David at last roused to action. He went off upstairs and brought down his Bible—half a Bible, it looked to Matilda's eyes; and under the bright gas lights the two sat down to compare notes.
"I don't know but a part of the things that are said about the Messiah," said David, turning over the leaves; "but what I do know, seem to me impossible to be fulfilled in him you Gentiles think the Messiah. And yet—they said—"
David stopped, in great perplexity.
"What are some of those things?"
"Well, this is one. He is to be of the seed of David; for so Isaiah prophesied."
"'And a rod hath come out from the stock of Jesse, and a branch from his roots is fruitful. Rested on him hath the Spirit of Jehovah, the spirit of wisdom and understanding, the spirit of counsel and might, the spirit of knowledge and fear of Jehovah.'"
"Well, David, Jesus was that. See,—here is the whole list of the names of the people." And she put in the boy's hands the first chapter of Matthew.
"'The son of David, the son of Abraham'!" cried he; but then immediately became so absorbed in the chapter and in that list of names which Matilda had always thought very uninteresting, that she could only watch him and doubt if he would come back to talk with her any more that evening.
"But," said David at last, handing back her book, "that is only one thing. Listen to this. The promise was to David—' I have raised up thy seed after thee, who is of thy sons, and I have established his kingdom; he doth build for me a house, and I have established his throne unto the age.' Where is the throne of—of your Messiah, as you call him? And see here again, in the Psalms of David—
"'I have made a covenant for my chosen,
'I have sworn to David my servant,
'Even to the age do I establish thy seed,
'And have built from generation to generation thy throne.'"