05.19. XIX. THE CASE OF PILATE A WARNING AGAINST RESISTING THE SPIRIT.

XIX. THE CASE OF PILATE A WARNING AGAINST RESISTING THE SPIRIT.

WE are unwilling to leave the subject of Pilate’s character and conduct, without attempting to apply it more particularly and practically than we have yet done to ourselves. For there are many Pilates still among us; and many occasions on which the Lord Jesus, if not personally, yet as represented in his cause, his gospel, and his people, comes before them for trial and judgment. And it may be interesting and profitable to observe how far, in such circumstances, our modern Pilates follow the winding track of their sorely harassed and desperately hunted predecessor of old.

Let us trace, then, a parallel case. Instead of Pilate, let us place on the bench an individual of the present day; and let each reader conceive that "he is the man."

Jesus comes before you to be tried; and his adversaries, the world, the devil, and the flesh, press for a sentence of condemnation. In plain language, the claims of serious religion, or vital godliness, are pressed upon you in a form and with an urgency which you find it difficult to evade. You are called upon, in a manner more peremptory than usual, to decide between God and Mammon.

You are shut up to the necessity of choosing whom you will serve. This crisis may arise in a variety of ways, either in reference to the general question of your condition and character before God, or in reference to some particular point of practical detail which brings that question specially to an issue.

You are living, and you have been living perhaps all your days, in a state of quiet and secure indifference; satisfied with a respectable routine of religious forms and moral decencies, and giving yourselves little concern about any deeper movement of soul, such as some might consider necessary to your being enrolled among the true followers of the Lamb. You hear, indeed, of proceedings in certain quarters, and among a certain class, which seem to indicate a very different tone of religious feeling from anything with which you are familiar. You hear and read of convictions and awakenings, of changes and conversions, of intense excitement, of extraordinary emotions both of joy and sorrow, of earnest meditation, of burning zeal, of things, in short, which show that the question which you take so easily and settle so smoothly, is found by others to be more engrossing, more agitating, more spirit-stirring. You regard these things, however, as a mere idler might listen to the strange news of revolutions in other lands, scarcely knowing what to make of them, scarcely caring to know; or as Pilate might superciliously catch some floating rumour bandied in his vacant court-circle, respecting Him who was creating such a stir in Jerusalem. But something occurs to bring the matter home to you.

Suddenly you find Jesus the gospel or the cause of Jesus standing before you. And who, or what, has brought him? Perhaps your own conscience, half awakened, or your worldly inclinations, your worldly lusts. These have taken the alarm. Jesus the gospel or the cause of Jesus is interfering with your allegiance to the master whom they serve, the world, or the prince of the world. This religion is like to be troublesome.

It is advancing very high and paramount claims, claims, as these advisers would fain represent them to you, incompatible even with the just and lawful demands of this world’s necessary business. On this plea and charge, these accusers these worldly lusts of yours or, it may be, worldly companions flattering your lusts virtually bring the religion of Jesus to your bar, and press you summarily to dispose of it?

Like Pilate, perhaps, you would gladly enough avoid the necessity of taking up the case at all. You shrink from the question, and are shy of meddling with it, you would rather keep this whole matter at a distance.

You have a sort of uncomfortable feeling that it does not lie quite in your way; that the discussion of it might not be altogether to your taste; and that, if you once entertained it, you might not easily get rid of it. But then, on the other hand, there is great importunity, not to be beaten off, in the demand made on you for a decision. At this stage, it may be an importunity all on one side.

There may be no very urgent pleading, no, very close striving, as yet, in favour of religion. The Lord may as yet be silent. But his enemies your sins, and the world’s vanities are clamorous; for they have taken the alarm. They see that if the high authority which religion claims is to be acknowledged, or even tolerated, it strikes at the root of their power; and this or the other darling attachment must be sacrificed, this or the other favourite indulgence must go. Therefore they press for your decision against that authority. It is true, they may not venture to avow their real motive and design, any more than the Jewish rulers ventured to do before Pilate. They did not tell Pilate that they wished to get rid of Jesus bedause he was destroying their influence and exposing their arts: that would have been too plain speaking.

