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opposed. But our Lord did not hesitate one moment to reply, and he said that the great commandment was to love God with all the heart; and who could dispute this, that God has the first claims on the love of his creatures? However, as all the commandments are great, he added, "The second is like unto it, Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself;" and what could they say against that being a great commandment, for if all men were to be guided by it, no one would ever do wrong to another? You know, indeed, that there are ten commandments, but all the rest are to prevent our oppressing, or doing wrong to our neighbour, and so our Lord made here two great commandments. The question, however, was, which one was the great commandment, and his answer did not evade it, for the whole signified as much as this-That love to God is the great commandment; for love to our neighbour, if it be of the right sort, can only be exercised by him who truly loves God.

Christ now turned the tables, as we say, and on his part he began to question his adversaries; but they were equally defeated whether he answered or proposed the question. The question was, "What think ye of Christ? Whose son is he?" As Christ means the Messiah, whom they were expecting, the teachers of the people and this skilful lawyer ought to have been able to make some reply to his question; but what they said was what any little child could have answered: "The son of David." Now every one who had learned the least about the Messiah, must have known that he was to spring out of the family of David. But on their answering this question, which they could not avoid, our Lord then added another, which arose out of it, and to which they found it difficult to reply: "He saith unto them, How then doth David in spirit call him Lord, saying, The Lord said unto my Lord, Sit thou on my right hand, till I make thine enemies thy footstool? If David then call him Lord, how is he his son ?" The words quoted are in the one hundred and tenth Psalm. The Jews understood these words to describe the Messiah, and they understood rightly—though now they did not receive that Messiah when they saw him, notwithstanding that he worked so many miracles among them, which showed him to be a most extraordinary person. Now the Messiah was to spring from the line of David, and so he was his son after the flesh, though many generations in distance from him; yet David called him Lord. The great Jehovah is represented speaking to him, and telling him to sit upon his seat of dignity and power; and, in describing this, David, a prophet, speaking of what was to come to pass, said, "The

Lord said unto my Lord, Sit thou on my right hand." Now if he were David's son, said Christ, how could he be his Lord? Is a son lord over his father? Certainly not. The Pharisees were puzzled, for they looked for some great man to come to be their Messiah, and did not see that the Messiah-Christ was to be not only man in his flesh, but also THE SON OF GOD, THE LORD-Him in whom dwelt all the fulness of the Godhead bodily. Since, therefore, they could not see this grand part of the description of the Messiah, they could not make out how David called his son Lord, and so could not answer Christ, and were put to shame and silence. They who truly know Christ, know him now to be David's son and David's Lord; the Son of David as he was a man of his race, and yet the Son of God, and the "Lord of all "-reigning over all things, and the great Governor of his Church. And on this account they own and adore him.

After this no man durst ask Christ any more questions.

Christ's Discourse respecting the Wickedness of the
Pharisees.

MATTHEW XXIII.

In order to notice what is most necessary, we shall run over this chapter in a sort of short way, explaining the passages something like notes.

Verse the fifth. But all their works they do to be seen of men; they make broad their phylacteries, and enlarge the borders of their garments. They were fond of making a show of religion, and did everything before men, instead of secretly before God. They wore great phylacteries, or pieces of parchment on their foreheads, and on the wrists of their left arms, on which were written certain words of the divine law, to make the people believe how much they tried to remember it. And as the Jews wore fringes on the edge of their garments, to distinguish them from the heathen nations round about, so they, to distinguish themselves from others of their own countrymen, wore broader fringes than others.

Verse the thirteenth.—But woe unto you, Scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! for ye shut up the kingdom of heaven against men: for ye neither go in yourselves, neither suffer ye them that are entering to go in. By woe, is here

meant sorrow, misery, and a threatening of dreadful punishment for such great wickedness as hypocrisy. By the kingdom of heaven is meant-not heaven itself, for happily no man has power to shut another out of heaven -but what is called "the Gospel dispensation," or the time of preaching the Gospel to perishing sinners, as I have before explained it to you. Now, by trying to prejudice the people against Christ-the Messiah who came. into the world to open the gates of this kingdom, and to preach the gospel to the meek-they did as it were shut the gates of this kingdom against them; and, not contented with refusing to enter in themselves, they both ruined themselves and others, by persuading them not to enter in.

