appear from those few instances that we meet with of it.

As first, that in Mark iii. 1, where we find him in a synagogue on the sabbath day, where was a poor man which had a withered hand; and the Scribes and Pharisees that were there watched him, whether he would then heal him, that they might have an accusation against him for breaking the sabbathf: and St. Matthew tells us they ensnaringly asked him whether it was lawful so to do upon that day. But our Lord, as St. Luke says, knew their thoughts, their malicious intentions against him, and was so far moved to indignation thereby, that he immediately commanded the lame man to stand forth in the midst of them; and to convince them of the lawfulness of what he was going to do, though upon that sacred day, he asked them a question, which struck them dumb with confusion, Is it lawful to do good on the sabbath day, or to do evil? to save life, or to kill? which at once shewed the great charity of the miracle he designed to work, and their baseness and treachery in intending to accuse and have him punished for it. And when he had looked round about on them with anger, he bid the man stretch out his hand, which immediately he did, though before it was impossible to have done it, it was so withered and shrunk up, and found it restored whole as the other.

Now, what could be a juster cause of anger than such base carriage as this of the Scribes and Pharisees towards him? And yet he shewed it only in an angry look, and it proceeded chiefly from the kind concern he had for the deplorable condition

they were in: he was grieved, it is said, for the hardness and blindness of their hearts, which nothing, he found, could soften, and make them see the things that belonged to their peace, before they were hid from their eyes.

We find him again moved to this passion when he observed the Jews' profanation of the temple 1, who of the house of prayer had made it like a market or a fair, and bought and sold, and returned and changed money in it as in other common places. This our blessed Lord could not see without a great resentment, and shewed it in an extraordinary manner, especially for one of so remarkable a meek spirit as he was; and so far was he carried by it, as twice with a whip of cords to drive out of that holy place those vile profaners of it, and overthrow their counting tables, and with an unusual warmth bid them not make his Father's house a den of thieves. But this was no more than became him, both as a prophet and a good man; and which the priests and rulers should have done, but for their gain connived at the abuse. It was the zeal he had for the honour of his Father's house, and which he saw that nobody else would take care of, that raised his indignation to this pitch; and which too he had so much under command, that even in the height of it, when he came to the seats of those that sold doves, for the convenience of such as were obliged to offer them, he was so considerate as not to let them loose, which would have been to the great damage of the owners without any advantage to the cause that he undertook, and only bade them take them thence. Another time we find him angry with St. Peter, i Mark xi. 17.

h John ii. 14.

when he would have persuaded him to take more care of himself than to run into those dangers, and expose himself to those sufferings, which he had told his apostles would attend him when he went up next to Jerusalem: Be it far from thee, Lord, says he, this shall not be unto thee. Upon which he turned and said unto Peter, Get thee behind me, Satan, (the very rebuke he gave to the Devil in the wilderness:) for thou savourest not the things that be of God, but those that be of men. And then he warmly urges the doctrines of self-denial and taking up the cross, and threatens the loss of life to those that would so basely save it, and puts them in mind of the just retributions at the day of judgment, according to every one's works. This indeed was a smart and home rebuke, and which shewed that his spirit was stirred in a manner more than usual, but yet without the least indecency of word or behaviour, and in a case upon which the salvation of the world depended, and therefore he would not hear the least dissuasive from it, without such a reprimand as would prevent any attempts of that nature for the future.

Once more, and I think but once, we find him touched with this passion, (for the answer he gave to his blessed mother at the marriage-feast, when she told him they wanted wine, I believe ought to be understood another way,) and that was when an officer of the high priest struck him with the palm of his hand, or the stick that he had in it, for making, as he would have it, an unseemly answer to his

k Matt. xvi. 22, 23.

1 See my

p. 6.

observations upon the miracle there wrought, vol. I,

master; upon which the meek Jesus replied with some resentment, though with no manner of indecent heat, If I have spoken evil, bear witness of the evil: but if well, why smitest thou mek? Now if that be true which some of the ancients have told us, that it was Malchus who offered this violence to our Lord, whose ear he had so lately healed, nothing could be more justly provoking; and a much higher resentment than this might have been thought to be very excusable. But be this how it will, whoever did it, it was a piece of illegal cruelty, and which the high priest should have rebuked him for, if Jesus had not, and whose answer to the inhuman wretch had nothing in it but what upon all accounts may be justified.

And this shews our Lord's meaning not to be strictly literal, when he says, Whosoever shall smite thee on the right cheek, turn to him the other also1; and which is equally true of what follows in the same paragraph; his own practice, we see, interprets it otherwise, namely, that we should suffer many injuries as he did, rather than return one, and not resist evil, which he never did; but content ourselves with a moderate expression of that resentment which in such cases is natural to us, and unavoidable and in the lesser sort of injuries and affronts, such as are those he mentions, rather pass them by, though with the hazard of receiving more of the same, than suffer ourselves to be hurried by the heat of our passion to the commission of what will be much worse to us in the consequence than the injury that we received at first.

Thus was our Saviour angry; and there is nothing

k John xviii. 23.

Matt. v. 39.

in all this but what is reasonable and wise and good; and were our passion kept within the bounds that his was, and which we should earnestly endeavour, and is in great measure practicable by us, it would not be at all inconsistent with the meekness of the gospel, but equally useful to ourselves and others and not only tend to our own self-preservation, but be instrumental to correct and reform such evil practices as ought not to be let pass without due reproof and punishment.

SECT. III.

Of our Saviour's regulation of hope and fear.

As for the passion of hope, there were very few things that our blessed Lord could hope for; for as for any thing upon this earth, even the greatest affluence and honours and pleasures of it, they were infinitely below him, and he despised and valued them as nothing, and freely chose their contraries; for had he esteemed of them so highly as we do, he was able immediately to help himself to them, without the tedious expectations of hope: and as for further improvements in holiness and virtue, his were perfect, and could receive no increase. All therefore that could be the object of his hope was the speedy and firm establishment, and wide, universal extent of his kingdom of righteousness, and the good success of those wondrous things which he came to do for the salvation of mankind; and the attainment of that glory and happiness to his own human nature, which was proposed by his heavenly Father as the reward of his sufferings and death. Thus, as to the latter of these, we are expressly told, by the apostle to the Hebrews, that for the joy that