with his guards. Priests were marching in
procession; and crowds of worshippers standing
about the holy place. Tongues of flame leaped
faintly from the altars on which the priests were
sprinkling blood
but the wretches
who lay around (the Pool) on their quilts and
rugs, the blind, the leprous, and the aged poor,
drew no compassion from the busy priests. One
man, the weakest of the weak, had been helpless
no less than thirty-eight years. Over this man
Jesus paused and said: -

"Wilt thou be made whole ?'

"Rabbi, I have no man, when the water is troubled, to put me into the pool; but while I am coming, another stepped down before me.""

The Compassionate answered him:

they were surrounded, to pray to their God, to sing their psalms, and to read the law. This gave rise to the synagogue, which means no more than a "meeting together;" but after the Maccabæan insurrection it became a popular institution, and every little village had its synagogue. Now, as much of the work of Christ was done in the synagogue, as he loved to go into them and to take part in their services, it is desirable that we should have a clear notion of what a synagogue was:

In

"A house of unhewn stones taken up from the hill-side; squat and square of the ancient Hebrew style, having a level roof, but neither spire nor tower, neither dome nor minaret to enchant the eye; such was the simple synagogue of the Jews in which Jesus taught. side a Syrian' synagogue is like one of our parish schools, with seats for the men, rough sofas of wood half covered with rushes and straw; a higher seat stands in the centre, like that of a mosque, for the elders of the town, a desk for the reader of the day; at the south end a closet, concealed by a hanging veil, in which the Torah, a written copy of the Pentateuch, The Jews had turned the blessing of the is kept in the sacred ark. A silver lamp is Sabbath into a curse.

"Rise, take up thy bed and walk.' "At once the life leaped quickly into the poor man's limbs. Rising from the ground, he folded up his quilt, taking it on his arm to go away; but some of the Pharisees seeing him get up and roll his bed into a coil, run towards him crying:- It it the Sabbath day; it is not law ful for thee to carry thy bed.' It was certainly an offence against the Oral Law."

In

always kept burning, a candlestick with eight
arms, a pulpit, a reading-desk, are the chief
articles of furniture in the room.
olden times women were allowed to enter with
the men, though they were even then parted
from father and son by a wooden screen.

Before entering a synagogue a man is ex-
pected to dip his hands into water.
Ten persons are necessary to form a meeting;
every town or city having a synagogue, appoint-
ed ten men called Batlanim (men of leisure),
who were bound to appear at the hour of prayer.

"From the moment of hearing the ram's horn, a sacred trumpet, called the shofa, blown from the temple wall, announcing that the Sabbath had commenced, he was not allowed to light a fire or make a bed, to boil a pot; he could not pull his ass from a ditch, nor raise an arm in defence of his life A Jew could not quit his camp, his village, or his city on the day of rest. He might not begin a journey; if going along a road, he must rest from Higher in office was the Chazzan, who sundown till the same event of the coming day. He might not carry a pencil, a kerchief, a shekel took charge of the house and scroll. in his belt; if he required a handkerchief for The Meturgeman was an interpreter of the law, use, he had to tie it round his leg. If he offend- whose duty it was to stand near the Reader for ed against one of these rules, he was held to the day, and translate the sacred verses, one by deserve the doom awarded to the vilest of sin-one, from the Hebrew into the vulgar tongue. ners Some rabbins held that a man ought not to change his position, but that, whether he was standing or sitting when the shofa sounded he should stand or sit immovable as a stone until the Sabbath had passed away."

Above him were the elders.

When the people came in they first bowed to the ark; the elders took their places on the raised platform; the rich went up to high seats near the ark; the poor sat on wooden sofas, matted with

straw.

