And Pilate, when he had called together the chief priests and the rulers and the people, said unto them, Ye have brought this man unto me, as one that perverteth the people: and, behold, I, having examined him before you, have found no fault in this man touching those things whereof ye accuse him. No, nor yet Herod: for I sent you to him; and, lo, nothing worthy of death is done unto him. I will therefore chastise him, and release him. (For of necessity he must release one unto them at the feast.) And they cried out all at once, saying, Away with this man, and release unto us Barabbas. (Who for a certain sedition made in the city, and for murder, was cast into prison.)—Then Pilate therefore took Jesus, and scourged him.—St. Luke xxiii: 13-19; St. John xix: 1.
NOTE BY THE ARTIST
In endeavoring to apprehend, however imperfectly, the sufferings endured by Jesus during this terrible day, there may be a tendency to under-estimate the significance of one detail which is only incidentally mentioned by the evangelists, namely, the punishment of scourging. But this was nevertheless so barbarously cruel, that the mind recoils in horror from the effort to realize the awful agony which it entailed. Bound in a crouching attitude to the pillar of torment, the quivering flesh lacerated by the fragments of bone and metal intertwisted with the thongs, few of its victims, save such as were in perfect physical health, were able to survive the infliction of the scourge, but perished either then and there, or shortly afterwards, from nervous shock or from mortification of the wounds. Yet it was a punishment so common, such an everyday occurrence, that the scourging of one more malefactor—Jesus by name—the justice or injustice of whose sentence they neither knew nor cared to know, would be regarded with utter indifference by the brutal soldiery charged with its infliction.
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Not long ago, a boy about nine or ten years old, named Pierre, was received into this school. He was a boy whose temper and conduct were so bad that he had been dismissed from several schools. He behaved pretty well at first; but soon his bad temper broke out, and one day he quarrelled with a boy about his own age, named Louis, and stabbed him in the breast with a knife.
Louis was carried bleeding to his bed. His wound was painful, but not dangerous. The boys were assembled, to consult about what was to be done with Pierre. Louis was a great favorite with the boys, and they all agreed at once that Pierre should be turned out of the school and never allowed to come back.
This was a very natural sentence under the circumstances, but the master thought it was not a wise one. He said that if Pierre was turned out of school, he would grow worse and worse, and probably end his life on the gallows. He asked them to think again. They then agreed upon a long imprisonment, without saying how long it was to be. They were asked as usual, if any one was willing to go to prison instead of Pierre. But no one offered and he was marched off to prison.
After some days, when the boys were all together, the master asked again if any one was willing to take Pierre’s place. A feeble voice was heard, saying—“I will.” To the surprise of every one this proved to be Louis—the wounded boy, who was just getting over the effect of his wound.