§ 67. His Mode of Teaching corresponds to the General Law of Developement of the Kingdom of God.

It was, then, according to Christ’s own words, a peculiar aim and law of his teaching, to awaken a sense for Divine things in the human mind, and to make further communications in proportion to the degree of living appropriation that might be made of what was given. And this corresponds with the general laws established by Christ for the developement of the kingdom of God. It is his law that choice must be made, by the free determination of the will, between God and the world, before the susceptibility for Divine things (which may exist even in the as yet fettered soul, if it incline towards God), and the emotions of love¹⁶⁴¹⁶⁴   Pascal (Art de Persuader), “qu’il faut aimer les choses divines, pour les connaitre.” Beautifully said. for the Divine which springs from that susceptibility, can arise in the human heart. The heart tends to the point from whence it seeks its treasure (its highest good).¹⁶⁵¹⁶⁵   Matt., vi., 21. The sense for the Divine, the inward light, must shine. If worldly tendencies extinguish it, the darkness must be total. Christ’s words, Christ’s manifestation, can find no entrance. The Divine light streams forth in vain if the light-perceiving eye of the soul is darkened.¹⁶⁶¹⁶⁶   Luke, xii., 34; Matt., vi., 22. The parable of the sower vividly sets forth the necessity of a susceptible soil, before the seed of the Word can germinate and bring forth fruit. And so he constantly assured the carnal Jews that they could not understand him in their existing state of mind. He who will not follow the Divine “drawing” (revealed in his dawning consciousness of God) can never attain to faith in Christ, and must feel himself repelled from his words. The carnal mind can find nothing in him.¹⁶⁷¹⁶⁷   John, vi., 44. The form of his language (so he told those who took offence at it¹⁶⁸¹⁶⁸   John, viii., 33, 44. In v. 43, λαλία expresses the mode of speaking. The substance is expressed by λόγος. See Lücke’s excellent remarks on the passage.) appeared incomprehensible, because its import, the truth of God, could not be apprehended by souls estranged from Him. The form and the substance were alike paradoxical to them. The uncongenial soul found his mode of speaking strange and foreign; it is foreign no more when the spirit, through its newly-roused sense for the Divine, yields itself up to the higher Spirit. The words can be understood only by those who have a sympathy for the spirit and the substance.

Thus, then, the other Evangelists agree with John in regard to the fundamental principles of Christ’s mode of teaching.