A prayer was said, one of the Psalms of David sung. The Chazzan walked Jesus broke the Oral Law that he might up to the veil, which he drew aside with reverbring his followers to a sense of its degrad- ence, lifted the ark from its niche, took out ing spirit, and announced the new truth that the torah, carried the roll round the benches, "The Sabbath is made for man; not man for every one striving either to kiss or touch it with the Sabbath." After two very interesting his palm; the Sheliach read the lesson for the chapters upon Antipas Herod and Herodias, day; at its close the elder expounded the text in we have one upon the Synagogue. Some a sort of sermon, when the torah was carried writers have striven to claim the remotest hal in those times a right to express his opinion back, and prayers began. Every hearer antiquity for this institution, but in all prob- of the sacred text, and of what it meant." ability it might be dated from the captivity. There would be a natural desire to meet together away from the pagans, by whom

Our Lord availed himself of this right,

"At even ve shall eat flesh, and in the morn-you not the bread from heaven, but my Father ing ye shall be filled with bread, and ye shall know that I am the Lord your God."

murmur against him, just as the men of Nazareth had murmured against him.

"Is not this Jesus the son of Joseph whose father and mother we know? How is it, then, that he saith, I am come down from heaven?' "Jesus spoke to them again

"Murmur not among yourselves. No man can come to me except the Father which sent me draw him; and I will raise him up the last day. . . . . I am the bread of life..... I am the living bread which came down from heaven; if any man eat of this bread he shall live for ever; yea, and the bread that I will give is my flesh, which I will give for the life of the world.' Strange doctrines for Jews to weigh. Then leapt hot words among them, and some of those who had meant to believe in him drew back. If he were the Christ, the Son of David, the King of Israel, why was he not marching on Jerusalem, why not driving out the Romans, why not assuming a kingly crown? How can this man give us his flesh to eat?' "The Lord spoke again, still more to their discontent and chagrin, seeing that they wanted an earthly Christ.

Except ye eat of the flesh of the Son of Man, and drink his blood, ye have no life in

you.'

"This was too much for many, even for some who had been brought to the door of belief. The service of the synagogue ended, the elders came down from the platform, the chazzan put away the sacred vessels, the congregation came out into the sun, angry in word and mocking in spirit. They wanted facts; he had given them truth. They hungered for miraculous bread, for a new shower of manna; he had offered them symbolically his flesh and blood. They had set their hearts on finding a captain who would march against the Romans, who would cause Judas of Gamala to be forgotten, who would put the glories of Herod the Great to shame. They had asked him for earth, and he had answered them with heaven."

to her and said, “Great is thy faith, O woman, be it unto thee as thou wilt." This was a fatal blow to the Jewish exclusiveness, a Gentile had been called into the Church, and the pride of the Jew humbled for ever. On the last Sabbath day which Jesus spent on earth, he struck another blow at the ceremonial law, by taking his disciples to dine at the house of one Simon a leper. He had reached Bethany, and taken up his abode in the house of Martha and Mary, among the outcast and the poor, for that last seven days now called in the Church the Holy Week. The scene was an impressive one. The city, as far as the eye could reach, was one vast encampment, caravans were arriving from every direction, bringing thousands of Jews to the feast, who, selecting their ground, drove four stakes into the earth, drew long reeds round them, and covered them with leaves, making a sort of bower; others brought small tents with Plain of Rephaim, the valley of Gihon, the them; the whole city, Mount Giheon, the hill of Olivet, were all studded with tents and crowded with busy people hastening to finish their preparations before the shota should sound at sunset, and the Sabbath begin, when no man could work. In the Temple, the priests, the doctors, the money changers, the bakers of shew bread, were all at work, and the last panorama in the life of Christ commenced.

On the first day in Holy Week, now known as Palm Sunday, Jesus entered Jerusalem on an ass's colt, a prominent figure in the festivities, for the erowds rushed to see him, with their palms, and marched with him singing psalms; they had come out from Jerusalem to meet him, and they escorted him into the city. At night he returned to Bethany.

But the scene was drawing to a close; Jesus went on with his work after this On the Monday and Tuesday he went tumult in the synagogue, opposing himself early to the Temple, mixing among the peoto the senseless rites of the Pharisees, defy-ple, restoring sight to the blind, and preaching the Oral Law, healing the sick, and ing to the poor. As his life began with a preaching to the people. Passing through series of Temptations, so it was the will of the country from Galilee a Syro-Phenecian his Father that he should be persecuted woman who had heard of him, and perhaps with them at its close a lesson we may all seen him, ran after him in the road, and do well to dwell upon - up to the last days besought him to heal her daughter who was of his life, Jesus was subjected to temptaa lunatic. The disciples urged him to send tions. On the Tuesday some emissaries of her away, for his life would not have been the Sanhedrim came to the court where he safe if he had another conflict with the was preaching to question him, and gather Jews in that quarter, and to heal this Gen- evidence against him. They found him tile woman's child would be sure to bring amongst a crowd of Baptists, and demanded them on his track. Turning to the woman, his authority for teaching. Christ retorted Jesus told her he was sent only to the lost by putting them to the dilemma of stating sheep of Israel; but she persisted, crying, whether John's baptism was of heaven or "Lord, help me; an evidence of faith not; they were too much afraid of the peowhich was quite sufficient, and Jesus turned ple to say it was of men, and if they said

