To labour is to pursue the work of sin as an agent; to be burthened is to endure pains and penalties as a passive suf ferer. To this miserable course of action and endurance are opposed the blessed activity, and the no less blessed suffering, of the believer's life". The Apostle Peter (Acts xv. 10.) describes the Law which God gave by Moses as a yoke which neither the Jews of his own time nor their fathers were able to bear; and it was rendered still more oppressive by the national teachers, who, as Jesus testified on another occasion, laid heavy burdens upon men's shoulders, which they would not themselves move with one of their fingers. In contradistinction to them, our gracious Master invites all that labour and are heavy laden to come unto Him, whose yoke is easy, and whose burthen is light. He says at the same time, Learn of Me, for I am meek and lowly in heart; and such as will take Him for an example, will find the declaration to be true. He requires nothing but what He has Himself performed before, and on account of His disciples, and in the path which He hath marked out for them, they may perceive His footsteps all the way. His yoke of obedience will in time be found "perfect freedom;" for He promises rest, and not only rest from unsatisfied desires and from the sense of guilt, but peace of mind; for the Greek word ávanaúσis comprehends not only deliverance from toil, but refreshment.

43. A Woman who had been a sinner anoints the feet of Jesus at an entertainment. Luke vii. 36-50.

An opportunity soon offered of proving Jesus to be in the best sense, what was brought against Him as an accusation, the friend of publicans and sinners—" the sinner's friend, but sin's eternal foe." He accepted a Pharisee's invitation to dinner; and a woman who was a notorious sinner, encouraged perhaps by His late gracious call upon all who laboured and

were heavy laden to come unto Him, entered while He was reclining at the meal. She stood behind, and was therefore unobserved, till her flood of penitential tears wetted His feet, which she then wiped with her flowing tresses, and anointed with an expensive ointment, once probably designed for her own person, but which now she did not think herself worthy to pour upon His head. Simon, looking at this woman's past life, not at her present feelings, formed an unfavourable opinion of Jesus; for he concluded, judging from himself and other Pharisees, that if He had been a Prophet, He must have known her character, and would not have suffered her to approach Him. Jesus answered to his thoughts, for he does not seem to have expressed them, in a way that showed Him to be more than a Prophet, a Discerner of the heart, and authorized to forgive sin. Had He directly remonstrated with the Pharisee upon his pride and his disdain of this penitent, He would have irritated and hardened him; but His indirect reproof through a Parable was calculated to convince and to affect without affronting him. The Creditor represents our Lord Himself; the two Debtors sinners, guilty in a very different degree, yet equally without the smallest power to atone for their sins. The case being put in the form of a question, Simon allowed that the greater debtor would have the deeper sense of obligation to the creditor who freely forgave them both. Jesus having approved of the answer, proceeded to apply it, and contrasted this woman's conduct with his cold reception of Him. Simon had not treated Him with the ordinary respect due to a guest; he had not even given Him the expected refreshment of water for His feet; he had not welcomed Him with the usual salutation, nor anointed His head with common oil; whereas she had continually kissed His feet, had watered them with her tears, and had poured on them a fragrant and costly ointShe had been forgiven many sins, and therefore she

loved much. "For she loved much," is the translation of our Version, with which the Vulgate agrees; and it must be allowed that or is usually so rendered. But as it appears that this sinner's love was the effect and evidence, not the cause, of her forgiveness, which our Lord ascribes to faith, therefore is the proper rendering, and this sense, which is supported by the most learned commentators, though uncommon, is not without authority. It likewise best accords with the Parable and the conclusion of His speech, but to whom little is forgiven, the same loveth little. This seems to have been spoken aside to Simon; for Jesus said afterwards to the woman, Thy sins are forgiven thee; and when the guests were offended at His assuming this divine prerogative, He confirmed His declaration by observing, that it was her faith that had saved her. She required no bodily cure, He must therefore have meant the salvation of her soul.

