righteous soul was troubled. He was sorrowful even unto death, and He was alone! For His disciples, instead of watching with Him, fell asleep, for sorrow and night made them very weary, and their eyes were heavy. Yes, when Jesus returned to them He found them sleeping, and to Peter He said, "What! could ye not watch with Me one hour? "

Again and yet again He left them and returned; but, alas! each time He found them sleeping. "Ah, sleep on now and take you rest-rest if ye can the time for watching is past-the Son of Man is betrayed into the hands of sinners." So He spoke at last.

Yes, it was so. Judas was at hand, and with a kiss pointed Him out to the Roman and Jewish soldiers who were at his side; while the chief priests and elders looked to see that Jesus did not escape them. At our Lord's command thousands of angels would have hastened to do His bidding; but no, He willed to submit for our sakes to suffer and to die for His people, that they might be saved. He had come to do the will of His Father, and He had just prayed-" Not My will, but Thine, be done."

So Jesus was taken, and led away to the palace of the high priest. In a little while John and Peter followed their Master to the palace, and were allowed to enter the court-yard around which the house was built. Here it was that Peter, through fear, denied his Master, declaring that he was not His disciple-that he did not even know Him. Then the cock crew, and Jesus turned and looked upon Peter. That look, so sad, so full of grief and pity, went straight to Peter's heart, and melted it, and he wept bitterly.

It was very early morning, just the dawn of day, when Jesus, who had first been brought before Annas, the father-in-law of Caiaphas, was taken across the court-yard, from the room in which he had been kept waiting, to the hall of Caiaphas, the high-priest. Here Caiaphas and the other Jewish judges of the Sanhedrin had come in haste to our Lord's trial, for they wished to condemn their prisoner, and to hurry Him away to execution, before the streets filled with the pilgrims and strangers who had come to Jerusalem to keep the feast. Many of these strangers were from Galilee, and they might take the part of the

Prophet of Galilee. But this trial was only a pretence. It was no real trial, for the men who pretended to sit as judges had already determined that our Lord should die, and this trial showed in other ways how corrupt and wicked the Jewish people had become at this time. These judges and rulers of the people were not ashamed to murder an innocent Man, and mock Him with a trial which they knew was no trial; but that they might the more easily and quickly bring it to an end and condemn Jesus to death, they hired false witnesses to speak against Him. These false witnesses would say anything they were told to say if they were well paid for it; but soon it was so plain that they were telling lies, that what they said was of no use. So the high-priest asked Jesus whether He was really the Messiah, and whether He was the Son of God? To the false witnesses Jesus had answered nothing, so that the high-priest said, "Answerest Thou nothing? What is it which these witness against Thee?"

But still Jesus spoke not a word.

Then said the high-priest, "I adjure Thee by

the living God, tell us whether Thou be the Christ, the Son of God ?"

And Jesus said, "I am. And hereafter ye shall see the Son of Man sitting on the right hand of power, and coming in the clouds of heaven."

That was enough. The Prisoner had declared that He was the Christ-that He was the Son of God, and so equal with God.

"He hath spoken blasphemy," said the highpriest. "We need no other witness than Himself. What think ye?"

And all the other judges said, "He is guilty of death. He deserves death."

The trial was over, and then the insults and the mockery began. The very servants struck Him, spat upon Him, and reviled Him; and in this way they fulfilled the words of the Lord, spoken long before by the prophet Isaiah, "I hid not My face from shame and spitting."

In a little while they led Him away to Pilate.

CHAPTER XXXV.

Jesus before Pilate.-Mocked by Herod.-Scourged and sentenced by Pilate to be crucified.

Read St. Matt. xxvii. 1,'2, 11-26; St. Mark xv. 1-15; St. Luke xxiii. 1-5, 13-25; St. John xviii. 28—40, xix. 1—16.

HE Jewish judges could condemn a man to death, but they might not put him to death without the leave of the Roman Governor; so the first thing they did, after finding Jesus guilty of blasphemy, was to hurry Him to the judgment-hall of Pilate, the Roman Governor of Judæa. They did not want Pilate to judge Him --to say whether He was guilty or not-for they had already decided that He was guilty, and that His punishment should be death. They only wished Pilate to give them leave to punish their prisoner according to their own law, or to hand Him over to his own Roman soldiers to be executed. But when Pilate saw that the chief priests and Jewish judges had brought him a prisoner