depend." Jesus had the rare understanding that the same man will usually not make the same mistake twice. To this frail, very human, very likable ex-fisherman he spoke no word of rebuke. Instead he played a stroke of masterstrategy. "Your name is Simon," he said. "Hereafter you shall be called Peter." (A rock.) It was daring, but he knew his man. The shame of the denial had tempered the iron of that nature like fire; from that time on there was no faltering in Peter, even at the death.

The Bible presents an interesting collection of contrasts in this matter of executive ability. Samson had almost all the attributes of leadership. He was physically powerful and handsome; he had the great courage to which men always respond. No man was ever given a finer opportunity to free his countrymen from the oppressors and build up a great place of power for himself. Yet Samson failed miserably. He could do wonders singlehanded, but he could not organize. Moses started out under the same handicap. He tried to be everything and do

everything; and was almost on the verge of failure. It was his father-in-law, Jethro, who saved him from calamity. Said that shrewd old man: "The thing that thou doest is not good. Thou wilt surely wear away, both thou and this people that is with thee, for this thing is too heavy for thee, for thou are not able to perform it thyself alone."

Moses took the advice and associated with himself a partner, Aaron, who was strong where he was weak. They supplemented each other and together achieved what neither of them could have done alone.

John, the Baptist, had the same lack. He could denounce, but he could not construct. He drew crowds who were willing to repent at his command, but he had no program for them after their repentance. They waited for him to organize them for some sort of effective service, and he was no organizer. So his followers drifted away and his movement gradually collapsed. The same thing might have happened to the work of Jesus. He started with much less

Vitalit

reputation than John and a much smaller group
of followers. He had only twelve, and they
were untrained simple men, with elementary
weakness and passions. Yet because of the fire
of his personal conviction, because of his mar-
velous instinct for discovering their latent v
powers, and because of his unwavering faith and
patience, he molded them into an organization
which carried on victoriously. Within a very
few years after his death, it was reported in a
far-off corner of the Roman Empire that "these
who have turned the world upside down havẹ
come hither also." A few decades later the
proud Emperor himself bowed his head to the
teachings of this Nazareth carpenter, trans-
mitted through common men.

CHAPTER II

THE OUTDOOR MAN

TO MOST of the crowd there was nothing unusual in the scene. That is the tragedy of it.

The air was filthy with the smell of animals and human beings herded together. Men and women trampled one another, crying aloud their imprecations. At one side of the court were the pens of the cattle; the dove cages at the other. In the foreground, hard-faced priests and money-changers sat behind long tables exacting the utmost farthing from those who came to buy. One would never imagine that this was a place of worship. Yet it was the Temple— the center of the religious life of the nation. And to the crowds who jammed its courts, the spectacle seemed perfectly normal.

That was the tragedy of it.

Standing a little apart from the rest, the

young man from Nazareth watched in amazement which deepened gradually into anger. It was no familiar sight to him. He had not been in the Temple since his twelfth year, when Joseph and Mary took him up to be legally enrolled as a son of the law. His chief memory of that previous visit was of a long conversation with certain old men in a quiet room. He had not witnessed the turmoil in the outer courts, or, if he had, it made small impression on his youthful mind.

But this day was different. For weeks he had looked forward to the visit, planning the journey with a company of Galilean pilgrims who tramped all day and spent the nights in their tents under the open sky. To be sure some of the older ones muttered about the extortions of the money-changers. A woman told how the lamb which she had raised with so much devotion the previous year, had been scornfully rejected by the priests, who directed her to buy from the dealers. An old man related his experience. He had brought down the savings of