memorials scattered all abroad throughout the land; we can call up the
whole epoch, and make it stand visible before us, visiting every shrine
and sacred place of that saintly time, seeing, with inner eyes, the
footsteps of those who followed that path, first traced out by the
shores of Gennesaret.

Once more, if the kingdom come upon earth were all of the message, we
might halt here; for here forgiveness and gentle charity performed their
perfect work, and learning was present with wise counsel to guide
willing feet in the way. Yet this is not all; nor, if we rightly
understand that darkest yet brightest message, are we or is mankind
destined for such an earthly paradise; our kingdom is not of this world.
Here was another happiness, another success; yet not in that happiness
nor in that success was hid the secret; it lay far deeper. Therefore we
find that morning with its sunshine rudely clouded over, its promise
swept away in the black darkness of storms. Something more than holy
living remained to be learned; there remained the mystery of failure and
death--that death which is the doorway to our real life. Therefore upon
our shores broke wave after wave of invasion, storm after storm of
cruelest oppression and degradation. In the very dust was our race
ground down, destitute, afflicted, tormented, according to prophecy and
promise. Nor was that the end. Every bitterness that the heart of man
can conceive, that the heart of man can inflict, that the heart of man
can endure, was poured into our cup, and we drained it to the dregs. Of
that saddest yet most potent time we shall record enough to show not
only what befell through our age of darkness, but also, so far as may
be, what miraculous intent underlay it, what promise the darkness
covered, of our future light; what golden rays of dawn were hidden in
our gloom.