man, and drink his blood, ye have no life in you. To use Dr Clarke's words here: "Jesus knowing how unreasonable his hearers were, did not think fit to explain himself more particu larly at this time, but persisting in the same figurative way of expressing himself, he repeated and affirmed more earnestly what he had asserted before. Except ye be entirely united to me by a hearty belief and practice of my doctrine, and partake of the merit of that sacrifice which I shall offer for the sins of the world, and continue in the communion of my religion, and receive spiri tual nourishment by the continual participation of those means of grace which I shall purchase for you by my death, ye can never attain eternal life."-54. Whoso caleth my flesh, and drinketh my blood, hath eternal life, and I will raise him up at the last day; he has the principles of eternal life implanted in him, and shall enjoy it, because I will raise him up at the last day. 55. For my flesh is meat indeed, and my blood is drink indeed: my flesh and blood (see on ver. 53.) are the true nutriment of the soul. For they feed it, and make it to grow: they give vigour to all its faculties, preserve it continually alive, and make it fit for hea 56. He that eateth my flesh and drinketh my blood, dwelleth in me, and I in him; we are most intimately connected together in the closest friendship, and therefore whatever blessings I can bestow, whether by my own power, or by my interest with the Father, or by the influences of my Spirit, my friends shall enjoy them in full perfection. The expression of persons dwelling in each other, occurs often in John's writings, and denotes the closest ven. union them, especially concerning his incarnation, and his dying to make atonement for sin. These articles of the Christian faith being particularly understood here give propriety to the metaphors of eating Christ's flesh and drinking his blood, by which the whole of that faith is denominated. The reason is, of all the discoveries made by Christ, those concerning his incarnation, and the nature and ends of his own death, received and meditated upon with a lively faith, afford sovereign and salutary nourishment unto the minds of sinners. They are as effectual for sustaining the spiri tual life in the soul, as flesh fitly prepared is for nourishing the animal life in the body. Dr Waterland, in his treatise on the eucharist, says, that by mens eating Christ's flesh and drinking his blond, is to be understood not faith, but its consequences; that is, mens partaking of the fruits of Christ's pas sion and death. And this interpretation he supports by the universality of the declaration, establishing the necessity of eating Christ's flesh, and by observing that to believe is not to eat and drink the fruit of Christ's passion, but is preparatory thereto as the means to the end. According to this gloss our Lord's meaning was, Except ye shall share in the atonement to be made by my sufferings, ye have no life in you, and so shall die eternally. But with respect to the universality of the proposition on which the doctor chiefly insists, it may be replied, that here, as in many other instances, an universal affirmation or negation, is to be limited by the nature of the subject to which it is applied. Except ye, to whom my doctrine is preached, believe it, ye have no life in you. As for the other arguments offered in the treatise just now mentioned, they cannot be urged against this explication. union of affections and interests. Wherefore, according to the grand figure made use of by the apostle Paul, it signifies that he who truly believes on Christ, is so united to him as to be a member of his body, and consequently a partaker with him of his life and immortality, and of all the happiness which he himself enjoys, or is able to communicate. 57. As the living Father hath sent me, and I live by the Father; so he that eateth me, even he shall live by me as it is my meat and my drink to do the will of the Father, who is the author of life and happiness, as I nourish and delight my mind with the punctual execution of all the orders he gave me when he sent me into the world, so he that eateth me, he that believes my doctrine and obeys my precepts, shall find therein eternal nourishment and refreshment to his soul. Or the meaning may be, as I shall live after I am put to death, because I am sent by the Father, the author of life, and because he dwells in me, and I in him; so he that eateth me, and thereby has me dwelling in him, shall after he dies be raised again by me. 53. This is that bread which came down from heaven: this is the bread which, in the beginning of my discourse, I told you was come down from heaven, (ver. 35.) a kind of bread infinitely superior to the manna, both in its nature and efficacy; for it is to be eaten by you, not as your fathers did eat manna and are dead: it is neither to be eaten the same way that your fathers did eat the manna, nor with the same effect; but he that eateth of this bread shall live for ever. (See ver. 50.)