Noble old man--he did not live to see me--he did not live to see his child.

And I--I--alas, I did not live to see him.

Weighed down by sorrow and disappointment, he died before I was born--six thousand brief summers before I was born.

But let us try to bear it with fortitude.
Let us trust that he is better off where he is.

Let us take comfort in the thought that his loss is our eternal gain.
The next place the guide took us to in the holy church was an altar dedicated to the Roman soldier who was of the military guard that attended at the Crucifixion to keep order, and who--when the vail of the Temple was rent in the awful darkness that followed; when the rock of Golgotha was split asunder by an earthquake; when the artillery of heaven thundered, and in the baleful glare of the lightnings the shrouded dead flitted about the streets of Jerusalem--shook with fear and said, "Surely this was the Son of God!" Where this altar stands now, that Roman soldier stood then, in full view of the crucified Saviour--in full sight and hearing of all the marvels that were transpiring far and wide about the circumference of the Hill of Calvary.