fixed on him with an earnest and troubled look, every the slightest act of kindness and benevolence, seen with an aspect of prejudice, was made to assume an appearance the very opposite to that it naturally bore. Even in accepting the civilities of one of the chief Pharisees, who had invited him into his house to eat bread—even here, at the table of hospitality, to this spot even, malignity had penetrated, even here “ they watched him."-"And, behold, there was a certain man before him which had the dropsy." I recollect once, on reading this passage, experiencing a difficulty in reconciling it with those ideas of propriety which naturally suggested themselves to me: it appeared to me as something strange, that, in the house of one of the chief Pharisees, who, it is not unreasonable to imagine, must have been a rich man, and his mode of living proportioned to his wealth, it appeared to me, I say, as It is something strange, that in his house, and in the apartment in which he entertained his friends, persons should be received like him who is here mentioned, sick and afflicted with divers kinds of disorders, who, it is evident, merely came for the purpose of exciting our Saviour's compassion, and, if it were possible, to be healed from their infirmities. true, in the streets, in the market places, in the synagogues, in the villages, on the sea shore, crowds attended him for this purpose only-this is all no more than might have been expected; but was it to be expected that they should be found here, in the very guest-chamber of the rich man? At this moment my mind was occupied with the manners and customs of the country in which I lived-I was thinking of such houses as we have in England, such as rich men live in here; but the instant the wide difference between the general construction of the houses in the east and our own, occurred to me, in the same instant the difficulty was resolved. I will endeavour to explain, as well as I am able, and as far as this passage is concerned, in what that difference consisted. The houses in Judea, particularly such as rich men inhabited, were built in the form of a hollow square,-four sides,-enclosing a court in the middle. In this court, as in hot climates, such as Judea was, persons choose rather to be in the open air, while they can, than confined in rooms, in this court much of the business of the family was transacted; here they frequently received visitors, and into this space any body seems to have been admitted; it was in such court as this, we have reason to believe, our Saviour was received, and here the sick followed, or were brought in before him. "And Jesus answering, spake unto the lawyers and Pharisees." The word answer' is frequently used where one should not look to see it used: the word answer' implies that something has been said before to which it is an answer, but nothing appears to have been said here. To estimate the matter rightly, we must place the scene before our eyes exactly as it presented itself at the time:-Our Saviour in the middle, before him the person afflicted with the dropsy, around him these Scribes and Pharisees, who came, we know, expressly to watch him, and had probably never taken their eyes off him from the moment he entered the court; they noticed the sick man as well as he did; they saw that he was looking towards him, pity perhaps in his countenancefor what we feel we commonly (at least if we are honest) show we feel; they remembered what had followed in other cases, and they were anticipating what would follow now; they were all eager ; they thought they should now, at least, have something whereof to accuse him; they were, I dare say, whispering one to another, and looking towards our Saviour with horror and alarm in their countenances, just as if some great crime were now about to be committed; not a word may have been distinctly uttered; not a syllable may have reached the ear of our Lord; but the manner may, and can, and often does, speak as plainly as the lips it was in answer to all this that our Saviour spoke, addressing himself to these men, who appeared as if they were so much shocked, "Is it lawful to heal on the sabbath day? and they held their peace." Look back to xiii. 10—17, you will there see how our Lord, on the sabbath day, even in the synagogue, a much more holy place, healed a woman of a spirit of infirmity, eighteen years afflicted. The ruler of the synagogue was indignant, and exclaimed loudly against |