known and professed that thou hast delegated to me every part of the office which I execute°: 8. for in truth what I have taught them is thy doctrine: and they have embraced it; and have been fully convinced of

my heavenly missionP. 9. I pray for them; I pray not

20.

for the world, for the wicked Jews who reject thee See Jo. xvi. and me, and who have too much hardened their hearts to be capable of believing and acting as they ought: but I pray for those disciples whom thou hast given me: and their relation to thee, as thy servants, is one ground of my supplication: for though thou hast given them to me, as subjects of my mediatorial kingdom, they are still thine: 10. and whatever is mine is thine, as the original giver; and whatever is thine is mine, by thy unbounded communications; and by these thy gifts I am glorified as Messiah. II. And since I can be no longer in the world to instruct and support my disciples, and these will remain exposed to its trials, and I depart to thee; I beseech thee, holy Father, to keep in the profession and practice of thy religion those whom thou hast given me, that they may be one in cooperation and affection, as we are one'. 12. While I was with them in the world, I kept them in thy true religion: I preserved those whom thou gavest me, and none of them has fallen from duty so as to be ever

lastingly destroyeds, but Judas, who deservedly inherits destruction, and whose conduct has fulfilled the scrip

Jo. xiii. 18. ture, "He that eateth bread with me hath lifted up his heel against me.” 13. But now I leave them and depart to thee; and I offer up this prayer in their presence, that I may give them abundant joy on account of my departure to thee, who wilt grant my petitions. 14. I have taught them thy doctrine; and the evil world hath hated them, because, like me, they are not of the world, nor conformed to it. 15. I pray not that

thou wouldest remove them out of the world; but
that thou wouldest make them instruments of the
greatest good to mankind, and heirs of salvation, by
preserving them from the power of the evil one.
16. Grant that they may persevere in their present dis-
positions: for now they are not of this evil world, even
as I am not of this evil world. 17. Sanctify their minds
by thy true doctrine: for thy word, as delivered by me,
is true doctrine. 18. They are commissioned by me,
as I was by thee: 19. and for their benefit I offer my-
self a holy sacrifice, that they also may be holy by my
doctrine thus enforced. 20. But I pray not for these
only: I pray also for all believers in me through their
doctrine: 21. that they may be all united in love and
good works; as thou, Father, art united with me, and
I with thee: that they, being thus in union with us,
may be also in union among themselves, and may con-
firm men in the belief of my divine mission.
22. And
I have given to them the glory of spiritual gifts, of that
preternatural knowledge and power which thou hast

s There is much more elegance in the Greek οὐδεὶς ἐξ αὐτῶν ἀπώλετο, εἰ μὴ ὁ υἱὸς τῆς ἀπωλείας, than in the English version, None of them is lost, but the son of per

dition.

t He guards against a misconception of ἐκ τοῦ κόσμου in the preceding verse. See Grot.

communicated to me, that they may be united, as we are; 23. I dwelling in them, and thou in me: that, I say, they may be in perfect union; and that mankind may know that thou hast sent me, and hast shown them the distinguished love which thou hast shown me. 24. O Father, I desire of thee that these whom thou hast given me may be with me in heaven, to see my glory which thou hast bestowed on me; for thou lovedst me of old before the foundation of the world. 25. O righteous Father, the world hath not known thee; but I have known thee, and these also have known that thou hast sent me. 26. And I have made known unto them thy perfections and thy will, and shall further make them known by the effusion of the Spirit; that thy love towards me may rest on them, and that I may be always with them.

The prayer used by our Lord during his agony is recorded by three of the evangelists": "O my Father, all things that are fit and right are possible with thee: if it be agreeable to thy will and wisdom, remove from me this bitter and deadly cup... Nevertheless, not my will, but thine be done. O my Father, if this cup may not pass from me, but that I drink it, thy will be done."

66

While the nails were piercing Jesus's hands and feet, he thus prayed for his crucifiers : Father, forgive Luk. xxiii. them; for they know not what they do."

And on the cross he thus addressed God with a loud voice, immediately before he expired: "Father, into thy hands I commend my spirit *."

Our Lord's perseverance in prayer is observable. St. Luke records of him that, before he chose the

u Matt. xxvi. 39, &c. and parallel places.

* Luke xxiii. 46. Παραθήσομαι

is the future for the present, in
the Hebrew manner.

34.

Luk. vi. 12. twelve, he "went out into a mountain to pray, and continued all night in prayer to God." And when he had sent away a great multitude whom he had fed with a few loaves and fishes, we likewise read that he retired to a mountain, and continued in prayer from the evening to the fourth watch of the night". Thus did our Lord converse with his heavenly Father when he could no longer converse with men, when he had no infirmities to heal, no errors to correct, no vices to reprove; and make an entire dedication of himself to the service of God and of man, by gloriously running an unwearied course of piety and benevolence.

Chiefly occupying such large portions of time in prayer were acts of the holy and heavenly Founder of our religion in extraordinary and peculiar circumstances; and can very rarely be the duty of his disciples. In general, as the pious and admirable bishop Taylor justly observes a, his piety was "without affrightment of precedent, or prodigious instances of actions greater than the imitation of men.-The instances of

y It is shown by J. Mede, Disc. xviii, that πроσeʊxǹ is sometimes used for locus Judæorum ubi orant, as the Scholiast on Juv. iii. 296 explains it. But I think that the word has not this signification Acts xvi. 13, or elsewhere in the New Testament. I doubt whether a proseucha would have been erected on a mountain; because it could not conveniently be frequented in such a situation, and because high places were formerly infamous for idolatrous rites. IIpoσευχὴ Θεοῦ as easily signifes prayer to God, as πίστις Ἰησοῦ Χριστοῦ faith in Jesus Christ. Rom. iii. 22, 26; Gal. ii. 16; iii. 22, or

it were actions of a very holy but of an ordinary life; and we may observe this difference in the story of Jesus from ecclesiastical writings of certain beatified persons, whose life is told rather to amaze us, and to create scruples, than to lead us in the evenness and security of a holy conscience."

I shall conclude this subject with observing that our Lord's life not only furnishes an eminent example of piety, but a great incitement to it. Signal instances of divine interpositions were vouchsafed to him during the time of prayer. At his baptism, as he prayed the heavens were opened, the Spirit visibly descended on Luk. iii. 21. him, and a voice from heaven pronounced him the beloved Son of God, in whom he was well pleased. And on mount Tabor, while he prayed, his countenance was Luk. ix. 29. changed and shone as the sun, Moses and Elias appeared to him, and a voice from the excellent glory again bare him testimony. And when he prayed, "Father, glorify thy name;" there came a voice from Jo. xii. 28. heaven, "I have both glorified it, and will glorify it again.”

SECT. II. Of our Lord's benevolence.

TILLOTSON has justly observed that "our Lord was a pattern both of the contemplative and active life, shows us how to mix these to the greatest advantage, and by his own example teaches us that we cannot serve God better than by doing good to men." His benevolence, which is the second virtue in rank after piety, was wonderful and unexampled. Though he was rich in the glories of his divine nature, yet for our 2 Cor.viii. 9.

in all that part of his life in which he is so proposed, we meet with nothing like it; but, as his instructions and rules of life were plain and intelligible, so the in

stances of his piety and virtue
were natural and imitable." Brad-
ford's Boyle's Lectures, fol. i. 487.

fol.

c Serm. on I Pet. ii. 21, p. 224.