We shall see, however, that our Lord does not Himself put Signs in the very forefront of His claims to the allegiance of men. He only appeals to them as subsidiary proofs; on which He would rest His cause when, owing to the situation or the disposition of the hearer, no higher kind of proof was available.(44) It will be asked, “If miracles were only a subsidiary ground on which our Lord claimed belief; What was the primary one?” We shall see that our Lord’s first appeal was Personal; He claimed men’s allegiance from what they had seen of Him and from what they knew. There is a passage in St John’s Gospel which brings this very clearly before us. The naturalness of it and its fidelity to character and situation are such, that I am as sure that these words passed between Philip and our Lord, as if they were found in all four of the Gospels, though they only occur in the last. They occur in the final discourse of our Lord when He and the Apostles are on the way to the garden of Gethsemane. Our Lord has said, “And whither I go, ye know the way. Thomas saith unto him, Lord, we know not whither thou goest; how know we the way? Jesus saith unto him, I am the way, and the truth, and the life: no man cometh unto the Father, but by me. If ye had known me, ye would have known my Father also: from henceforth ye know him, and have seen him. Philip saith unto him, _Lord, shew us the Father, and it sufficeth us_. Jesus saith unto him, Have I been so long time with you, and dost thou not know me, Philip? he that hath seen me hath seen the Father; how sayest thou, Shew us the Father? Believest thou not that I am in the Father, and the Father in me? the words that I say unto you I speak not from myself: but the Father abiding in me doeth his works. Believe me that I am in the Father, and the Father in me: or else believe me for the very works’ sake.”(45) In Philip’s words we perceive an assurance of the reasonableness of what he asks, which is most true to the life. He never doubts but that God _could_ be brought before his eyes;—he supposed that the clouds might be rolled away, so as to reveal a form of awful majesty clothed with resplendent light, and with one glimpse of this he would be content. He thinks that he makes a most moderate request. Our Lord shews a sort of surprise, that after having been so long with them, going in and out among them, they should have missed seeing that God was in Him. It was perhaps this constant companionship that stood in Philip’s way; that what was Divine should have mingled with his daily life was beyond his conception. God, he supposed, could only shew Himself in some strange and appalling manner. That God’s presence is reflected, in the least broken way, in that course of things which is most normal and most ordinary, was an idea that did not belong to Philip’s race or time; but Christ drops a germ from which it should arise.