spent his life and fortune in achieving, and which was virtually accomplished by the British nation only a couple of days before his death, is, in its direct operation on the fate of millions of his fellow men, and in its influence on the entire human race, equivalent to the foundation of a new religion. And yet, had it not been for the filial piety of those nearest and dearest to him, he might, during the last years of his life, have had to apply to himself the words of him whose example he kept incessantly before his eyes: 'The foxes have holes, and the birds of the air have nests, but the Son of Man hath not where to lay his head '*.

There can be no doubt that Jesus made use of these words with reference to his own destitute condition. But it does not at all follow that such had always been his position in life. On the contrary, he had become thus reduced in circumstances owing to his caring more for others than for himself; and his words, when thus understood, are far more apposite and impressive in the mouth of a rich man who had become poor, than of one who had always been indigent. They also give a very different meaning to the words of the Apostle Paul, in his Second Epistle to the Corinthians, from that they have hitherto received; which words, under the view now taken of Jesus's position in life and character, also acquire a much deeper import.

Paul, when calling on the Corinthians to contribute largely to the poor saints' at Jerusalem, instances first the Macedonians, whose deep poverty had abounded with the riches of their liberality,' and then refers to the Lord himself, who (says he) though he was rich, yet for your sakes he became poort. And if these words are read literally, as meaning that Jesus had become poor through his excessive philanthropy and liberality, the appeal made by the Apostle to his example will have far more force than if they were understood to have been spoken figuratively; and at the same time a light will be thrown on our Lord's life and conduct, serving to clear away many difficulties and apparent inconsistencies found to exist in the

Gospel history, as interpreted on the assumption of his having been nothing more than a poor labouring mechanic.

In like manner, the story related in the first Gospel of the young man who came asking Jesus what he should do to have eternal life, receives a totally different construction. He was told to keep the Commandments; to which he replied that he had done so from his youth upwards. On this 'Jesus said unto him, If thou wilt be perfect, go and sell that thou hast, and give to the poor, and thou shalt have treasure in heaven, and come and follow me'*. This exhortation, usually regarded as an abstract lesson, which, from the mouth of a poor man, might almost seem to be dictated by interested motives, has now to be read as a practical direction, altogether beyond the suspicion of any such motives, to follow the teacher's own personal example.

The attempt, too, of Jesus's family to lay hands on him under the pretence of his being out of his mind† may well have arisen from interested motives, their object being to prevent him from squandering away his property on what they not unnaturally regarded as visionary schemes. At the present day we witness frequent instances of such interference in the case of persons well off in the world; though, should a poor mechanic, like George Fox or John Bunyan, feel himself called on to neglect his business, for the purpose of preaching the Gospel, or even of promulgating doctrines of a very different character, few of his kinsmen would trouble themselves to check him or prevent him from going whithersoever he might list, perhaps they would think the further off the better,-provided only he did not leave a wife and family burthensome to them or chargeable on the parish.

The main cause of all this error has been the desire to exalt the divine nature of our Lord Jesus at the expense of his humanity. The poor carpenter's son, born in a stable, uneducated, the companion of outcasts, without a place wherein to rest his head, is made not only the object of veneration, but also an example † Mark iii. 21.

* Matth. xix. 21.

to be followed, both by devout and simple-minded persons, who imagine they can best serve him by renouncing the pleasures as well as the cares and temptations of this sinful world, and also— which is far worse-by the dangerous class of Socialists and Communists, who profess to find a sanction for their wild schemes in the life and doctrines of Jesus, as so erroneously represented to them.

What is here stated may serve to place in a totally different light our Lord's character and conduct during his early manhood, previously to his baptism by John, and the consequent commencement of his own mission; at the same time that it helps to fill up the blank of nearly twenty years which has hitherto existed in his personal history.

CHAPTER IX.

JOHN THE BAPTIST.

