beliefs, but we
return to our old position, "We have believed and we know." It may be
true that devils have been cast out by the prince of the devils; we do
not know. But a stainless life is more miraculous and Divine than the
casting out of devils; it is more unknown in the world, referrible to no
freak of nature, accomplished by no sleight of hand or jugglery, but due
only to the presence of God. Here we have not the sign or evidence of
the thing but the thing itself, God not using man as an external agent
for operating upon the material world, but God present in the man,
living in his life, one with him.

Upon our faith nothing is more influential than the holiness of Christ.
Nothing is more certainly Divine. Nothing is more characteristic of
God--not His power, not His wisdom, not even His eternal Being. He who
in his own person and life represents to us the holiness of God is more
certainly superhuman than he who represents God's power. A power to work
miracles has often been delegated to men, but holiness cannot be so
delegated. It belongs to character, to the man's self; it is a thing of
nature, of will, and of habit; a king may give to his ambassador ample
powers, he may fill his hands with credentials, and load him with gifts
which shall be acceptable to the monarch to whom he is sent, but he
cannot give him a tact he does not naturally possess, a courtesy he has
not acquired by dealing with other princes, nor the influence of wise
and magnanimous words, if these do not inherently belong to the
ambassador's self. So the holiness of Christ was even more convincing
than His power or His message. It was such a holiness as caused the
disciples to feel that He was not a mere messenger. His holiness
revealed _Himself_ as well as Him that sent Him; and the self that was
thus revealed they felt to be more than human. When, therefore, their
faith was tried by seeing the multitudes abandon their Lord, they were
thrown back on their surest ground of confidence in Him; and that surest
ground was not the miracles which all had seen, but the consecrated and
perfect life which was known to them.

To ourselves, then, I say, by the circumstances of our time this
question comes, "Will ye also go away?" Will you be like the rest, or
will exceptional fidelity be found in you? Is your attachment to Christ
so based on personal conviction, is it so truly the growth of your own
experience, and so little a mere echo of popular opinion