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dawned but slowly on His contemporaries. Kepeated miracles were requisite to gain any hearing whatever for the claims of the Nazarene ; and after all His miracles, except the last and most stupendous, there was always a residue of doubt which vented itself in the desire to see some sign of their own choosing, different from any which He had vouchsafed. When astonishment was really produced, we may be sure it was not without good grounds ; and even astonishment did not invariably lead to faith. It was from unbelief, not from credulity, that the contemporaries of our Saviour erred.
The subject may be divided into two parts — (1) From Wonder to Adoration ; (2) Adoration.
From Wonder to Adoration.
Four classes of men have to be considered.
1. Some men saw nothing in Jesus to wonder at. Did He cast out demons ? They had an explanation : He cast them out with the help of the prince of the demons. Did He raise the dead ? They had their answer ready : " It is expedient for us that one man die." The Pharisees and Sadducees did not wonder, because they were too much occupied with themselves. They were too much occupied with their own honour. Jesus did not bow to them and call them Eabbi ; He openly rebuked their vanity and their selfishness. Wonder is the first step in the path of knowledge. They did not take that step, because they reckoned that they knew everything already.
There are those still who do not wonder — who do not wonder even at Jesus. And the reason is stiU the same : they are occupied with themselves,
^ One of the distinguishing marks of human nature is the sense of wonder. The animal creation seems to have it not. Beasts of the field and birds of the air may be surprised or terrified at the unexpected, but the faculty of wonder seems to be left out of their constitution. For wonder is not mere
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astonishment at the marvellous, nor surprise at the new ; it goes on to ask, How and Why? It is aptly expressed by the old childish rhyme, "Twinkle, twinkle, little star, How I wonder what you are ! " That is wonder rising into curiosity as to how this astonishing thing came to be, how it works, and what caused it, what force controls it, the source and secret of its origin. The great philosophical and much debated idea of Causation begins in wonder. Wonder is man's first step in quest of the unknown, and all the marvellous things of creation, whether of power or of beauty, have their primary of&ce in stimulating the human soul to wonder. Without wonder there would be no inquisitive mind, no eager, breathless desire to search out the secrets of the hidden, or discover the reasons of things. No animal looking up at the stars, if indeed it sees them at all, ever exclaims, " How I wonder what you are ! " No lower creature gazing at a " flower in the crannied wall," says wistfully with the poet, " Little flower, if I could understand what you are!" But this is one of man's prerogatives ; he must find answers to the questions started by the sense of Wonder.^
^ The man who cannot wonder, who does not habitually wonder (and worship), were he President of innumerable Eoyal Societies, and carried the whole M6canique Cdeste and Hegel's Philosophy and the epitome of all Laboratories and Observatories with their results, in his single head, — is but a Pair of Spectacles behind which there is no Eye.2
2. Some wondered at Christ without admiring Him. This was the way with His own citizens. When He came into His own country and taught in the synagogue, " many hearing him were astonished," but they did not approve. " Is not this the carpenter?" they said. "And they were offended in him." When they saw Him there was no beauty that they should desire Him.
^ Have you ever considered what a great teacher the sense of wonder is to children ? If you get anybody's wonder excited, you can teach him anything. But wonder is most natural to the young. What freshness, what eagerness, what expectation, what hope we have in childhood ! We have not seen everything yet. Like Charity, we believe all things ; we are on the outlook for surprises. We are ready to know more. The best things do not yet lie behind us. We have not yet settled into the belief, which makes middle life so often a dead, monotonous level, that nothing more is to be seen. We have not shut ourselves to the
1 J. Wood. ' Oarlyle, Sartor Resartut, bk. i. chap. x.
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persuasion, which turns advancing age so often into a timorous, cramped, grudging thing, that nothing better is to be known.^
^ When wonder first appears it inspires the effort to know; later on this leads up to admire. No doubt there are various kinds of admiration in the world, but that of which I am thinking is born of wonder in the presence of beauty, charmed by it, delighting in it, and solemnised by it, filled with a sense of joy and satisfaction. Wordsworth tells us that we partly live by admiration. He who has ceased to admire, the heart of a man has ceased to beat within him. Now admiration is stirred in us chiefly by the beauty of things. Of course their utility wakens a kind of admiration, but this is a poor passion compared with the stirring of the heart by beauty. There is a chord in the human heart which responds to beauty, and never was this more susceptible of impression than to-day. The older poetical view of nature dwelt more on its utility and active force, its nourishing power, wealth, comfort, and prosperity. Since Wordsworth it is nature as a vision, a sight, a picture, a symbol of the unutterable, that the poets have looked for and opened our eyes to see.^