It is remarkable that Mary was never in any one instance associated in public work with Jesus. She was not among the women who are mentioned as following and ministering unto him. She was, it seems, in Jerusalem at the last Passover of our Lord, but it was not with her, or at her table, that he prepared to eat the Passover. He did that as master in his own house, with a family of little children of his own choosing. Mary was not at the first Eucharistic feast. Undoubtedly there was foreknowledge and divine design in all this, and doubtless Jesus and Mary were so completely one in will and purpose that she was of perfect accord with him in all these arrangements. There are souls so perfectly attuned to each other, with such an exact understanding and sympathy, that personal presence no longer becomes a necessity. They are always with each other in spirit, however outwardly separated. But we find her with him once more, openly and visibly, in the hour when all others forsook him. The delicacy of woman may cause her to shrink from the bustle of public triumph, but when truth and holiness are brought to public scorn she is there to defend, to suffer, to die. Can we conceive what this mob was, that led Jesus forth to death? Mobs in our day are brutal, but what were they then? Consider what the times must have been when scourging was an ordinary punishment for criminals, and crucifixion an ordinary mode of execution; what were the sights, the sounds, the exhibitions of brutality among which Mary and the women friends of Jesus followed him to the cross! And Mary did not faint--did not sink. She did not fall to the earth when an angel predicted her glory; she did not fall now, when the sword had gone through her heart. It is all told in one word, "Now there _stood_ by the cross of Jesus his mother." The last word that Jesus spoke to any mortal ear was to commend her to his dearest friend. After the resurrection Mary appears once more among the disciples, waiting and praying for a descent of the Holy Ghost--and then in the sacred record we hear of her no more. But enough is recorded of her to make her forever dear to all Christian hearts. That Mary is now with Jesus, that there is an intimacy and sympathy between her soul and his such as belong to no other created being, seems certain. Nor should we suffer anything to prevent that just love and veneration which will enable us to call her Blessed, and to look forward to meeting her in heaven as one of the brightest joys of that glorious world. V THE HOLY CHILDHOOD In the first recorded public prayer of the Apostles after the resurrection of our Lord he is called "THY HOLY CHILD JESUS." The expression is a very beautiful one if we couple it with the Master's declaration that the greatest in the kingdom of heaven is the most like a little child, and that to become as a little child is the first step toward fitness for the knowledge of spiritual things.