ave all power in heaven and in earth; He was to be
the true and supreme Lord of all,--yes; but this dignity and power were
to be attained by no mere official appointment, by no accidental choice
of the people, by no mere hereditary title, but by the sheer force of
merit, by His performing services for men which made the race His own,
by His leaving no depth of human degradation unexplored, by a sympathy
with the race and with individuals which produced in Him a total
self-abandonment, and suffered Him to leave no grievance unconsidered,
no wrong unthought of, no sorrow untouched. There is no royal road to
human excellence; and Jesus could reach the height He reached by no
swift ascension of a throne amidst the blare of trumpets, the flaunting
of banners, and the acclamations of the crowd, but only by being exposed
to the keenest tests with which this world can confront and search
human character, by being put through the ordeal of human life, and
being found the best man among us; the humblest, the truest; the most
faithful, loving, and enduring; the most willing servant of God and man.

It was this which Christ sought to suggest to Nicodemus, and which we
all find it hard to learn, that true glory is excellence of character,
and that this excellence can be reached only through the difficulties,
trials, and sorrows of a human life. Christ showed men a new glory and a
new path to it--not by arms, not by statesmanship, not by inventions,
not by literature, not by working miracles, but by living with the poor
and becoming the friend of forsaken and wicked men, and by dying, the
Just for the unjust. He has been lifted up as the Brazen Serpent was, He
has become conspicuous by His very lowliness; by a self-sacrifice so
complete that He gave His all, His life, He has won to Himself all men
and made His will supreme, so that it and no other shall one day
everywhere rule. He gave Himself for the healing of the nations, and the
very death which seemed to extinguish His usefulness has made Him the
object of worship and trust to all.

This is certainly the point of analogy between Himself and the Brazen
Serpent which our Lord chiefly intended to suggest--that as the serpent
was _lifted up_ so as to be seen from every part of the camp, even so
the death of the Son of man was to make Him conspicuous and easily
discernible. It is by their death that many men have become immortalized
in the memory of the race. Deaths of gallantry, of