-59. These things said he in the synagogue, as he taught in Capernaum: he spake them openly, in the hearing of all the people who attended at public worship in the syna gogue. Most of the metaphors in this discourse, and particularly that of food to signify doctrine, and of eating and drinking to signify believing, were abundantly easy, and might have been understood at the very first by the Jews, being found in their scriptures and used in their schools. Only not being able to comprehend what he meant by his flesh, they took the whole literally, and were so offended at the thought of eating his flesh and drinking his blood, a thing not only prohibited by the law of Moses, but repugnant to the customs of all civilized nations, that many of them who were his disciples, when they heard it, said it was absurd. 60. Many therefore of his disciples, when they heard this, said, This is an hard saying, who can hear it? who can believe, and obey it?-61. When Jesus knew in himself that his disciples murmured at it, he said unto them, Doth this offend you? 62. What, and if ye shall see the Son of man ascend up where he was before? Are ye offended because I said my flesh is bread, and that it came down from heaven, and that you must eat my flesh and drink my blood in order to your having eternal life? What if ye shall see me me ascend up into heaven bodily, where I was before? Will not that convince you of the truth of my having come down from heaven? Will it not shew you likewise, that I never intended you should eat my flesh in a corporeal manner? 63. It is the spirit that quickeneth, the flesh profiteth nothing: the words that I speak unto you, they are spirit, and they are life: when I spake of your eating my flesh, I did not mean it in a literal sense. So used, my flesh would be of no advantage at all to any man. But I meant your believing the doctrines, to reveal which I was made flesh, by taking upon me the human nature. So that more properly it is my Spirit that giveth life to men and maketh them immortal. For the words that I speak to you, the doctrines that I preach, proceed from my Spirit, and are the food of your souls, consequently the means of your life. To some of you however my doctrine will be ineffectual, because you do not believe it, and perhaps are desirous to pervert it, that you may have a pretence to forsake me. 64. But there are some of you that believe not. For Jesus knew from the beginning who they were that believed not, and who should betray him. He knew the inward disposition of every particular person that heard him, and foresaw which of his disciples would be so base as to betray him. 65. And he said, Therefore said I unto you, that no man can come unto me, except it were given unto him of my Father: because I know perfectly the inward frame of your minds, therefore I told you that no man can believe on me, except an opportunity of knowing the evidence of my mission, a capacity to judge of it, and such a hearty love of the truth as will prompt him to use the means proper for discovering it, and when discovered, dispose him cheerfully to receive it, are given him of my Father. The words of this verse, with those mentioned ver. 37. are our Lord's own paraphrase of that difficult expression, ver. 44. «No man can come to me, except the Father which hath sent me draw him" wherefore the explication given of it above must be just. This sermon was in all its different branches so offensive to the Jews, that many of them who till now had been our Lord's disciples, finding by the general strain of it, that their ambitious, Carnal views were to be utterly disappointed, they went out of the synagogue in a passion, and never came to hear him more.— 66. From that time many of his disciples went back, and walked no more with him: Jesus perceiving this defection to be very general, asked the twelve if they were going to leave him with the rest. 67. Then said Jesus unto the twelve, Will ye also go away 68. Then Simon Peter answered him, Lord, to whom shall we go? thou hast the words of eternal life. In allusion to and acknowledgement of what Jesus had said concerning his flesh, verse 63. namely, that it was the bread of life, a truth which had stumbled the apostate disciples, but which Peter believed, because he rightly rightly understood it to signify the doctrine, word, or scheme of religion which Jesus taught in the flesh, and which alone can make a man happy here, and bring him to the possession of etermal life hereafter, the great end of all religion. This implicit faith in the whole of our Lord's doctrine, Peter rightly founded upon his faith in him as the Messiah. Thou hast the words of eternal life. 69. And (xx, for) we believe, and are sure that thou art that Christ, the Son of the living God. 70. Jesus answered them, Have not I chosen you twelve, and one of you is a devil? The opinion of my character and mission which thou hast expressed in thine own name, and in the name of thy brethren, is just. However I am sensible that you art not all agreed in this confession. For one of you is a devil, i. e. so very bad a man, that he will betray me. It is true, I made choice of this very person equally with the rest, to be my apostle and companion. But from what I now tell you will happen, I hope you are convinced that I did not pitch upon so unworthy a person, through ignorance of his wicked disposition. I was intimately acquainted with the characters and dispositions of all of you, and in my choice of you, had it in view to make each of you assist me according to his qualities, whether good or bad, in carrying on the grand design I am come to execute. By this argument, therefore, you may likewise know that I am Messiah, the Son of the living God, and that your faith in me is well founded. 