Tracts for the Christian Seasons.

TUESDAY BEFORE EASTER.

The fig-tree is found withered-Jesus argues with the Pharisees in the Temple-Pronounces the destruction of the Temple.

WE have risen to a day of still increasing interest and awfulness, as we look to the events which mark this week in the history of our Lord. Yesterday we were summoned to be present at a sentence of condemnation on a mere representative of human unprofitableness. Today we are summoned to witness both the execution of that sentence and a sentence of condemnation on an actual criminal. And the terrible solemnity of this latter event is increased by the manifest preparation of the former, which assures us that it shall as surely be executed, as was the sentence on the fig-tree. The whole day, in short, is one of a most important trial. A whole nation, God's chosen people, are brought to the bar in the most solemn court upon earth, in the house of the Lord; and the trial ends with the passing of sentence of death and we

are invited to enter the court, and be present at the trial. How many have risen early and pushed their eager way through jostling crowds to hear a trial of surpassing interest in its day. Here is a trial of surpassing interest to every member of the Church of God throughout all lands and all generations to the end of the world. Shall we not enter in and hear?

(1.) The Judge is already on His way to the court. Let us put ourselves in His train. We meet Him on His way from Bethany, and now we are come to the place of the fig-tree. But where is it? Hear Peter crying out, "Master! behold the fig-tree which Thou cursedst is withered away." And hear the Lord's answer, “Have faith in God."

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Those whom it represented had not faith in God, as will appear from the evidence of this day's trial, to which we are hastening on, and therefore will only stay to make a remark or two. choly enough in itself is the view of the shortness of our stay in this world. Men's "days are as grass; as a flower of the field so he flourisheth. For the wind passeth over it, and it is gone; and the place thereof shall know it no more:" says the Psalmist. But how much more melancholy when we think of any one being taken away in

a state of impenitence, when he may be compared to this fig-tree which yesterday was so green and flourishing, and to-day is dried up from the roots and withered away. And yet men will go on sinning, thinking to repent in their last hours. But how suddenly may these come, and how suddenly also may they go, not leaving even so much time as was given to the fig-tree: perhaps but a few moments: perhaps not one. Besides, every day's advance in sin throws the day of repentance further off, and the further in proportion to the wilfulness and knowledge with which transgression is made. And what clearer proof of wilfulness and knowledge can there be than the prospect of repentance accompanying the act of transgression. And yet to such blindness can men come, that they will in their last moments console themselves with the memory of this delusive intention of repentance, and put it against the sin. But the effect of the indulgence in sin sometimes shews itself in a way which cannot be mistaken. Though we meet with men of whom we feel a moral certainty that they never can effectually repent, except something like a miracle of grace should be vouchsafed, yet charity is always ready to put down the horrible thought. Their understanding is

clear: so that the door of possibility is still open for an alarmed conscience and affected heart, and therefore we are fain to hope for the best. But when the effects of sin are manifest in injured faculties, when that part of man is gone, on which alone conviction of heavenly truth can work, what a dreadful spectacle is before us, what a fulfilment of the doom of this fig-tree. Thus we may see fig-trees already beginning to wither under the terrible curse, "No man eat fruit of thee hereafter for ever;" all probability, and sometimes we might almost say, even possibility, of their ever awakening to the service of the Lord, being removed for ever.

So speaks this fig-tree from its withered branches and blasted leaves. Shall they not bé continually before our eyes to waru us? And before our eyes they will continually be, if we be but on the right road, and in the right company. For the right road for us all is that which leads to the heavenly Jerusalem, the everlasting city of the living God, where is the Temple of His celestial presence. And the right company is that of the Lord Jesus Christ, who is leading His disciples thither, not to see Him suffer on the cross, but to behold Him glorified upon the throne of His everlasting kingdom. "Turn not away from this road (it

cries out to us) but persevere in it, that you may flourish in the courts of your God for ever."

(2.) And now we enter the court, and Israel is put upon trial. Every advantage is afforded him. He is represented in those of his children. whom he himself at that day would choose for his representatives, men who professed a zeal for God and for His law. For such were the Pharisees men whom our Lord Himself asserted to be lawfully filling Moses' seat: men who were the heads and boast of the nation, the chief priests, the scribes, the elders. What an imposing crowd of criminals: yet out of their own mouth He condemns them. He convicts them of leaves of boastful profession and of emptiness of fruit of true service. They are allowed the utmost freedom of speech, even to the crossquestioning of their Judge, and the very spirit of their questions convicts them. Read the evidence of this trial as it is given in the 21st, 22nd, and 23rd chapters of the Gospel according to St. Matthew. Then you will perhaps fall upon something like the following considerations.

It sometimes happens in a trial that the criminal accuses his witnesses, and by his very charges only establishes his own guilt. It was thus also with the Pharisees. They demand Christ's au