They went about the matter more warily, more wilily. And on the same principle, it might be too plain speaking in those lusts and pleasures which regard Jesus as their enemy, to let you understand at once what they would have, or to avow that they hate him because he condemns them. It is not thus that you are to be managed, and, if possible, "hardened through the deceitfulness of sin/’

No; these plausible Jewish hypocrites sink the offence against themselves, and are only anxious lest Caesar’s lawful power be touched. And so the plea still is, that Jesus and his cross or rather, that Jesus and his crown would threaten even what is lawful in this world, its lawful and necessary pursuits, or its lawful and necessary pleasures. Yes; the fear is, that these high and uncompromising views of Christ’s authority, as so paramount and so holy, are carrying matters decidedly too far, and encroaching upon every other province, and engrossing and swallowing up all things. It is plain that, if this kind of religion is to prevail, the world is at a stand.

Such is the charge which certain secret sins in the heart, or certain open flatterers in the world, towards whom you have a lurking bias, and who have gained an ascendency over you certain solicitors with whom you are inclined to comply certain habits which, almost for very necessity, you are fain to indulge may be urging against that godliness which, as they are beginning to suspect, would reprove and denounce them. And they may be insisting on the plea importunately, in the hope that you may be at once persuaded to acquiesce in the accusation and give sentence accordingly.

I. Well, and what is the first step in the process?

You have no great objection to do what is asked. You would willingly enough dispose of the whole matter by coming to the abrupt conclusion that this allegation against all serious religion at least against a religion so very serious as that in question is substantially well founded; that it will not do for this world; that it does involve danger to the quiet and orderly course of this world; and that it must, therefore, be sacrificed. Thus you would decide, your sympathies and predilections, as yet, being all against such a religion. Your interest as well as your inclination leads you to leave unmolested those principles and passions opposed to religion, which, if you do not positively desire to gratify, you are, at any rate, not prepared to mortify and offend. But you cannot altogether evade the necessity of at least appearing to deliberate. You cannot quite drown your instinctive sense of what is due to the claims which are pressed upon you. There is a time for reflection. You have to enter into your closet, and Jesus follows you there.

And, however unseasonable and inconvenient the interruption of your business or your gaiety may be, you are constrained in your own mind to look a little into this religion of Jesus, and let its voice, however faintly, enter the ear of conscience. And here the hollowness of the pretence on which the first insidious charge against it is urged, must soon become apparent. You quickly perceive that the plea of interference with anything really useful or lawful in the world cannot be sustained. A single word of explanation on the part of our Lord satisfied Pilate that his imperial master had nothing to fear. And you too, in the like case, however willing to be imposed upon, cannot fail to see through "the deceitfulness of sin/’ You are not at all disinclined, at the instigation of sin, or of some of its vain and worldly allies and friends, to get rid at once of this religion, whose very presence is troublesome, by finding that it must necessarily in practice be compromised, for the sake of this world’s peace and this world’s indispensable calls. But you cannot easily satisfy yourself that you are quite justified in doing so. Conscience, the judge, detects the partial counsel of the accusers. Almost in spite of yourself you are convinced that the character of this religion, so pure, so spiritual, and so holy, is such as not only must prevent any undue interference with a single lawful claim which anything in this world can have over you, but must even, on the contrary, impart a new sanction and a new sacredness to them all. Nay more, you cannot but suspect that it is this very character that makes the world’s sins and vanities so clamorous against it. And then, its twofold claim of sovereignty and of truth begins to arrest you. Jesus is King; and he is the Witness of the Truth. It is with authority that he speaks, and there is an impression made by his emphatic and peremptory demand upon your faith, such as is not easily shaken off. You cannot but feel that there must be, that there is, more in this religion than you at first imagined.

You cannot dispose of its claims so summarily as might suit your convenience, and that of your worldly lusts.

No! You have an idea now that it may be mystical, visionary, fanatical; but whatever it may be, it has got a hold over you. It has taken possession of you; so that, at all events, it cannot be put down by any false pretence in regard to its interference with other claims. Such a pretence might once have led you to think some sacrifice of religion’s high demands excusable, at least, if not absolutely indispensable; but it will not avail you now.

