Mark 16:6-7 And he said to them, Be not affrighted: You seek Jesus of Nazareth, which was crucified: he is risen; he is not here… During the years that followed the outbreak of the French revolution, and the revolt against Christianity which accompanied it, there was an extraordinary activity in some sections of French society directed to projecting a religion that might, it was hoped, take the place of Christianity. New philanthropic enthusiasms, new speculative enthusiasms, were quite the order of the day. On one occasion a projector of one of these schemes came to Talleyrand, who, you will remember, was a bishop who had turned sceptic, and so had devoted himself to polities; but whatever is to be said of him, he was possessed in a very remarkable degree of a keen perception of the proportion of things, and of what is and is not possible in this human world. Well, his visitor observed, by way of complaint to Talleyrand, how hard it was to start a new religion, even though its tenets and its efforts were obviously directed to promoting the social and personal improvement of mankind. "Surely," said Talleyrand, with a fine smile, "surely it cannot be so difficult as you think." "How so?" said his friend. "Why," he replied, "the matter is simple; you have only to get yourself crucified, or anyhow put to death, and then, at your own time to rise from the dead, and you will have no difficulty." (Canon Liddon.) Parallel Verses KJV: And he saith unto them, Be not affrighted: Ye seek Jesus of Nazareth, which was crucified: he is risen; he is not here: behold the place where they laid him. |
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