have recorded his separate appearance to this apostle on the day of his resurrection. He appeared not apart to St. John, his beloved disciple; but to him who had thrice denied him, who had bitterly bewailed his crime, and whose mind stood in need of healing and with the same kind attention our Lord afterwards afforded Peter an occasion of expiating, as it were, his three denials of him by thrice declaring his love.

t

With an admirable consistency, our gracious Saviour ended as he began. "He was taken up to heaven in the very act of lifting up his hands on his disciples and blessing them.

Nor must we stop here. He is now our

Vinter

cessor at God's right hand, and will hereafter be the dispenser of eternal life to the righteous and he has taught us to anticipate his conduct on that day; when he will allot so high a rank to the virtue of benevolence as to place actions arising from it among our leading and essential duties, and will shew so intimate a concern and affection for his disciples as to regard acts of humanity done to the meanest of them as done to himself.

written under the direction of St. Paul. We have therefore another proof, besides 2 Pet. iii. 15. that no jealousy subsisted between these two great apostles after their variance. Gal. ii. 11. • The

remark is Chrysostom's. See his comment on 1 Cor. xv. 8. Beausobre refers to it, and in explaining it, beautifully adds; Jesus shewed Peter that, though he had forgotten his Lord in the time of his humiliation, his Lord did not forget him after his exaltation. Remarques Historiques, &c. 1 Cor. xv. 5. John xxi. " Luke xxiv. 51. w Rom. viii. 34. Heb. vii. 25. * Rom. vi. 23. John xvii. 2. y Matt. xxv.

SECTION III.

OF OUR LORD'S COMPASSION.

IN those dispositions which are eminently benevo lent we may justly expect to find the most lively sensibility and compassion: for compassion is a benevolent sensation towards the miserable; it is that humane uneasiness which is excited by the evils of human life, in proportion to their degree and to the merit of the sufferer. Our Lord has expressly enjoined this virtue, "Be ye merciful, as your Father also is merciful :" and he has annexed to it a special blessedness: " Blessed are the merciful; for they shall obtain mercy."

a

d

b

He has recommended it to our practice in the parable of the good Samaritan; and he has enforced it by the example of God himself, both under the similitude of a king who took account with his servants, and under that of a Father receiving inte favour a wasteful and unworthy son.

The three parables referred to are remarkably affecting. Nothing can more forcibly inculcate commiseration than the example of the Samaritan, who, though estranged from the Jews by every circumstance most apt to inflame the human mind with

* Aristotle calls it an affection of a good disposition, xgus Rhet. ii. xi. 1. ed. Cantab. And Tully thus addresses Julius Cesar: Nulla de virtutibus tuis plurimis nec admirabilior nec gratior misericordia est. Pro Ligario. § 11. b Luke vi. 36. < Matt. v. 7. Matt. xviii. 27, 33. Luke xv. 20.

Luke x. 33, 37.

hatred, yet shewed" mercy to the wounded Jewish traveller, the sight of whose distress moved not a Priest and a Levite, who were of his own nation, and employed in the sacred offices of his own religion. Nothing can be more strongly contrasted and condemned than the merciless behaviour of him who was inexorable to his fellow servant, took him by the throat, and rigidly exacted a debt of an hundred pence, when his lord had forgiven him ten thousand talents. "His lord was wroth, and delivered himto the tormentors, till he should pay all that was due unto him." Nothing can represent in a more lively manner the compassion of God to the Gentile world in particular, and to repenting sinners in general, than the image of a father, who, when he saw yet a great way off his son returning to him after he had wasted his substance with riotous living, had compassion, and ran, and fell on his neck, and kissed him, and rejoiced as though he had received him again from the dead.

The images with which these parables abound shew an overflowing tenderness and humanity: and our Divine Instructor seems to have peculiarly delighted, and excelled, if I may so speak, in delivering lessons of this kind.

In his own life he has given us a bright example of this virtue. He deeply compassionated the spiritual and temporal wants of mankind. "When he saw the multitudes, he was moved with compassion on them, because they were wearied [with following

f Matt. ix. 36, 7, 8.

& The true reading is ἐσκυλμένοι, of which exaμév seems a marginal explanation crept into the text.

him for the benefit of his miracles and instructions,] and scattered abroad as sheep having no shepherd. Then saith he unto his disciples, The harvest truly is plenteous, but the labourers are few: pray ye therefore the Lord of the harvest, that he will send forth labourers into his harvest." On another occasion also, when he saw much people he had compassion on them, and "began to teach them many things.” He miraculously fed them in the desert from the same principle; and prompted by this amiable virtue healed a leper, restored the sight of two blind men near Jericho, and when "a dead man was carried out of Nain, the only son of his mother and she a widow, generously overcome by her distress, he said to her, Weep not, and raised her son to life.

So justly may our Lord be " described in the language of the prophet Isaiah, as binding up the broken hearted, as feeding his flock like a shepherd, as gathering up the lambs in his arm, as carrying them in his bosom, and gently leading those that were with young.

It must be further observed that our compassionate Lord was no stranger to the most sensible emotions of the human heart, and to the strongest outward expression of them. It is thrice recorded of him that he wept. Once indeed his own sufferings were the cause, "when he offered up prayers and supplications, with a strong cry and tears, unto him that was able to save him from death, and was heard"

from the filial reverence with which he prayed, an angel being sent from heaven to comfort him.

Another occasion of his tears was his prophetic foresight of the destruction which impended over Jerusalem, and of the complicated and unexampled calamities which would attend it. "When he ap

proached, he beheld the city and wept over it, saying: If even thou [who hast killed so many prophets] hadst known, at least [after so many calls to repentance] in this thy day [of merciful and final trial,] the things which belong unto thy peace. But now they are hidden from thine eyes."

It is also recorded of Jesus that he wept, in St. John's simple and beautiful account of his raising Lazarus from the dead. Some think it was not unworthy of our Lord to weep from a sympathy observable in the best minds, because he "saw Mary weeping and the Jews also weeping who came with her." Generous dispositions are overcome by the distress of others; and particularly by the anguish of friends. Others suppose that reflections on the

:

P Luke xxii. 43. 9 ib. xix. 41, 2. Kypke and others say, that should here be translated utinam and Archbishop Secker says that we should rather render the passage, O that thou hadst known. Nine Sermons: 1758. p. 199. But I find that și gàg is used for side, and not alone. I therefore prefer the aposiopesis, as a natural ex pression of grief. Est interrupta locutio dolore turbati. Servius En. ix. 427. Nimius affectus defectus orationis amat. Donatus, Ter. Eun. v. ix. 20. So in Homer's hymn to Apollo, after

Αλλ' ει μοι πλαίης γε, Θεά, μέγαν ὅρκον ομόσσαι, κ. λ. Ernestus says that we should supply, tum ego utique te libenter acceperim. 1. 79, &c.

John xi. 35.

T. 33.