II. What, then, is next to be done? Send the question to your neighbour, and take his opinion. It concerns him as much as you, perhaps a little more. It is in Herod’s jurisdiction; let Herod judge. Yes! Try, if you can, to devolve upon another the responsibility of determining this matter. See if some worldly friend, or, still better, if some worldly enemy, will keep you in countenance, and take away from you the blame. And if possible let him be one who has been better acquainted with these things than you, who has at one time entertained godliness at his court, or in his house, and has been accustomed to hear it gladly. If such a one now mocks it, and sets it at nought, if he scoffs, at this religion, or at its professors, his levity may somewhat relieve and dissipate your growing seriousness. And this seasonable relief administered by him to you may make you great friends!

Ah! how many intimacies are thus cemented between individuals, otherwise most uncongenial to one another.

Herod and Pilate had little in their respective characters, and little in their previous histories, to bring them together. Herod was probably too impetuous and headstrong, Pilate too reserved and too refined, to admit of much cordiality between the fastidious Roman courtier and the ruder Galilean tyrant. They had mutually offended one another; they were at outstanding enmity and open quarrel. But a common cause, or rather a common distress, made brothers of them. They were both rendered uneasy by having to deal with Jesus, Herod by his old recollections, Pilate by his new convictions. Hence the reconciliation between Pilate and one whom otherwise he would have hated or despised; Herod seemed to give him countenance and support in his attempt to get rid of this troublesome case. And is not this the explanation of too many of this world’s friendships, as well as of much of that complacency and admiration with which we see some highly gifted individuals regard those who in every valuable endowment are far inferior to themselves, for whom, indeed, and for whose sentiments and manners, except on this most deplorable ground of union, they could have no toleration? Is it not thus that we must account for a certain delight which even persons of some good taste and good feeling take in the coarse scandal or the profane levity of loose companions, who, in a style of writing or conversation that would otherwise be most offensive, use familiar liberties with sacred subjects and serious men, to the implied disparagement of all sacredness and seriousness together? Is it not that, ill at ease, and not satisfied in their own minds, they derive a certain courage and confidence from seeing how others, better acquainted perhaps with these matters than they can pretend to be, are yet free to treat with every kind of contempt what has made them tremble and stand in awe? If Herod, who knows such cases so much more intimately, as being himself, after a sort, a Jew, once professing a kind of devotion, the friend of a holy man, understood to have repented of the wrong he did in beheading him, if Herod and his men of war set Jesus at nought, it ma}’ the less hurt the conscience of a Gentile unbeliever to treat his cause with indifference, and count his death a trifle.

Still, where there is conviction of any depth at all, the conscience may not be so easily satisfied. Herod, after all, though he has insulted Jesus, has not judged him. The case is still undisposed of, and in all its urgency it comes back upon Pilate once more.

Ah! you would often be glad to find a temporary expedient for keeping serious thought away, by lending an ear to the vain and flippant cavils of those who, dealing in smart remarks, or in the light and frivolous irreverence of tale-bearers and busy-bodies, substitute mere wit for argument, and settle the most momentous questions by a personal hit or a party jest. But criticising or mocking the godly does not really get rid of the claims of godliness. Neither you nor your friends have yet decided the cause. Jesus is still there, claiming sovereignty and witnessing truth. His adversaries the lusts and passions which he condemns still require you to give him up. And, in spite of raillery and ridicule in spite of all that might make you easy and indifferent about the matter you have your own misgivings and relentings.

You cannot bring yourself altogether to renounce or sacrifice your reverence for religion, or make an entire surrender of your religious feelings and scruples, to the sins, the follies, and vanities of the world. These, therefore, or your own lusts flattered and stirred up by them, are still unsatisfied. They persevere in their demand that you should come to some decision in regard to this serious call of godliness, such a decision as may prevent its troubling them any more. What, then, is to be done?

III. Try what a compromise will do. You will not decide positively in favour of this religion; but neither will you decide peremptorily against it. You will leave the matter undetermined; you will simply let Jesus alone.

He shall escape the last sentence of death; but it shall be merely by sufferance, and of grace. You will take advantage of some fair and plausible excuse for not actually proceeding to extremities against his cause, or against his people; such an excuse as cannot well subject you to the suspicion of fully sanctioning either it or them. The decent custom of the season, ordinary civility, mere routine, may explain what you say or do in favour of godliness, or of its statutory observances; and you will not be committed on either side.

Well, and will this satisfy the world that is pleading so urgently for the Lord’s condemnation, or those worldly desires which have gained such an ascendency over you? Will they be contented with this declaration of neutrality? Will they accept of this proposal of a middle course?

