SECT. VI. That our Lord's instructions frequently sprang out of the occasion: and that his images were drawn from familiar objects. It is observable of our Lord's discourse, that it is often suggested by accidental objects, and arises in the most easy and natural manner from present or recent occasions and circumstances. This topic has been discussed by very sagacious and diligent writers, who have left little to be supplied, and have sometimes strained a true hypothesis beyond its just limits. I shall enumerate such instances as appear to be well founded. The temple was the scene of the transaction, when Jesus thus answered the Jews who asked of him a sign: "Destroy this temple," pointing to his body, in which Jo. ii. 19. dwelt all the fulness of the godhead, "and in three Col. ii. 9. days I will raise it up." * Within the precincts of the same building, in erecting which stones of great magnitude and beauty had been used, our Lord said to the chief priests and elders, "The stone which the builders rejected, the same is Luk. xx.17, c Sir Isaac Newton on Daniel, p. 148. Lond. 1733. Bp. Law's Considerations, &c. p. 229, 3rd edit. Benson's Life of Christ, P. 379. Jortin on the Christian Religion, 3rd edit. 229, &c. Bp. Newton's Works, 4o. iii. 281. "I freely acknowledge," says Whiston, "that sir I. Newton's observation, how Christ in his parabolical discourses was wont to allude to things present, is, though not an entirely new, yet a very true, and, as here more fully than anywhere else insisted on, a very curious observation: and I further take the liberty to men tion this rule, as that by which d So Ter. Andr. ii. i. 12: Tu, * In this and the next section the asterisk is prefixed to the author's own illustrations of the general remark. 18. become the head of the corner. Whosoever shall fall on that stone shall be broken; but on whomsoever it shall fall, it will grind him to powder." To Nicodemus, who came to him by night, our Lord observed, that "men loved darkness rather than light, because their deeds were evil e." At Jacob's well in Samaria, Jesus, having asked drink of a Samaritan woman, went on to represent his doctrine under the image of living, that is, flowing, or Jo. iv. 10, perpetually springing water: and added, "Whosoever shall drink of the water that I shall give him shall never thirst; but the water that I shall give him shall be in him a well of water springing up into everlasting life." 14. Ver. 31,32, 34. At the same time "his disciples prayed him, saying, Master, eat. But he said unto them, I have meat to eat that ye know not of.... My meat is to do the will of him that sent me, and to finish his work." It is also highly probable that it was seedtime, when, during the course of this transaction, he thus addressed Ver. 35-37. his disciples: "Say ye not, There are yet four months, and then cometh harvest? behold, I say unto you, Lift up your eyes, and look on the fields; for they are white already to harvest. And he that reapeth receiveth wages, and gathereth fruit unto everlasting life: that both he that soweth and he that reapeth may rejoice together. And herein is that saying true, One soweth, and another reapeth." Simon and Andrew his brother were employed in their occupation as fishermen, and astonishment had seized them at the wonderful draught of fishes which Mat. iv. 19. they had taken, when Jesus thus called them: "Follow me, and I will make you to become fishers of men:" Mar. i. 17. e John iii. 19. istry, p. 67. Randolph's View of our blessed Saviour's Min and when in particular he said to Simon, who, agreeably to the warmth of his feelings, might most strongly express his admiration, "Fear not, from henceforth Luk. v. 10. thou shalt catch men.' "From his power exerted in raising the impotent man, our Lord makes an easy transition to his power of raising the dead; and from thence takes occasion to Jo.v.21,25. instruct the Jews in the doctrine of a general resurrec tion and future judgment." iv. 1. Mat. It must also be observed, that our Lord was addressing fishermen when he said, "What man is there Mat.vii. 10. among you, of whom if his son ask a fish, will he give him a serpent?" And that he was speaking to the See Mar. same hearers, immediately after sitting in a ship and xiii. 36. teaching the multitude that stood on the shore, when he compared his kingdom to "a net that was cast into Mat. xiii. the sea, and gathered of every kind: which, when it was full, they drew to shore, and sat down, and collected the good into vessels, but cast