exhibited. If man is ever to be won to obedience, it must be by the force of such an example presented in so divine a person, and sustained by such exuberant grace.

4. Next remark the IMPRESSION AND EFFECT OF THE WHOLE PUBLIC CHARACTER of Christ-how the contemplations of the separate excellencies of his character are heightened when the mind proceeds to embrace the whole. The high and lofty parts are so united with the lowly and attractive; the divine qualities of our Lord with his human; what he did as the Son of God, with what he suffered as the Son of man; the claims of equality with the Father, with his voluntary subjection to him; the example he proposed to his followers, with the salvation which he wrought out for them; his deportment as our pattern, with his exalted conduct as the founder of the Christian Revelation; all is so sublime, and yet so condescending; so divine, and yet so human; so infinitely above us, and yet so familiarly known, and so entirely level to our feelings; the mysterious parts are so softened down by the condescending ones; the authority and majesty are so blended with the compassion and kindness of Jesus, as to render the impression of the whole character beyond measure deep and pe

netrating. We feel that never did such a personage appear before or since. We feel that it is Deity incarnate; God stooping to man; the divine perfections made visible to mortal eye; the distance between the holy God and guilty sinners annihilated; salvation, joy, duty, motive, hope, resignation-all the Christian religionconcluded and comprehended in the brief but inexhaustible excellencies of the character of its founder.

5. This conviction is strengthened by observing, in the last place, the MANNER IN

ever seen.

WHICH THE CHARACTER OF OUR LORD IS GIVEN BY THE EVANGELISTS. For the narrative, as we have before had the occasion to notice at some length,' is the most inartificial There is no panegyric, no putting of things together, no drawing of a character, no apologies nor explanations. The evangelists merely relate faithfully what they severally remembered of one individual; but this individual was so extraordinary a personage, that in recording his life, they present a picture such as the world never before saw. The account, however, only furnishes the materials from which we may study, as we can, our Lord's several excellencies. The Evangelists leave us

1 Lecture vi., on Credibility.

to do this. They do not even arrange the different incidents in the order of time. Thus the minds of men are set at work; and the true impression and bearing of the history is the result of their own conclusions, from the incidents thrown together in naked and unadorned simplicity.

The very circumstance, indeed, of such a portrait being drawn by such writers, is an independent proof of the divine origin of the gospels. It could never have entered the mind of man. We know what efforts writers of the greatest genius have made in different ages to describe a perfect character. Poets, historians, philosophers, have laboured the point to the utmost. They have succeeded but imperfectly. Their entirely virtuous man has neither been amiable nor consistent nor imitable. Some gross defects have marked their first conceptions of the subject. But, behold! four unlettered and simple persons, give separate narratives of the life of their Master, and accomplish unwittingly what men in all ages and countries have aimed at and failed.' The gospels appear. The writers make no comments on the history they give; and they leave a character, without seeming to think of it, which is found to be new, to be such as the mind of man could never have 1 Scott.

conceived; and yet, at the same time, to be so lovely, so imitable, so dignified, so sublime, as to comprise, by universal consent, all the excellencies and perfections of which the human nature is susceptible, in a form the most engaging, tender, and elevated.

But we pause-and draw our argument to a close. We have taken a view of the peculiar character of our Lord as Mediator; of his private deportment as our example; and of his public and more elevated conduct as the founder of the Christian religion. The mind is lost in striving to collect the several parts.

We began with the various claims preferred by our Lord. We were startled at the variety and difficulty of them. We yet found, as we proceeded, every one established in the most ample and satisfactory manner. The impression of reverence increased as we reviewed his conduct as the Son of God and Saviour of the world, as the Teacher of mankind, as a Man of Sorrows, and the Rewarder of his disciples. We were yet more affected, as we considered the separate as well as combined excellencies of our Lord's personal conduct. When from this we proceeded to notice the public bearing of his life and ministry as the founder of our religion, we were only the more filled with

astonishment at the majesty and sublimity of his character. The attempt to do justice to any portion of it is fruitless. It is difficult even to touch on the principal features. Enough, however, has been said to enable us to estimate the argument which it supplies in confirmation of our faith and love.

This argument, then, it will be found, springs from a FAIR PRESUMPTION upon the first statement of the case; rises yet higher when that case is contrasted with EVERY SIMILAR PRETENSION; proceeds upwards to a moral demonstration when the OTHER BRANCHES OF THE EVIDENCES are taken into account; and ceases not its course till it BEARS AWAY THE HEART of every competent and serious inquirer.

1. For what is THE FAIR PRESUMPTION ON THE VERY STATEMENT OF THE CASE, after reviewing such a character as that of the founder of the Christian religion? The life and spirit of the author of any religious system, when truly known, go far to determine the truth of his claims. If real sincerity, purity, benevolence, humility, disinterestedness, consistency, appear in the founder of a religion; if that individual present himself openly before the eyes of men; if he submit all his pretensions to their scrutiny; if, in addition, there appear