You do not intend to pledge yourself rashly to the principles and the practices of the godly. You are not prepared to go all lengths with them in their extreme strictness and severity. You have no wish to take up what is called a religious profession, and to be marked out as a religious character. No! by no means. There is nothing to be apprehended on that score. Your worldly friends need not take the alarm so fast. You will not offend them. You will not separate yourself from them. And your worldly lusts may, in the meanwhile, rest assured that there is no great risk of your sacrificing any of them that are really dear to you, to your new religious sensibility. At the same time, you cannot bring your mind to declare wholly against this religion. There may be something, after all, in its high and uncompromising claim of sovereignty and of truth. There are some features in it which you admire, others which you fear, a few which you almost love. You cannot join in sweeping censures and denunciations against it. You cannot summarily conclude that it is all folly and madness. You may be allowed at least to treat it civilly.

Thus the case remains in suspense. And surely this understanding might appease the distressing strife. Surely your worldly habits, and worldly counsellors and tempters, need not ask more than this.

Nay, but it is not enough for them that you are not for Christ. It is not enough if you are not against him; for otherwise you are not wholly theirs. They would have you to be entirely their own, to go along with them heartily and fully, not with hesitation and reluctance, not with misgivings and scruples, not like one " fleeing when no man pursueth," and "in great fear where no fear is," but boldly and frankly. This halting, therefore, will not do. Even so measured and cautious a toleration of godliness they will not endure. You may put it to them, as an alternative, whether they will have serious religion allowed and countenanced even to so limited an extent, and on so guarded a footing, or have open profanity and profligacy let loose. You may put the very hesitating and halting regard you would still have paid to Christ, on the ground of its being preferable to the license of evil, which otherwise is to be chosen. They will almost take their risk of a jail-delivery of all crime, rather than let the religion which they dislike have free scope and play.

Even if the choice I between Christ and Barabbas, they will choose Barabbas, though Barabbas be a robber.

What, then, is next to be tried?

IV. Make yet another experiment. Make the experiment of concession, and see if that will succeed. Give them, if not the cloak, at least the coat. Go with them a mile. Let Jesus, in pain and mockery, be crowned, and robed, and smitten. Perhaps that measure of compliance will content the Jews!

Yes, you will overcome your scruples so far as to allow certain liberties to be taken with religion. The profane and worldly, when they treat it with levity, can now sometimes win a smile from you. Nay, you have so much of a kind of sympathy with them as to be rather pleased than otherwise to see unseasonable gravity and sanctimonious gloom somewhat rudely handled, and solemn professors made sport of. But beyond this you are not at all inclined to go. For your secret uneasiness is increasing; you have more and more disquieting apprehensions; you have your dreams and omens, your warnings and visitations. You tremble more and more at the extremity to which you are likely to be hurried.

Still you cannot extricate yourself from the toils which the deceitfulness of sin, and this vain world, have cast around you. You are involved with those who are carrying their violence against religion to the most implacable extremes; you are committed to Christ’s enemies; and any concession that you may make only emboldens them to insist on more. But if they will thus insist on going so much farther than you can approve of, you can wash your hands, you can protest against their guilt; you, at least, are not to be blamed. Most miserable delusion, most deplorable infatuation, of this wretched and hollow truce between light and darkness, between Christ and Belial! You wash your hands! you protest your innocence! Idle ceremony! empty and hypocritical words! What! do you not continue still associated with the very parties whose proceedings, as you now acknowledge, are becoming offensive and alarming? Do you come out from among them? When you discover whither they are really hurrying you, do you break with them at once? No! you give them still the right hand of fellowship and the embrace of brotherhood; and, however you may save yourself by feebly protesting and washing your hands, you smile on them, you court them, you flatter them!

Most melancholy dream! And not more melancholy than false and vain! For meanwhile the world and your sins are not contented. They still press for a more explicit condemnation of Christ and his gospel. They take advantage of the compromise which you have proposed, and the concession which you have made, and they urge with greater importunity their demand, " Crucify him! Away with him! " Your uneasiness increases, your perplexity, your pain. The strife becomes more deadly. And a surmise, or a hint, as to the true nature of it comes out. Jesus must be got rid of, because he claims to be the Son of God I Here is the secret cause of offence, the real ground of opposition to him. He is a King and a Witness to the Truth; a King whose authority may not be set aside, a Witness whose testimony may not be rejected, because he is the Son of God. He claims to be so; and they who would have him crucified let out at last that it is on account of this claim they would away with him.

