founded church sent out its heralds, two by two, to proclaim the everlasting gospel' (Rev. xiv. 6), giving them power over demoniacs, and leaving them dependent for support on the sympathies they should excite in people's minds (April 16th). Such was the array of means by which Jesus thought (and thought not wrong) to convert and revolutionise society. Surely, if weaklings such as these could, in God's power, accomplish the changes which history records and which our eyes behold, the work of evangelising the world needs not the shows of outward grandeur; and surely, too, wherever God's power dwells with men, there, how weak or despised soever, they will prove mighty and irresistible in his cause. The possession of that power it is which alone fits ordinary men for the work of the ministry,' and places them in a line with the apostles (Mark vi. 6—13; Luke ix. 1—6).

The deeds of Jesus reached the ears of Herod Antipas. The cruel tyrant became haunted by his fears. His conscience, not wholly extinct, and his imagination, too active and very morbid, caused him sore distress. He had unjustly beheaded John. Superstition lent its aid. There was a current notion that dead persons returned to earth in other bodies. Jesus, he hence fancied, was only John in a new shape, and might be expected to take speedy vengeance. Guilt is the parent of guilt. The slayer of John may have fixed his hope of safety in slaying Jesus. Perhaps rumours to this effect may have been afloat. Certainly the apostles appear to have immediately returned; and with them Jesus, without delay, departed by ship into a desert. Our Lord hastened down to Capernaum, where he was in the midst of friends, and thence at once passed over the lake into the territory of the mild Philip, and so put himself beyond the jurisdiction of Herod (Matt. xiv. 1-13; Mark vi. 14—33; Luke ix. 7—11; John vi. Ì—4). It was near Bethsaida Julias that Jesus sought refuge (April 17). As was natural, great numbers followed him. The evening approached, and food was necessary. The want being urgent, the Son of him who gave Israel manna, and daily makes the earth produce corn, and the corn minister strength to man, employed his divine power to feed five thousand persons. Yet, with a frugality which is equally divine with his bounty, he commanded the fragments of the meal to be gathered up. How often should we find the fragments of our substantial fare, as in the case before us, exceed that fare itself, had we eyes to see and hands to gather up the fragments of happiness, of usefulness, of succour, which lie around us, dropped from that 'feast of fat things' which the great Host every day lays out before his guests! Ere this high moral frugality can be learnt, however, those who abound and those who suffer want must learn to avoid waste in things pertaining to the body. Every thing that has use and is not used is wasted. Men waste by eating and drinking more than they need; by possessing more than they can well employ or

properly superintend; by appropriating to themselves sources of pleasure for which they have no capacity or no relish; and by keeping from others that which others could turn to good account for themselves or for society (Matt. xiv. 14—21; Mark vi. 34—–— 44; Luke ix. 12-17; John vi. 5—15).

This miracle astounded the minds of the persons who witnessed it. The evidence which it afforded them of the Messiahship of Jesus, they judged to be unanswerable. And with their material conceptions of the Messiah, they were ready to take Jesus by force, and make him a king.' Thus, having just escaped from Herod, he found himself in danger from his mistaken friends. There was no resource but flight; and, accordingly, he departed again into the neighbouring uplands, where he could find security in solitude (John vi. 14-16), having first directed the disciples to cross to Capernaum (John vi. 17).

While engaged in prayer to his heavenly Father, Jesus appears to have become aware that a storm had suddenly risen. Descending, he approached the borders of the lake, where he beheld the vessel in the midst of the sea' (Mark vi. 47), borne away by the waves (Matt. xiv. 24). Immediately he proceeded to the vessel and calmed the tempest. The port was speedily and safely reached (Matt. xiv. 22—34; Mark vi. 45—53; John vi. 16-21).

This event has afforded great difficulty to those who have vainly tried to explain our Lord's miracles from purely ordinary causes. The prevalent representation is, that by walking on the sea is meant walking on the sea-shore; as if Jesus, by walking on the sea-shore, could have occasioned fear to the mariners, or been by them received into the vessel. In such attempts, the sole effort is to make the New Testament speak the language of a favourite philosophy. This is not to explain, but to explain away, the Scriptures. No unprejudiced reader can doubt that the writers of the narratives of the event before us, really intended to say that Jesus walked on the bosom of the lake, and that so walking he bore aid to his alarmed friends, and stilled the tempest. If men can or will not receive the statements, let them rather refuse than distort and pervert the testimony. False friends are more dangerous than open foes.*

The next day (Passover, 18 April, 782) Jesus was visited by some of those who were around him at Bethsaida. Their eagerness to be with him arose from the love, not of truth, but gain. So worldly were their views, that it became necessary to repel

* See the whole fully expounded, and the rationalistic perversions of it exposed, in the second publication of 'The Library of Christian Literature' before referred to. See also the localities and the track of the vessel described in the Map of the Lake of Galilee, in the author's 'Biblical Atlas.'

them. Jesus spoke to them of his high spiritual doctrines, until at last they took offence. There were even disciples who abandoned Jesus. He was a mystery to them. They had seen his works, it is true; but they had also seen how he had refused the very dignity to which he seemed aspiring. If he were the Messiah, why did he not enter into his glory? Instead of doing so, he had just declared that his disciples must eat his flesh and drink his blood (53, seq.). Was he, as had been affirmed, out of his right mind? The whole, to their carnal tempers, was inexplicable. They withdrew. Perhaps even among the twelve some tokens of surprise had been manifested. Jesus asked, 'Will ye also go away?' Peter, first in profession and first in flight, declared his and their conviction that Jesus was the Messiah. He, who knew the heart, and was aware how weak as yet Peter's was, received the confession with a distinct assertion that one of them was an enemy (Matt. xiv. 35, 36; Mark vi. 54-56; John vi. 22, seq.).

