“The king could have slain the prophet ere this day. Verily the king has tried the pleasure of His subjects. Kings of yore were not so slow in giving the head of a prophet to the
“I grieve not for John, but rather for Herod, who let fall the sword. Poor king, like an animal caught and led with a ring and a rope.
“Poor petty tetrarchs lost in their own darkness, they stumble and fall down. And what would you of the stagnant sea but dead fishes?
“I hate not kings. Let them rule men, but only when they are wiser than men.”
And the Master looked at the two sorrowful faces and then He looked at us, and He spoke again and said:
“John was born wounded, and the blood of his wounds streamed forth with his words. He was freedom not yet free from itself, and patient only with the straight and the just.
“In truth he was a voice crying in the land of the deaf; and I loved him in his pain and his aloneness.
“And I loved his pride that would give its head to the sword ere it would yield it to the dust.
“Verily I say unto you that John, the son of Zachariah, was the last of his race, and like his forefathers he was slain between the threshold of the temple and the altar.”
And again Jesus walked away from us.
Then He returned and He said: