Ceaselessly the blessed, redeemed through His Blood, are entering the celestial courts, and the number of His elect is being made up.

2. Nor is there reason for fatalism in our own lives. Our destiny is heaven, albeit the attainment of that destiny is contingent upon the exercise of our free-will. It is certain that we can come at last to the celestial country, if we but perseveringly seek it. No one was ever yet created to be lost. Judas could have been saved even after He gave the treacherous kiss. To our last conscious hour the way of repentance will be open to us-only repentance must include the amending of our evil ways. The way of repentance is always the way of eternal life.

Third Thought.-Alas for that man by whom the Son of man is betrayed! He will not permit us to forget the awful seriousness of giving Him up to His enemies by deserting Him for them after we have learned to serve Him. It were better never to have been born.

We know that there is an everlasting hell; nothing is more explicitly taught by our Lord than that. We know that Judas is there, and Dives, if he be a real man; and from the story of Dives we know of what sort his punishment in hell is; he is tormented in fire, and separated

by an impassable gulf from all hope. We know that the gate is wide and broad the way which leads to destruction, and that many go in thereat. We know that humanly speaking it is impossible to restore believers who have lapsed into mortal sin; happily we know also that grace accomplishes the impossible, and that no sinner need despair. We have known of those who once devout, afterwards lapsed, and died giving no sign of repentance.

How careful then should we be to keep in the way of grace, and if we fall not to rest till repentance has restored us.

CIII.

"And as they did eat, Jesus took bread, and blessed, and brake it, and gave to them, and said, Take, eat: this is my body. And He took the cup, and when He had given thanks, He gave it to them: and they all drank of it. And He said unto them, This is my blood of the new testament, which is shed for many. Verily I say unto you, I will drink no more of the fruit of the vine, until that day that I drink it new in the kingdom of God."-St. Mark xiv. 22-25.

Exposition.-Swete says: "The words, This is my Body would have recalled those spoken at the supper at Bethany six days before, She is come aforehand to anoint my Body to the burying, and perhaps also the teaching at Capernaum just before the previous passover (St. John vi.). The bread which is now given is identified with the Body of His Flesh; to eat it is to partake in the great sacrifice. St. Paul adds, and the words have found their way into all but the 'Western' texts of St. Luke. Do this for my memorial. He took a cup. St. Paul

Capernaum.

identifies the cup with that which followed the meal the cup after supper. The gift of the meal-the Cup had been foreshadowed in the discourse at This is my Blood of the new testament. The original words are clearly based on Exodus xxiv, 8: Behold the blood of the covenant which the Lord hath made with you concerning all these words, that is, the blood which ratified the book of the covenant. A new covenant was on the point of being ratified by the Blood of a better Sacrifice with a greater Israel, whose representatives all drank of it as the whole congregation had been sprinkled with the blood shed under the mountain of the Lawgiving. . . . The Blood of the Covenant was the fruit of 'the holy Vine of David', the Didache says. Which is being shed on behalf of many; the shedding is imminent and regarded as already present. . . . Drink it new; the newness is the characteristic mark of all that belongs to the kingdom of God. The new covenant inaugurates a new inheritance, in which at length all things are to become new. The saying has a partial fulfilment in the Eucharists of the universal Church; its ultimate accomplishment belongs to the risen life, for which the Bridegroom has kept the good wine."

...

And Isaac Williams: "Great must have been the anxiety of the disciples, and deep their at

tention, when with solemn and adorable action He took bread; and the whole action could not but have reminded them of those two great miracles in which He had done the same, and of that awful comment on one of them afterwards at Capernaum, in which He had said His own Body was the true bread alone to be desired. Every particular is recorded; and St. Paul also, who had himself received the account, not from man, but by revelation from God, on this one point alone comes in to add his testimony to that of the Evangelists; St. Luke, his disciple, keeps closely to his statement; and when they come to the awful words themselves, then they all join in with one accord to give our Lord's exact expressions, This is my body. . . . Of the appointment of the bread it is said, that it took place as they were eating; the expression may merely signify, while they were at the table. What pause may have ensued between that and the wine does not appear. It is however clear that the supper was now ended, for it is said, Likewise after supper. Likewise, for if these two were not connected together by the time of their appointment, yet there was something, either in the marked and emphatic manner of our Lord, or some other circumstance, that distinguished these two actions beyond all the important transactions of that memorable evening.