71. * He spake of Judas Iscariot, the son of Simon: for he it was that should betray him, being one of the twelve: he meant Judas Iscariot, though he did not at this time think fit to name him. To conclude, by declaring that he had knowingly made choice of a traitor to be one of the twelve who constantly attended him, he insinuated that in his most retired hours and secret actions, he was not afraid of the eyes of his enemies. Wherefore, having initiated a person of his character into all the mysteries of his fellowship, no man can suspect that he was carrying on a plot to deceive the world; for if he had, Judas, when he deserted him and betrayed him to the priests, would not have failed to discover the imposture. Ver. 71. He spake of Judas.] He called Judas a devil, because he was to be an apostate and traitor. So likewise in rebuking Peter, who had expressed an utter aversion to his suffering at Jerusalem, he called him Satan, on account of that one act, by which he opposed the great design of his coming into the world. Wherefore he might much more give Judas the name of devil, who resembled Satan so nearly in the. wickedness of his dispositions and actions. § LXIII. Jesus leaves Capernaum, and goes up to the passover. Mark vi. 54. THE evangelist Mark, after having described the miracles performed by Jesus at Capernaum upon the sick, who were brought to to him in consequence of the messages which the inhabitants of the land of Gennezareth sent on his arrival from the desert of Bethsaida, into all the neighbouring region, proceeds to give the history of a multitude of miracles performed in other towns and villages. Mark vi. 56. And whither soever he entered, into vil lages, or cities, or country, they laid the sick in the streets, and besought him that they might touch, if it were but the border of his garment: and as many as touched him were made whole. It seems Jesus now made a long journey, in which he visited many different villages, cities, and countries. This could be no other than his journey to the passover, which the evangelist John says was nigh when the miracle of the loaves was performed, John vi. 4. THIRD PASSOVER. That the third passover in our Lord's ministry happened about this time, appears from what John tells us in his history of the miraculous dinner, chap. vi. 4. And the passover, a feast of the Jews, was nigh. According to Sir Isaac Newton's scheme of the harmony, this is the fourth passover in our Lord's ministry. And because John says, chap. vii. 1. After these things, viz. the miracle of the loaves, and the conversation in the syna gogue of Capernaum. Jesus walked in Galilee, for he would not walk in Ferry, because the fews sought to kill him, Sir Isaac thinks he did not celebrate this passover at Jerusalem. And it must be owned, that the evangelist's do not say expressly, that Jesus went up to it. Nevertheless, if we may judge of him from the religious regard which he constantly shewed to all the divine institutions, and from his behaviour on other occasions of a like nature, we may safely believe that he went, not only to this, but to all the feasts which the Jewish males were obliged by law to attend, Deut. xvi. 16. See also Numb. ix. 1. where he who was in a capacity, and did not keep the passover, is ordered to be cut off from his people. Besides, if I mis take not, Mark, as was mentioned above, insinuates that our Lord went to Jerusalem on this occasion; for his words which fall in here, may be considered as the history of that journey, vi. 56. And whithersoever he entered, into villages, or cities, or country, they laid the sick in the streets, and besought him that they might touch, if it were but the border of his garments and as many as touched him avere made whole. See on John vi, 45. This conjecture seems to be favoured by John likewise; for that evangelist have ing related what happened at Capernaum, in consequence of the miraculous dinner, adds, chap. vii. . After these things Jesus walked in Galilee, for he would not walk in Jewry, because the Jews sought to kill him. This I suppose implies, that after the miraculous dinner Jesus had been in Jewry, where, an attempt was made upon his life, which made it dangerous for him to continue there any longer at that time. But if any attempt was made upon our Lord's life in Jewry about this time, no scene was so fit for it as Jerusalem, no time so proper as the passover which happened during this period, and no actors so likely to be engaged in it as the Jews, the haughty priests, Pharisees and doctors, who were all assembled at the feast. Perhaps Christ's disciples also, who were offended by the sermon in the synagogue of Capernaum, had joined his enemies in the metropolis when they came up to the feast, and incensed them anew by rehearsing, with the usual aggravations of fame, the miracle of the loaves, performed to the conviction of every individual present. The commentators indeed have supposed that in the passage quoted, John alludes to what happened at the preceding passover, on occasion of the cure of the infirm man who lay in one |