DISCIPLINE.
Pathema also watched their movements and departure, fearing that the
wounded youth was dead. Her heart yearned anxiously after him. Who
was he that had so valiantly fought and bled for her? His name was
Tharsos, and he was a brave, self-sacrificing nobleman--that was all
she could tell. It was enough. Self-sacrifice vividly recalled
another sacrifice, greater, perfect, and for all. The flood-gate of
feeling could not be kept closed. She held the lilies in her drooping
hand, she raised them, looked at them tenderly for a moment, then
buried her face in them, and wept.
A herald now approached Pathema and formally announced that she was
free, at the same time pointing to the open door through which they had
borne the bleeding hero. But to the sensual undiscerning multitude,
Pathema was no heroine. She was only a woman; and in those days when
heathenism prevailed, women were not honoured as they are now.
Besides, Pathema was to them a fanatic, a detested Christian, and at
best but a stubborn, unbending, young woman. They knew not her supreme
gentleness and modesty, which shrank from publicity like a sensitive
plant from touch. They did not know that it was intense love and
loyalty to her Head which gave her strength to dare even cruel death.
Pathema turned to leave the arena, but the tension and turmoil and
reaction were now telling fast upon her fragile frame. As she walked
away, her weakness was so great that she had the utmost difficulty to
keep from falling, and it was only too visible; but she struggled on.
There was no sign of sympathy from the now talkative crowd, wailing for
another scene of blood. They treated her with indifference--she was
but a very secondary actor in the tragedy. Yet, though they knew her
not, she was the greater victor, not that day alone, but in her past
daily life of sacrifice. She was greater than he that slays a lion or
takes a city!
Among the indifferent crowd there was one bright exception. Carnion,
though not then a Christian, yet was fulfilling the beautiful
words--"Rejoice with them that do rejoice, and weep with them that
weep." As Pathema walked away with bowed head and faltering steps, the
lad stepped to the edge of the balcony, and waiving his silken
handkerchief, called out--"Thy God bless thee!" And the sufferer heard
the boy's sweet, strengthening voice, and struggled on.
Misunderstood and unregarded by the heartless multitude, yet Pathema's
discipline and victory were the work of God, and they, even the
greatest of them, were but the willing, guilty instruments. She was
being fashioned through suffering in the truest beauty and for the
highest honour--the beauty of holiness, which endures for ever. She
walked meekly and painfully on, she reached the little door, and then
she passed from their guilty presence,--a queen, though uncrowned.