Babylonian king. If ever a man had seemed since to another like the son
of God, Jesus was that man; and Joseph asked himself how it was that
these words had passed over the ears of the disciples--over the ears of
those who knew Jesus' mind, if any could be said to know Jesus' mind.
Jesus, though he lived near them and loved them, lived in the world of
his own thoughts, which, so it seemed to Joseph, he could not share with
anybody. Not one of the men he had gathered about him, neither Peter,
nor John, nor James, had noticed the notable words: "And the form of the
fourth is like the son of God." It was for these words, Joseph felt
sure, that Jesus had related the story of Daniel in the furnace. But his
disciples had not apprehended the significance; and like one whose
confidence was unmoved by the slowness or the quickness of his
listeners, almost as if he knew that the real drift of his speech was
beyond his hearers, Jesus began to tell that Darius' counsellors had
combined into a plot against Daniel and succeeded in it so well that
Daniel and his companions were cast in a den of lions. But there being
nothing in the story that pointed to the setting up of the Kingdom of
God upon earth, Joseph was puzzled to understand why Jesus was at pains
to relate it at such length. Was it to amuse his disciples? he asked
himself, but no sooner had he put the question to himself than the
purpose of the relation passed into his mind. Jesus had told the
marvellous stories of Daniel's escapes from death so that his disciples
might have no fear that the priests of Jerusalem would have power to
destroy him: whomsoever God sends into the world to do his work, Jesus
would have us understand, are under God's protection for ever and ever;
and Joseph rejoiced greatly at having discovered Jesus' intent, and for
a long time the glen, the silent forest and the men sitting listening to
the Master were all forgotten by him. He even forgot the Master's
presence, so filled was he by the abundant hope that his divination of
the Master's intent marked him out as one to be associated with the