Mark 13:13 And you shall be hated of all men for my name's sake: but he that shall endure to the end, the same shall be saved. Under this revival of the persecuting spirit, in a few days nineteen Christians, conspicuous for their character and zeal, were apprehended, and it was resolved to make a severe example. All were condemned to die; the four nobles (one of them a lady) were ordered to be burned alive; fifteen others were to be thrown over a precipice. At one o'clock the night before their execution, a large gathering of their companions secretly took place, not to break prison or attempt a rescue, but to commend the sufferers specially to God in prayer. "At one at night, we met together and prayed." With the early dawn the whole city was astir: it had been whispered that the Christians were to die, and an immense multitude gathered to witness the sight. On the west side of Antananarivo, is a steep precipice of granite, a hundred and fifty feet high; the terrace above which has long been used as a place of execution. Above the terrace the ground rises rapidly to the crest of the ridge, on which the city is built, and on which the palace enclosure, with its lofty dwellings, stands conspicuous. Beneath the precipice the ground is a mass of jagged rocks and boulders, upon which the unhappy criminal would fall headlong, when rolled or thrown over the ledge. The refined cruelty which invented this terrible punishment has, in the modern world, been repeated in but one country and among one people, the half-savage population of Mexico. Through the thousands that had crowded every point of the sloping hill the condemned brethren were carried, wrapped in mats and slung on poles. But they prayed and sang as they passed along the roadway; "and some who beheld them, said that their faces were like the faces of angels." One by one they were thrown over the precipice, the rest looking on. "Will you cease to pray?" was the only question. "No," was the firm answer in every case. And in a moment the faithful martyr lay bleeding, and mangled, and dead, among the rocks below. — (Trophies of Grace in Madagascar.) Parallel Verses KJV: And ye shall be hated of all men for my name's sake: but he that shall endure unto the end, the same shall be saved. |
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