of Him as merely our example; we must at the same time consider that He is our God. It is this which our Church takes pains to teach us, so that although she sets before us all our Lord's sufferings so carefully and particularly throughout this week of His passion, yet at the same time she especially sets before us His eternal Godhead.

And herein the example of Jesus Christ differs from the example of every one of His saints. He was perfect; and we are commanded to be perfect even as He is perfect; whereas the best of men are but imperfect like ourselves. Yet it is not on account of any danger we are liable to from their imperfections, that the example of holy men is not sufficient for us. Indeed it

might be supposed in some respects, if we look only to example, that the example of good men might be more profitable to us than that of our Lord Himself; for He is at such an infinite distance from us that we can never approach Him: whereas the example of men frail like ourselves may encourage us with some hopes; inasmuch as we may be as they. Yet it is our Lord's own example that is set before us beyond all things and in addition to those of holy men. The reason of this is because we can never look to our Lord merely as our example; He is in manifold ways unspeakably more.

When we believe in Jesus Christ as our God, then His example itself becomes profitable to us in a way perfectly different from any example of good men and this is the reason why faith in Christ-faith in Christ as God-is of such infinite importance to us, is indeed all in all to us. For we must follow His example. It is this alone, we are told, will afford us substantial ground of confidence on the day of judgment, that "as He is, so are we in this world.” Thus it is that

although in following the pattern set before us, we are ever at an immeasurable distance from it, yet (wonderful to speak!) we are brought near, so near as to be made one with Him, by His infinite power and Godhead. He seems to set us afar off, by His infinite perfections; at the same time He draws us near to Him, He communicates Himself to us, by giving us light to understand and power to perform. As "perfect Man" He gives us His inimitable pattern; but at the same time as "perfect God" He is ready to afford us Almighty aid to approach Him. So important is this great truth that our victory depends on the right reception of it. "Who is he that overcometh the world, but he that believeth that Jesus is the Son of God ?"

JOHN HENRY PARKER. OXFORD AND LONDON.

Tracts for the Christian Seasons.

TUESDAY IN HOLY WEEK.

The Discourse on the Mount of Olives.

EPISTLE, Isaiah 1. 5. GOSPEL, St. Mark xv. 1.

We usually connect together our Lord's first and His second coming. The blessed and happy time of Christmas is inseparably united with the thought of judgment; the manger at Bethlehem with the throne of glory. And this connection pervades all the services for Advent, as the collect for the first Sunday points out. Nor indeed can we carry back our thoughts with suitable feelings to the memory of our Lord's birth and infancy, unless we are impressed with the sense of our having to appear before Him hereafter as our Judge. Something of the same kind may be said also with respect to the season of our Lord's passion. It is not usually indeed so interwoven and bound up with His second advent in glory as the approach of Christmas is. But there are many indications in Scripture which would lead one to suppose that our Lord

would have us read the awful lessons of this holy season with a light from the great day of days, the final Judgment. Thus we may observe that the very first time that our Lord spake to His disciples of His death on the cross, saying that "the Son of man must suffer many things, and be rejected of the elders, and chief priests, and scribes, and be slain," He proceeds immediately to add, "Whosoever shall be ashamed of Me and of My words, of him shall the Son of man be ashamed when He shall come in His own glory, and in His Father's and of the holy angels." And then, at the time when our Lord continues to dwell so much on His future sufferings in His discourses to the disciples, He manifests His divine glory and majesty on the mount' of the transfiguration, in the presence of those three disciples, Peter, and James, and John, who were to be the witnesses of His agony in the garden; they who were to behold His countenance marred more than the sons of men, were made, as St. Peter says, "eye-witnesses of His majesty." Again, in the night of our Lord's betrayal, when He stood before the chief priests and the council, being buffetted, and mocked, and spit upon, betrayed, denied, and condemned, He declared, "Hereafter shall ye see the Son of man sitting

on the right hand of power, and coming in the clouds of heaven." And yet more particularly did our Lord shew that He would have us to connect the contemplation of His sufferings with a future judgment to come upon ourselves, when on the next day, as He was bearing His cross from the hall of judgment to Calvary, He addressed the women which bewailed and lamented Him. "But Jesus turning unto them said, Daughters of Jerusalem, weep not for Me, but weep for yourselves and for your children." He then proceeds to speak of the days when they shall say to the mountains, "Fall on us, and to the hills, Cover us." "For if they do these things in a green tree, what shall be done in the dry ?"

From the character of these reflections we may be led to see, that not without a divine meaning and suitableness at this awful period, when our Lord was now closing His public ministry and preparing for His approaching sufferings, He dis-courses so much at large with some of His disciples on the subject of the day of judgment. The circumstances under which the conversation ensues are as follows. Our Lord had just finished His last teaching in the temple, and after denouncing the woes upon the Pharisees, He had concluded with these affecting words to Jerusa