the bad away.” 47, 48. Maundrels informs us that not far from the mount of beatitudes was the city of Bethulia, which stood on a very eminent and conspicuous mountain. Our Lord might therefore direct the eye to it, when he said, “A Mat. v. 14. city that is set on a hill cannot be hidden." It has been further supposed that he might observe husbandmen manuring the soil with that material when he called his disciples the "salt of the earth :" and that he Ver. 13. might point to the objects themselves when he bade them "behold the fowls of the air," and "consider the Mat. vi. 26, lilies of the field;" when he instructed them to judge of false prophets as of trees, by the fruits which they Mat. vii. 16, brought forth; and when he compared hearers and 17, 24, 26, doers of his word to houses founded on a rock, and 28. 27. f Randolph's View, &c. 93. P. 115, edit. 6. Oxf. NEWCOME. G 27. forgetful hearers of it to ruinous houses which had been erected on the sand. We find the same exhortation from the fowls of the Luk. xii. 24, air and the lilies of the field repeated, when the words were probably spoken in Capernaum, or between that place and the adjoining lake. We have not sufficient Mat. xiii. 2. grounds to fix the time of this repetition; Jesus's teach ing from a ship being an equivocal mark in such a Mar. iv. 37. country as Galilee, and the tempest, which immediately succeeded, being no less so, in a lake surrounded with mountains, like that of Tiberias. It seems plain, from the series of events in the gospel history, that the discourse on the mount was delivered soon after the second passover in Christ's ministry, and perhaps about a month after the vernal equinox. But yet I incline to think that the general scene of the transaction, and the usual occupations of the Jews in their fields, vineyards, and gardens of herbs, suggested some of the images which are ingeniously supposed to have arisen, not from familiar but from present objects. Mat. viii. Mat. xii. 47-50. *On healing the servant of a centurion, who, though a Gentile, was more eminent for a rational faith in Jesus than the Jews, our Lord foretold the admission of many Gentiles into the kingdom of heaven, and the exclusion and punishment of the unbelieving Jews. When our Lord compared the progressive guilt of the Jews to the malady of a demoniac returning on him with sevenfold fury, it is ingeniously remarked, "that he did not introduce this comparison abruptly, but soon after curing a demoniac, who perhaps was then standing before him.” When one said to him, “Behold, thy mother and thy brethren stand without, desiring to speak with thee; he answered, Who is my mother? and who are my h See Farmer on the Demoniacs, p. 330. Matt. xii. 22, 43, 44, 45. brethren? And he stretched forth his hands toward his disciples, and said, Behold my mother and my brethren! For whosoever shall do the will of my Father who is in heaven, the same is my brother, and sister, and mother." Sir Isaac Newton, and many after him, have supposed that the parable of a sower going forth to sow Mat. xiii. was spoken during seedtime, about the month of No- 3, &c. vember: and the series of events does not contradict the supposition. When one of our Lord's disciples excused himself from becoming his immediate and constant attendant, by saying, "Lord, suffer me first to go and bury my Mat.viii. 21. father;" to wait for his death, which in the course of nature cannot be distant; "Jesus said to him, Let the Luk. ix. 60. dead bury their dead;" let the spiritually dead, thy brethren or thy kinsfolk, perform this office: "but go thou and preach the kingdom of God." ..... 35, 51. In allusion to the miracle of feeding a great multitude with five loaves and two fishes, and to the attendance of the multitude that their returning wants might be again supplied, our Lord said to the people the next day, "Labour not for the meat which perish- Jo. vi. 27, eth, but for that meat which endureth unto everlasting life, which the Son of man shall give unto you. I am the bread of life: he that cometh to me shall never hunger; and he that believeth on me shall never thirst." And afterwards in the synagogue: "I am the living bread which came down from heaven: if any man eat of this bread, he shall live for ever: and the bread that I will give is my flesh, which I will give for the life of the world." *Immediately after the Pharisees had censured his disciples for eating with unwashen hands, our Lord, Mar. vii. 2. referring to Pharisaical ablutions and fear of outward |