still. It cherished the constant hope of a great Deliverer. It was ready to rise. It rose, before long, with an energy which, though the issue was the destruction of Jerusalem, shook for a moment the adamantine throne of Rome. And even before the last great struggle more than one insurgent chief was able to lead his thousands into the wilderness. Everything, to a human apprehension, counselled an appeal to the strong hand: and strong hands and brave hearts were ready to answer to the call.
Nevertheless our Lord and His Apostles said not a word against the powers or institutions of that evil world. Their attitude towards them all was that of deep spiritual hostility and of entire political submission. The dominion of a foreign conqueror, the presence of his soldiery, the extortions of his tax-gatherers, the injustice of his judges, the iniquitous privileges of the conquering Roman, the iniquitous degradation of the conquered Jew,—all these, as well as slavery, are accepted with unquestioning resignation. The things which are Cæsar’s are rendered unto Cæsar, though Cæsar is a Tiberius or a Nero. To endure patiently the dominion of those monsters, it has been truly said, was the honour of Christianity and the dishonour of mankind.
Had this implicit submission to political power not been preached by our Lord and His Apostles, and enforced by their example, the new religion must, humanly speaking, have perished in its birth. The religious movement would infallibly have become a political movement, as Protestantism did when preached by Wycliffe and Huss to an oppressed people. And
