The Gospel of St. John Part 11

I know well--we all know--what use has been made, and is made, and will be made, of this expression, '_from the beginning_.' 'So, then,'

the objector exclaims, 'there is a second G.o.d, another creator, coming into existence with the good G.o.d. If this is not Manichaeism, what is?'

The answer is simply an appeal to the words as they appear on the face of the book,--'_He stood not in the truth_.' There was, then, a truth to stand in; there was a truth to revolt from. The name 'murderer'

implies a life to be taken away; the name 'liar' implies a contradiction of that which IS. Yes; it implies that the evil spirit is this, and _only_ this; it implies that the murderer is the author of _no_ life; it implies that the liar has called nothing that _is_ into existence. You ask, 'What is Manichaeism _but_ this?' I answer, 'It is exactly the reverse of this. It affirms that the evil power _does_ produce some life; that some part of creation may be ascribed to him.' And those who shrink from speaking of '_him_'--those who will not admit a devil at all--do, unawares, let this Manichaeism continually into their thoughts, into their acts, into their words.

They may talk of universal benevolence, but facts are too strong for them. They meet evil everywhere; they meet it in themselves. They do not like to say,--'It is an evil will to which I am yielding up my will. Because men are obeying this evil will, therefore there is misery and ugliness in this blessed and beautiful world.' They try to escape from that confession. They talk of evil in nature, of evil in themselves. Unawares, they have introduced it among the works of the good G.o.d. They have either made Him answerable for it, or they have said that there is some creator besides Him. The last alternative is very dreadful; but the former is, it seems to me, infinitely more dreadful. In accepting what our Lord said to the Jews in this discourse, I escape from both. I am able solemnly and habitually to deny that any insect or blade of gra.s.s is the devil's work; I am able to regard the whole universe as very good, even as it was when it came forth at the call of the divine Word; I am able to declare that humanity, standing in that divine Word, is still made in the image of G.o.d, as He declared that it was; and that there is no one faculty of the human soul, no one sense of the human body, which is not good, and blessed, and holy in G.o.d's sight. I am able, at the same time, to look facts in the face, and confess that sin has entered into the world, and death by sin; that there has been from the beginning of man's existence on this earth, and that there still is, a murderer, who is seeking to sever him from his proper life: that there has been from the beginning of man's existence upon earth, and that there still is, a liar, who is seeking to persuade men that G.o.d is not all good; that He is not all true; that He is not the Father of their spirits; that it is not His will that they should know Him, and be like Him. I can admit that this liar has been listened to, and is listened to; and that men may enter into such communion with him--may become so penetrated with his false and mendacious spirit, that they shall become in very deed his children, entirely fas.h.i.+oned into his likeness, understanding no lessons but his. Our Lord speaks of the Jewish people--of the most religious part of them especially--as having pa.s.sed, or as rapidly pa.s.sing, into this condition. He declares, in the words which I have taken as my text--and which embody, I think, some of the deepest lessons of the chapter--that they could not '_understand His speech_;' that that sounded strange, monstrous, deranged to them, because they '_could not hear His word_'--because their hearts and consciences were closed against that which was every moment knocking and craving for admission there. They did '_not hear G.o.d's words, because they were not of G.o.d_'--because their whole minds and wills were given up to another G.o.d, because they had become Devil-wors.h.i.+ppers.

'_Then answered the Jews, and said unto Him, Say we not well that thou art a Samaritan, and hast a devil? Jesus answered, I have not a devil; but I honour my Father, and ye do dishonour me. And I seek not mine own glory: there is one that seeketh and judgeth._'

It is certainly most unfortunate that our translators--who had just rendered ??????? by Devil, in our Lord's discourse--should take the same word for da??????, in the discourse of the Jews. I need not say that they did not mean what He meant, or anything like what He meant.

They called Him a Samaritan,--evidently alluding to the Samaritan pa.s.sion for enchanters. He was a possessed man, like one of those who appeared so often among the wors.h.i.+ppers on Gerizim, and drew so many disciples after them. The reply of Jesus is, that He had not a daemon; that He was speaking the words of no subordinate spirit or angel; that He was '_honouring His Father_'--Him whom they called their G.o.d, the Father of spirits. He did not seek His own glory, as those did who came boasting that they were possessed by a spirit or daemon, of which no others could partake. He came seeking His Father's glory, promising to make all partakers of His Spirit.