Verse the fourteenth.-Woe unto you, Scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! for ye devour widows' houses, and for a pretence make long prayers; therefore, ye shall receive the greater damnation. It is said by some writers, that the Pharisees, to seem very holy, prayed three times a day, and three hours at a time, so that they must have prayed nine hours a day. But they did not pray from the heart. They muttered over some words which they had got ready, without their souls going out towards God in what they said. They also made money by their prayers, and this was their object, which was a vile abuse of the design of prayer, which is to ask blessings of God for ourselves and others. And what was worse, under this pretence of praying, they devoured widows' houses, that is, they imposed upon poor widows, from whom they most likely got much of the money left to them for their support, by pretending to pray for them better than they could pray for themselves.

Verse the sixteenth.-Woe unto ye, blind guides, which say, whosoever shall swear by the temple it is nothing, but whosoever shall swear by the gold of the temple he is a debtor. People were accustomed to offer gifts of gold for the use of the temple, and sometimes to swear or make oath that they would give certain gifts. Now, if they made oath to do anything, and merely said, "By the temple, or in the name of the temple, I will do it," the Pharisees said they might break their promise if they pleased; but if they swore in the name of the gold to be offered, they must not break their promise then. But our Lord said this was wicked, for one sacred promise should be kept as much as another; and if there was any difference in point of dignity, between the gold consecrated to the temple, and the temple itself, the temple was the most noble, and the promise made by it ought rather to be kept. But he who knows men's hearts saw that this was all hypocrisy, and that they recommended the keeping the oath by the gold, because they were sharers of it when it was cast into the treasury.

Christ called these men blind guides, since they pretended to guide others in the way to heaven, and could not see it themselves.

Verse the twenty-third.-Woe unto you, Scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! for ye pay tithe of mint, and anise, and cummin, and have omitted the weightier matters of the law, judgment, mercy, and faith. Mint, anise, and cummin, are herbs. The Pharisees were very particular in giving the Priests and Levites the tenth part of the value of everything that made their income, even to these small herbs; and they did not lose by it, for the priests made them due returns for setting this example. But they were unjust, unkind, and unfaithful to others; and so while they minded trifling things that cost them nothing, and turned to their advantage, they neglected more weighty or important things.

Christ foretells the Destruction of Jerusalem.

MATTHEW XXIV.

The temple of Jerusalem was a most splendid building, and king Herod had expended a great deal for its improvement, so that it was so grand that the Jews used to say, he who has not seen the building of Herod, has never seen a beautiful building.

The disciples one day, having taken particular notice of its fine marble columns and curious workmanship, pointed them out to Christ, that he might admire them too. Our Lord then told them, "There shall not be left here one stone upon another that shall not be thrown down;" which really took place not a very long time afterwards, though there was then no probability that so fine and firm a building would or could be so easily destroyed.

The disciples were then more curious to know when this wonderful destruction should happen. Our Lord did not satisfy their curiosity, but gave them warning how they might know when it was coming on; that there should first be false prophets arising, who should deceive the people; and so it was. Then there should be wars; and there were terrible wars for a long time between the Jews and the Romans, who then ruled over them, as between them and several other nations. There should also be "famine, pestilences, and earthquakes." There should likewise be cruel

persecutions and murders of the followers of Christ; and finally the Gospel should be preached to all other nations as well as to the Jews.

This would be a dreadful time. The Jews must then expect miseries never known before in the whole world. God was about to punish them for their many and great sins against him, but especially for the greatest of all sins, that of rejecting and hating Jesus Christ, the only Saviour. So dreadful would be the vengeance of the Roman armies when once Jerusalem should be besieged, that the moment there was an appearance of it, all Christians were advised to escape, and lose not a moment, but flee and hide themselves in secret places in the mountains. If they were walking to cool themselves on the tops of their Eastern houses, they must not even return to pack up anything, but hasten down outside; if at work in the field, and their clothes lay at a distance, it would be unwise to risk delay by going after them; and unfortunate would the mother be, that then had to escape with the burden of a child at her bosom; or if the siege should happen in winter, miserable would it be for the poor creatures who had to hurry over bad roads and amidst swelling floods; or if on the Sabbathday, when they were limited by the law to a short journey, it would hardly be possible to escape at all.

Then Jesus spake a parable or comparison about the fig-tree, and told them, that these signs of the destruction of Jerusalem which he had given them, would be as sure guides as were the leaves of the fig-tree, when they broke out, guides of the approach of the summer. But the exact time was a secret known only to God, though it would be sudden as the destruction of the world in the days of Noah.

The desolation should also be so great, that if but two were together, even one of these should perish while the other escaped, whether they were labouring in the field, or grinding at the mill: "the one" should "be taken and the other left."

Hence he told them all to " watch," and be on the look-out for these signs, that they might be ready to escape.

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ROMAN COIN STRUCK TO COMMEMORATE THE CONQUEST OF THE JEWS.

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