From then on there was only one light attractive to Judas, and that was the luring light of avarice and greed. Seeking for it, he found it. Like the red fires of hell it burst into flaming stream from the high priest’s windows, where Arrogance and Lust for Power were plotting against the innocent. Rushing toward it, out of breath, his hands clutching his garments, his brow wet with perspiration, his eyes staring madly with greed for gold, he demanded: “What will you give me?” Shrewd and crafty, these unscrupulous leaders of men knew that the language of love and friendship could not be understood by this grasper of gain; so they used the only language he could now understand and wanted to hear--the language of the market place; and “they promised him money.” This is one of the darkest pictures in history, its black shadow reaching through the centuries, but it does not hang alone in the galleries of death. There are others still making the awful bargain of Judas, and gladly sacrificing the innocent for the sake of financial gain. Behold the unscrupulous real-estate dealers who force houses of immoral character into clean, residential sections of cities, betraying the cause of righteousness, injuring homes, and damning the souls of hundreds. Because immorality promises a more handsome and immediate return for the investment they become partners in the exploiting of sin and crime. As Judas went into the quietude of the Mount of Olives and brought wreck and ruin, so these men insidiously lead marauding bands of immoral workers into the best communities, well knowing that their deed means the betrayal of youth and maiden, but refusing to give it a thought, their attention fixed only on the increasing volume of business. The good name of a city or community, the value of innocence, and the sanctity of the home are nothing to these modern Judases. Behold the employers of child labor, who, under the disguise of charitably giving employment to the poor, are reaping revenues that provide them with luxuries at the cost of blasted lives. Many of our shops, stores, and factories are but presses where the life, hope, vigor, and vision of childhood are crushed out in order to fill to the brim the intoxicating cup of extravagance for people whose own lives are too foul and unfit to be used as grapes in their own presses. Daily the bright-faced boys and girls, the hope of the nation, are crowded out of the public school into the vats. Hour by hour their lives are pressed out until, broken in body, dwarfed in intellect, incapacitated for works of social service, falling far short of the requirements made upon their later years, they are thrown aside as useless pomace. The uncontrollable spirit of greed that places money above the value of life and happiness and goodness is the spirit of Judas.