Bitter and deadly was their selfish wrath, when they heard One who
ate and drank with publicans and sinners stand up in the very midst
of that grand ceremony, and cry; 'If any man thirst, let him come to
Me and drink. He that believeth on Me, as the scripture hath said,
Out of him shall flow rivers of living water.' A God who said to all
'Come,' was not the God they desired to rule over them. And thus the
very words which prove the text to be divine and inspired, were
marked out as such by those bigots of the old world, who in them saw
and hated both Christ and His Father.

The Spirit and the Bride say, Come. Come, and drink freely.

Those words prove the text, and other texts like it in Holy
Scripture, to be an utterly new Gospel and good news; an utterly new
revelation and unveiling of God, and of the relations of God to man.

For the old legends and dreams, in whatsoever they differed, agreed
at least in this, that the Water of Life was far away; infinitely
difficult to reach; the prize only of some extraordinary favourite of
fortune, or of some being of superhuman energy and endurance. The
gods grudged life to mortals, as they grudged them joy and all good
things. That God should say Come; that the Water of Life could be a
gift, a grace, a boon of free generosity and perfect condescension,
never entered into their minds. That the gods should keep their
immortality to themselves seemed reasonable enough. That they should
bestow it on a few heroes; and, far away above the stars, give them
to eat of their ambrosia, and drink of their nectar, and so live for
ever; that seemed reasonable enough likewise.

But that the God of gods, the Maker of the universe should say,