if we have been ungrateful to a friend, if we have slighted his kindness and repaid it with injury, we are troubled by his glance, and would do much to avoid the reproachful yet sorrowful expression of his countenance. And to see hereafter that gracious Being who has unweariedly studied our good, who has spared no pains that He might turn us from evil, who has striven by all imaginable means to lead us to happiness, to see Him, and know Him, with the frown upon his brow-terror of terrors! Even love is armed against us, and we feel in an instant all the anguish of despair. "Be ye not as the horse or as the mule,"-with what emphasis come these words, when we think on the eye of God as passing sentence, by its glance of reproach, on the scornful and the obdurate. "I will guide thee with mine. eye "-can these gracious syllables be ever taken as a threat? Alas! yes. That eye would now guide you, by its look of love, to the kingdom of heaven; but resist it, and that eye shall direct you, by its look of wrath, to the "fire prepared for the devil and his angels.” SERMON XIII. PILATE'S WIFE. "When he was set down on the judgment seat, his wife sent unto him, saying, Have thou nothing to do with that just man: for I have suffered many things this day in a dream because of him."-MATT. xxvii. 19. ings with Christ, that he was thoroughly satisfied as to the innocence of the prisoner, and the malice of his accusers. The more he examined Him, the more does he seem to have deepened in the conviction that there was no fault in Him, and to have become anxious to procure his enlargement. And when at length he yielded, and gave up Jesus to the will of his persecutors, it was avowedly because overborne by the cry for his destruction, and in no degree because persuaded of his being worthy of death. We need hardly tell you that these words have reference to Pilate, the Roman governor of Judea, by whose direction or consent our blessed Lord was crucified. There have been many disputes in regard of certain parts of Pilate's conduct; but all seem to agree in condemning him, on the whole, as having acted with signal injustice. He would seem to have been a weak as well as a wicked person at least, his wickedness forced him to assume all the appearance of weakness-for having irritated and disgusted the Jewish people, over whom he was set, by extortion and cruelty, he There never perhaps was a more sinwas in dread lest their complaints should gular scene than that exhibited when procure his removal from his govern- the governor surrendered up our Lord. ment; and therefore he did not dare to Wishing to show by a most significative thwart their will, even when acknowl-action his firm belief in the innocence of edging to himself its baseness and un- Christ, Pilate "took water, and washed reasonableness. You observe, through- his hands before the multitude, saying, out the whole account of Pilate's deal- I am innocent of the blood of this just of conscience, he must join them in their wickedness. person: seeye to it." What a scene! the judge acquits the prisoner, and at the same time delivers Him to death. He wishes We speak, you observe, of the upto have no share in the murder about braidings of conscience: for the obto be committed, though it could not servable thing is, that this great princibe committed but by his order or concur- ple was not dormant in Pilate, but, on rence. Alas! for human inconsistency: the contrary, acted with faithfulness and Pilate is not the only man, who whilst vigor. Whatever the sensuality and sinning against conscience, has contriv- tyranny of this Roman, he had evidented some excuse, and thought both to do ly not succeeded in silencing conscience: the deed and prevent its consequences. he had not reached the state, sometimes But how striking was the testimony reached by the wicked, when wrong given to our Lord. He was to die as a actions seem preceded by no repugmalefactor: but who ever died as a nance, and followed by no remorse. malefactor, before or since, with the Through all the proceedings against Jejudge's verdict in his favor of his being sus in which he had part, there was a "just person?" It was wondrously manifestly a great struggle in his breast; ordered by God, that the enemies of and it was only a sense of danger, the Christ should be witnesses to his right- fear of offending the people, and of eousness. Judas, who betrayed Him, giving ground for an accusation of negcould furnish no accusation, and hanged lect of the interests of Cæsar, which himself through remorse when He saw finally prevailed against the sense of Him condemned. Pilate who allowed what was right, and induced him to conhis crucifixion, stood forward amongst sent to the crucifixion of Christ. And the multitude who were clamorous for this it is, as we have said, which fixes his death, and declared, even whilst upon Pilate so enormous a criminality. consenting to their wish, that He who Though backed by his legions so that called Himself their King had done he might have repressed any tumult exnothing to justify his being made their cited by his refusal to do wrong, he victim. But the testimony thus borne knowingly and wilfully committed an to the Redeemer, however irresistible, act of monstrous injustice and cruelty, in no degree takes off from the sin of in the hope of obtaining a transient those, who, having given it, were ac-popularity, or averting a momentary cessory to his death. Indeed, so far as Pilate is concerned, it is very evident that what makes him immeasurably guilty, is the consciousness, which he took no pains to conceal, of the perfect innocence of Christ. Had he had his doubts, had he felt, that, though appearances were in favor of