XXIV.
THE TWELVE.
And now the second Pasch of our Lord's Public Life
had come. The country from one end to the other was
ringing with the sound of His Name. In the crowded
cities, in lonely hamlets, in the synagogues, the bazaars,
the streets, the Temple itself, Jesus of Nazareth and
His marvellous works were the talk of high and low.
Herod Antipas in Galilee, Pontius Pilate in Judea,
came to hear of Him, and in their own households He
had found adherents. Joanna, the wife of Herod's
steward, Claudia Procula, the Governor's wife, and
many others of rank and influence, either followed Him
openly with the crowd or believed in secret. The news
of fresh cures sped like wildfire through the land, and
kept up an enthusiasm which grew daily. For the
miracles of which we are told in the holy Gospels are
samples only of the immense numbers wrought. Day
after day, in all sorts of places, and at all hours He was
amongst the sick and suffering. He "went about doing
good," this was the business of His Life.
It was blazed abroad how on one Sabbath He had healed a man whom all Jerusalem knew, the paralytic at the Probatica pond, who for nearly forty years had lain there looking wistfully at the water that would have cured him could he have found a friend to help him into it when it was troubled. Jesus of Nazareth had seen him, and, unasked, had cured him, bidding him take up his bed and go into his house. The people did shout when he swung his bed over his shoulder and walked away. But he had not gone far when some
