4 “Then asked He them again, Whom do you seek? And they said, Jesus of Nazareth. Jesus answered, I have told you that I am [He]. If therefore ye seek me, let these go their way: that the saying might be fulfilled which He spoke, That of those whom You have given me I have lost none.” “If you seek me,” He says, “let these go their way.” He sees His enemies, and they do what He bids them: they let those go their way, whom He would not have perish. But were they not afterwards to die? How then, if they died now, should He lose them, were it not that as yet they did not believe in Him, as all believe who perish not?
Source: Tractates on the Gospel of John (New Advent)