the people, and that he gave the Twelve authority to do the same words which plainly exclude a curious selection of objects. If we allow ourselves to expatiate in the fields of imagination,

W

Fertur equis auriga, neque audit currus habenas. Virg. For instance: by healing a paralytic, or a leper, our Lord shews that his doctrine will remove corresponding deseases of the soul; his stilling the waves signifies his victory over the madness of the people; and his walking on them, the progress of his gospel, and its crossing the ocean to the remotest lands; interpretations which Jortin has actually given. In like manner we might go on to allegorize the raising of the dead, the healing of the diseased, and the ' feeding of the hungry, by the prophets under the law and, particularly, the multiplication of oil by Elisha might be said to foreshew the future large effusion of the Spirit; and his removing the effect of poisonous herbs, shred into pottage, might be considered as aptly expressing the power of God's word to counteract sin, the poison of the soul, or, as prefiguring that the disciples of the Messiah should drink any deadly thing and it should not hurt them. From thus commenting on the miracles at large, we shall come to a fanciful explanation of each circumstance. Thus Victor Antiochenus says that our Lord gradually restored sight to the blind man near Bethsaida, to signify that men did not at once emerge from the darkness of ignorance, but were by degrees

2

w 1 Kings xvii. 21. 2 Kings iv. 35. 1 Kings xvii. 16. 2 Kings iv. 44.

A. D. 401.

z ib. 41.

See Lucas Brugensis on Mark viii. 24.

* ib. v. 14. xx. 7.

. He lived

enlightened with a clear knowledge of gospel mysteries. b Grotius also thought that the twelve baskets of fragments, gathered after miraculously feeding the five thousand, answered to the twelve apostles; and in his note on our Lord's act of spreading clay over the eyes of a blind man, he has this mystical remark: Homini, non tantum suapte natura non inest vis cognoscendi per se ea quæ divina sunt et spiritualia; sed et, quia ex luto factus est, affectus habet luteos qui ipsum impediunt. 1 Cor. ii. 14." And, for aught I know, some commentator, trained in the school of Cocceius or Hutchinson, may have interpreted the seven baskets of fragments, taken up when the four thousand were fed, as signifying the seven spirits of God. Criticisms of this kind might well have been passed over in silence, if love of novelty or ostentation of ingenuity had not sometimes, though very rarely, led men of the first names to authorize them: however it is impossible to establish a taste for them in an age when the best writings of antiquity are so constantly read, and the rules of sound interpretation are so well understood. But to go on.

When the disciples asked Jesus who was the greatest in the kingdom of heaven, he did not barely recommend an humble unambitious spirit in general terms, but gave an energy to his words by placing an example of it before his disciples. "a He called a little child unto him, and set him in the midst of them, and said, Verily I say unto you, Unless ye

On John vi. 12.

с Rev. iv. 5. v. 6.

d Matt. xviii. 2, 3, 4

be converted, and become as little children, ye shall not enter into the kingdom of heaven. Whosoever therefore shall humble himself as this little child, the same is greatest in the kingdom of heaven."

h

с

f

When our Lord approached Jerusalem at the last passover, he "knew all things that should come upon him :" that the fame of his raising Lazarus from the dead would cause the great multitude which crowded into the city at that season to meet him with branches of palm trees, the ensigns of triumph; that they would shew him the greatest honour by 1 strewing their garments and branches of trees in the way; and that they would bless his kingdom, and hail him king of Israel. At this time therefore he chose to declare his regal character by publicly and triumphantly riding into Jerusalem in a manner anciently customary among the first persons of his country; thus reminding all of Zachariah's prophecy, "Tell ye the daughter of Sion, Behold thy king

e

* John xviii. 4.

f John xii. 18. John xii. 13.

8 ib. 13. 1 Macc. xiii. 51. i Judges v. 10. 2 Sam. xvi. 2. Here I believe the present read

Mark xi. 8, 10. * So Matt. xxi. 5. in our translation. ing in Zachariah, c. ix. 9. to be right: and that mistaken in some old Greek translation for quotes it c. xii. 15: and for 1997 ♬ Tell ye, &c. Matthew has it. The Hebrew text may be rendered thus ;

Shout, has been Fear not, as St. John Shout ye to, &c. as St.

נזושיע .i. e מטע corruptly for נושע

cometh unto thee, meek and sitting upon an ass, and a colt the foal of an ass."

1

m

Blasting the fig tree, which bare leaves only, was a symbolical action, typifying both the rejection of the Jewish nation for their unfruitfulness under such abundant means of grace, and the curse which all the disciples of Christ would be subject to, unless they brought forth fruit meet for repentance. This was agreeable to the moral of a parable before delivered; in which a " fig tree, that bare not fruit for three years, was to be cut down, if it continued barren. The next day, the disciples saw the fig tree" dried up from the roots," turned our Lord's attention to the object, and wondered at the suddenness of the event. Our Lord left the instruction immediately arising from the miracle to their present and future reflections; and, speaking only to the circumstance of their astonishment, observed that they should be enabled to work greater miracles than what now raised their admiration, if they had a due degree of faith, obtainable by such prayer as was accompanied with proper moral qualifications in the petitioner.

On the night immediately preceding his crucifixion, the paschal supper being brought but not partaken of, Jesus at the close of his life continued to shew that affection to his disciples which he had uniformly evidenced throughout the whole course of it; and therefore took occasion to enforce some most important lessons of instruction. Though conscious of his high and unspeakable dignity, he condescended

1 Matt. xxi. 18-22. and p. p.

Luke xiii. 6-9.

to perform a low and servile office, for the sake of deeply impressing its moral uses. "He" riseth from supper, and laid aside his garments, and took a towel and girded himself. After that he poured water into a basin, and began to wash the disciples' feet, and to wipe them with the towel wherewith he was girded." Peter reverently declining his part, our Lord taught him and all this great truth: "If I wash thee not, [if I cleanse thee not from all sin by my example and death, by my doctrine, and by the Spirit,] thou hast no part with me [in my kingdom of glory.] Having resumed his place, he instructed his followers that they should readily perform to each other that very office, or any equally humble: I have given you an example applicable to a variety of cases; that you may act with a general conformity to what you have seen in me your superior. The easterns were shod with P sandals: and the performance of the special action, related by the evangelists, depended on climate and mode 9 of dress. It could not therefore be meant as an universal and perpetual rite in the Christian church.

г

"As often as we eat bread and drink the cup [at the celebration of the Lord's supper,] we shew his death, [by easy and natural signs,] till he come.” The bread is the "outward and visible sign" of his

4 To wash the saints' feet, 1 Tim. v. 10. them.

1 Cor. xi. 26.

P Mark vi. 9. Acts xii. 8. is to use hospitality towards The transubstantialists of the

Greek and Latin church would do well to consider the following passage in the famous Fenelon, one of the greatest ornaments to the church of Rome. "It would be easy to shew in detail, with the books in our