assembling of ourselves together, as the manner of some is; but exhorting one another: and so much the more, as ye see the day approaching."

We have now arrived at the most solemn day in all the year. A day on which happened the most wonderful event the world ever saw. A day on which Angels were filled with wonder, and devils with terror. A day which had been foretold for four thousand years. A day without which we should have been eternally miserable, and which we may well call good, for it has brought the best of good things to the whole race of man.

With what solemn feelings should we enter upon it, and how earnestly should we pray, that we may not, through any fault of our own, lose our share in its blessings!

The season of Lent for this year is drawing to its close; and what has been its effect upon us? One of the verses which we have just read (which form part of the Epistle for to-day) tells us what it ought to have done for us. It ought to have provoked us to love and to good works. "To love," because we have been told again and again the wondrous love which has been shown to us; because the sufferings of Christ, for our sakes, have, during the last six weeks, been brought before us in every variety of way we can imagine. "To good works," because by them only can we show our gratitude to Him for all that He has done for us; and because we know that one purpose of His coming was "to put His laws into our hearts."

But are these indeed our feelings? I fear that this Good Friday will find many of us destitute of them; and that, notwithstanding the advantages we have enjoyed during Lent, our love and gratitude are still lamentably cold. Perhaps one reason is, we do not consider sufficiently in detail the sufferings of our Lord. It is very easy, in the words of

this Epistle, to talk of "the one offering of the body of Jesus Christ, once for all." The words are soon said, but it is hard to realize their meaning. Let us, however, attempt it. Let us employ some portion of this solemn day in dwelling upon them, and endeavouring to bring before our mind's eye a picture of all that Jesus endured for our sakes. Let us think upon Him in the garden, behold the bloody sweat stand upon His brow; follow Him to Pilate; see Him crowned with thorns, mocked, scourged, and spit upon; and, finally, let us try to imagine the agonies of crucifixion: and as we dwell upon it, let us ask ourselves the solemn question, "Why was it necessary that all this suffering should be borne ?" We shall find an answer in the verses we have just read; and surely the consideration of them will warm our love, and increase our gratitude.

For they tell us, first, that Jesus came in order that "He might do His Father's will." The law which God first gave to man was, like Himself, perfect, and so strict, that after Adam's fall, no man was found able to obey it; for if he could, he must have been without sin. God could not alter His terms, for it was impossible for a perfectly holy Being to give any but a holy law; and man must therefore have perished, if the wondrous plan had not been devised, of renewing the covenant which man had broken, between the Father and the Son, and of Jesus keeping that law which man was unable to keep for himself. This, then, was the first thing which made it necessary for Him to come into the world, that the purity of the law might not be infringed: "Lo, I come to do Thy will, Ŏ God."

But, secondly, these verses tell us that He came, not only "to do God's will," but "to offer a sacrifice for sin." He not only kept God's law for us, but also bore the punishment justly due to us for breaking it. This is what we are commemorating to-day. We have heard all through Lent of the way in which

He kept the law, of His meekness, His gentleness, His purity, His labours. To-day we hear how He bore our punishment by the offering of His body; and how He endured the agonies of the Cross, that we might not have to endure the yet greater agonies of hell.

But even this was not all; for we are told, thirdly, that Jesus came to make a new covenant with His people in place of the one they had broken, and that this covenant was not only "that He would remember their sins and iniquities no more," but that He would put His laws into their hearts, and write them in their minds. So that we see that Jesus not only kept God's law for us, not only bore the punishment due to us for breaking it, but enabled us to keep it for ourselves; and this He did, by bestowing upon us His Holy Spirit. This was the gift He promised to His disciples before He left them, and which He told them would be better for them than even the continuance of His presence; for when the Comforter came, He would guide them into all truth. He promised, too, that this blessing should be continued to His people, that the Holy Ghost should dwell with them, and be in them. And this promise has been fulfilled, and is the crown of all our Saviour's gifts. Through Adam's fall we became sinners, unable of ourselves to think a good thought, or do a good action; but through Christ's mediation, we have an Almighty helper, and if we follow His guidance, we shall be enabled to do those good works which are acceptable in God's sight.

Let us, in the concluding words of this Epistle, exhort one another, that so it may be, and strive to provoke each other to love and to good works, and so much the more as we see the day approaching. Year after year rolls on; Lent after Lent passes away; and each one, as it goes, brings us nearer to that awful day, when He who was offered as a sacrifice will appear as a Judge, no longer ready and

willing to take away sin, but telling those who were not here sprinkled from an evil conscience, to depart from Him into everlasting fire.

Easter Even.

LENT is all but over, and to-morrow morning we shall awake with the glad consciousness that the great holiday of the year is come-the day when we are to celebrate the resurrection of our Lord, and may sing with His Church in all ages the joyful strain, " Christ being raised from the dead dieth no more; death hath no more dominion over Him "."

If we have, as we ought, followed our Saviour through this week of sorrow, if we have entered into the sufferings of the cross, and all He there endured, we shall indeed rejoice that the time has arrived when we may again think of Him ascended into glory; no longer bearing about a weak and suffering body, no longer despised, and rejected of men, no longer without a place in which to lay His head, but dwelling in the light which no man can approach unto, freed from all pain and sorrow, and receiving the praise and obedience of adoring Angels.

But before this joyful morning breaks, one day remains, a calm and solemn, but not a sorrowful day, in which we may think of our Saviour as resting in the tomb; and which, forming as it were a link between Lent and Easter, we may profitably spend in reviewing the lessons which the one has taught us, and considering the use we can make of them now the other is come.

8 Rom. vi. 9.

To some minds the feeling which Easter brings is this: "Well, Lent is over. The time of self-denial and mortification is passed. We have lived hardly and carefully long enough, and now is the time for a little indulgence." And so they at once relax the reins, give themselves up to enjoyment, and commit more acts of thoughtlessness and folly than at any other time of the year, excepting perhaps at Christ

mas.

But surely those who thus act cannot rightly have used the season of preparation through which we have just passed, nor can they remember why they rejoice. If they called to mind what Easter really is, and why they are to be happy and joyful, they could not imagine they were keeping it by being particularly sinful. It is true we ought to rejoice, but it should be with a heavenly, not an earthly, joy, and we should strive to show to all about us that the self-discipline which we have undergone has had its due effect upon us by making us more meek, and humble, and self-denying, than we were before.

At the beginning of Lent we compared ourselves to soldiers, and Lent to the time of training; and we then saw how useful it was for a portion of the year to be set apart for the especial purpose of selfexamination and discipline, in order that when trial came we might be prepared boldly to meet it. But what should we think of a soldier who, when the time of instruction was over, and he was called to march against the enemy, should say, "I am weary of all this discipline. I know how to fight, but I do not mean to practise it; I shall rest and enjoy myself till the war is over?" Surely we should consider him a cowardly dastard, unworthy of the pains and money which had been bestowed upon him.

And equally unworthily are they acting, who at Easter lay aside the care and watchfulness they practised in Lent, and give way to their own inclinations. The retirement of Lent, the extra ser