This may be called shallow rationalism, but surely the human _ratio_ or reason cannot be entirely rejected. Many know of their own experience that a man of high moral energy can even now drive out devils and base thoughts. Why not also believe that through his appearance and words Jesus made such an impression upon those possessed, for instance, upon the man or the two men who herded swine in the country of the Gadarenes or Gergesenes, that they came to themselves and began to lead new lives? That on such a conversion the swine-herds should forget their swine which rushed headlong into the lake, is easily understood, and when these two incidents came to the ears of the people, what was more natural than the story which we find in Matthew (viii. 28), Mark (v. 1), and Luke (viii. 26), but not in John? We need not now enter into the discrepancies between these three narratives, striking as they would be in a divinely inspired book. Of course it will be said again, that this is a shallow, rationalistic explanation, as if the word “rationalist” contained within itself something condemnatory. At all events, no one can now demonstrate that Jesus did not bewitch the unclean spirits out of the two demoniacs into the two thousand swine; but I confess that the shallow rationalistic explanation seems to me far better calculated to bring clearly to light the influence which Jesus could exercise over the most abandoned men. One more instance. How often does Jesus say that he is the bread that really satisfies man, and the water that quenches all thirst (vi. 48): “I am the bread of life. This is the bread which cometh down from heaven, that a man may eat thereof and not die. Whoso eateth my flesh and drinketh my blood hath eternal life, and I will raise him up at the last day.” Would any one, even the woman of Samaria, take these words literally? Does not Jesus himself help us to a correct understanding of them when he says (vi. 35), “I am the bread of life; he that cometh to me shall never hunger; and he that believeth on me shall never thirst,” and again, (vii. 37), “If any man thirst let him come unto me, and drink.” And in order to shield his words against any misunderstanding he himself says (vi. 63), “It is the spirit that quickeneth; the flesh profiteth nothing; the words that I speak unto you, they are spirit and they are life.” And are we resolved in spite of all this not to understand the deep meaning of his words, to remain blind and deaf; and do we, like the Pharisees, prefer the story of how Jesus by magic means fed thousands with five or seven loaves and two fishes (vi. 9), so that in the end twelve baskets of bread remained after all were satisfied? We can readily comprehend how in the mouths of the people the great miracles of Jesus, the real _mira_ wrought by his life and teaching, became small _miracula_. But if we surrender these small _miracula_, is not something far better left us, namely, that