Tradition reports, that this sinner was Mary of Magdala; and she is become, in consequence, in the Roman Church, the personification of female penitence. As such, she is a favourite subject with their artists; and in our own country her name has been assigned to a benevolent Asylum, provided by Christian philanthropy in London for women who have deviated from chastity. Objection was made at the time of its erection to this application of her name, and it has certainly no Scriptural warrant, for she is only described as possessed with seven devils, which are in no other instance taken to mean sins; nor is there any reason to suppose, that if she had been the woman who anointed Christ's feet, the Evangelist would have concealed her name. This portion of Scripture was selected for the Gospel on St. Mary Magdalene's day, and the Collect in our original Prayer Book was composed in conformity with this tradition. Within three years, however, the Book was revised, and among its alterations was the omission of this Festival; from which I

conclude, that in the interval our Reformers had satisfied themselves, that this sinner had been erroneously assumed to be the Magdalene. The mention of her a few verses later appears to be the origin of this tradition. It is still more extraordinary that she should also in the Latin Church be confounded with Mary, sister of Lazarus, since Christ's anointment by the latter plainly led to our Lord's betrayal.

44. Jesus cures a Demoniac, and, being accused of confederacy with the Devil, declares, that all Reviling is pardonable, except that of the Holy Spirit. Matt. xii. 22—37.

Mark iii. 20-30. Luke viii. 2-4. xi. 14—26.

Jesus now made another circuit of Galilee, accompanied by His Apostles, and several women, who had been cured by Him of diseases and of demoniacal possession. Some of them, being persons of property, defrayed His expenses; for He not only had, as He told one who offered to become His disciple, no home of His own, but He was unable even to pay the tribute money without a miracle, to such a depth of poverty did it graciously please Him to condescend. Three of them are named, Mary Magdalene; Joanna the wife of Chusa, a person of some distinction in Herod's court, conjectured to be the officer whose son was miraculously cured"; (John iv. 46.) and Susanna. From her being mentioned first, we conclude that Mary was a person of at least equal rank, and it appears from this connection, and her distinctive appellation, that she was neither the sister of Lazarus, nor the sinner above mentioned, who seems to have been an inhabitant of Capernaum. On the return of Jesus to that town, when the eagerness of the multitude to hear Him did not give Him leisure for His meals, His relations were so far from believing

• 'Exirgoros, the word here used, which is also translated steward, is of wider extent than oixovóuos, (which answers more accurately to the English term,) and may mean any kind of superintendence.

on Him, that they wished to keep Him within the house, considering Him as disordered in mind.

His cure of a demoniac, who was at once both blind and dumb, being an indisputable fact, while it caused the people to exclaim, Is not this the Son of David? provoked from the Pharisees the malignant charge, that He performed miracles through a confederacy with the Devil, the prince of the demons. He repelled it, by showing that He came to deliver men from subjection to evil spirits; and that Satan's reign must be subverted in proportion as His own was established. From the fact of His ejecting demons, He demonstrated the superiority of His power to theirs; illustrating it by the remark, that no one could break into and rob a strong man's house, unless he first overpowered and bound him; and as He came to destroy the works of the devil, the case admitted not of neutrality, but those that refused to act with Him must be accounted as His enemies. He added, that every kind of sin and reviling was pardonable, except one-Reviling the Holy Ghost. It is frequently, but improperly, called the Sin against the Holy Ghost; and this inaccuracy has a tendency to augment the alarm which the mention of an unpardonable offence cannot fail to excite. It is Blasphemy; and this limits it to something not done, but spoken. Few passages have more alarmed and distressed conscientious yet. weak believers, than this awful denunciation; yet taken, as all Scripture ought to be, in connection with the context, we perceive that it was primarily designed as a warning to these His personal opponents, and cannot be committed by any who believe in Christ, though .they may grieve, resist, and even quench the influence of the Holy Ghost, by provoking Him to leave them to themselves. Hammond, Tillotson, Waterland, and other eminent divines, are of opinion, that our Lord means the very sin which His enemies were then in the act of committing, the ascribing His Miracles to the devil;