Ar the time of the appearance upon earth of our Lord Jesus, the Jews were divided into two main religious parties, distinguished by the names of Pharisees and Sadducees. They cannot properly be called sects; for they professed the same faith, worshipped together in the Temple at Jerusalem, and were thus members of the same congregation or church.

Though the name Pharisee may be derived from a word signifying separation' or exclusion,' it does not necessarily mean more than Methodist did, when it was first applied to those members of the Established Church of England, who, without thinking of secession from it, lived according to method; or than the name of Ritualist does at the present day—the Ritualists being, in fact, the Pharisees of the Anglican Church. The Pharisees, like the Chasidim,—the 'pious' or 'God-fearers' of the time of the Maccabees, if they are not the same, were the more religiously

disposed, and also the more important section of the congregation, who gave the most decided expression to the national belief, and strove to establish it by a definite system of teaching and interpreting the Law. With this object they had introduced amplifications and sometimes limitations of the Law itself, and had extended its prescriptions to actions and things, which in themselves were innocent, but which now seemed objectionable or dangerous; and this was oftentimes done by an artificial and arbitrary interpretation and application. To the hedges' thus set round the Law, the same binding force was attributed as to the written letter of the Law itself, if even they were not held to be more stringent. And as it was not easy to stop in such a course when once it had been entered on, a system of legal-which with the Jews was religious-casuistry arose, whereby small matters of no real moment were insisted on with painful scrupulousness, and raised to the same level and importance as the first duties of life.

The Sadducees, who are said to have derived their name from Sadoc, a disciple of the celebrated teacher of the Law, Antigonos of Socho, in about the third century before Christ, were diametrically opposed to the Pharisees. They did not, however, form a separate sect on that account. They were, like their opponents, merely a party, or school, within the pale of the national Church, being principally of the higher classes of society, persons of birth, wealth, and rank, who had received a more liberal education than the majority of their countrymen; and as they were not deterred by any religious scruples from mixing with persons out of the pale of the Church, they not unnaturally became acquainted with the philosophy of the Greeks, and derived many opinions from it. Hence they were philosophers, rationalists, freethinkers, denying the existence of a spiritual world, rejecting the traditions and glosses of the Pharisees; and though feeling themselves bound by the Law, they looked upon it as a manual for the regulation of their moral conduct, rather than as a system of revealed religion. As we witness among ourselves at the present day, this philosophical scepticism prevailed among

the higher and more intellectual classes, far more than among the middle and lower ranks of the community, who were under the influence of their spiritual teachers.

Within these two classes, but principally belonging to the former, were the Scribes or Lawyers, and the Priests.

The Scribes, or Sopherim, were those Jews, mostly Levites, who had received an education founded on the study of the Scriptures, so as to qualify them to read and expound the Law, the language of which had become dead and unintelligible to the mass of the people, as at the present day Latin is to the Italians. These Scribes or Lawyers took on themselves to explain the written Law by means of the traditions and dogmas with which it had become laden, as is seen to be generally the case with the clergy of all countries. They were, in fact, the teachers whose precepts the Pharisees, or Ritualists, put into practice; and hence it may be understood how Jesus always classed the two together. Though there may not be any existing proof that the Scribes of the time of Jesus had any part in the actual reduction into writing of the Mishna, or oral interpretation of the written Law, it is not unreasonable to suppose they had. At all events, their oral traditions and glosses must have formed the basis of it; and how numerous and minute these had already become, is sufficiently proved by the reproaches and animadversions of Jesus himself.

The Priests, as a body, were of the High Church or Ritualistic party. But, in the time of Jesus, the family of the high-priest were Sadducees, probably on account of their connexion with the Gentile Roman authorities, on whom they were entirely dependent, and whose creatures their position compelled them to be.

Equally within the Jewish congregation, of which they did not form even a separate body, were the Nazarites, who were individuals specially 'set apart' and consecrated to God. Some were made so for life by their parents, even before their birth, as Samson and Samuel had been; others were ascetics, as Elijah ; John the Baptist seems to have been both, he having been dedicated to asceticism for life*.

* Luke i. 15.