The following was his expostulation with the people for not using their reason in discovering that he was the Messiah. "When ye see a cloud rise out of the west, straightway ye say, There cometh a shower and so it is. And when ye see the south wind blow, ye say, There will be heat and it cometh to pass. Ye hypocrites, ye can discern the face of the sky and of the earth: but how is it that ye do not discern this time? Yea and why even of yourselves judge ye not what is right ?"

When the Pharisees arraigned the conduct of the disciples, in satisfying their hunger by plucking and eating ears of corn on the sabbath, he defended it by a variety of arguments. ❝d Have ye not read what David did when he hungered, and they that were with him how he entered into the house of God, and did eat the shewbread, which was not lawful for him to eat, neither for them who were with him, but only for the priests? Or, have ye not read in the law, that on the sabbath day the priests in the temple profane the sabbath, and are blameless? But I say unto you, that in this place is one greater than the temple." [These therefore, who attend on me, are still more free than those who attend on the temple.] " The sabbath was made for man, and not man for the sabbath." " But if ye had known what this meaneth, I will have mercy and not sacrifice, [if ye had duly considered that a tender regard to the wants and infirmities of men is of more value in the sight of God than a

Luke xii. 54-7. Matt. xvi. 2, 4.

•Mark ii. 27. f was appointed for his benefit.

d Matt. xii. 3-6.

Matt, xii. 7, 8.

strict observance of his positive institutions,] ye would not have condemned the guiltless. For [these are my disciples: they act under the authority of a prophet who has power to regulate the observance of the sabbath :] the Son of man is Lord even of the sabbath day."

When the Scribes and Pharisees murmured against him and his disciples for eating and drinking with Publicans and Sinners in the house of Matthew, his convincing reply was; "They that are whole need not a physician, but they that are sick. But go ye and learn what that meaneth, I will have mercy and not sacrifice. [Now reforming sinners is the greatest act of mercy; and it is part of my office :] for I came not to call the righteous, but sinners, to repentance." And on another occasion he spake three parables in vindication of a like conduct; shewing the fitness of it from hence, that there was joy in heaven over repenting sinners, and that God readily embraced such with the arms of his mercy.

In the last instance but one there is a link omitted in the chain of reasoning. We may observe a like manner of speaking in another place. "Whosoever will come after me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross and follow me. [And this is your true interest.] For whosoever desireth to save his life, shall lose it; but whosoever shall lose his life for my sake and the gospel's, the same shall save it.

i Luke xv.

* Mark viii. 34, 35, 36.

h Matt. ix. 12, 13. 'Those who sought to save their lives at the time of the Roman war by deserting Christ, lost them: but those who adhered to Christ, though they seemed to endanger their lives from their persecutors in fact preserved them by leaving Jerusalem before the siege.

[And life is the most valuable consideration.]

For

what shall it profit a man, if he shall gain the whole world, and lose his own life? or what shall a man give in exchange for his life ?"

When the disciples of John and of the Pharisees asked him why his disciples fasted not, he benevolently and wisely answered; "Can" the children of the bride chamber fast, while the bridegroom is with them? As long as they have the bridegroom with them they cannot fast. But the days will come when the bridegroom shall be taken away from them; and then shall they fast in those days." "And he spake also a parable unto them: No man putteth a piece of a new garment upon an old: else both the new maketh a rent, and the piece that was taken out of the new agreeth not with the old. And no man putteth new wine into old bottles: else the new wine will burst the bottles, and be spilled, and the bottles 'shall perish. But new wine must be put into new bottles, and both are preserved. No man also, having drunk old wine, straightway desireth new : for he saith, The old is better." The force of the reasoning is: The days of mourning must come after my departure; and therefore I will not anticipate them. Besides, it is not fit that rigorous moral discipline should be prescribed to new converts; or that my hearers should be discouraged by the forbidding aspect of my religion. When my doctrines are fully known and attentively considered, human prudence,

Mark ii. 19, 20.

"The children of the bride chamber are the • Luke v. 36-9. P Perire solent.

guests invited to the marriage feast.

assisted by them, will be enabled to dictate proper rules of self denial.