V. Thus, as the prolonged struggle begets impatience and irritation, the mask at last drops, and the deep source of the outcry against Jesus comes out. The adversaries lose their self-possession, and, pressing for a decision, show what really is at the bottom of their enmity, and what it is in his claims that most provokes them, he makes himself the Son of God. The judge also, taking the alarm anew once more tossed on a sea of doubt, and not knowing what to make of the expressive and emphatic silence of the accused loses temper, and affects to end the whole by a mere bravado and boast of power: ’Am I not the master of this King this Son of God. May I not use my discretion in disposing of him and his pretensions? Have I not power to condemn and power to release, as I see fit?’ In the instance of Pilate, this menace is the last and impotent struggle of an uneasy conscience sorely and hardly pressed by convictions and appeals to which it will not submit, and of which it cannot get rid. It is an affectation or assumption of bravery which he does not really feel, a desperate effort to cover or to overcome, by an ostentatious attitude of defiance, the secret misgivings of a quailing spirit. The feeblest victim of the chase, when, after all his shiftings and windings, he is brought at last to stand at bay, will turn upon his pursuers and emit some expiring flashes of rage. Baited and maddened by the prolonged pursuit, he will face his unrelenting foes and give fight ere he yields and dies. So the poor sinner, whom the claims of religion are dogging so closely and importunately at his heels, after vainly seeking to evade or to escape from them, becomes petulant and indignant, and almost thinks that he does well to be angry! Is there to be no end of this annoyance? Is he to be thus harassed for ever? And now when he would bring the matter to a point, and therefore puts an explicit question, "Whence art thou?" he receives no answer Jesus is silent. Has he not a right to be vexed? And why, after all, should he suffer his peace to be disturbed when he can put an end to the whole question at once?

Why continue to be dunned by the solicitations of these Jews; and, especially, why allow one who is wholly at his mercy to keep him thus endlessly on the rack of a painful suspense? He will change his tone. What! has he not a right, after all, to take his own way, and do as he pleases? He will settle the affair off-hand, and so have done with it. A state of mind like this is more common than some may be ready to suppose, when men attempt, as it were, to face down the uncomfortable remonstrances and suggestions of conscience, and by putting on, as it is called, a bold front, abruptly end internal deliberations of which they are weary. This is seen in their way of dealing with the general question of religion’s claims upon them, as well as with particular questions of duty which arise in regard to their employment of their time:iul talents. The flesh, with its lusts and passions; the world, with its deceitful pleasures; the devil, with his seductive wiles; all come and clamorously demand that you make a sacrifice to them of your religious principles, and give up, as incompatible with the actual condition of life, that vital godliness which, however good in itself, seems too visionary to be here realized. On the other hand, the Son of God stands before you; and though he does not cry, nor lift up, nor cause his voice to be heard in the streets; though, he is led as a Lamb to the slaughter, and as a sheep before her shearers is dumb, so he openeth not his mouth, his very silence awes the conscience. And the heart too is sometimes touched, when, meek and lowly in heart himself, he says, " Come unto me, ye weary." At such seasons, you feel as if you were more than half inclined to comply at once with the affectionate call, and end the strife of your soul by casting yourself unreservedly into his arms, and consenting to be wholly his. You almost wish that you could make up your mind to be fairly and thoroughly religious, and to cast in your lot with the godly. But again you are pressed on the other side. You are peremptorily and importunately solicited to let religion go, and accommodate yourself to the world; and they who solicit you will not easily take a denial. You are in straits, you are at a loss, what is to be done? And here there is a fallacy into which you are very prone to fall the very fallacy by which Pilate deceived himself into the idea that he had ground of complaint against the Lord Jesus, when he said, " Speakest thou not unto me?" This same religion, that so urges you, will not speak so articulately as you would wish. It seems to present its claims to you in a form too vague and indefinite. You want something more precise and explicit: ’ Who is it, after all, that you are? What is it that you would have? " How long dost thou hold us in suspense? If thou be the Christ, tell us plainly." ’ For there is no feature in the gospel which more sorely perplexes and provokes unrenewed and worldly men than this alleged indistinctness. The demands which it makes have a certain character of large, vast, and unlimited extent, which they cannot easily grasp. If it were something more specific and more tangible that it asked, they would know better how to deal with it.

