The
Voice that spoke from Sinai was still audible to him, and the Arm that
delivered Israel he saw still stretched out over the nations. The
miracles of the Old Testament were as real to him as the premiership of
Disraeli, or the financiering of the Rothschilds. There was, at the same
time, a vein of rationalism that ran through his thought and speech. We
were speaking one day on the subject of miracles, and, with his usual
energy of manner, he said:
"There was no need of any literal angel to shut the mouths of the lions
to save Daniel; the awful holiness of the prophet was enough. There was
so much of God in him that the savage creatures submitted to him as they
did to unsinning Adam. Man's dominion over nature was broken by sin, but
in the golden age to come it will be restored. A man in full communion
with God wields a divine power in every sphere that he touches."
His face glowed as he spoke, and his voice was subdued into a solemnity
of tone that told how his reverent and adoring soul was thrilled with
this vision of the coming glory of redeemed humanity.
He knew the New Testament by heart, as well as the Old. The sayings of
Jesus were often on his lips.
One day, in a musing, half-soliloquizing way, I heard him say:
"It is wonderful, wonderful! a Hebrew peasant from the hills of Galilee,
without learning, noble birth, or power, subverts all the philosophies
of the world, and makes himself the central figure of all history.
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