The next words are only a part of this promise. '_Verily, verily, I say unto you, If a man keep my saying, he shall never see death._' Why the translators, who have been careful in adhering to the common rendering of ????? thus far, should suddenly have forsaken it here, and dilute it into 'saying,' I cannot conjecture. Certainly they have done much to make the whole pa.s.sage unintelligible by that wilfulness.

_He_ has taken pains to distinguish the _speech_ or _saying_ which enters the ear from the _word_ which is lodged in the heart, and is to be cherished there. That His word brings life, because in Him the Divine Word is Life, He has a.s.serted again and again. When the man loses his hold on that word, death overtakes him; if he hold it fast, he is united to that which is stronger than death; and he shall not taste of death. When it comes to his soul and body, he shall defy it.

He shall rise above it, and they shall be raised with him.

'_Then said the Jews unto Him, Now we know that thou hast a devil.

Abraham is dead, and the prophets; and thou sayest, If a man keep my saying, he shall never taste of death. Art thou greater than our father Abraham, which is dead? and the prophets are dead: whom makest thou thyself? Jesus answered, If I honour myself, my honour is nothing: it is my Father that honoureth me; of whom ye say, that He is your G.o.d: yet ye have not known Him; but I know Him: and if I should say, I know Him not, I shall be a liar like unto you: but I know Him, and keep His saying._'

The sense of eternity, of a relation to the eternal G.o.d,--to a Father of spirits, had almost forsaken these Jews. The sense of time,--of a series or succession of years,--had displaced every other in their minds; they could contemplate nothing, except under conditions of time. To the mere trader,--to him who lives in calculating when so much money will become due--any conditions, except those of time, seem impossible. He laughs at those who hint at any other. But the reverence for ancestry,--the affection that binds us to a family and a nation, does not belong to time. It brings past and present into closest proximity; it leaps over distinctions of costume and circ.u.mstance, to claim affinity with the inmost heart of those who lived generations ago. For all family feeling, and all national feeling, has its root in a living G.o.d; therefore it defies death; it treats death as only belonging to the individual.

The Jews _knew_ that Jesus had a daemon, because He spoke of men who believed His word not tasting of death. For Abraham to them was dead; the prophets were dead. They had no sense of a life which united them to Abraham and the prophets; they did not really confess a G.o.d who was a G.o.d of the living and not of the dead. Jesus probes this state of mind to the quick. He tells them first, that it is their want of knowledge of G.o.d which makes what He says incredible to them,--the lying, atheistical temper which they were cultivating under the name of religion. Because He knows G.o.d,--because He keeps His word,--because He lives in communion with the truth, therefore His speech seems to them that of a possessed man.

But he was to seem to them worse than a possessed man before the dialogue ended.

'_Your father Abraham rejoiced to see my day: and he saw it, and was glad. Then said the Jews unto Him, Thou art not yet fifty years old, and hast thou seen Abraham? Jesus said unto them, Verily, verily, I say unto you, Before Abraham was, I am._'

The Jews, I said, were utterly entangled in thoughts of time. It was necessary to break these bonds at once and violently asunder. The Word who had been in the beginning with G.o.d, who was the Light of men, declares that He conversed with Abraham; that Abraham heard His voice; that Abraham saw His light; that this was the source of all his gladness. This was the reason why men in after days, who had heard the same voice, who had seen the same light, could rejoice with Abraham,--could feel that years did not sever those whom G.o.d had made one. The ears that were dull of hearing, the obtuse mammonized hearts, were proof against this paradox; it excited only a grin. Then came the other words,--'_Before Abraham was, I am_.' They were too familiar, too awful, not to arouse even those who were most petrified by worldliness and pride. The name which had been spoken in the bush had been spoken to them! The Man who stood before them was calling Himself the '_I Am_.' A flash of light broke in upon them. He _had_ meant this. The blasphemy was now open.

'_Then took they up stones to cast at Him: but Jesus hid Himself, and went out of the temple, going through the midst of them, and so pa.s.sed by._'

And oh, brethren, may the meaning of those words flash upon us too!

May they come to us not as dull sounds, but as if they proceeded fresh from Him who spoke them then! They do proceed from Him. Each day and hour He repeats them to us. When all schemes of human policy crack and crumble; when we discover the utter weakness of the leaders and teachers we have trusted most; when we begin to suspect that the world is given over to the spirit of murder and lies; He says to us, 'The foundations of the universe are not built on rottenness: whatever fades away and perishes, I AM.'

