Page:Medicine and the church.djvu/217

 apostolic rite of unction, and the pious followers of John Wesley?

(ii) But that spiritual power, thus resident in the Healer, has to communicate itself to the subjects of His grace; subjects they must be rather than objects. And His first purpose is to excite the dormant energies of life and action. He does it as a wise physician will do it, by concentrating the patient's mind upon Himself. This is done by a question, or other means, adapted, with His profound insight into character, to the individual case. In the case of the deaf man who had an impediment, He effected this by isolating him, and then using physical means (with finger and saliva). Exactly parallel is the case of the blind man, which, like the former, is recorded by St. Mark alone. He asks blind Bartimæus, 'What wilt thou that I should do unto thee?' And this is one of several cases in which the sovereign faculty of will leaps forth, and the confession of faith attends it. In the cure of the lame man by St. Peter (in