from their own prolific Jewish fancies. The Judaism, therefore, of the time of Christ was a very different thing from the religion of the Old Testament. As for the most part of human origin, that Judaism had no root in the heart of the people, who held to it rather by an intellectual than a religious bond; while on the part of the great it was supported from a regard to self-preservation, a fear of change, and by the influence of a force of will which was great in proportion as it was perverse and debased. On one side, words and shows had set aside spiritual realities; on another, denials and doubts prevented that healthful inquiry of which they occupied the place. With neither the Pharisee nor the Sadducee was there a germ of true religion; while the minor sects were political adventurers, dreaming speculatists, or benevolent hermits. Spiritual power had well nigh died out of the nation's heart: therefore moral corruption abounded, and social strife; injustice on the side of the lofty, disaffection and turbulence in the multitude. Scarcely was there left in the higher ranks a remnant of true national feeling. The Hebrew spirit had been superseded by the Pagan. Greek and Roman art, manners, and modes of thought, had become fashionable. Adulation to Cæsar was universal. There was, indeed, especially among the people, a patriotic party, but they were as rash and violent in their measures as they were shortsighted in their aims. Assassination, hatred, and insurrection, which were their measures, only served to bring ruin on themselves and to hasten the downfal of their country. Amid the general confusion, trouble, and fever of mind which were the inevitable consequences of this state of things, a large portion of the common people retained enough of their nature undebased to desire a great change. Had their desire been as wise as it was intense, it might have saved the nation. But, misinterpreting the words of their ancient prophets, they placed all their hope in one who was to come in resistless might to restore independence and secure universal empire to Israel. Thus the best class of mind in the land rose not above the fallacious expectations offered by an appeal to physical force. It was in the midst of this ignorance, narrowness, bigotry, injustice-this show and pretence-this moral depravity and social disorder-that Jesus came, preaching peace and giving new life. Teaching the truth and doing good, His course of pitying love he ran; Where'er man suffered Jesus stood The common good Samaritan. The Between him and his age there was the greatest contrast. one was as low as the other was lofty. Here, perfect wisdom; there, folly and infatuation. In Christ, the purest, most elevated, and most comprehensive benignity; in the Jews, the most intense selfishness. On the one side, a simple and sublime piety, whose power and depth were tested in suffering and death; on the other, long empty prayers, self-praise, self-seeking, and all the evils of man-worship. That such an age could have produced Jesus, cannot be believed. He was the gift of God, who pitied and wished to redeem the world. That benign end was promoted by the prevalence, both in the East and the West, of an earnest expectation of some deliverer. The feeling was dark. Those who saw most, saw but dimly. Still, when combined with the natural yearning of the human heart after good, it did something to prepare the way for Christ. And that preparation was still further advanced by a renunciation of idolatry, and a sincere and earnest belief in 'God who made the world,' to which individual minds had been led, mainly by the Hebrew Scriptures, in every civilised nation. The accession to the throne of the world of the emperor Augustus, bringing as it did universal peace, opened for the missionaries of the gospel a path into all parts, and enabled them, within a few years, to proclaim the gospel in most of the great centres of thought. Christianity, in consequence, soon became the topic of the times. It was preached, assailed, defended, discussed, rejected or believed, in all countries; and in some three centuries, though having at first no other human support than what could be given by a few despised Jews, it succeeded in overcoming the opposition of priest, statesman, and philosopher, and gained a seat in the heart of man, from which it has never been dislodged, and where it continues, and will continue, to diffuse new blessings and gain fresh triumphs. The Saviour comes! by ancient bards foretold: (Comp. Is. ii. 4, ix. 6, xxv. 8, xl. 11). BOOK III. A LIFE OF CHRIST. PART I. EVENTS BEFORE JESUS BEGINS HIS PUBLIC MINISTRY. U. C. 749 to 780; A. C. 5 to A. D. 27. CHAPTER I. NAZARETH AND ITS HOLY FAMILY. U. C. 749; A. C. 5. NAZARETH (a chaplet) is the place whence proceeded Jesus, the Saviour of mankind. There did he pass his early days and receive the education commonly bestowed on Jewish children (Matt. ii. 23; Luke iv. 16). There also did he dwell at the commencement of his public ministry (Matt. iv. 13). From the name of the town he was called 'the Nazarene,' and the 'Prophet of Nazareth.' The name has also been given to the modern province en-Nassirah, which, with the neighbouring provinces Tebarijeh (Tiberias) and Szafed, form the ancient Galilee. The chief town, en-Nassirah, lies on the western side of the basin in which it is situated. The height of the vale above the sea at the spot where Nazareth stands, measures about 870 feet. The limestone hills which enclose the place on three sides, namely, on the west, the south-west, and the north-west, rise to the height of some 1600 feet above the ocean. They open on the plain of Esdraelon, the traveller across which sees the town stretching out in the shape of an amphitheatre on the lower part of the north-western hill. The houses, built of stone, have flat roofs, without the domes common in Jerusalem and Southern Palestine. On these roofs, in the cool of the evening, there may be seen small knots of persons