it, dear friends, more than fifty years after the one who sowed the seed had gone to his long home.

"Today the seed of life is being sown in the hilly land of Old Canaan, the buds are promise, blossoms peace and fruit everlasting life. As through summer and winter, sunshine and rain, the old cactus came forth, so through joy and sadness, bitterness and despair, the tree of life may put forth. When we think of the thorny path over which good souls before us have traveled, we ought to trust in providence, for God is with us and knows it all.

"God's mysterious guide oft leads us where we would not go, but never where we cannot stay. He plans our course, he knows it all and some bright morn he will reveal. Abraham did not know, when he was called from home to spend his years among these hills, that when the frost of time had turned him pale, the angels would appear. Hagar, wandering in the wilds of Beersheba, did not think that God knew all of her troubles, and would not let her perish with her child. Moses did not know when he fled across the desert wilds oft looking back in fear, that his fair Zipporah would meet him at the well. When Ruth looked, for the last time, on the scenes of her childhood, and turned from the hills of Moab, to follow Naomi in the plain path of duty, she did not know that God had called her to become the mother of the most illustrious family in the world. All these, my friends, were blessings in disguise.

"Neither does the seed sown mature so quickly. The seed here sown in Galilee these days may bear little fruit in our generation, even for hundreds or thousands of years, but some sweet day, when the storms of life are over, and the followers of our Lord join hands to spread the gospel of the "Bread-of-life" as we have heard today, like the sleepy cactus, it will blossom forth in all lands."

At this point Jesus and James stepped in, unobserved by her, while she continued: "The storm is upon us now. I hear the distant billows roar. This night to you who hesitate may be the turn of the tide throughout an endless Eternity, so bare your bosoms to the storm and look only to the beacon lights, if dimly you may discern them.

"Earth life is but a fleeting shadow, soon past. I know my name will never appear on the records of this great struggle, no one will ever weep at the tomb of Mary Magdalene, but what for aye the morrow. Can you all meet me there?

"Did you who beheld Moses on the Mount of Transfiguration a few days ago think he had just come from his grave on Mount Nebo, where he had been sleeping fifteen hundred years? If you did, I hope God will wink at your ignorance, but you did not, no—no. The real spiritual, personal Moses did not die, he has lived, he does live, he will live, and you and I will just begin to live when these poor eyes will cease to weep, when this poor heart will ache no more and these soft hands are cold in clay.

"Is this struggle a sacrifice or a privilege? Oh, friends, the day will come when the world will envy us who lived in these dark days, and walked and talked and sang with the real Savior of the world, the son of the living God."

The last words seemed to thrill the throng with emotion, but the climax was only reached when Magdalene fainted into the arms of John and Ruth, who bore her gently away.