to his revealed will-that you should be smitten; he is never pleased with those who smite you; he said you were to bless the world by speaking. Moses erred, and a wicked world has erred. Doubtless God decreed that Moses should smite that rock, though he did it sinfully. So God hath decreed that you should be smitten, that you may be of some use to the people. The fig will not ripen unless it be bruised; and thou wouldst not have ripened if thou hadst not felt the rod. The fountains of the deep earth would never send up their waters unless they were bored to the very bottom; so the Christian must be bored with trouble to make him give forth living water. It is said that the oyster hath no pearls unless it be sick; so it is true of the Christian that he will have no pearl unless he be persecuted. There will be little good done by any of us, unless we have some trials and troubles. The rock must be smitten; if it hath a double blow do not be afraid, for the rock was smitten twice, and the waters gushed out.

But I want you to notice that the rock, although smitten wrongly, was SMITTEN WITH THE ROD OF THE LAWGIVER. This delighted me when I first thought of it, that the second rock, that is Christ mystically, was smitten with the very same rod which smote the first rock, Christ himself. If I suffer for Christ, my sufferings are the sufferings of Christ; and, although they are occasioned by man as the second cause, yet they do really spring from God. "The rod of the wicked shall not rest upon the lot of the righteous;" and when the wicked smite us, unwittingly to themselves, they do not smite with their own rod, but with the rod of God. God measures out our trials and our troubles, and let the enemy do what he may against me, he can not smite me with any thing except my Father's rod. My Father makes even Rab-shakeh the rod of justice to Hezekiah, but Rab-shakeh can not smite with his own rod. It is God's rod that falls on his children. No child of God is ever smitten with any rod but God's. It may be that we think it comes from hell, but, in truth, it comes from heaven. Even though Judas betrayed his Master, we read, "whereunto he was appointed." And if our most intimate friend lift up his heel against us, even then God has given the dog leave to bark no devouring lion roars against God's

children until God unchains his lips. No fierce leopard comes out of his den against an heir of heaven until God bids him. Even the devil himself becomes the servant of God: he can not smite God's child with any thing but God's rod. He had to go and ask God's leave to oppress one of his children; he had to ask whether he might afflict Job, and even then Satan could not afflict Job himself, but he besought God, saying, "Put out thine hand." It was God's hand that had to smite Job, even though Satan seemed to be the instrument. So, beloved, though thou art smitten by a rod, it is the same rod which fell upon the back of Christ.

Once more you will observe, you who are wont to persecute God's children, that although great results flowed from the smiting of the rock, yet Moses WAS PUNISHED for doing it. Moses never entered the promised land, because he smote that rock. It was the emblem of Christ mystically, and even the smiting of the emblem had significance in it. Moses was commanded to speak, and not to smite; he rashly and wickedly did smite, and therefore was punished. Mark that, persecutor! Thou shalt be punished for thy persecution, whether it be by word or by deed. Whatsoever thou doest against a child of God shall be fearfully returned into thine own bosom. "Whosoever shall offend one of these little ones that believe in me, it were better for him that a millstone were hanged about his neck, and he were cast into the sea." I tell you men and women, there is pardon for all kinds of sin against the Son of God, even persecution; but if there be any thing which, when God doth punish, he visiteth with severe vengeance, it is this. Do you not remember how Herod, the proud perse cutor, was eaten of worms? Have you never read of the fate of Antiochus Epiphanes, who put to death the glorious Maccabees, the testifiers of the truth? Have you never heard how Bishop Bonner died, who persecuted the Lord's children? Do you not know that persecutors seldom die in their beds, or if they do, they die as if the flames of hell were kindled about them, before they entered there? To be a persecutor is indeed a horrible thing; a sinner of any kind must be damned, if unsaved, but a persecutor must be sunk into the lowermost depths of the pit that is bottomless. Tremble, ye

