XIII. THE CHAPTER OF THE GOOD SAMARITAN.

MAN is never found more worthless

than when he boasts of his own dignity; nor more foolish, than when he is proud of his own wisdom. While he saith I am rich, and have need of nothing, God tells him, that he is poor and miserable, and blind and naked. How different are the sentiments of God and Man, when man himself is the subject! So low and wretched is the condition of man by his natural birth in sin, that sometimes he is said to be sick with sin, sometimes to be dead in it, sometimes to be possessed by it, like a man who is raving with an evil spirit.

No words can be too strong to paint the misery of man in this world of sin and sorrow, and the dangers to which hẹ is exposed of perishing here and hereafter. No language can be too exalted to describe the goodness and mercy which from the heaven above hath looked

looked down upon our lost condition, and brought us to a state of health and safety under the terms of the Gospel. Nothing can be plainer than the duty arising from these considerations. If God hath so saved us, we ought also to save one, another if we can. He who is thus wonderfully delivered, must have neither sense nor godliness, unless he is disposed to acts of kindness towards his suffering neighbour in all his wants and afflictions. When Jesus Christ had represented this case to one who consulted him; Go, said he, and do thou like wise.

Such is the doctrine, and such the duty set before us in the parable of the Samaritan. There we learn that a man was nce in Jerusalem, the holy city, and went down from thence to Jericho, a city under a curse from God for the sin of its inhabitants: that, in the way from the one to the other, he fell into the hands of the destroyer; who, like a

obber on the road, stripped him of his raiment of innocence and righteousness, and wounded him, so as to leave him half dead; dead in the spirit, hus better part.

part. We learn, farther, that when the Priest and the Levite (all the religious ministrations of man) see him lying in this condition, they must pass by and leave him as they find him: for the blood of bulls and of goats, which they offer, cannot take away sin. But when the Priest and the Levite are gone by, then, that which they could not do is done by him who cometh after the law, and is the end of it for righteousness: who, while upon this work of saving mankind, was reviled as a Samaritan, and hated as an alien; yet in that Samaritan so hated and reviled, we see and acknowledge the Saviour of the world. He finds the poor wounded traveller lying helpless upon this earth, and has compassion on him. He pours oil and wine into his wounds; the oil of the Holy Spirit, which healeth our infirmities, and the blood of redemption, which cleanseth us from all sin. Then he raises him up, sets him on his own beast, (humbles himself that man may be exalted) and removes him to a place of reception, even to his Church, which; like an Inn, admits all that are brought

into

into it. There the Host, who is the minister of God, is under a charge to take care of him, and is supplied with every thing necessary to restore him, and complete the cure. When our Samaritan shall come again this way, as he hath promised to do, then, at his second coming, he will reckon with the host, and repay him, and every man, according to his works.

O Lord, if I am this man, so fallen, and so raised up, grant that I may know myself and thee; my own misery, and thy goodness. Let not any false doctrines of human pride keep me ignorant of myself, nor any pleasures of the world tempt me to neglect so great a salvation; that, having received the blessings of thy visitation, and followed thy example in doing good according to my ability, I may be rewarded by thy mercy out of thy heavenly treasure; for I believe that thou shalt come again according to thy promise, to repay me and every man for what we shall have done, in all those things, and toward all those persons, which thou hast commit. bed to our charge, Amen.

THE QUESTIONS.

Q. What do we learn from the parable of the good Samaritan?

A. The fall of man, and his salvation, and our own duty.

Q. How is his fall signified?

A. As a going down from Jerusalem to Jericho.

Q. What is Jerusalem ?!

A. The holy city, or life of paradise.
Q. What is Jericho?

A. A city under a curse, like this world of sin.

Q. What is it to go down from Jerusalem to Jericho ?

A. To depart from Paradise into this world.

Y. What happens to man in the way from one to the other?

A. He falls among thieves.

Q: Who are they?

A. The devil and all evil spirits.
Q. What do they do to him?

A. They strip him of his raiment.

Q. What