AFTER HE WAS taken, they entrusted Him to me. And I was ordered by Pontius Pilatus to keep Him in custody until the following morning.
My soldiers led Him prisoner, and He was obedient to them.
At midnight I left my wife and children and visited the arsenal. It was my habit to go about and see all that was well with my battalions in Jerusalem; and that night I visited the arsenal where He was held.
My soldiers and some of the young Jews were making sport of Him. They had stripped Him of His garment, and they had put a crown of last year's brier-thorns upon His head.
They had seated Him against a pillar, and they were dancing and shouting before Him.
And they had given Him a reed to hold in His hand.
As I entered someone shouted, "Behold, O Captain, the King of the Jews."
I stood before Him and looked at Him, and I was ashamed. I knew not why.
I had fought in Gallia and in Spain, and with my men I had faced death. Yet never had I been in fear, nor been a coward. But when I stood before that man and He looked at me I lost heart. It seemed as though my lips were sealed, and I could not utter no word.
And straightway I left the arsenal.
This chanced thirty years ago. My sons who were babes then are men now. And they are serving Caesar and Rome.
But often in counselling them I have spoken of Him, a man facing death with the sap of life upon His lips, and with compassion for His slayers in His eyes.
And now I am old. I have lived the years fully. And I think truly that neither Pompey nor Caesar was so great a commander as that Man of Galilee.
For since His unresisting death an army has risen out of the earth to fight for Him. . . . And He is better served by them, though dead, than ever Pompey or Caesar was served, though living.
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