"Death is self-surrender; all loss is a kind of death; the only-begotten Son is the summing up of what is dearest, most _one's own_--_i.e._, God can only be _at one_ with his work, can only make it to be truly his work by eternally dying--sacrificing what is dearest to him. God does not, therefore, _cease to be_; he does not annihilate himself; he lives eternally in the very process of sacrificing his dearest work. Hence God is said to be love; for love is the consciousness of survival in the act of self-surrender.... Such would be the _atone_ment of the world-god eternally living in his own death, eternally losing, and eternally returning to, himself" (Nettleship). It cannot be denied that "suffering" was the burden of Gotama's song, the refrain of his passionless, yet beautiful, utterances. Jesus has been described "as a man of sorrows and acquainted with grief." Jesus wept. The whole creation weeps. "What think ye, my disciples (the Perfect One said), whether is more, the water which is in the four great oceans, or the tears which have flown from you, and have been shed by you, while ye strayed and wandered in this long pilgrimage, and sorrowed and wept because that was your portion which ye abhorred, and that which ye loved was not your portion? And while ye experienced this through long ages more tears have flown from you, and have been shed by you, while ye strayed and wandered on this long pilgrimage, and sorrowed and wept because that was your portion which ye abhorred, and that which ye loved was not your portion, than all the water which is in the four great oceans" (Oldenberg's _Buddhism_). St. Paul conjures up a vision of the immense figure of creation, prostrate, groaning beneath the silent heavens. "The true Buddhist certainly sees in this world a state of continuous sorrow; but this sorrow only awakes in him a feeling of compassion for those who are yet in the world. For himself he feels no sorrow or compassion.... He seeks Nirvana with the same joyous sense of victory in prospect with which the Christian looks forward to his goal, everlasting life" (Oldenberg). The doctrine of an irrevocable doom for the unbeliever and obdurate sinner is not easy to follow, because it would seem to imply "a failure of the redemptive work of the Saviour unless all for whom he died ultimately partake of salvation." If many are called and but few are chosen; if the gate is narrow, and only a microscopic minority enter thereby, the supreme sacrifice of the only-begotten Son of God is liable to lose significance in the eyes of an _exigeant_ public. Jesus "treated popular religious terms such as Hell and Heaven as symbols." "He employed the familiar images of Heaven and Hell to impress on men's consciousness the supreme bliss of righteousness and the awful misery of sin."