the Romans, he built another city on the shores of the lake Genezareth which he called Tiberias, in honour of the emperor Tiberius who had succeeded Augustus, and from hence the lake was known by the name of the city. The moral character of this prince was base and licentious. He divorced his wife, the daughter of Aretas king of Arabia, that he might indulge in an incestuous passion with Herodias the consort of his brother Philip, who was yet living-a connexion which, infamous in itself, is memorable because it introduces to the reader's attention, one of the most extraordinary characters in the history of the Jews.

Give an account of John the Baptist.

John, commonly called the Baptist, the son of Zecharias and Elizabeth, was born about six months before the Messiah. At a mature age, the wilderness to which he retired, and where he lived in unparalleled abstinence and austerity, resounded with his proclamations of repentance, and his predictions of the certain approach of the kingdom of heaven. A multitude of every age, rank, and sex, became his auditors; the lamentations of their sorrow and their resolutions of reformation disturbed the solitude of the desert; the voice of their united confession of sin ascended before the throne of God; and to the baptism of John they submitted as emblematic of that necessary purification which he described. The testimony of this extraordinary man to the personal glory and divine mission of Jesus Christ, was most decisive. The Saviour repaired to the wilderness; John, immediately conscious of the superiority of the personage he saw in humble guise before him, reluctantly at first discharged to him the functions of his office; and after the heavenly voice had declared that Jesus was the Son of God, John testified at once to his atoning sacrifice and his mediatorial grandeur, by the emphatic exclamation, "Behold the Lamb of God, which taketh away the sin of the world."

What was the cause of John the Baptist's death?

A man of zeal so fervent, of character so holy, and of courage so undaunted, was not likely to be deterred from denouncing the abominable vices of the times,

though sheltered behind the pomp of power, and veiled beneath the splendours of a throne. When Herod contracted the incestuous marriage which has been mentioned, John with noble boldness and exalted piety, preferring the approbation of God to human applause and to existence itself, reproved him to his face for his infatuated folly and his detestable crime. The voice of truth was never melodious in the ears of a tyrant. John was rewarded for his faithfulness by imprisonment, and was soon conducted to his grave. Upon the return of his birth-day, Herod gave a sumptuous entertainment to his officers and courtiers; the daughter of Herodias by his brother Philip, contrary to the dignity of her station and the modesty of her sex, danced before the company; the voluptuous prince was so delighted, that he promised to grant her whatever she demanded, though it amounted to half his kingdom; Herodias, who trembled lest after all, the rebuke of John might be effectual, and that therefore her shameful connexion with her second husband might be dissolved, instigated her daughter to demand the head of the faithful servant of God; Herod, who in spite of the offensive boldness of the Baptist had conceived a high opinion of his character, and by no means despised his instructions, was reluctant to order the undeserved and unjust punishment; but his royal word had passed, his oath had confirmed his promise, and John died by the hand of the executioner.

Were the followers of John the Baptist numerous ? Although the writers of the Gospels have not given any detailed history of the disciples of John the Baptist, it is certain that they were very numerous; that they not only existed, but increased, after the death of their master; that they had peculiar practices of fasting and of prayer, and peculiar opinions of the manner of life. It is a remarkable fact, that a sect no doubt descended, or deriving their principles, from them, is found in the East at the present day. In the vicinity of the Schat-el-Arab, at Bassora, Korna Schuster, &c. in the neighbourhood of Latikieh, the ancient Laodicea, and in a district east of mount Libanus, under different names the members of this sect are to be discovered. They appear, says an excellent author

who has described them, to occupy a middle station between Jews and Christians; they take honey and locusts, which are distributed as consecrated elements sacramentally. The chief topic of their discourse is the Light of the World, always introduced in sentences like those of the Evangelist, "In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God"-words which they apply not to Jesus, but to John. Christ they believe to have been, not the Son of God, but a prophet, and a follower of John. Baptism, the rite of initiation, they perform in a large vessel with significant ceremonies at the earliest dawn of the day; they worship John as their father, and ascribe to him the prerogative of illuminating the mind with the light of the true religion. They dedicate to their founder four festivals in the year; the first, to commemorate his birth; the second, the institution of his baptism; the third, his decapitation; and the fourth, his conquest of a dragon of wonderful size, which they pretend that he slew after it had issued from the lake of Tiberias. They have many mystical numbers, mystical names, and mystical spirits, and various books to which they appeal in defence of their tenets and for the encouragement of their faith. But to return from this digression, which it is hoped will not be uninteresting to the reader.

