I believe the conscience of men has received the right impression from this story. It has come to them in dark oppressive hours as the witness of a Presence that had been with them, though they knew it not,--of a calm power in which they might trust. This might not be their notion of a miracle. If they had been asked to define its nature and its purpose, they would carefully limit it to the time in which Jesus dwelt on earth; they would say it was a departure from the laws of nature to attest His divine mission. They would explain away the faith they had expressed unawares; they would say they had only been making a moral or personal improvement of the incident. No, brethren, it is not so. They discovered the true meaning of the sign at first. The other is the cold intellectual _mis_interpretation of it. They feel in their hearts that it is _not_ a violation of the laws of nature, for the Son of Man to prove that the elements are not man's masters. They feel that when He raised up His disciples' hearts to trust in Him, He was teaching poor, weak, ignorant men the true law of _their_ being, and thereby teaching them to reverence and not to despise the laws which He had imposed on the winds and on the waves. They feel that the whole beautiful narrative is not an argumentative assertion of a divine mission which can confute disputants, but the practical manifestation of a divine kinghood to meet the cravings and necessities of human beings. What does a debater care for '_It is I; be not afraid_?' What else does a man tossed about in a tempest care for? The words were not spoken to Scribes and Pharisees, and were not heard by them. They were spoken to fishermen out in a boat at night; and by such they have been heard ever since.