DISCOURSE XVIII.

THE LIGHT OF THE EYE, AND THE LIGHT OF THE SPIRIT.

[Lincoln's Inn, 2d Sunday after Trinity, June 1, 1856.]

ST. JOHN IX. 39.

_And Jesus said, For judgment I am come into this world, that they which see not might see; and that they which see might be made blind._

The reading of the last verse of the 8th chapter, which our version has adopted, connects it directly with the first verse of the 9th.

'_Jesus hid Himself and went out of the temple, going through the midst of them, and so pa.s.sed by_ (pa???e? ??t??). _And as He pa.s.sed by_ (?a? pa?????), _He saw a man blind from his birth_.'

Possibly the former verse ought to end at the word '_temple_.' But if we lose that link between the incidents recorded in the two chapters, the internal relation between them will remain as strong as ever. The discourse of Jesus, which we have been considering on the two last Sundays, began with the sentence, '_I am the light of the world_.'

Every subsequent pa.s.sage unfolded itself out of this opening one. The story which forms the subject of this chapter is introduced by the same announcement. Can we doubt that the words and the act had the same origin and the same object? Can we safely sever what Christ has joined together?

I am aware of the motive which induces us to sever them. I have had occasion to speak of it more than once already, and to acknowledge that an honest feeling is lurking in it. We are afraid of confounding what is sensible with what is spiritual. We are afraid of using light in two senses, and of fancying that they are the same. I complain of no desire to be religiously accurate in the use of language.

Scrupulosity in this matter is far less dangerous than indifference.

We are in continual peril of falling into confusions and equivocations; let all our faculties be awake to the risk,--let them all watch against it. But they will not be awake, they will not watch, unless they do homage to the fact, that light has been used, is used, must be used, in every dialect in which men express their thoughts, to denote that which the eye receives, and that which the mind receives,--the great energy of the eye, the great energy of the mind.

Instead of repining at this fact, as if it were a hindrance to our perceptions of truth,--instead of labouring to reconstruct speech according to some scheme of ours,--instead of fancying that we have done a good work when we have got a scholastical or technical phrase subst.i.tuted for a popular one,--let us earnestly meditate upon the principle which is latent under these forms of discourse, from which we cannot emanc.i.p.ate ourselves. Let us thankfully accept them as proofs that the sensible world and the spiritual, though entirely distinct, are related; and that the last is not closed any more than the first against the wayfarer and the child. This, at all events, is the doctrine which goes through Scripture, and which has made its words so mighty to those who can understand no others--so full of relief and discovery to those who do not wish to be separate from their kind, and who have convinced themselves that the deepest truths must be the commonest. Such is the doctrine implied in every parable of our Lord; such, above all, is the doctrine of St. John, who does not report many parables, but who takes us into the inmost heart of them, and shows us the divine law which is involved in the use of them.

I find an unspeakable blessing in following the order of St. John's narrative. It is the true order of human life. After we have listened to the divinest discourse, there is a sense of vacancy in the heart.

We feel as if we were out of communion with the business and misery of the world,--as if the words had not proved themselves till they could be brought into collision and conflict with these. When we are in the midst of action, we want to know that it is not merely mechanical action,--that it is in conformity with some principle, and springs out of a principle. When Jesus has finished His discourse with the Jews, by a.s.suming a name which lies beneath all discourse,--when they have finished their arguments by taking up stones to cast at Him,--He meets a man blind from his birth. He proceeds at once to do him good. But before He can enter upon that work, He must encounter a metaphysical doubt which has occurred to the fishermen who are walking with Him. A metaphysical doubt to fishermen! Yes; and if you go into the garrets and cellars of London, you will have metaphysical doubts presented to you by men immeasurably more ignorant than those fishermen were, even before Jesus called them; the very doubts which the schools are occupied with, only taking a living, practical form. Unless you can cause men not to be metaphysical beings--that is to say, unless you can take from them all which separates them from the beasts that perish--they must have these doubts. Thanks be to G.o.d, He awakens them! And thanks be to G.o.d, He, and not priests and doctors, must satisfy them for every creature whom He has made in His image!

The doubt which troubled the disciples is one that has exercised all generations--none more than our own. '_Master, who did sin, this man, or his parents, that he was born blind?_' 'He came into the world under this curse. Was it for some sin he committed in another world, in some older state of existence? or is this an ill.u.s.tration of the doctrine, a.s.serted in the second commandment? Are the sins of the father and mother visited on the child?' The former hypothesis has always connected itself closely with the sense of immortality in man.

