CHAPTER XXXIX.
SO all was at an end; the Son of God had come and gone, and few had known Him; salvation had been purchased for the world; to be the hope in life, and the solace in the hour of death, of countless thousands yet unborn. The reason for living had been given to humanity. The priceless object of His incarnation had been achieved. The agony of death the martyrdom of life, were over. The great Spirit, released at last, had flown back to its Father.
Torn as they were with grief, the mourning women could not but rejoice that His long night was ended and, faithful to Him in His death as they had been in His life, they now thought only of how best to honour the divine Body they loved so well.
Now that the great agony of watching Him was over, their thoughts turned to Lazarus. Was he, too, now in prison, following in the anguished steps of his beloved Master? With what joy they saw him appear with Joseph, to help them in taking down the body of their Christ! Nicodemus, grown fearless through remorse, helped too, and soon the sad procession wound round the hillock of Golgotha to the garden in which Joseph had hewn out a tomb. How tenderly they bore that lacerated body to its resting-place, the women ever pressing forward, if
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