to the people, not their shabby villages of wigwams: he said it would be

sad for them at "the day of judgment"--and what business have mud-hovels

at the Day of Judgment? It would not affect the prophecy in the least

--it would neither prove it or disprove it--if these towns were splendid

cities now instead of the almost vanished ruins they are. Christ visited

Magdala, which is near by Capernaum, and he also visited Cesarea

Philippi. He went up to his old home at Nazareth, and saw his brothers

Joses, and Judas, and James, and Simon--those persons who, being own

brothers to Jesus Christ, one would expect to hear mentioned sometimes,

yet who ever saw their names in a newspaper or heard them from a pulpit?

Who ever inquires what manner of youths they were; and whether they

slept with Jesus, played with him and romped about him; quarreled with

him concerning toys and trifles; struck him in anger, not suspecting

what he was? Who ever wonders what they thought when they saw him

come

back to Nazareth a celebrity, and looked long at his unfamiliar face to

make sure, and then said, "It is Jesus?" Who wonders what passed in

their minds when they saw this brother, (who was only a brother to them,

however much he might be to others a mysterious stranger who was a god

and had stood face to face with God above the clouds,) doing strange

miracles with crowds of astonished people for witnesses? Who wonders if

the brothers of Jesus asked him to come home with them, and said his

mother and his sisters were grieved at his long absence, and would be

wild with delight to see his face again? Who ever gives a thought to

the sisters of Jesus at all?--yet he had sisters; and memories of them

must have stolen into his mind often when he was ill-treated among

567

The Innocents Abroad