On the dark wave of Galilee

The gloom of twilight gathers fast,
And o'er the waters drearily

Sweeps the bleak evening blast.

The weary bird hath left the air,
And sunk into his shelter'd nest;
The wandering beast hath sought his lair,
And laid him down to welcome rest.

Still near the lake, with weary tread,
Lingers a form of human kind;
And from his lone, unshelter'd head,
Flows the chill night-damp on the wind.

Why seeks he not a home of rest?

Why seeks he not the pillow'd bed?
Beasts have their dens, the bird its nest,-
He hath not where to lay his head!

Such was the lot he freely chose,

To bless, to save the human race;
And through his poverty there flows
A rich, full stream of heavenly grace.

PART IV.

COMPRISING EVENTS FROM THE SECOND TO THE THIRD PASSOVER.

CHAPTER I.

JESUS ESCAPES ACROSS THE COUNTRY TO SYROPHENICIA.

THE Passover was now again being celebrated in Jerusalem, but Jesus went not thither. With characteristic silence, the evangelists pass over the circumstance without mentioning the fact or assigning the reason. Only John remarks (vii. 1), ‘After these things, Jesus walked in Galilee; for he would not walk in Jewry (Judah), because the Jews sought to kill him ;' where it is implied that our Lord kept at a distance from the metropolis and its great festival, in order to avoid the premature death which awaited him in Jerusalem.

In truth, the authorities of that guilty city had never lost sight of their victim. Expecting that Jesus would appear at the Passover, they may have formed a plot to entrap and destroy him. When, however, they found that Jesus kept in Galilee, where he was beyond their jurisdiction, they sent thither Scribes and Pharisees, in the hope that they might detect something which should further their wicked ends. Their messengers, accordingly, repair to Capernaum. Doubtless these emissaries made every inquiry which malice could suggest, in order to find something of weight against Jesus. In vain. All they could discover was, that some of his disciples did not always conform to the traditional usage of washing their hands before they took food. A slight fault was better than none; and so, furnished with this accusation, they went to Jesus to ask an explanation. Jesus

knew what they had designed, how they had failed, and what their present purpose was. And well did he lay bare their baseness and hypocrisy-so well, that if they had any feelings as men left, they must have been ashamed of their dishonourable errand. True enough it was that they did not fail to wash before they ate. What then? This was but to observe a human tradition; and while they were scrupulous in this trifling custom, they, under pious pretences, broke the law of God, by dishonouring father and mother, and abandoning them in want. Not content with unveiling them to their own face, Jesus exposed their hollowness and turpitude to the people, showing the latter the difference between the outward pretences of their spiritual teachers, and the inward reality and power of true religion (Matt. xv. 1—20; Mark vii. 1-23).

Who can refuse his sympathy to Jesus in this work of exposure? So to strip baseness naked was an act worthy of God's messenger and representative. Jesus sent these vile men back to their employers, defeated and disgraced, with their errand unaccomplished. The perfect man is great in strength to rebuke wickedness, as well as rich in mercy to succour the distressed, and noble in purpose to resign all for God and duty. But never before or since were strength, gentleness, love, and self-oblivion, found in one person, in measures so ample and in proportions so harmonised.

Leaving Capernaum, Jesus went across the country into Syropheni'cia. Safety seems to have been his object; for we read that on his arrival he entered into a house, and would have no one know' (Mark vii. 24). If he wished to avoid snares laid for him by the Jews, he could not do better than repair to Syrophenicia, which was beyond their jurisdiction (Matt. xv. 21-28; Mark vii. 24-30).

Syropheni'cia in the time of Christ bore the designation of Pheni'cia (palm-land). It had been conquered by the Syrian kings and made a part of their dominions. When the Romans became masters, it was incorporated with their province of Syria. It contained the narrow line of coast which, beginning just above the stream Eleu'therus, ran along Lebanon and Galilee, as far south as Ptolema'is (Acco, St. Jean d'Acre). The territory is hilly and well watered. Worth mentioning is the river Ado'nis, now called Nahr Ibrahim, or Abraham's river, which at certain seasons flows with red water, coloured by the soil over which it runs in coming down from Mount Lebanon. Hence arose the fable that it bore the blood of Adonis, wounded in the high lands by a boar-an event which the Syrian damsels bewailed every spring with rites that were as superstitious as they were unclean. This Adonis was the Tammuz of Ezekiel (viii. 14).

Pheni'cia was a prolific land. Even in winter fruits grow and flourish which can endure no cold. Its fruitfulness, aided by its