X. JESUS SHALL BRING PEACE TO THE
WORLD, 110

PART VI., 117

XI. THE PERSONS TO WHOM GOOD
WILL IS EXPRESSED, 126

XII. THE PERSON WHO EXPRESSES
"GOOD WILL," 134

_PART I._

The birth of an heir to the throne is usually accompanied by
circumstances befitting so great an event. No place is deemed worthy
of it but a royal palace; and there, at the approach of the expected
hour, high nobles and the great officers of state assemble, while the
whole country, big with hope, waits to welcome a successor to its long
line of kings. Cannons announce the event; seaward, landward, guns
flash and roar from floating batteries and rocky battlements; bonfires
blaze on hill-tops; steeples ring out the news in merry peals; the
nation holds holiday, giving itself up to banqueting and enjoyments,
while public prayers and thanksgivings rise to Him by whom kings reign
and princes decree justice. With such pomp and parade do the heirs of
earthly thrones enter on the stage of life! So came not He who is the
King of kings and Lord of lords. On the eve of His birth the world
went on its usual round. None were moved for His coming; nor was there
any preparation for the event--a chamber, or anything else. No fruit
of unhallowed love, no houseless beggar's child enters life more
obscurely than the Son of God. The very tokens by which the shepherds
were taught to recognise Him were not the majesty but the extreme
meanness of his condition: "This shall be a sign unto you; Ye shall
find the babe wrapped in swaddling clothes, lying in a manger." In
fact, the Lord of heaven was to be recognised by his humiliation, as
its heirs are by their humility. Yet, as we have seen a black and
lowering cloud have its edges touched with living gold by the sun
behind it, so all the darkest scenes of our Lord's life appear more or
less irradiated with the splendours of a strange glory. Take that
night on Galilee when a storm roared over land and lake, enough to
wake all but the dead. The boat with Jesus and His disciples tears
through the waves, now whirling on their foaming crests, now plunging
into their yawning hollows; the winds rave in His ear; the spray falls
in cold showers on His naked face; but He sleeps. I have read of a
s