who slander, and jeer, and ridicule, and oppress the children of God; remember, their Maker is mighty. They can not avenge themselves; they do not wish to; but remember, "Vengeance is mine, and I will repay, saith the Lord." It may be with some of you who are persecutors of God's children, that the word has gone out, and if so, O man, thou shalt never enter into the promised land, because thou hast smitten that rock. Yet if thou art a persecutor, hear God's truth: Paul says, “I was a persecutor and blasphemer, yet I obtained mercy, because I did it ignorantly in unbelief." Have you done it ig norantly? Have any of you been persecuting God's children, not believing them to be his, but supposing them to be hypocrites? Hear this! Return, ye persecutors, return, ye who have sinned willfully against God; with him is plenteous redemption; he is able to blot out your transgressions, and wash you from your sins; yea, he will pass by all your iniquities, receive you graciously, and love you freely, if you will cry unto him with your whole heart. O! believe me, there is no sin which can damn a man if he have faith in Christ; there is no crime, however black, which can exclude a man from heaven, if he doth but believe in Jesus Christ; but if thou goest still on to thy grave a hoary-headed sinner against God, how awful will be thy fate when the fierce lions of his vengeance shall grind thy bones, or ever thou reachest the bottom of the den where thou hopedst to have destroyed Daniel. Thou shalt see him delivered, and thou shalt thyself be cast into the midst of demons fiercer than thou hast ever guessed, and flames more terrible than thou hast ever dreamed; ay, tremble; "Kiss the Son, lest he be angry, and ye perish from the way, when his wrath is kindled but a little. Blessed are all they that put their trust in him.”

May God bless what I have said, to your souls, for Jesus Christ's sake!

SERMON XXI.

A VISIT

то

CALVARY

"And Pilate saith unto them, Behold the man !"-JOHN, xix. 5

It had been insinuated against Pilate, that he was in league with Jesus Christ to set up a new monarchy in opposition to that of Cæsar. In order to refute that accusation, Pilate orders Jesus to be scourged. The soldiers put upon his head a crown of thorns; they spit upon him; they pluck his hair; they buffet him; and when all these cruelties and insults have been exercised upon his person, Pilate brings forth Jesus Christ upon the balcony. Standing there, he addresses the people assembled in the street, tersely exclaiming, "Ecce homo," ," "Behold the man! This is the man with whom you charge me of conspiring against Cæsar. Is this how I would treat my accomplice? Would I in this way exercise my kindness for one whom I intended to set up as Cæsar's rival? Do you fancy that here you see marks of honor? Is that purple robe of shame the purple robe of the empire which you say I wish to fling upon his shoulders? Are these my kindnesses to my friend ?" It must have been a very telling answer to their accusations; and they must have seen that a repetition of the charge would be a bare-faced falsehood. Methinks, also, that Pilate had another purpose to serve by bringing up Jesus in this array of misery: he sincerely desired to deliver our Saviour from crucifixion, and he thought that, blood-thirsty as the people were, their vengeance would be satisfied at the sight of their victim in this extremity of suffering and misery, and they would then say: "Let him go." "Surely," he thought, "it will satisfy them; though they had demon's hearts, this might content them; though,

like fiends, they thirst for cruelty, surely this were quite enough." But no; like the wolf which hath tasted blood, they were insatiable, and the very sight of his emaciated form, stained all over with the streaming gore, did but excite them the more loudly to cry: "Crucify him! crucify him!" We believe that one of Pilate's purposes was answered: the people no longer suspected him of being an accomplice with our Saviour. But the other purpose, blessed be God, was not accomplished; for if it had been, we had been unredeemed at this hour, and the sacrifice of Calvary had been unoffered for our redemption.

We shall leave Pilate, however, and I shall endeavor, by the help of God, to stand in Pilate's place, and with an infinitely different motive, to say to each of you: "Behold the man!" And may our Master be with us, and, by his grace, reveal our Lord Jesus Christ, visibly set forth crucified among you! so that by the eyes of faith every one of you, whether you have seen him before or no, may now be enabled to look unto him who was crucified for our sins, who bore our griefs, and carried our sorrows!

A view of Christ on Calvary is always beneficial to a Christian. We never hear a sermon concerning Christ of which we disapprove, however inelegant in its diction, if it be sound in doctrine. We never complain of our minister that he preaches too much concerning the cross of Jesus Christ. No; there can be no tautology where his name is mentioned. Though a sermon should be a mere repetition of his name, we would rejoice to hear it, and say:

"Jesus, I love thy charming name;

'Tis music to mine ear."

The French king said of Bourdaloue, that he "would rather hear the repetitions of Bourdaloue than the novelties of another." So we can say of Jesus Christ, that we had rather hear the repetitions of Jesus than any novelty from any preacher whatsoever. O! how are our souls dissatisfied when we listen to a sermon destitute of Christ. There are some preachers who can manage to deliver a sermon and leave out Christ's name altogether. Surely the true believer will stand