^ If Simon had started from the little village where he lived five minutes earlier or later, if he had walked a little faster or slower, if he had happened to be lodging on the other side of Jerusalem, or if the whim had taken him to go in at another gate, or if the centurion's eye had not chanced to alight on him in the crowd, or if the centmion's fancy had picked out somebody else to carry the cross, then all his life would have been different. And so it is always. You go down one turning rather than another, and your whole career is coloured thereby. You miss a train and you escape death. Our lives are like the Cornish
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rocking stones, pivoted on little points. The most apparently insignificant things have a strange knack of suddenly developing unexpected consequences, and turning out to be, not small things at all, but great and decisive and fruitful.
^ Let us look with ever fresh wonder on this marvellous contexture of human life, and on Him that moulds it all to His own perfect purposes. Let us bring the highest and largest principles to bear on the smallest events and circumstances, for we can never tell which of these is going to turn out a revolu- tionary and formative influence in our life. And if the highest Christian principle is not brought to bear upon the trifles, it will never be brought to bear upon the mighty things. The most part of every life is made up of trifles, and unless these are ruled by the highest motives, life, which is divided into grains like the sand, will have gone by, while we are preparing for the big events which we think worthy of being regulated by lofty principles. Look after the trifles, for the law of life is like that which is laid down by the Psalmist about the Kingdom of Jesus Christ : " There shall be a handful of corn in the earth," a little seed sown in an apparently ungenial place " on the top of the mountains." Yes ! but what will come of it ? " The fruit thereof shall shake like Lebanon." The great harvest of benediction or of curse, of joy or of sorrow, will come from the minute seeds that are sown in the great trifles of our daily life.^
2. Compelled to hear the Cross. — " They compel one Simon to go with them that he might bear his cross." The question at once presents itself. By what right, from what cause, did they seize on this stray traveller and force him into the degrad- ing position of bearing this shameful cross ? For let it be remembered that then it was a shame/ul cross. "What is now our ornament and pride, the symbol of all that is worthiest in man and divinest in God, was then the badge of shame and lowest degradation. So that it was an outrage and an insult of the very last degree that was inflicted on Simon the Cyrenian when they compelled him to bear the cross of Jesus Christ. The vilest of that howling Jewish mob would have shrunk from touching it, it would have been pollution ; while the lowest Eoman soldier would have regarded " bearing a cross " as an unspeakable degradation. Then how came they, how dared they, inflict this insult on Simon the Cyrenian ? Was it
^ A. Maclaren.
462 THE GREAT TEXTS OF THE BIBLE
the swarthy hue, the dusky complexion, the slave mark on skin or dress, which singled him out as one who might be safely wronged ? This seems to be the most probable opinion, for Simon was a Cyrenian, that is, a native of North Africa, and though we may not, perhaps, say positively he was a " man of colour," yet there might be enough to mark him out the slave. Was it for that reason they dared to inflict on him this wanton insult, and compelled him to bear the cross of the doomed Nazarene ?
^ When Cyrus, the Persian king, conquered Palestine, he introduced into it several of the customs of his own country. One of the most remarkable of these was what might be called the postal service, which forwarded the messages of the govern- ment to all parts of the land. It was called the Angareion, from a Tartar word which means compulsory work without pay. Herodotus gives an interesting account of this custom; from which we learn that, in order to transmit messages with the utmost possible speed, relays of men and horses were kept ready at intervals along the principal roads, which handed on the despatches from one to another without pause or interruption, whatever might be the inclemency of the weather, and by night as well as by day. Such mounted couriers were further em- powered to press into the service, should it be found necessary, additional men and horses, even if they had to leave their own work in the field for the purpose ; and boats, if they had to cross a river or an arm of the sea. It can easily be imagined that such a system could be used by a government as an engine of oppres- sion ; and the people who were compelled to render this gratuitous service, often at very inconvenient times, and at great risk and loss to themselves, would doubtless feel very keenly the injustice of it. In Palestine it was greatly disliked, for, besides its own inherent evils, it had the additional one of being a foreign custom imposed upon a conquered people. The Tartar word for this disagreeable labour, having been introduced into the language of the Jews, came to be identified by them with every oppressive service. Our Lord used this peculiar word when He laid down the duty of self-denial and goodwill, even towards those who act oppressively towards us. "And whosoever shall compel thee " — as the mounted courier compels the farmers and labourers along the way to help him in forwarding the despatches of the government — " whosoever shall compel thee to go a mile, go with him twain." And here in the text the word which is employed to denote the action of the Eoman soldiers in compelling Simon