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"I will pray the

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go to prepare a place for you." Father, and he shall give you another Advocate, that may abide with you always." "Peace I leave with you, my peace I give unto you: not as the world giveth, give I unto you. Let not your heart be troubled, neither let it be afraid." Father, I will that they also, whom thou hast given me, be with me where I am; that they may behold my glory which thou hast given me."

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Such was the sensibility of his disposition, and his benevolent horror at Judas's ingratitude and guilt, that he could not mention his traitorous design at the paschal supper without great emotion: "he was troubled in spirit, and testified, and said, Verily, verily, I say unto you, that one of that one of you shall betray me."

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His ignominious and painful death was the greatest act of benevolence to the whole world. "° Greater love than this hath no man, that a man lay down his life for his friends." "But P God commended his love towards us in that, while we were yet sinners and enemies, Christ died for us."

After our Lord's resurrection, his benevolence shone with the same degree of mild lustre. We have remarkable proofs of it in his conduct to St. Peter. One of the angels who appeared to the women at his sepulchre thus addressed them: and, no doubt, in conformity to our Lord's command: "Depart, say to his disciples and to PETER, He goeth before you into Galilee." And two of the sacred 'writers

lib. v. 27.

m xvii. 24.
9 Mark xvi. 7.

n John xiii. 21. Luke xxiv. 34

* John xiv. 16. ⚫ib. xv. 13. P Rom. v. 8, 10. 1Cor. xv. 5. This circumstance, so honourable to St. Peter, is mentioned only by St. Paul, and by St. Luke whose gospel is said to have been

OUR LORD'S MORAL CHARACTER.

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.

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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.

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Nor must we stop here. He is now our "intercessor at God's right hand, and will hereafter be the dispenser of eternal life to the righteous: and he has taught us to y 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 • The two great apostles after their variance. Gal. ii. 11. 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 Histori"Luke xxiv. 51. w Rom. viii. 34. ques, &c. 1 Cor. xv. 5. John xxi. 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 a 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."

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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 into 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, xgust. Rhet. ii. xi. 1. ed. Can ab. 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. e 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 him to 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 spirit"When he ual and temporal wants of mankind. saw the multitudes, he was moved with compassion on them, because they were wearied [with following

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f Matt. ix. 36, 7, 8.

The true reading is iozunuárez, of which

seems a marginal explanation crept into the text.

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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 thereplenteous, but the labourers are few: pray ye fore 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.

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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 gath. ering 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"

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