our Lord, there were circumstances of which the Jews were better judges than himself, and which might perhaps warrant his condemnation, there would have been some shadow of excuse for his yielding to the importunity of the priests and the people. But not a syllable of the kind can be alleged. The Roman governor was as certain of Christ's innocence as of his own existence: he had not the remotest suspicion that He might be guilty of anything which merited death: and therefore, in suffering Him to be crucified, he passed his own condemnation, and registered his sentence as wilfully unjust, having by his vices. so placed himself in the power of the wicked, that, in spite of the upbraidings anger. He could hardly have been ignorant that the very multitude, which were now vociferating "Crucify him, crucify him," had, but a few days before, rent the air with their hosannahs as Christ entered Jerusalem; and he might therefore have calculated that, if he shielded Jesus for a while from the popular fury, he should see Him again the object of the popular favor. But no he would run no risk: and, therefore, like many others who sacrifice the future to the present, he crushed his conscience and himself by the same desperate act. Neither is this all: we do not think that the enormity of Pilate is to be estimated from the mere resistance of conscience. There is a circumstance in the narrative of this guilty man, which scarcely seems to us to obtain its due share of attention, but which, in our view of the matter, aggravates immeasurably his crime. And this is the circumstance related in our text, which is omitted indeed by the other Evangelists, and re ceives no comment even from St. Matthew. At the very moment that he sat down on the judgment seat, already persuaded of the innocence of Christ, but perplexed by the clamor of the multitude, there came to Pilate a message from his wife, a message of entreaty and warning, declaratory of her having had some fearful dream or vision in reference to Christ, and beseeching him to take no measures against that just or righteous man. We know nothing in regard of Pilate's wife-she may have before been inclined to the receiving Jesus as a Prophet; or, which is the more probable, she may have known or cared nothing respecting Him, till, through a supernatural visitation, she learnt his innocence, and the peril of acting as his enemy. This is comparatively unimportant. It is certain that God specially interfered to work in her mind conviction on these points, and that she in consequence sent a distinct and urgent message to her husband, which reached him at the critical moment when he was inclined to waver between what he felt to be duty, and what he thought to be interest. There is nothing told us as to the manner in which Pilate received the communication. But forasmuch as he is described as taking increased pains afterwards to prevail on the multitude to forego their bloody purpose, we may suppose that it was not without effect; but that, corroborating his own conviction, it added to his earnestness to deliver Christ, and therefore to his guiltiness, when he nevertheless abandoned Him. And this, as we have stated, is, in our view, the most singular circumstance in what is narrated of Pilate, the most remarkable in itself, and the most condemnatory of the unjust and dissolute judge. We do not know whether we shall be able to make palpable to you all the instructiveness and energy contained in an incident to which you may not have been wont to attach much importance. But we will make the endeavor: we will consider God as acting upon Pilate to deter him from committing a great crime, and therefore to leave him inexcusable in the commission; and we will strive to show you-and that too in a manner which shall bring certain great practical lessons home to yourselves how this was emphatically done, when the wife of the Roman governor sent to tell him of her vision, and to beseech him that he would abstain from all violence against that righteous man Christ. Now there is unquestionably a difficulty in reconciling the foreknowledge, and yet more the purposes of God with the free agency, and therefore with the responsibleness of man. It certainly is not easy, and perhaps with our contracted powers not possible, to understand how men can be fully independent in the doing, and therefore thoroughly chargeable with the doing, things on which God has long before determined, so that they are instruments in his hands, and yet at the same time free agents, following their own wills, and answerable for all the consequences. But there is abundant evidence from Scripture, and also from the nature of the case, that there is no human action which is not foreseen by God, which is not indeed so definitely pre-ascertained that it can be reckoned on as though fixed by an absolute decree, but which, all the while, does not spring from the unbiassed human will, unbiassed, we mean, in such sense as to acquit God altogether of being the author of evil. We are to be especially careful that we never reject either one of two truths, because we may be unable to prove their consistency: for the harmony of two truths is itself a third truth; and whilst our faculties may be competent to the determining the two, they may fail us when we would advance to determine the third. The foreknowledge, and pre-determination of the Almighty this is a truth which reason and revelation concur in setting forth. The liberty of human actions, so that each of us is decided by his own will what to do, and what to forbear-this is another truth, demonstrable from the same sources, and on the same testimony. 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