The Pharisees brought him a woman taken in adultery. By the Mosaic law this offence would have been punished with death. But the Roman government would have executed any Jew who would venture to carry out such a law, and therefore the question seemed to compel Jesus to speak either against Moses or the Romans. He quietly turned to the witnesses, and told the man who was innocent amongst them to cast the first stone at her.

of heaven, Jesus would have reproached | government would allow them to punish with them for their want of faith; they confessed death. Annas told him to speak for himtheir ignorance. Then each party tried to self, but he would not. The High Priest entrap him. then said, "Art thou the Christ? "he said, "I am." Then Annas asked him who were his disciples, and Jesus replied, "I spake openly to the world, I taught in the synagogue and in the Temple, whither the Jews resort, in secret I have said nothing; ask them which heard me, they know what I have said." The officer of the Temple smote him, and Annas ordered him to be bound with cords, and when it was day they went in a body to the palace of Caiaphas. Here Jesus was questioned again, and answering that he was the Christ, the High Priest rent his clothes, in sign that it was blasphemy and worthy of death. The Sanhedrim pronounced him guilty, and the officers carried him to the Prætorian gates and delivered him a prisoner into the hands of Pilate's guards. The vacillation of Pilate, and the last scene in our Lord's career, are known to all. Mr. Dixon leaves them with the observation, "They form a divine episode in the history of man and must be left to the writers who could not err."

The Herodians tempted him on a point of tribute. They had two taxes, one to God and one to Cæsar, both were disputed, and they consulted him in order to involve him with God or Cæsar; but he foiled them by confirming both.

"Render unto Cæsar the things which are Cæsar's, and unto God the things that are God's."

They began to be astonished.

The Sadducees tempted him with their dogma of the Non-Resurrection. They told him sneeringly of a woman who had married seven husbands, and they wanted to know whose she would be in the life to come. Jesus replied calmly

"In the Resurrection they neither marry nor are given in marriage, but are as the angels in Heaven."

And the Sadducees with their philosophy, their learning, and their unbelief, retired in confusion.

On the Wednesday he remained in Bethany in seclusion, while Judas was arranging for his safe betrayal to Annas and the nobles.

Thursday Jesus sent Peter and John into Jerusalem to prepare the Passover, and at sunset that day he and the twelve sat down to the last supper; Judas left to see Annas, and after singing a hymn, the other disciples rose from the table, passed through the sheep-gate into the Cedron Valley, and came to Gethsemane. Here Jesus withdrew, and whilst his disciples were sleeping, he watched and prayed until the betrayers came, and the kiss of Judas revealed him to them. The Sanhedrim was summoned in the dead of the night, and when the members arrived they found Annas examining witnesses, but with no avail, they could not substantiate any charge against him that the Roman

It is su

A good book is its own best eulogy, and we may safely leave this of Mr. Dixon's to itself, but we cannot refrain from testifying our appreciation of such a valuable addition to the records of eastern travel. perfluous to say that it is excellently written, as it emanates from the pen, not of a tyro but of a master-craftsman, whose style is too well known to need eulogy, a style graphic, pointed, and impressive, the result of clear vision and accurate delineation, strengthened by a sort of Frith-like power of grouping, as witness the description of the street life of Jaffa, which, as an exquisite piece of word-painting, is perfect.

