And he has gained his point. The spirit in the woman has been divinely goaded into utterance, and out come the glorious words of her love and faith, casting aside even insult itself as if it had never been—all for the sake of a daughter. Now, indeed, it is as he would have it.
"Yes, Lord; yet the dogs under the table eat of the children's crumbs."
Or, as St Matthew gives it:
"Truth, Lord: yet the dogs eat of the crumbs which fall from their masters' table."
A retort quite Greek in its readiness, its symmetry, and its point! But it was not the intellectual merit of the answer that pleased the Master. Cleverness is cheap. It is the faith he praises, [Footnote 5: Far more precious than any show of the intellect, even in regard of the intellect itself. The quickness of her answer was the scintillation of her intellect under the glow of her affection. Love is the quickening nurse of the whole nature. Faith in God will do more for the intellect at length than all the training of the schools. It will make the best that can be made of the whole man.] which was precious as rare—unspeakably precious even when it shall be the commonest thing in the universe, but precious now as the first fruits of a world redeemed—precious now as coming from the lips of a Gentile—more precious as coming from the lips of a human mother pleading for her daughter.
"O woman, great is thy faith: be it unto thee even as thou wilt."
Or, as St Mark gives it, for we cannot afford to lose a varying word,
"For this saying, go thy way; the devil is gone out of thy daughter." The loving mother has conquered the tormenting devil. She has called in the mighty aid of the original love. Through the channel of her love it flows, new-creating, "and her daughter was made whole from that very hour."
Where, O disciples, are your children and your dogs now? Is not the wall of partition henceforth destroyed? No; you too have to be made whole of a worse devil, that of personal and national pride, before you understand. But the day of the Lord is coming for you, notwithstanding ye are so incapable of knowing the signs and signals of its approach that, although its banners are spread across the flaming sky, it must come upon you as a thief in the night.
For the woman, we may well leave her to the embraces of her daughter. They are enough for her now.