'Am I merely to be hereafter? Does not the future imply a past? Do not shadows of that past pursue me? Can I interpret the facts of memory if I deny its existence?' The second doctrine is not more a.s.serted in the law than it is justified by experience. The facts from which it is deduced belong to physiology as much at least as to theology. Every one who thinks of hereditary sickness and insanity confesses them and trembles.

'_Jesus answered, Neither hath this man sinned, nor his parents: but that the works of G.o.d should be made manifest in him._'

A dogmatist who ventured, on the strength of this answer, to say that the bodily condition of this particular man, or of any man, had not been affected by the misdoings of his parents,--who should venture even to p.r.o.nounce the other opinion respecting a pre-existent state a false and heretical one,--would speedily find himself at fault. To be consistent, he must take the sentence according to the letter of it, and say that the parents of this man had not sinned at all before he was born. One who really reverences our Lord's words will not trifle with them after this fas.h.i.+on. He will seek from them actual guidance for his own life, not an excuse for suppressing evidence or condemning the conclusions of other men. And if this is his object, he will not be disappointed. In a single case He gives us the hint of a law which is applicable to all cases. That law remains true, whatever may be the truth respecting our own sins or the sins of our parents. That law is one which reveals the mind of G.o.d, and removes all dark surmises respecting His government of the world. That law is one which we may use for the regulation of our own conduct.

The disciples were speculating about final causes. They would not have understood what any one meant who had told them they were doing so; they were doing it nevertheless. Jesus met them with the _most_ final cause. 'I can give you a better reason for this man's blindness than those you have imagined. His blindness will be a means of showing forth the power and purpose of G.o.d. He will learn himself, he will be a teacher to the world through this blindness, whence light comes, who is the Father of light.'

It was not the mere announcement of a principle. Every principle He delivered embodied itself in an act. He added immediately: '_I must work the works of Him that sent me, while it is day: the night cometh, when no man can work. As long as I am in the world, I am the light of the world_.' He declares that what He was going to do He must do. He did not choose His own way. When He was most exercising power, He was obeying a power,--'_He was working the works of Him that sent Him._'

And every such work was a revelation. It showed forth the Will and the Mind that had been creating and ruling all things. That Will was proving itself to be a Will of absolute goodness,--that Mind, a light in which is no darkness. But there is a sorrow for Him who is about to impart joy. His countrymen had taken up stones to cast at Him. He has a vision of a time when they would have their way. The light for a while would be quenched. But as long as He was in the world, He must illuminate it. Here, again, we have the feelings of the Man, the presentiments of the Sufferer--not drawn out, but just indicated--that we may have a glimpse into the heart from which they came. They cannot be divided from the divine truth He is enunciating; they are the media through which that truth is exhibited to us. The Word is indeed made flesh; it is in the Son of Man that we know the Son of G.o.d.

'_When He had thus spoken, He spat on the ground, and made clay of the spittle, and He anointed the eyes of the blind man with the clay, and said unto him, Go, wash in the Pool of Siloam (which is by interpretation, Sent). He went therefore, and washed, and came seeing._'

Every one has remarked that this cure is distinguished from most others that are recorded in the Gospels, by the careful use in it of intermediate agencies. He does not merely speak the word, and the man is healed. There is a process of healing. And I think you must confess that the use of these agencies is a part of the sign to which St. John wishes to draw our attention. If Christ's other signs testified that there is an invisible power at work in all the springs of our life,--that there is a Fountain of life from which those springs are continually refreshed and renewed,--did not this sign testify that there is a potency and virtue in the very commonest things; that G.o.d has stored all nature with instruments for the blessing and healing of His creatures? The mere miracle-worker who draws glory to himself wishes to dispense with these things, lest he should be confounded with the ordinary physician. The great Physician, who works because His Father works, who comes to show what He is doing in His world, puts an honour upon earth and water as well as upon all art which has true observation and knowledge for its basis. He only distinguishes Himself from other healers by showing that the source of their wisdom and renovating power is in Him. We have put our faith and our science at an immeasurable distance from each other. May not the separation lead to the ruin of both?

