)

"He fought his doubts and gathered strength,
He would not make his judgment blind,
He faced the spectres of the mind
And laid them;--thus he came, at length,

"To find a stronger faith his own,
And Power was with him in the night,
Which makes the darkness and the light,
And dwells not in the light alone."
TENNYSON.

John's Misgivings--Disappointed Hopes--Signs of the Christ--The
Discipline of Patience--A New Beatitude

It is very touching to remark the tenacity with which some few of
John's disciples clung to their great leader. The majority had
dispersed: some to their homes; some to follow Jesus. Only a handful
lingered still, not alienated by the storm of hate which had broken on
their master, but drawn nearer, with the unfaltering loyalty of
unchangeable affection. They could not forget what he had been to
them--that he had first called them to the reality of living; that he
had taught them to pray; that he had led them to the Christ: and they
dare not desert him now, in the dark sad days of his imprisonment and
sorrow.

What an inestimable blessing to have friends like this, who will not
leave our side when the crowd ebbs, but draw closer as the shadows
darken over our path, and the prison damp wraps its chill mantle about
us! To be loved like that is earth's deepest bliss! These heroic
souls risked all the peril that might accrue to themselves from this
identification with their master; they did not hesitate to come to his
cell with tidings of the great outer world, and specially of what He
was doing and saying, whose life was so mysteriously bound up with his
own. "The disciples of John told him of all these things" (Luke vii.
18, R.V.).

It was to two of these choice and steadfast friends that John confided
the question which had long been forming within his soul, and forcing
itself to the front. "And John, calling unto him two of his disciples,
sent them to the Lord, saying, Art Thou He that cometh, or look we for
another?"

I. JOHN'S MISGIVINGS.--Can this be he who, but a few months ago, had
stood in his rock-hewn pulpit, in radiant certainty? The brilliant
eastern sunlight that bathed his figure, as he stood erect amid the
thronging crowds, was the emblem and symbol of the light that filled
his soul. No misgiving crossed it. He pointed to Christ with
unfaltering certitude, saying, This is He, the Lamb of God, the Son of
the Father, the Bride