continually looking out for the time when He would assume a regal splendour, and advance them to posts of honour in His earthly kingdom. A very short time before His death, James and John came and asked to have the two first stations, the highest posts of eminence in His kingdom; and excited no small indignation among their brethren by this request.59 When our Saviour forewarned His disciples of His sufferings, which He did repeatedly, their language was, Be it far from Thee, Lord; this shall not be unto Thee.59 And therefore when He was apprehended to be put to death, they were so little prepared for this reverse, that they all forsook Him and fled.60 His death put them in great consternation, and for a time destroyed all their hopes. This appears clearly from the conversation of the two disciples on their way to Emmaus, in which they declared their disappointment in having trusted that it had been He which should have redeemed Israel,61 since instead of His having done this, He had been crucified and slain; and therefore the redemption of Israel by His means was, in their idea, entirely out of the question. But the manner in which they spoke on this subject showed their folly and unbelief. Our Saviour therefore reproved them,61 O fools, and slow of heart to believe all that the prophets

59 Matt. xx. 24, xvi. 22. 60 Mark xiv.50. 61 Luke xxiv. 21, 25, 26.

have spoken: Ought not Christ to have suffered these things, and to enter into His glory? This was as much as to say, that it was by means of His sufferings the redemption of His people was effected, and His glory would be manifested; or, that from His sufferings and death His greatest triumphs would arise. His cross was the way to His crown. When our Saviour had before spoken on these subjects, it is said, They understood none of these things. They could not comprehend what He meant, when He spoke of dying, and rising again the third day.

The Gospel for this day gives an account of the first information which was received by the followers of the Lord Jesus concerning His resurrection; or of His having left the tomb in which His sacred body had been deposited by Joseph of Arimathea and Nicodemus. The women who came from Galilee had witnessed His interment; and then went home, and prepared spices and ointments, with the intention of embalming His body as soon as the Sabbath was past. And accordingly, at the dawn of the morning, on the first day of the week, cometh Mary Magdalene early, when it was yet dark, unto the sepulchre. She seems to have been a woman of a peculiarly ardent mind; and therefore went, before the other women were ready to go, to visit the tomb of her beloved Master; not doubting to find it in the same state as it had been

When

left before the commencement of the Sabbath. She was a person to whom much had been forgiven by the Friend of sinners, and therefore she loved much, and was anxious to pay every possible mark of reverence and affection to her Lord and Saviour. St. Mark says, Now when Jesus was risen early the first day of the week, He appeared first to Mary Magdalene, out of whom He had cast seven devils. By which it may be understood that He had graciously recovered her from a state of uncommon hopelessness and depravity. This may be inferred from one of our Lord's parables, to which our attention was directed on the third Sunday in Lent. the unclean spirit is gone out of a man, he walketh through dry places, seeking rest; and finding none, he saith, I will return unto my house whence I And when he cometh, he findeth it swept and garnished. Then goeth he, and taketh to him seven other spirits more wicked than himself; and they enter in, and dwell there. And the last state of that man is worse than the first. Such had perhaps been the case with Mary Magdalene. The Jewish exorcists had probably dispossessed her of a demon; and it had returned again with sevenfold power and vengeance; and held her so completely under its dominion, that nothing short of the almighty power of the Lord Jesus could deliver her from the desperate state into which she had been brought. But He had

came out.

graciously delivered her from the grievous bondage under which she had been held by sin and Satan: He had set her at liberty, and freely forgiven her all her trespasses. Whether or not she was the woman who in the house of the Pharisee washed His feet with her tears, and wiped them with the hair of her head, does not appear. But she had received peculiar marks of our blessed Lord's condescension and kindness, and was grateful for it. She ministered unto Him of her substance, together with others, while He was living; and she was anxious to show the last proof of her gratitude to Him after His death. She had seen the sepulchre closed, and a great stone rolled against the door. And therefore when she returned, she was much surprised at seeing the stone taken away from the sepulchre, and the body removed. Being grieved and dismayed at so unexpected a circumstance, then she runneth, and cometh to Simon Peter, and to the other disciple whom Jesus loved, and saith unto them, They have taken away the Lord out of the sepulchre, and we know not where they have laid Him. She was full of concern about it, and made her complaint to the disciples; but they did not believe her. Her words seemed to them as idle tales, and they believed them not. As, however, the circumstance, if true, was very extraordinary; Peter and John were desirous to ascertain for themselves whether it was really

so, or not. Peter therefore went forth, and that other disciple, and came to the sepulchre.

The Evangelist proceeds to relate a friendly contest between Peter and himself on this occasion. So they ran both together: and the other disciple did outrun Peter, and came first to the sepulchre. It has been supposed that Peter's consciousness of having denied his Master repressed his accustomed ardour, and prevented him from keeping pace with John on this occasion. But though John reached the sepulchre first, he did not fully satisfy his curiosity until Peter came up to him. He merely stooped down and looked in, so that he saw the linen clothes lying by themselves, without the body of Jesus; yet went he not in. Peter went in first. Then cometh Simon Peter following him, and went into the sepulchre, and seeth the linen clothes lie; and the napkin that was about His head not lying with the linen clothes, but wrapped together in a place by itself; which showed that there had not been any confusion and disorder in consequence of the removal of the body, but that every thing had been done deliberately and decently. Then went in also that other disciple which came first to the sepulchre; and he saw and believed.

It seems as if the other women, who had desired to show the last acts of kindness to the Lord Jesus, had arrived at the sepulchre soon after Mary Magdalene had left it. They at