The reader is led through the sacred scenes of the Holy Land by an artist as well as a scholar, who as he journeys on revives the life of the past. We see the patriarchial life, the tents, the flocks grazing on the hills, the ready-writer with his pen lingering at the city gate. We hear David's minstrelsy and the tramp of Maccabæan soldiery; we peer into the depths of one of those ancient wells built by the patriarchs and listen to the conversation of the Samaritan woman with that wonderful stranger; we linger at the wayside Khan, and see how natural is the tale of the Gospel. As we near Jerusalem the grander figures of the panorama pass over the scene, the Herods in their luxury and pride, in their humiliation and their sins, the grim towers of

Macherus and the dark deed done behind peculiar theology. Shakespeare, though he its walls when the head of the messenger of has written with spotless purity, yet bears God fell to please a wanton woman, and traces of the tolerated licentiousness of the terror was struck into the heart of the ty- Elizabethan age. But Christ and his Gosrant; the splendid ceremonial service of the pel stand out distinct, totally distinct from Temple, with its altars, its sacrifices, and its the times and the life when they appeared. robed priests; the Sadducees luxuriating in That Gospel could not have been produced their palaces, with servants, carriages, gar- by the age, for it was an antagonism to it; dens, living their voluptuous, godless lives; the age was a degenerate one, a mixture of the Pharisees with their demure aspect, formal ceremony and licentious unbelief; broad and multiplied phylacteries; the hel- paganism was waning; Rome becoming demets of Roman soldiery, the imperial eagles based; the ancient traditions of the Jews hovering over the scene as the Jews passed were lost in human inventions and Rabiniby scowling at the pagan rulers of the Holy cal fantasies, when rising up in the midst of City, and then that marvellous god-like all this debasement, this corruption, these figure wandering about the streets followed anomalies, came Christ and his Gospel, pure by crowds of people, now entering the amongst rottenness, gentle in the midst of Temple courts to preach to them, and now violence, holy amongst flagrant infidelity and stopping on his way to heal some lame man wanton vice, the Preacher and the preachor leper; his wandering along the wearying ing, both sent from somewhere, but manifestroads of Galilee; his mingling with the peo- ly not from the world, not from oriental barple in the synagogues, the popular gather- barism, not from western paganism, not ing place; his taking part in the service from Jewish corruption; it could then have and reading the Scriptures; his final com- come from no other place than heaven, and ing up to the Holy City, the betrayal, the had no other author than God. And when scenes of his trial, the frantic eagerness of we reflect upon what was compressed in the Jews, the vacillation of Pilate, the terri- that three years' labour, and compare it with ble suspense and the ultimate triumph of systems which have occupied men's lives to his foes, all these and many more incidents sketch out merely, and taken ages to perof biblical and gospel history are revived fect; when we see that this greatest system, and enacted as it were amid the very scenes which has spread over the whole civilized and in the very places where they once took world by the force of its own truth, was in place. We repeat again, that this work is three short years laid down and consolidatan excellent commentary and illustration of ed, every principle defined, every rule esthe Gospel narrative; and though the pen tablished, every law delineated, and an imof its author has been nobly wielded in the petus given to it by its great Master, which controversial defence of that Gospel, yet has always kept it advancing in the world perhaps even greater good may be done by against every opposing force, and in spite this exhibition and illustration of the life of every disadvantageous circumstance, all and work of Christ. To hold Him up to the doubt about its individuality, its superhueyes of men is the best antidote to scepti- man character, and its divine origin, must cism and whatever tends to do that, to plant vanish from the mind. Therefore we think, the image of Christ in the hearts of men, in conclusion, that the best thing for Chrisis a good work. The illustration of his in- tians still to do in this world is, to lift up dividuality, standing out as he did in his Christ before the eyes of men, no matter times, and as he does in every time distinct how, so that he be lifted up boldly and from all men and things. We take up the faithfully, be it by the voice, the pencil, great work of any age, its characteristic or the pen (as in this instance before us), achievement, and we find the impress of the or better still by the more impressive exhiage stamped indelibly upon it; it smacks of bition of Christ in a Christian life. If we the time and the scenes. Homer is per- wish to save men, let us display Him always vaded with the valour of a mythic heroism, and everywhere in the confidence that he bloodshed and victory. Dante is the very will fulfil his own divine promise" I, if I best reflection of medievalism-its deep, be lifted up from the earth, will draw all superstitious piety, its weird dreams, and its men unto me."