When the Scribes and Pharisees asked him, in the synagogue, whether it were lawful to heal a man with a withered hand on the sabbath, he thus appealed to their feelings and understanding: "Is it law. ful to do good on the sabbath day, or to do evil? to save life, or to kill ?" " What man shall there be among you that shall have one sheep; and if it fall into a pit on the sabbath day, will he not lay hold of it, and lift it out? How much then is a man better than a sheep? Wherefore it is lawful to do good on the sabbath day." And he argued in like manner, when the ruler of the synagogue was moved with indignation at his restoring on the sabbath a woman "who had been bowed together, and could in no wise lift up herself," for a long course of years. "Thou hypocrite, doth not each of you on the sab. bath loose his ox or his ass from the stall, and lead him away to watering? And ought not this woman, being a daughter of Abraham, whom Satan hath bound lo these eighteen years, to be loosed from this bond on the sabbath day," And he thus vindicated his miracle at the pool of Bethesda: "Moses gave

t

Matt. xii. 11, 12.

• Luke xiii. 15, 16.

¶ Mark iii. 4. The authorities for omitting v. 4. of John, c. v. may be seen in Wetstein, and in Kuster's edit. of Mill in loc. and proleg. 433, and præf. p, 5, I add that cod. Brix. in Blanchini's evang. quadr. omits this verse: though against this omission some remarks may be found in the proleg. to that work, p. 22. The close of this verse does not resemble St. John's style; and contains two words which do not occur elsewhere in the New Testament. I am strongly inclined to omit the verse, and, with Theophylact and Hammond, to attribute the quality of the water

you circumcision, and ye on the sabbath circumcise a man." If a man on the sabbath day receive cir

to the blood and entrails of the beasts slain in the temple at the Jewish festivals. Maundrel says that the place shewn for Bethesda is contig uous to the area of the temple. Journey 6th ed. p. 108. The word Bethesda is usually derived from on fa domus misericordiæ; but its etymology may be domus effusionis : for is effudit in Chald. and Syr. The blood, &c. of the victims may therefore have been conducted off, from the place of slaying the beasts in the temple, to this pool: and the multitude may have supposed its healing quality greater and more general than it really was. The former part of o. 7. may refer to the latter part of v. 3; if indeed this clause is to be retained. Otherwise it alludes to a well known fact at the time, that the virtue of the water began when it was disturbed by the usual influx. And danes in the latter part of v. 7. may signify plurally, as v. 43. and 1 Cor. iii. 10. "Others prevent me: some one or other of the crowd continues to obstruct me, till the waters lose their quality, or till the place is full. I have no friend to bring me forward soon enough." Wolfius, curæ phil. in loc. mentions the derivation from , and says; ita statuit Bochartus ii. 614, Wagenseilius in notis ad Sota, p. 308, cum Calvino, Gomaro, aliisque : aquas præterea iilas eas fuisse autumat, quibus sacerdotes manus suas pedesque aut victimas abluerent, et quæ elabro æneo quotidie evacuabantur, ex templo manantes, et hinc in urbe alicubi stagnantes. Non alienus hinc est Adrian Relandus in Palestina, p. 857. Posset, inquit is, aliquis suspicari, aquas quæ lavandis victimis inservierunt in conclavi lavantium, collectas fuisse certo loco, et illas pro sanctis habitas, adeoque salubribus. Reland quotes Eusebius's Onomasticon as saying that "one of the two lakes of Bethesda had uncommonly red water, and retained a trace, as was reported of the victims which were formerly cleansed in it; for which reason it is called the sheep pool, on account of the sacrifices." And he also quotes these words from Jerom: alter [lacus,] mirum in modum rubens, quasi cruentis aquis antiqui in se operis signa testatur. Nam hostias in eo lavari a sacerdotibus solitas ferunt, unde et nomen accepit. * John vii. 22, 3. Ala TTO may very well be joined to the preceding verse. Some think that it may be rendered, As to this matter. See Mark xii. 24. Grotius supplies, Propterea audite quod dicam. It seems probable that the words, (not that it is of Moses, but of the fathers,) are a gloss inserted in the text,