We may say we believe in Jesus and, therefore, we will be saved; but we must remember also that faith without works is dead, and on the great day of judgment all will be made known, for St. John says in the Apocalypse: "I saw the dead, small and great, stand before God; and the books were opened: and another book was opened, which is the book of life: and the dead were judged out of those things which were written in the books, according to their works. And the sea gave up the dead which were in it; and death and hell delivered up the dead which were in them: and they were judged every man according to their works."
CHAPTER XXIII.
THE NINETY AND NINE.
When he lived on earth so lowly,
Friend of sinners was his name;
Now enthroned among the holy,
He rejoices in the name.
When Jesus was here upon earth the question was asked, 'Can any good thing come out of Nazareth? But it is said that the thirty years of Christ's obscurity was the foundation of his three years' manifestations. He was there, however, not alone, for he was under the fostering love and anxious solicitude of His heavenly Father. Nazareth is beautifully described thus:
It was "a handful of pearls in a goblet of emerald. No great road led up to this sunny nook. Trade, war, adventure, pleasure, pomp, passed by it, flowing from west to east, from east to west, along the Roman road. But the meadows were aglow with wheat and barley. Near the low ground ran a belt of gardens, fenced with loose stones, in which myriads of green figs, red pomegranates, and golden citrons ripened in the summer sun. High up the slopes hung vintages of purple grapes. In the plain among the corn, and beneath the mulberry-trees and figs, shone daisies, poppies, tulips, lilies, anemones, endless in their profusion, brilliant in their dyes. Low down on the hillside sprang a well of water, bubbling, plentiful and sweet; and above this fountain of life, in a long street straggling from the fountain to the synagogue, rose the homesteads of many shepherds, craftsmen, and vine-dressers. It was a lovely and humble place, of which no poet, no ruler, no historian of Israel had ever taken note."