THE PRODIGAL SON.

AMONG the persons who daily resorted to our Saviour to hear his discourses, were many Publicans, and those who had been guilty of grievous sins. This gave great offence to the Scribes and Pharisees, who assumed a sanctimonious behaviour, and extreme fastidiousness in performing the ceremonial observances of the Mosaic law. They affected to be shocked at our Saviour eating with such infamous persons. Christ condescended to justify himself; and in order to render his justification the more obvious, he began by comparing his conduct to that of a man who, having a hundred sheep, left the ninety-and-nine to go in search of that which had gone astray. He next compared his conduct to that of a woman who, having lost a piece of silver, sweeps the house and searches diligently till she finds it, and when she has found it rejoices at the recovery of her treasure. The parable of the Prodigal Son, which he likewise used upon this occasion, with the same view as the two former, is one of the most beautiful illustrations of divine mercy in the forgiveness of sinners which language can convey. A son quits his father's house with a certain share of the paternal property, and having dissipated his portion in the most licentious manner, is reduced to such a dreadful state of privation, that he would have been glad to share with the swine the husks upon which they were fed, but even these were denied him. In this emergency he resolves to return to his father: "And he arose and came to his father; but when he was yet a great way off, his father saw him, and had compassion, and ran, and fell on his neck, and kissed him. And the son said unto him, Father, I have sinned against heaven, and in thy sight, and am no more worthy to be called thy son*." But the father received him with joy, and honoured his return by public rejoicings; thus showing how dear to his heart was the contrite prodigal. How beautifully does this illustrate the divine affirmation, that "there is joy in heaven over one sinner that repenteth!"