Hence, to such persons, even the most painful system of penance, and the most burdensome routine of forms, will be more intelligible and more welcome than the free grace of the gospel. They desire a religion which will just tell them at once what is to be done, and then let them alone. They wish to know the utmost range of its claims upon them, that they may get through what is necessary to meet them, and then be free. They feel always as if, in pressing upon them the gospel, we were not coming to the point as if we were dealing in vague generalities. They call for something more particular and practical Just prescribe to them at once, in so many precise terms, their creed and their task what they are to believe, and what they are to do and so let there be an end of it. This is the very longing, this is the very craving, of the natural mind, which Popery is so skilfully contrived to satisfy. It relieves men of the responsibility of an indefinite obligation in religion; it exacts from them the acknowledgment of a certain formal authority, and the fulfilment of certain formal conditions, and, as to all beyond, it simply lets them off. This is what men seek, to have the claims of religion put into a tangible shape, and marked out by exact limits; and for this they will consent to pay a very considerable price, in the way of service or of sacrifice, to any church that will thus define and circumscribe their duty. In fact, this is the religion which, in whatever church, men commonly try to make for themselves. You have your statutory or customary round of duty to which you bind yourself a certain decent acquiescence in the form of sound words which you hear, a certain measure of attendance on outward ordinances, a certain reverence for things sacred, and a punctual performance of certain pious offices. So much as this, religion seems fairly entitled to require; and, having so far acknowledged and complied with its requirements, you would fain be let alone and suffered to take your ease. And so you might take your ease, but for the apprehension which ever and anon haunts you, that there may, after all, be something more in the gospel than this that there may be some depth which you have not yet fathomed. The very enemies of true religion suggest to you this apprehension. They let out their jealousy of the Lord Jesus because he is the Son of God. You cannot help suspecting that there must be more in his claims than at first appeared, since so strong a feeling of dislike on their part is manifested; especially when you experience the difficulty of any compromise, and perceive how hard it is to reconcile the importunate demands of the world with anything like respect and reverence for religion, or the safe preservation of any of its life in your souL You begin to be convinced that it may be a very different kind and amount of homage that it requires from any that you have hitherto thought of rendering. Jesus stands before you, the King, the Witness to the Truth, the Son of God. May he not have rights in you, and over you, to an extent hitherto unrecognised and unconceived? But here again the complaint comes in of the vague and indefinite character of what he claims. There is an air of mystery about him. He does not speak out plainly and explicitly enough. You are unhappy, uneasy, dissatisfied, angry. You have the idea of some unknown discovery which it may deeply concern you to make, some unknown heavenly majesty with which you ought to be acquainted. But you know not how to proceed, or to which hand to turn. This religion of which you hear so much, what precisely, and whence is it? What, definitely, would it have of you? It will not further explain itself. But still there it stands, and the solemn impression of its high and undefined authority remains, and cannot be got rid of. What, in these circumstances, is to be done?

Weary of this uncertainty, provoked by this apparent mystery, you determine to break up the useless conference, to break off the unsatisfactory negotiation. After all, this religion is a matter under your own power. It rests with you to dispose of it at your discretion; and, if it will not come to terms or to an understanding with you, assume you the mastery over it, assert your right to treat it as you choose.

Thus you would gladly terminate the strife. And there are many who in this attempt partially and for a time succeed. They keep the Lord Jesus at a distance, and in abeyance. They affect to deal with him and his holy and spiritual religion as if he and it were at their mercy, left to their arbitrary disposal, as if they had a kind of title to make of both of them what they please; so that any respect shown on their part to vital godliness must be considered as a favour, an act almost of grace and condescension. That they do not at once condemn Jesus, that they tolerate his claims even for a moment, that they pay him the compliment of listening to him at all, is a great stretch of courtesy, for which they duly take credit. They might, if they chose, adopt far more decided measures against him. ’ They might give the word or the hint, and there would be plenty of his enemies ready to revile, to scourge, to crucify him. Religion is really indebted to them for their forbearance, and for the decent homage which they render to it. They confer an obligation on Christ and on his cause by going so far as they do go, nay, by simply abstaining from going against him, which if they did, the loss would be his. Let him beware, then, of driving them to this extremity. Let religion beware of making its high and mysterious demands on them so unpalatable as to put them to the necessity of withdrawing even the countenance and support which they now give, and leaving it to take its chance without their patronage.

