'As eternal as his own story'

And there is no one grace in which Christ propounded himself imitable so signally as in this of meekness and humility; for the enforcing of which he undertook the condition of a servant, and a life of poverty, and a death of disgrace; and washed the feet of his disciples, and even of Judas himself, that his action might be turned into a sermon to preach this duty, and to make it as eternal as his own story.

Jeremy Taylor The Great Exemplar, 'Considerations upon the Washing of the Disciples' Feet by Jesus, and his Sermon of Humility'.

(The painting is Dirck van Baburen, 'Christ Washing the Apostles' Feet', c.1616.)