But we are not allowed to lose ourselves amidst these general characteristics of this cure. The words, '_He came seeing_,' remind us that one special malady is brought before us; that we have to do, not with a sick man, but with a blind man; and that it is as the Restorer of sight that the Lord of man is declaring Himself to us. That object is kept before us as we proceed in the story. '_The neighbours therefore, and they that before had seen him that he was blind, said, Is not this he that sat and begged? Some said, This is he: others said, He is like him: but he said, I am he. Therefore said they unto him, How were thine eyes opened? He answered and said, A man that is called Jesus made clay, and anointed mine eyes, and said to me, Go to the Pool of Siloam, and wash: and I went and washed, and I received sight. Then said they unto him, Where is He? He answered, I know not._' I do not introduce this pa.s.sage for the sake of commenting upon it (a commentary would be very superfluous and out of place), but that we may be reminded continually how this theologian--he who has been supposed to be writing a learned, dogmatical treatise, he who has been supposed to live in an age in which plain facts had been forgotten in profound speculations--tells a story. We feel at once that to talk about its dramatical character is to spoil its effect. It is dramatical, as every childlike narrative is dramatical. The people who were alive at the time speak to us because they actually presented themselves to the writer as living beings, and because he did not want to thrust himself into their places. I do not say that these qualities belong only to a divine teacher. They belong, in their measure, to every simple narrator and poet. But they certainly do not belong to the builder up of a system; and they are precisely the gifts which we should expect would be imparted to one who had seen and handled the Word of life, and was bearing a message concerning Him to his brethren.

'_They brought to the Pharisees him that aforetime was blind. And it was the sabbath-day when Jesus made the clay, and opened his eyes.

Then again the Pharisees also asked him how he had received his sight.

He said unto them, He put clay upon mine eyes, and I washed, and do see. Therefore said some of the Pharisees, This man is not of G.o.d, because he keepeth not the sabbath-day. Others said, How can a man that is a sinner do such miracles? And there was a division among them._'

I observed before, that the only two acts of healing which are recorded in this Gospel, as done by our Lord in Jerusalem, were done on the Sabbath-day. In the story of the man at the Pool of Bethesda, this was the most prominent circ.u.mstance; the subsequent discourse bore upon it; the strongest, and to the Jews the most offensive, proclamation by Jesus of G.o.d as His Father, arose out of it; the purpose to kill Him was first suggested by it. Apparently what He said then, and had said since at the feast of Tabernacles, was not quite lost even upon the Pharisees. There were some in this particular synagogue, if not in the Sanhedrim, who thought that to do a good act on a Sat.u.r.day might not be a sin against G.o.d. The next verses show that they were a strong enough minority to force their fellows into a further inquiry respecting the fact of the cure. '_They say unto the blind man again, What sayest thou of Him, that He hath opened thine eyes? He said, He is a prophet. But the Jews did not believe concerning him, that he had been blind, and received his sight, until they called the parents of him that had received his sight. And they asked them, saying, Is this your son, who ye say was born blind? How then doth he now see? His parents answered them and said, We know that this is our son, and that he was born blind: but by what means he now seeth, we know not; or who hath opened his eyes, we know not: he is of age; ask him; he shall speak for himself. These words spake his parents, because they feared the Jews: for the Jews had agreed already, that if any man did confess that He was Christ, he should be put out of the synagogue. Therefore said his parents, He is of age; ask him._'

The answer of the man, that He who healed him was a prophet, was the simplest of all forms of expressing his belief that he had been brought into contact with a Person who was higher than himself, who was sent from G.o.d. This pa.s.sage would show, if it stood alone, how little even the commonest Israelite identified the prophet with the mere predicter of events. Foretelling had surely no direct connexion with opening the eyes; but one who could do that was naturally felt to be the bringer of a message and a blessing from another and a better region. These words, as we have seen before, lay very near to the others, '_He is the Christ_;' only in the last the king was blended with the prophet, the Son of David with the successor of Elijah. It is probable that the rulers of the synagogue would draw a much sharper distinction between the names than the people did. The belief in Him as a Prophet might be tolerated; those who owned Him as Christ were interfering with the authority of the priests or of Rome. Positive exclusion from wors.h.i.+p and fellows.h.i.+p, therefore, might be restricted to that. The parents of the blind man feared, that he had approached the borders of offence. If they made a false step, it might be pa.s.sed; therefore it was prudent to keep as nearly as possible to the mere fact of his blindness. Perhaps they had no opinion about the Person who had healed their son. If they had, is it worth while to run risks for an _opinion_? A _belief_ is another thing altogether. If a man has _that_, he must run risks for it. His belief makes this demand upon him, and perishes if the demand is not complied with.

