Never  do  they  wish  Him  back  in  their  midst ;
never  do  they  mourn  for  Him  as  for  a  friend
whom  they  have  lost.  On  the  contrary,  they  felt
.  that  Christ  was  with  them  now  in  a  sense  in
which  He  had  never  been.  There  is  no  hint  that
any  even  of  the  Twelve  would  have  gone  back
to  the  old  days  had  it  been  possible.  They  had
lost,  but  they  had  also  gained,  and  their  gain  was
greater  than  their  loss.  "  Even  though  we  have
known  Christ  after  the  flesh,"  they  also  would
have  said,  "  yet  now  we  know  Him  so  no  more."
Read  over  again  St.  Luke's  account  of  our  Lord's
Ascension  :  "  He  led  them  out  until  they  were

1  J.  Denney,  Studies  in  Theology,  p.  154.
