Page:Spiritual Reflections for Every Day in the Year - Vol 1.pdf/190

 man's eternal condition in the future world. The narrative speaks of Jacob's fountain, and not of a well. "Now Jacob's fountain was there—Jesus sat thus on the fountain!" (ver. 6.) The Lord also says (ver. 14), that the water He gives shall be in the receiver of it, a fountain of water springing up into everlasting life. Thus, what the narrative itself calls Jacob's fountain, the Samaritan woman (ver. 11, 12) calls a well. This distinction is carefully noted in the Greek scripture, but not preserved in our translation; the two Greek words,, (pege) which signifies a fountain, and , (phrear) a well, being rendered by one and the same word in English—a well. The distinction is very instructive; for a fountain gives the idea of water in an active and living state; but a well, that of still water. The fountain of Jacob upon which the Lord sat, is an emblem of the of  as it is in itself, the truths of which are all living waters, given in mercy to cleanse and satisfy the thirst of the soul; but this Word of Revelation, which in itself is living and spiritual—a bubbling fountain—is seen by the woman, who represents the Gentile church, in agreement with her own dark uninformed mind; and not being as yet acquainted with its interior contents, the  appears to her as a mere well, without spirit and without life. Hence she, in her mental deficiency of spiritual truth, calls that a well which in reality is a fountain. When the Lord conversed with the Samaritan woman, there was no reception of the living waters—of those spiritual Truths of Revelation which refresh and satisfy the longings of immortal men. The church in those days was only interested in what was outward, literal, and external—