One lesson from this history we pray may be taken into every mourning heart. The Apostle says that Jesus upholds all things by the word of his power. The laws by which accident, sickness, loss, and death are constantly bringing despair and sorrow to sensitive hearts are upheld by that same Jesus who wept at the grave of Lazarus, and who is declared to be Jesus Christ, the same yesterday and forever. When we see the exceeding preciousness of human love in his eyes, and realize his sympathetic nature, and then remember that he is RESURRECTION AND LIFE, can we not trust him with our best beloved, and look to him for that hour of reunion which he has promised? The doctrine of the resurrection of the body is a precious concession to human weakness and human love. How dear the outward form of our child,--how distressing to think we shall never see it again! But Christ promises we shall. Here is a mystery. St. Paul says, that as the seed buried in the earth is to the new plant or flower, so is our present mortal body to the new immortal one that shall spring from it. It shall be our friend, our child, familiar to us with all that mysterious charm of personal identity, yet clothed with the life and beauty of the skies; and then the Lord God will wipe away all tears from all faces. XVI THE ATTRACTIVENESS OF JESUS There was one great characteristic in the life of Jesus which his followers succeed in imitating less than any other, and that is a singular sweetness and attractiveness which drew toward him even the sinful and fallen. There are the most obvious indications in all the narrative that Christ's virtue was not of the repellent kind that drove sinners away from him, but that there was around him a peculiar charm and graciousness of manner which affected the most uncongenial characters. We are all familiar with a style of goodness quite the reverse of this--a goodness that is terrible to evil-doers--a goodness that is instinctively felt to have no sympathy with the sinner. Such was the virtue of Christ's great forerunner, John the Baptist. He commanded, but did not charm; the attraction that drew men toward him was that of mingled fear and curiosity, but there was no tenderness in it. When the Scribes and Pharisees flocked to his baptism, he met them with a thunderbolt: "O generation of vipers! who hath warned _you_ to flee from the wrath to come?" He declined all social joys; he would not eat or drink at men's tables; he dwelt alone in the deserts, appearing as a _Voice_--a voice of warning and terror! His disciples were few; he took no pains to make them more.