"(I) The immense field covered by the conquests of Alexander gave to the civilized world a unity of language, without which it would have been, humanly speaking, impossible for the earliest preachers to have made known the good tidings in every land which they traversed. (II) The rise of the Roman Empire created a political unity which reflected in every direction the doctrines of the new faith. (III) The dispersion of the Jews prepared vast multitudes of Greeks and Romans for the unity of a pure morality and a monotheistic faith. The Gospel emanated from the capital of Judea; it was preached in the tongue of Athens; it was diffused through the empire of Rome; the feet of its earliest missionaries traversed the solid structure of undeviating roads by which the Roman legionaries--'those massive hammers of the whole earth'--had made straight in the desert a highway for our God. Semite and Aryan had been unconscious instruments in the hands of God for the spread of a religion which, in its first beginnings, both alike detested and despised." A similar marvel is the spread of the restored Gospel through the Gentile nations of modern times, a work yet in its infancy. The proselyting success of the Latter-day Saints on both hemispheres, their great pilgrimage from the Mississippi River to the Rocky Mountains, the redemption of a wilderness, the founding of a State, and the extraordinary attention attracted by the "Mormon" people--altogether out of proportion to their numbers--these combined facts constitute a striking fulfillment of the prophetic picture drawn by the Savior: "Ye are as a city set upon a hill which cannot be hid." PART FIVE IN TIME'S MERIDIAN ARTICLE TWENTY. The Lamb of God. A stranger Star, that came from far, To filing its silver ray Where, cradled in a lowly cave, A lowlier infant lay; And led by soft sidereal light, The Orient sages bring Rare gifts of gold and frankincense, To greet the homeless King. * * * He wandered through the faithfulness world, A Prince in shepherd guise; He called his scattered flock, but few The Voice did recognize; For minds unborne by hollow pride, Or dimmed by sordid lust, Ne'er look for kings in beggar's garb, For diamonds in the dust. * * * Transfixt he hung--O crime of crimes!-- The God whom worlds adore. "Father forgive them!" Drained the dregs; Immanuel--no more. No more where thunders shook the earth, Where lightnings, 'thwart the gloom, Saw that unconquered Spirit spurn The shackles of the tomb. Far-flaming falchion, sword of light, Swift-flashing from its sheath, It cleft the realms of darkness and Dissolved the bands of death. Hell's dungeons burst! Wide open swung The everlasting bars, Whereby the ransomed soul shall win Those heights beyond the stars! [1]