Nicodemus now retired to his accustomed seat in the Sanhedrim, leaving Magdalene, deathly pale, standing alone, when she cautiously meandered forward. Then, as though inspired, quickly tossing her head erect, said in a firm tone: "Learned men of Judea, angry are the elements and fierce the gale, now hovering over old Jerusalem, but dark as the night and wild as the storm, it is sunshine and peace compared with the gloom and terror now raging in my poor soul. I stand before your august body making my last plea for suffering innocence. Not only for the guiltless Jesus, but for fair Canaan's sons and daughters, who are this night slumbering, all unconscious of the fact that in the City of David, blind bigotry has marshalled its unscrupulous forces against the welfare of humanity, all unconscious, that in secret session, surrounded by fanatical apirants, this Sanhedrim has convened to consider an act which, if accomplished, will defame for ages the name of our people, the Jews. "Judas Iscariot now confesses to me that he bargained with the priests and elders for silver to pilot their hirelings to the arrest of Jesus, in the dark, and bring him before Annas, which he did. Now he has repented, returned the silver and is about to destroy himself. "Why all this haste, what has Jesus said, what has he done, that he should be apprehended in the night and destroyed before the people can gather?" "Has he not criticized the law of God, through Moses?" inquired Caiaphas. "Never! Never!" she said, as she faced the high priest. "He has eulogized Abraham, Moses and the prophets, but the law, 'An eye for an eye, and a tooth for a tooth,' what is it? "Abraham, face to face with the angels, Moses at the burning bush, the pillar of fire, the quails and the manna were all involved in mystery, but the law, the law, 'Ye shall be a peculiar treasure to me above all people, ye shall be unto me a kingdom of priests,' that was consummated in the foothills of Mount Sinai, at the home of Jethro, the priest of Midian, after Moses had virtually been dethroned and doomed to a hermit's cave on Mount Pisgah, there to die alone. "From the dawn of human observation, deep meditators have faintly observed that which appears to be the hand of providence. The islanders of the South Seas see God in the soft silent moon. The Greek highland philosophers see God in the groups of the heavenly hosts. The friends of Job observe God in the awakening of the dawn, while our people, the Hebrews, picture God in human form. Thus all mankind, each in their own way, bow to the strange unknown, whom Jesus terms a spirit.