enjoying themselves in friendly union after the swel tering heat of the day is gone. The vale, protected on the north and west, lies open to the winds from the north-east and east, and consequently is, though but seldom, visited in winter by severe cold. Schubert found the town having a sweet and gentle aspect, yet, as it had not long before been injured by an earthquake, resembling a widow of the land mourning her lost husband, as she sat apart and threw ashes on her head. The place is thus described by that traveller:-'Lovely and gay as innocent infants at play, does Nazareth with its constant verdure offer itself to the enchanted sight. When from the lands of the south-east the burning wind of the desert, panting with thirst, reaches this vale, encircled by green hills, immediately freshness spreads over its face, and a gentle, moderately-heated breeze is felt; which revives the purple of the pomegranates, and hastens the ripening of the orange, the olive, the grape, and other fruits, which here grow in abundance.' Nazareth is full of spots which call to mind the names and scenes mentioned in the New Testament. Here the traveller is shown 'The Fountain of Mary,' the mother of Jesus, to which, after the manner of the East, she, like the woman of Samaria, went to draw water for domestic purposes. There, under the shade of a pomegranate, is the garden in which Jesus in his boyhood is believed to have found a recreation congenial with what we may believe his disposition was. In another place stands the Latin convent, with massive walls, like a fortification; the church of which marks the place where, as it is said, the angel announced to Mary that she was to be the favoured woman who should give birth to the Messiah. Here, again, is a hill on which tradition makes our Lord to have frequently gathered his disciples around him; and there, at some distance, is the precipice down which his weak and rash fellow-townsmen were on the point of casting the great prophet. That these are the real localities is more than can be now affirmed. In regard to the last-mentioned event, Tischendorf remarks that there are several heights which correspond with the statements in the gospel. Dr. Wilson ('Lands of the Bible,' ii. 93) thus speaks of the vicinity of Nazareth :-'When we got to the Wali Nabi Ismail, on the top of the hill over Nazareth, we had on all sides of us a most glorious prospect. The sphere of observation is here as much enlarged as below it is contracted. To the north-west of us, overlooking a part of the country considerably wooded, we had the bay of Akka (Acre), with the clear blue expanse of the Mediterranean, or Great Sea' of the Hebrews, spreading itself in the distance beyond. South of this, and striking to the south-east, we had the whole ridge of Carmel before us, which, though stripped of much of the glory of its olden forests, still presents striking memorials of that 'excellency' for which it was distinguished. To the south and south-west of us, somewhat circular in its form, is seen here, bounded by the picturesque mountains of Samaria, the great plain, the battle-field of the country both in ancient and modern times, and probably the real or typical site of the battle of Armageddon. To the east and south-east of us we had the little Hermon, which, though bald on its crown, has considerable vegetation on its shoulders; Mount Tabor, standing apart in its own nobility, and, like Nature's own pyramid, not commemorative of death, but instinct with life, and clothed with luxuriant verdure to its very summits; and the deep valley of the Jordan and the sea of Tiberias, with the equable hills and mountains of Bashan and Golan (Jaulan) on its eastern side. To the north, beyond the plain of el-Battauf, we had the hills and mountains forming the continuation of Lebanon; and to the north-east, those forming the termination of Antilebanon, with Jebel es-Sheikh, the true Hermon, the chief of all the mountains of the land, moistened with the copious dews which descend from its hoary locks. Many villages, including a considerable number mentioned in Scripture, are distinctly visible. Besides Jezreel, Jenin, Taanuk, Megiddo, and others, to which I have already alluded when passing over the great plain, we had before us-beginning with Safariyah, the Sepphoris of Jewish history, called also Dio-Cesare'a, lying immediately beyond the rather bare hills of Nazareth; and turning to the right-Kana el-Jalil, or Cana of Galilee, which was privileged to witness the beginning of our Lord's miracles; Safed, the famous sanctuary of rabbinism, and supposed to be 'the city set upon a hill,' immediately before the attention of our Saviour and his disciples during the delivery of the Sermon on the Mount; Endor, the residence of the witch who is noticed in the history of Saul; Nein, or Nain, where the widow resided whose son was raised to life by our Lord. The associations of the scene were. numerous and hallowed, independently of those immediately connected with Nazareth below. There is a good deal of soil on this hill of Nazareth. It is covered in many of its patches with a species of erica called bilad, found on all the hills of the country. With this are mixed a good many herbaceous and flowering plants, among which we noticed some of great beauty.' The evangelists do not give us the names of the parents of Mary. They inform us merely that she was a descendant of David, the national idol. In her day, however, the family had lost their outward splendour. They lived, accordingly, in the narrow circumstances of humble life. Yet they could not have been destitute of property, since its heads had to travel to their native city, Bethlehem, that they might give in a statement of what they possessed (Luke ii. 5). Mary, however, was distinguished by a modest, gentle, earnest, thoughtful, and affectionate spirit. She was also devout, and may have received an education superior to that of her class. Her chief claim to attention and her highest |