doleful music and the shrill shrieks of Eastern mourning, which met
them as they entered Jairus's house, disturbed the sanctity of the
hour, and were in strong contrast with the majestic calmness of
Jesus. Not amid venal lamentations and excited cries will He do His
work. He bids the noisy crowd forth with curt, almost stern, command,
and therein rebukes all such hollow and tumultuous scenes, in the
presence of the stillness of death, still more where faith in Him
has robbed it of its terror, in robbing it of its perpetuity. It is
strange that believing readers should have thought that our Lord meant
to say that the little girl was not really dead, but only in a swoon.
The scornful laughter of the flute-players and hired mourners
understood Him better. They knew that it was real death, as men
count death, and, as has often been the case, the laughter of His
foes has served to establish the truth. That was not worthy to be
called death from which the child was so soon and easily to be
awaked. But, besides this special application to the case in hand,
that great saying of our Lord's carries the blessed truth that,
since He has come, death is softened into sleep for all who love
Him. The euphemism is not peculiar to Christianity, but has a deeper
meaning on Christian lips than when Greeks or Romans spoke of the
eternal sleep. Others speak of death by any name rather than its
own, because they fear it so much. The Christian does so, because he
fears it so little,--and, as a matter of fact, the use of the word
death as meaning merely the separation of soul and body by the
physical act is exceptional in the New Testament. This name of
sleep, sanctioned thus by Christ, is the sweetest of all. It speaks
of the cessation of connection with the world of sense, and 'long
disquiet merged in rest.' It does not imply unconsciousness, for we
are not unconscious when we sleep, but only unaware of externals. It
holds the promise of waking when the sun comes. So it has driven out