Do you see how everywhere His enemies are distressed and afraid? Do you see their anguish? Learn, too, the kindness of the Crucified. They said, _His blood be upon us and upon our children_. Not so Christ, but, supplicating the Father, He said, _Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do_. For, if His blood had indeed fallen upon them and upon their children, the Apostles would not have been made out of their children; neither three thousand nor five thousand would have believed on the spot. See you how barbarous and cruel as they were towards their descendants, they ignored even nature itself, whilst God was more loving than all fathers put together and tenderer than any mother? Still His blood _was_ upon them and upon their children, though not upon all their children, but on those alone who emulated the impiety and unrighteousness of their fathers. Those alone were liable to the evils who were sons, not according to nature, but through their own foolish choice. Look with me at another side of the goodness and lovingness of God. He did not at once let the chastisement and penalty fall upon them, but He allowed forty years and more to pass after the Cross. Our Lord Himself was crucified under Tiberius, and their city was destroyed under Vespasian and Titus. Now, why did He allow so long a time to elapse after these things? Because He wished to give them time for repentance, so that they might put off their iniquities and be quit of their crimes. As, having a respite for conversion, they remained in their impenitence, He at last inflicted punishment upon them, and, destroying their city, sent them out wanderers over the face of the earth. And this He did through love. He dispersed them that they might everywhere see that Christ Whom they had crucified adored, and that, seeing Him adored by all, they might learn His power and acknowledge their own exceeding wickedness, and in acknowledging it might come to the truth. And indeed their humiliation became a teaching to them and their chastisement a remedy, for, if they had remained in the country of the Jews, they would not have recognised the truth of the prophets. What had the prophets said? _Ask of me and I will give you the gentiles for your inheritance and the ends of the earth as your possession._ Thus it behoved them to go out to the ends of the earth that they might see with their own eyes that Christ reigns even there. Again, another prophet says, _Each one shall adore Him from his own place_. Therefore it was necessary that they should be dispersed into every corner of the earth, that with their very eyes they might see every man adoring Him from his own place. Again, another says, _The earth shall be filled with the knowledge of the Lord as the waters cover the sea_. Therefore, it was fitting that they should go forth unto all the earth, that they might see it all filled with the knowledge of God, and _seas_, that is, these spiritual churches, with His fear.