s. Let us be
thankful for, and own the attractions of, the knowledge that is wrapt in
ignorance, and thankfully say, 'Now are we the sons of God, and it doth
not appear what we shall be!'

III. Now I must be very brief with the last thought that is here, and I
am the less unwilling to be so because we cannot travel one inch beyond
the revelations of the Book in reference to the matter. The thought is
this, that our sonship flings one all-penetrating beam of light on that
future, in the knowledge of our perfect vision and perfect likeness. 'We
know that when He shall be manifested, we shall be like Him, for we
shall see Him as He is.'

'When He shall be manifested'--to what period does that refer? It seems
most natural to take the manifestation here as being the same as that
spoken of only a verse or two before. 'And now, little children, abide
in Him, and when He shall _be manifested_, we may have confidence, and
not be ashamed before Him at His coming' (ii. 28). That 'coming' then,
is the 'manifestation' of Christ; and it is at the period of His coming
in His glory that His servants 'shall be like Him, and see Him as He
is.' Clearly then it is Christ whom we shall see and become like, and
not the Father invisible.

To behold Christ will be the condition and the means of growing like
Him. That way of transformation by beholding, or of assimilation by the
power of loving contemplation, is the blessed way of ennobling
character, which even here, and in human relationships, has often made
it easy to put off old vices and to clothe the soul with unwonted grace.
Men have learned to love and gaze upon some fair character, till some
image of its beauty has passed into their ruder natures. To love such
and to look on them has been an education. The same process is
exemplified in more sacred regions, when men here learn to love and look
upon Christ by faith, and so become like Him, as the sun stamps a tiny
copy of its blazing sphere on the eye that looks at it. But all these
are but poor, far-off hints and low preludes of the energy with which
that blessed vision of the glorified Christ shall work on the happy
hearts that behold Him, and of the completeness of the likeness to Him
which will be printed in light upon their faces.

It matters not, though it doth not yet appear what we shall be, if to
all the questionings of our own hearts we have this for our
all-sufficient answer, 'We shall be like Him.' As good old Richard
B