'_Then again called they the man that was blind, and said unto him, Give G.o.d the praise: we know that this Man is a sinner._' The two parties had probably come to a compromise. The cure was to be admitted as good; it was to be ascribed respectfully and devoutly to G.o.d; only the instrument of it must be declared to be evil. It was, of course, a.s.sumed that such an adjustment would be satisfactory to the beggar; he would not rebel against the authority of his betters. Nor did he.

'_He answered and said, Whether He be a sinner or no, I know not: one thing I know, that whereas I was blind, now I see._' Was not his as fair an adjustment as theirs? He left them all their probable conclusions, all their traditional wisdom. He vindicated to himself only his pin-point of personal experience. No! it was not fair; the doctors demurred to it, as they had a right to do. Theirs was a fantastical airy possession, which every hour might diminish; he was standing on solid ground; every day he might add something to that ground. Nothing frets men like a discovery of this kind. The rulers of the synagogue showed their irritation by repeating their question.

'_Then said they to him again, What did He to thee? how opened He thine eyes?_' The beggar became bolder as the doctors became feebler.

'_He answered them, I have told you already, and ye did not hear: wherefore would ye hear it again? will ye also be his disciples? Then they reviled him, and said, Thou art his disciple; but we are Moses'

disciples. We know that G.o.d spake unto Moses: as for this fellow, we know not from whence he is._' Their self-complacency has returned. Of such people as this blind beggar did the disciples of Jesus consist!

_They_ had a law and a history. Moses had been sent to them from G.o.d fourteen hundred years before. About his mission there could be no doubt; they had it in the book. What help had they to determine the pretensions of the new Teacher, but His own words? The beggar thought they must have some means of finding out what He was, if they were learned men and guides of the people. '_The man answered and said unto them, Why herein is a marvellous thing, that ye know not from whence he is, and yet he hath opened mine eyes. Now we know that G.o.d heareth not sinners: but if any man be a wors.h.i.+pper of G.o.d, and doeth His will, him He heareth. Since the world began was it not heard that any man opened the eyes of one that was born blind. If this Man were not of G.o.d, he could do nothing._' It was very simple, childish logic,--the logic of a man who had convinced himself that G.o.d was living then, and was ruling the world then as in the days of old. He had done what the synagogue bade him. He had given G.o.d the glory. He had confessed a good G.o.d, who cared for him an outcast. Jesus had brought him to that confession, and therefore he could not, at the bidding of any synagogue, call Him a sinner. There was only one safe and conclusive reply to a man who spoke as he did. '_They answered and said unto him, Thou wast altogether born in sins, and dost thou teach us? And they cast him out._'

A strange process had been going on in this man, one worthy of all study. The world of flowers and trees, of earth and sky, and of human faces, had burst upon him; a vision too wonderful to take in, which might have crushed him with its strangeness and its excess of beauty.

But with that had come another vision, for which his hours of darkness had not been unfitting but perhaps preparing him,--the sense of a loving Power near him, sympathising with him, caring to restore him; the a.s.surance that this Power must be His who made the trees and flowers, the sky and earth, and had stamped on the human face an expression that was not of the earth. This sense, this confidence, came to him not suddenly, but gradually, by a discipline scarcely less hard than that to which he had been subjected hitherto. It came to him, in part, through that strange conflict with creatures of his own flesh and blood,--with men of whom he had asked alms and whom he reverenced as his masters,--into which he was brought almost as soon as he could look into their countenances. It came through their denial of facts, of which he felt as sure as he was of the existence of those things which he had begun to see. It came to him with a feeling of his own duty, of his own power, to declare that G.o.d did not forget beggars, and that the man who had raised him out of misery must be from G.o.d. But this inner revelation was not overwhelming like the outward,--it was sustaining. The man who could look upon sun and stars found that he was more than they. G.o.d was nearer to the beggar than to them. A light was s.h.i.+ning into him which did not come from them. Was it not a light which would go with him and cheer him, whatever synagogue cast him out; yes, if sun and stars were to disappear for ever?

He had been under a marvellous education. It was not completed.

'_Jesus heard that they had cast him out; and when He had found him, He said unto him, Dost thou believe on the Son of G.o.d? And he said, Who is He, Lord, that I might believe on Him? And Jesus said unto him, Thou hast both seen Him, and it is He that talketh with thee. And he said, Lord, I believe. And he wors.h.i.+pped Him._'