op, we are immediately aware of the
infinite distance between the highest snow-peak and the nearest star.
To the crowds John may have seemed to fulfil all the essential
conditions of the prophetic portraiture of the Messiah; but _he_ stood
on the mountain, and knew how infinitely the Christ stood above him.
This is apparent in his reply to the final inquiry of the Sanhedrim,
"And they asked him, and said unto him, 'Why, then, baptizest thou, if
thou art not the Christ, neither Elijah, neither the Prophet?'" And
John said in effect, "I baptize because I was sent to baptize, and I
know very well that my work in this respect is temporary and transient;
but what matters that? In the midst of you standeth One whom ye know
not, even He that cometh after me, the latchet of whose shoe I am not
worthy to unloose. The Christ is come. Have not I seen Him, standing
amid your crowds, yea, descending these very banks?"

The people must have turned one to another, as he spoke. What! Had
the Messiah come! It could hardly be. There had been no prodigies in
earth or sky worthy of his advent. How could He be amongst them, and
they unaware! But it was even so, and it is so still. The Christ is
in us, and with us still. There may be no transcendent symptoms of his
blessed presence, as He stands in the little groups of two and three
gathered in his name; but the eye of faith detects Him. Where others
see only the bare cliffs of Patmos, or the mines with their gangs of
convicts, the anointed gaze beholds a face brighter than the sun, the
purged ear catches the accents of a voice like the murmur of waters on
the still night air. Remember how He said, "He that loveth Me shall be
loved of my Father; and I will love him, and will manifest Myself to
him." As the Holy Spirit revealed Him to John, so He will reveal Him
to us, if only, like John, we will be content with nothing less, and
wait expectant with the heart on the outlook for the manifestation of
the Son of God; for so He promised, saying, "He shall take of mine, and
shall declare it unto you." And when the child of faith speaks thus,
with the accent of conviction, of what he has seen, and tasted, and
handled, of the Word of life, it is not strange that the children of
this world, whose eyes are blinded, begin to question and deride. What
is there to be seen that they cannot see? What heard that they cannot
detect? Ah, "the natural man receiveth not the things of the Spiri