e was asked if he heard, he
replied in an evasive manner that the praise which comes from young
lips is the most agreeable to God.[2]

[Footnote 1: A cry which was raised at the feast of tabernacles,
amidst the waving of palms. Mishnah, _Sukka_, iii. 9. This custom
still exists among the Israelites.]

[Footnote 2: Matt. xxi. 15, 16.]

He lost no opportunity of repeating that the little ones are sacred
beings,[1] that the kingdom of God belongs to children,[2] that we
must become children to enter there,[3] that we ought to receive it as
a child,[4] that the heavenly Father hides his secrets from the wise
and reveals them to the little ones.[5] The idea of disciples is in
his mind almost synonymous with that of children.[6] On one occasion,
when they had one of those quarrels for precedence, which were not
uncommon, Jesus took a little child, placed him in their midst, and
said to them, "Whosoever therefore shall humble himself as this little
child, the same is greatest in the kingdom of heaven."[7]

[Footnote 1: Matt. xviii. 5, 10, 14; Luke xvii. 2.]

[Footnote 2: Matt. xix. 14; Mark x. 14; Luke xviii. 16.]

[Footnote 3: Matt. xviii. 1, and following; Mark ix. 33, and
following; Luke ix. 46.]

[Footnote 4: Mark x. 15.]

[Footnote 5: Matt. xi. 25; Luke x. 21.]

[Footnote 6: Matt. x. 42, xviii. 5, 14; Mark ix. 36; Luke xvii. 2.]

[Footnote 7: Matt. xviii. 4; Mark ix. 33-36; Luke ix. 46-48.]

It was infancy, in fact, in its divine spontaneity, in its simple
bewilderments of joy, which took possession of the earth. Every one
believed at each moment that the kingdom so much desired was about to
appear. Each one already saw himself seated on a throne[1] beside the
master. They divided amongst themselves the positions of honor in the
new kingdom,[2] and strove to reckon the precise date of its advent.
This new doctrine was called the "Good Tidings;" it had no other name.
An old word, "_paradise_," which the Hebrew, like all the languages of
the East, had borrowed from the Persian, and which at first designated
the parks of the Achaemenidae, summed up the general dream; a delightful
garden, where the charming life which was led here below would be
continued forever.[3] How long this intoxication lasted we know not.
No one, during the course of this magical apparition, measured time
any more than we measure a dream. Duration was suspended; a week was
an age. But whether it filled years or months, the dream was so
b