“Lead on,” he said to the slave, “I will follow. You, my friends, must excuse me.”
The worldly priest might well have dreaded to enter the house of woe to which he had been called.
The unhappy mother met him at the door. “Oh, Joshua!” she cried, the foolish affectation of the Greek name being forgotten in the hour of trouble. “Can you help us? My dear Asaph is dying, and he is terribly distressed about his sins. You are high-priest. Have you not some power to do him good?”
“Take me to him,” said Jason, “I will do all that I can for him.”
The unhappy lad was lying on a couch, the deathly pallor of his face showing with a terrible contrast against the rich purple of the coverlet. His eyes were wide open, and there was a terror-stricken look in them that was inexpressibly painful to witness. As soon as he saw his uncle, he burst forth in tones of agonized entreaty. “I have sinned; I have sinned; I have followed in the ways of the heathen, and, see, my God hath called me into judgment. Help me! help me! Save me from the fire of Gehenna!”
The high priest strove to say something; but his faltering lips seemed to refuse to do their office.
“Speak! speak!” cried the young man. “It was you who told me to go into the arena. You [pg 15]said there was no harm in it; you encouraged me, and now you desert me. O help me!” and his voice, which had been raised to a loud, angry cry, sank again to low tones of entreaty. “You are high priest; you surely can do something with the Lord. Pray for me to Him. Quick! quick! the evil ones are clutching at me!” and, as he spoke, he turned his eyes with a fearful glance as if he saw some terrible presence which was invisible to the rest.
His uncle, more unhappy than he had ever been before in his life, stood in dumb despair. It seemed impossible to mock this wretched creature with words in which he did not himself believe. And, indeed, the words themselves seemed to have fled altogether from his memory. At last, with a tremendous effort, he summoned up some of the words, once familiar to his lips, but which had not issued from them for years. It was what we know as the fifty-first Psalm in our psalter that he began—“Have mercy upon me, O God, after Thy great goodness, according to the multitude of Thy mercies do away mine offences.” He began with a faltering and uncertain voice, which gathered strength as he went on. The dying man listened with an eagerly-strained attention, and the words seemed to have some soothing effect upon him. When the speaker came to the words, “Cast me not away from Thy presence,” he clasped his hands together. At the very moment of the act a strong [pg 16]convulsion shook his frame: a stream of blood gushed from his mouth; in another moment Asaph was dead.
His unhappy mother had been carried fainting to her apartments, where her maids were endeavouring to restore her to consciousness. The high priest was almost glad that she was in such a state that there could be no question of attempting to administer to her any consolation. No one, indeed, could have felt less like a comforter than he did at that moment. As he walked slowly back to his palace he felt less satisfied with the Greek fashions, for which he had sacrificed the faith of his fathers, than he had done for many years.
The news that he found awaiting him at home changed the current of his thoughts. A letter, carried, in Eastern fashion, by a succession of runners, had arrived from Joppa. It was as follows:—