Vain, impotent, and impious pride, of the poor potsherds of the earth! What! and do you really fancy that the Lord is indebted and obliged to you, because you are graciously pleased not to turn your power wholly against him? that he must purchase your forbearance by concession, and bow his head to you, lest you should be provoked to declare more openly against him than you do? Nay, but know, O vain man! that He who sitteth in the heavens laughs, (Psalms 2:1-12) The Lord holds such haughty bearing in derision. Yes; and he will speak to you in his wrath. What! dost thou think that it is as a criminal at thy bar, a suppliant at thy footstool, that the Son of God standeth before thee? Is he not thy Lord, thy King? He, indeed, dependent upon thee! Thou worm of the earth, He challenges thee to do thy worst!

Yes, use thy power against Him, if it seem to thee good; only remember it is at thy peril it is on thy responsibility. And think not, though thou givest up the Savior, thou canst have peace. No, thy weakness, thy imbecility, is still thy curse. Thou carriest to thy grave the sting of an uneasy mind Thou hast not succeeded in braving and bullying either thy conscience or thy God. Thou art driven at last to desperate measures, to suicide or self-murder itself; to the worst form of suicide, the hardening of thine own heart, the destroying of thine own soul. Only in spiritual death wilt thou find that end of thy strife which the miserable Roman was fain to seek by imbruing his hands in his own blood. But enough of this. The parallel between Pilate in a great strait between the Jews and Jesus, and a worldly man struggling in the grasp of certain spiritual convictions which he cannot shake off, and to which his worldly lusts will not suffer him to yield, might’ be followed up at greater length and in much more minute detail.

It is a painfully interesting study, and it suggests not a few important practical lessons. One in particular may be noticed.

If the question be once fairly and seriously raised between Christ and his. enemies, or between the claims of vital Christianity and the demands of the world, neutrality becomes impossible, neither party will suffer it. Christ, on his part, cannot endure it: the authority with which he speaks, the Truth of which he is the Witness, the relation in which he stands to God as his Son, and to men as their Savior, Sovereign, and Lord, are all of such a kind as to forbid his being satisfied with anything short of a full and unreserved acknowledgment of his claims. But the point of the moral lies rather in the consideration, that the world on its side is as intolerant of neutrality as is the gospel of Christ itself. Let the question come to a trial before you, and the world will never let you off until it extorts from you a sentence against the Lord. Your inclinations, your convictions, your good feelings of every sort, may be all in favour of some middle course. But it is all in vain. You cannot long escape. You are at the mercy of evil principles and evil men with whom you are not prepared to break; and, as you will not give them up for Christ, the issue is too plain and certain on the other side, you cannot but in the end sacrifice Christ to them. There is, therefore, no safety in a neutral position neither the prince of this world nor the Prince of Life will let you rest in it. There must be a decision for or against the Lord. "He that is not with me is against me." Let the inevitable alternative be pondered well. And not only let the decision be on the side of Christ, let it be also on the side of Christ as having authority.

Too ’often is the question weighed between him and his enemies in the spirit of haughty or headstrong independence; as if he were at our mercy and disposal, as if we had an absolute discretion, and might own or reject him at our pleasure. He seems to stand before us at our bar, awaiting our verdict; or we conceive of him as if he were to be obliged to us for a little water, such as he asked of the woman at the well of Samaria; or for a courteous act of hospitality, such as he accepted in the Pharisee’s house when he sat down to meat with him. No wonder that our decision in reference to his claims partakes of the character of compromise and evasion, when we regard him as thus a suppliant merely, or an accused person, at our gate. But let us conceive of him as lie stood before Pilate, in high and holy majesty; or as he appeared to Saul on the way to Damascus, in the glory of his divine sovereignty and grace; and our attitude will be that of Saul, prostrate on the ground before him; and our language also will be that of Saul, " Lord, what wouldest thou have me to do?" Let us hear his word to the woman of. Samaria, "If thou knewest the gift of God, and who it is that saith unto thee, Give me to drink, thou wouldest have asked of him, and he would have given thee living water/’ And let each one echo the woman’s prayer, with intelligent, prompt, and guileless faith, " Lord, give me this water, that I thirst not."