Feeble old men, weak women, poor slaves,
even little children, sealed their testimony with their blood, and
conquered, not by fighting, but by suffering.
They conquered. They conquered for themselves in the next world; for
they went to heaven and bliss, and their light affliction, which was
but for a moment, worked out for them an exceeding and eternal weight
of glory.
They conquered in this world also. For the very world which had
scourged them, racked them, crucified them, burned them alive, when
they were dead turned round and worshipped them as heroes, almost as
divine beings. And they were divine; for they had in them the Divine
Spirit, the Spirit of God and of Christ. Therefore the foolish world
was awed, conscience-stricken, pricked to the heart, when it looked
on those whom it had pierced, as it had pierced Christ the Lord, and
cried, as the centurion cried on Calvary, 'Surely these were the sons
and daughters of God. Surely there was some thing more divine, more
noble, more beautiful in these poor creatures dying in torture, than
in all the tyrants and conquerors and rich men of the earth. This is
the true greatness, this is the true heroism--to do well and suffer
for it patiently.'
And thenceforth men began to get, slowly but surely, a quite new idea
of true greatness; they learnt to see that not revenge, but
forgiveness; not violence, but resignation; not success, but
holiness, are the perfection of humanity.
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