What event occurred at this period particularly effecting the Jews in Rome?

While Herod Antipas was thus conducting the affairs of his government, a decree was issued by Tiberius banishing all the Jews from Rome, or according to one author, from Italy. This edict originated in the hateful crime of a young Roman, Decius Mundus, who, by bribing some Egyptian priests, had debauched a noble lady in the character and garb of their god Anubis. The Jews were implicated in the calamities of the Egyptians by the artifices of the notorious Sejanus, whose nefarious plots might be discovered or thwarted by the known loyalty of the people he persecuted. It appears that this fact was discovered after the death of that prostituted minister, and a more favourable decree was issued by the emperor.

SECTION II.

INFLUENCE OF THE REJECTION OF CHRIST BY THE JEWS ON THEIR NATIONAL CONDITION.

THE time had now arrived, when the final destiny of the Jewish nation was sealed; when the reiterated and appalling threatenings which had been pronounced by God against their obduracy and unbelief were fulfilled; and immediately subsequent to which, they were oppressed by calamities which might have appalled ages and generations, but which were inflicted upon them within the limits of a single province, and in the duration of a few short years.

WHAT was the political condition of Judæa when Christ commenced his ministry?

A, D. 26.

When the blessed Redeemer commenced his public ministry, Judæa and Jerusalem were agitated with popular commotion, and were oppressed by the outrages of their unjust and tyrannical governor. The predecessors of Pilate had respected the religious principles or prejudices of the Jews, and their standards had not been introduced into the city, because their images of the emperors and of eagles being regarded as idolatrous emblems, were held in utter abomination by the people. Pilate, however, had no such complaisance for their feelings. A body of his troops were to winter in Jerusalem; they entered the city in the night with their standards covered, but the next morning the offensive emblems were displayed. The whole city was in an uproar. A number of the people immediately repaired in a body to the governor at Cæsarea, and implored him to remove the causes of their grief. Pilate refused; he declared that the application was an insult upon the emperor; six days he resisted their importunity; at length he was irritated by their pertinacity; he commanded some soldiers, stationed for the purpose, to put the suppliants to the sword; the Jews immediately offered themselves to be slaughtered, declaring that they had rather die

than violate the laws of their God; their passive constancy astonished, and then affected, the stern Roman, and he commanded the standards to be removed. But he soon returned to his purpose of mortifying the Jews. He placed in the royal palace of Jerusalem a number of shields in honour of Tiberius-an action which they resented rather as an indignity to them, than as an honour to the emperor. Their remonstrances were presented to Pilate in vain, but their application to Tiberius himself was successful, and an order was transmitted to the governor to place the shields in some other place. Pilate dared not disobey, and the shields were removed to Cæsarea.

Give another specimen of the contempt of Pilate for the Jews.

Whether Pilate in his next undertaking was actuated by a reference to the public good, or by a mere desire to vex the Jews, it is unnecessary to inquire. To have a pretext for extorting money from the sacred treasury, he plausibly pretended to build an aqueduct which was to convey water to Jerusalem from a distance of two hundred furlongs; and in order to defray the expense of the undertaking, he demanded that a tax should be laid upon the funds of the temple. The people were irritated into a determined resistance; the sanguinary Roman commanded some of his soldiers to mix with the crowd with weapons concealed under their garments; when the populace persisted with their clamour, at a given signal, these men fell upon the unarmed and defenceless multitude; a vast slaughter ensued; the crowd was finally dispersed, and though the people were intimidated by the massacre, it was soon found that even by this bloody infliction, their spirit was by no means subdued. In what gloomy times, and under what a dreadful tyranny did the meek and lowly Jesus commence his ministry of mercy!

What was the connexion, and what were the consequences of the ministry of Christ to the Jews?

This momentous inquiry demands a specific reply, and it would be unpardonable to omit its brief investigation in this work. The doctrines which the Sa