The beatitudes were His greeting to the whole human family. Looking upon the vast throng gathered to listen to the sermon on the mount, He seemed for the moment to have forgotten that He was not in heaven, and He used the familiar salutation of the world of light. From His lips flowed blessings as the gushing forth of a long-sealed fountain. Turning from the ambitious, self-satisfied favorites of this world, He declared that those were blessed who, however great their need, would receive His light and love. To the poor in spirit, the sorrowing, the persecuted, He stretched out His arms, saying, “Come unto Me.... I will give you rest.”[91] [Sidenote: _Perception of Man’s Possibilities_] In every human being He discerned infinite possibilities. He saw men as they might be, transfigured by His grace,—in “the beauty of the Lord our God.”[92] Looking upon them with hope, He inspired hope. Meeting them with confidence, He inspired trust. Revealing in Himself man’s true ideal, He awakened, for its attainment, both desire and faith. In His presence souls despised and fallen realized that they still were men, and they longed to prove themselves worthy of His regard. In many a heart that seemed dead to all things holy were awakened new impulses. To many a despairing one there opened the possibility of a new life. Christ bound men to His heart by the ties of love and devotion; and by the same ties He bound them to their fellow-men. With Him love was life, and life was service. “Freely ye have received,” He said, “freely give.”[93] [Sidenote: _In the Secret Place of Power_] It was not on the cross only that Christ sacrificed Himself for humanity. As “He went about doing good,”[94] every-day’s experience was an outpouring of His life. In one way only could such a life be sustained. Jesus lived in dependence upon God and communion with Him. To the secret place of the Most High, under the shadow of the Almighty, men now and then repair; they abide for a season, and the result is manifest in noble deeds; then their faith fails, the communion is interrupted, and the life-work marred. But the life of Jesus was a life of constant trust, sustained by continual communion; and His service for heaven and earth was without failure or faltering. As a man He supplicated the throne of God, till His humanity was charged with a heavenly current that connected humanity with divinity. Receiving life from God, He imparted life to men. [Sidenote: _The Scope of His Teaching_]