Notwithstanding he was not so much distressed with the pains and diseases of the body as with the pains and diseases of the soul. For the sins of souls seemed to him as real and loathsome as the diseases of the flesh to us; and oftentimes a transgression that would appear slight to us, he counted as a work of Satan; so that whithersoever he moved, he saw sins more than could be seen of common men, yea, a very sea of sinfulness; albeit, underlying the sea of sin and sorrow, he still discerned the Everlasting Arms.
Moreover, because he loved all men with an exceeding great love, for this cause every hour in his life brought unto him a burden passing the power of words to describe. For the sins of men were not unto him as the sins of aliens and strangers, but as the sins of his own brethren: yea, they were even as his own sins; for, although he himself sinned not, neither knew sin, yet what pain cometh from the bearing of a brother’s sin, that he knew full well. Wherefore in him was fulfilled the saying of the prophet Isaiah; who prophesied that the Messiah should be a man of sorrows and acquainted with griefs, and that he should carry our sins and bear our iniquities.
On the morrow, about the second hour, we began to go up the mountain which Jesus had appointed. But having strayed from the path, we knocked at the door of a house which was near the foot of the mountain, and besought the goodman of the house that he would guide us. There opened the door a man of churlish appearance; but he would neither come out, nor so much as speak with us. This delayed us for a time, but we soon found the path, and the way became steep. The sun shone, but not with too fervent a heat, and the north wind blew gently from Hermon, whose top we saw clearly toward the north, clad in snow. On the west was the Mount Carmel, shining with a brightness as of purple; and further off the Great Sea, resembling a blue plain, whereon appeared many sails, almost too small for sight by reason of the distance. We climbed upward through groves of terebinth and oak. As often as we turned round to recover breath, the houses and fields grew smaller, till, at the last, when we drew nigh unto the top, the whole plain of Esdraelon seemed but as a small ground‐plat; and large towns appeared as little hamlets, and all the works of man became very small in our eyes, as though we were leaving earth and approaching heaven.
