April 5

and the rude rabble, who setting up a laugh, exclaimed, "Well, since the negro pities him, he shall help him." And so "on him they laid the cross, that he should bear it after Jesus." In another place it is said they "compelled" him; but this regards their enforcement of the thing; for it is obvious he made no resistance. Had he been an unrelenting Jew, an enemy to Jesus and his doctrine, he would have railed and cursed; and the Priests and Scribes would have interposed for him, and desired the soldiers not to make a laughing-stock of one of their fellow-citizens. Or if for a moment he discovered a little reluctance, he soon felt enough not only to make him willing to yield, but to enable him to rejoice that he was counted worthy to suffer shame for his Name.

And is not the same thing required of us? Has not Jesus said, "Whosoever doth not bear his cross, and come after me, cannot be my disciple?" We too at first may be ready to shrink back; but further information and experience induce us cheerfully to deny ourselves, and to go forth to him without the camp bearing his reproach. We see him before us—dignified and holy—enduring the curse for us—and leaving us only "this light affliction, which is but for a moment, and which worketh out for us a far more exceeding and eternal weight of glory"—

"We tread the path our Master trod, We bear the cross he bore; And every thorn that wounds our feet, His temples pierced before.

"O patient, spotless Lamb! My heart in patience keep; To bear the cross so easy made, By wounding thee so deep."

APRIL 5.—"And there followed him a great company of people, and of women, which also bewailed and lamented him. But Jesus turning unto them, said, Daughters of Jerusalem, weep not for me, but weep for yourselves, and for your children. For, behold, the days are coming, in the which they shall say, Blessed are the barren, and the wombs that never bare, and the rags which never gave suck. Then shall they begin to say to the mountains, Fall on us; and to the hills, Cover us. For if they do these things in a green tree, what shall be done in the dry?"—Luke 23:27—31.

ONLY six days before he had descended into Jerusalem from Bethany, by the Mount of Olives, when the multitude spread their garments in the way, and cried, Hosannah! Blessed is he that cometh in the name of the Lord! Many of the same people are now following him as he goes to Calvary to be crucified. As it was now a festival, there was an immense concourse of people; this would readily increase the number of spectators. But a public execution always collects a crowd. There must be something exceedingly attractive and interesting in such a sight, or so many would not repair to it; for they go voluntarily; and there have been instances in which a reprieve has disappointed their expectation, and led them to murmur that they had taken so much trouble in vain. Yet a public execution might be rendered morally impressive and useful. "The way of transgressors is hard." See there what an evil and bitter thing sin is. See the degradation of our common nature. That criminal may be less guilty than myself. He may have had

few of my advantages. If left in the same circumstances he was, what might I have been?—

Our regard for the sex makes us lament that so many females always attend such scenes as these. They have certainly more compassionateness than men; but they have also in their nature a principle of curiosity, and a love of excitement, which sometimes carry them away. Here were many women lining the sides of the road by which Jesus was to pass, some leading their children, and some carrying their babes. But they did themselves honour; for while others insulted, they "lamented him." Perhaps some of them had been healed by him. Perhaps some of them had heard him preach. Were any of the mothers here whose infants he had taken in his arms and blessed? Was the widow here whose son he had raised from the dead? Was the woman here who had washed his feet with her tears? Could Martha and Mary be here? Or Mary Magdalene and the other Mary?—These seeing him as he came opposite to them—in this piteous plight—bleeding—exhausted—pausing and panting—the executioners savagely goading him on—and the populace mocking at his grief; could refrain no longer, but strongly, as the word implies, expressed their sorrow, by cryings and tears, by wringing of their hands and striking their breasts. This required courage as well as tenderness. It showed an interest in the supposed culprit: it seemed a censure of his suffering as unjust and cruel. And persons were severely forbidden to indulge in public condolence with offenders the Sanhedrim had condemned—But "love is strong as death; many waters cannot quench love, neither can the floods drown it."

Our Saviour's kindness and presence of mind are here seen. The nearness of his execution, and his present anguish, do not absorb him in selfish feeling, but he turns to these daughters of Jerusalem, and says, "Weep not for me, but weep for yourselves and your children." Some suppose that he blamed these tears, because he knew they sprang from ignorance of the cause and design of his death. Others suppose he blamed them because he did not deserve these tears, as he was a guilty sufferer, the Lord having laid upon him the iniquity of us all. The former surmise is ill founded, the latter absurd. The fact is he did not blame them at all, but would intimate. That if they knew what was ready to befall them, their sorrow would be more required for themselves than for him. It was an expression of his pity, excited by a view of the dreadful calamities which would desolate their city and their country, when even Jewish mothers, who so valued offspring would hail the childless; and others envy the happiness of those who would be buried alive! "For, behold, the days are coming, in the which they shall say, Blessed are the barren, and the wombs that never bare, and the paps which never gave suck. Then shall they begin to say to the mountains, Fall on us; and to the hills, Cover us."

Of these judgments he intimates the cause, in a question drawn from a proverb: "For if they do these things in a green tree, what shall be done in the dry?" The green tree refers to himself, the dry to the people of the Jews. Surely wood full of sap is less inflammable than wood withered and dead. If I suffer who am innocent—how will the guilty escape—and who are adding my death to all

VOL. I.

their other crimes? It shows us that sin is danger, and prepares us for the wrath of God: "Fury is not in me. Who would set the briars and thorns against me in battle? I would go through them, I would burn them together." And there are degrees of peril and of punishment. If the ignorant are destroyed for lack of knowledge, what will become of those who possess and abuse it? If they escaped not who refused him that spake on earth, how much more shall not we escape if we turn away from him that speaketh from heaven? If the children of ungodly parents perish, what will be the doom of those who have been trained up in the nurture and admonition of the Lord? If Moses and Aaron were so severely chastised for a single offence, to which they were greatly provoked at the waters of strife; what have they to expect who sin constantly and without excuse? If he deal thus with friends, how will he treat enemies? "Behold, the righteous shall be recompensed in the earth, how much more the sinner and the ungodly?" "The time is come that judgment must begin at the house of God: and if it first begin at us, what shall the end be of them that obey not the gospel of God? And if the righteous scarcely be saved, where shall the ungodly and the sinner appear?"

APRIL 6.—"But one of the soldiers with a spear pierced his side, and forthwith came thereout blood and water."—John 19:34.

THIS incident is recorded by none of the other evangelists. But John more than sufficiently attests it. The fact is very striking and improvable; and perhaps we are not instructed in it as we ought to be.

The ancients enlarge much on this wound, and some of the moderns are not far behind them. One makes it an allusion to the manner in which Adam obtained his wife, and by which he was a figure of him that was to come. While the Lord from heaven was sleeping the sleep of death, his side was opened, and from thence his Church was taken, to whom he has espoused himself. Another makes it the cleft of the rock into which God puts us, as he did Moses, when he passes by and proclaims his goodness. A third represents it as a window made in his body, by which we can look into his heart and see his love. Herbert in his Temple calls it a letter-bag, into which we may put any of our requests, and which shall be thereby safely conveyed to God.

It is painful to think what freedoms have been taken with the Scriptures; and what silly and profane conceits have been indulged on subjects at once the most sacred and awful. And yet many affect to wonder at the impression made by such improprieties upon the minds of the young, and the educated, and the sceptic, and the scoffer! We are not answerable for the dislike men feel to the truth itself; but we should distinguish between the offence of faith, and the offence of folly.

The occasion of the event was this. The Jews, because it was the preparation, that the bodies should not remain upon the cross on the Sabbath-day, for that Sabbath was a high day, besought Pilate that their legs might be broken; and that they might be taken away.