So he took from its place on the shelves the Book that was most likely of all to give the suggestions he needed, because it dealt specifically with the matter in hand. Of all those who bore witness in the Book the most remarkable one was Jesus Christ. So he turned to the New Testament, and to the Gospels. He was none too familiar with their teachings, but he believed that of them all the Gospel of John contained the fullest statement of abstract principles. He would read it.
It was still early, and he settled himself for an hour's study. It occurred to him to invoke afresh that One whom he was seeking for light upon His own law. An impulse of pride almost deterred him, but he thought,
"If He is, and I am His creature, I can afford to be humble. Indeed, it is the only fitting thing."
So he bowed his head and said:
"O God, I am seeking Thee. Help me to understand the truth."
He found the Gospel of John, and began at the beginning. He read the sublime statements concerning the Word, and wondered if they were true. If true, it was the most wonderful fact in the world. If untrue—oh, what darkness lay in the shadow of so great light's negation! He read the twelfth verse, and the thirteenth, and pondered them in the light of the foregoing statement. If they were true, then He who was "with God," who "was God"—he paused to consider the mysterious relationship; mysterious, yet not thereby incredible; he would not repeat the folly of the gardener by too ready unbelief! If true, then God, that eternal Word, came down to man, and "as many as received Him," to them it was granted to become the sons of God! They were translated into the realm whence He came forth.
The stupendous fact—if fact?—glowed like a sun-lit prism and awoke an ardent longing that it might be so. Ah, to escape the limits of this petty life! How mean and small it seemed. Man at his best, his grandest, but to live out a brief day, and then go out into the uncertain darkness forever! If God had ordained a way into His own infinite realm, surely it was worth the finding.
But what was it to "receive" Him? In what sense did they in the days of His fleshly life receive Him? Was it in a more physical, tangible way than would he possible to man now? Evidently not; for of those among whom He moved in bodily presence, the majority "received Him not." Certainly His mission to the earth was not for that generation only, but for all men. Perhaps the receiving was explained by the companion statement, "even to them that believe on His name."
But to "believe" was not less difficult to Hubert than to "receive." He had boasted his inability to believe that which was unsupported by evidence, and had found bitter fault with evangelical doctrine, which, he supposed, put a high premium upon blind credulity,—an attitude of mind, he contended, which would render a man as open to receive the teachings of Buddha, or Mahomet if he happened to hear them, as those of Jesus Christ. He might have added, or the teachings of a Payne, or an Ingersoll, or, as a remoter example, of the serpent in Eden who beguiled a credulous woman.
Hubert's search had become so earnest that he did not now pause to nurse his rancor against the defenseless word "believe," and it even flashed into his thought that, should he study diligently its use, he might discover in it a further or different meaning than he had credited it with. At this point he wished for a Greek Testament, but there was none in the house. Later in the day, however, he surprised a book dealer by the purchase of one, and prepared himself for further studies in the "believes" of John's Gospel.