colouring according to the surface on which they fall.

Let us now pass on to the other circumstance recorded by St. Luke, which gives its warning to the day. He tells us that when our Lord was come near, He beheld the city and wept over it, saying, “If thou hadst known, even thou, at least in this thy day, the things which belong to thy peace! but now are they hid from thine eyes." None can fail to be struck by the contrast between the scene itself and these solemn words. The branches of the palm tree were still unwithered, and the echo of the hosannas had not died away, when our Lord was thus weeping over the departed glory of Jerusalem. And why

was this? Doubtless it was because He could read the heart, and saw that the feelings of the people were in themselves more frail and perishable even than the outward symbols which they had called forth. He knew that it was the day of their visitation, the season in which the

Holy Spirit was calling upon them to welcome Him as the Christ; and He knew also that the excitement, which it had caused, was passing away without producing any lasting impressions on their minds. Nay more, He could look beyond the present hour, and see how their neglected blessing must become a curse; and their thoughts which were now so highly strung, would fly back in an opposite direction, and lead to darker sins than they had contemplated before. And under this view, the excitement of the Monday formed a meet introduction to the clamorous demand for the crucifixion of Christ. The one followed from the other by what men call a reaction of feeling: I say that men so call it; for Holy Scripture teaches us to take a deeper view, and to recognize in the change the return of the evil spirit to his deserted abode. Satan had been forced to abandon his hold on the hearts of the people for the brief period during which they rejoiced in the Lord; but

when he saw that the joy passed away in a mere outbreak of feeling, and led to no act of self-devotion, no real abiding faith, no sincerity of repentance, or earnestness of prayer,—when, in a word, he found that the house, from whence he had been driven, had merely been swept and garnished, and then left empty-he came back again with a seven-fold power, and the spiritual state of the children of Israel was far worse than it had been before he had been driven away.

It was this foreknowledge which rendered the day of our Lord's seeming triumph a day of sorrow to Himself; not all the unbelief and hardness of heart, which for three long years He had witnessed, not all the taunts and blasphemy which in a few days He was destined to endure, called forth the same outward expression of grief as this entry into Jerusalem; and the traces of those tears may be said, from that hour, to have remained upon the day itself. We now go forth at this season to meet

Christ, "not with palm branches in our hands, but with alms-deeds, and fastings, and tears, and watchings, and all kinds of piety, which we offer to our Lord "." The procession is no longer one of triumph, there are no green leaves upon the ground, no shouts and acclamations in the air. But the anniversary of the day brings with it only sad and solemn thoughts, and stands at the threshold of a week of fasting and prayer.

In consequence of this change, the event of the Monday has no peculiar application to the present season; there is indeed a time when we as a nation resemble the Jews in our outward celebration of the coming of Christ; when the evergreens in our churches, and the songs in the streets and ways, and the greetings of friends, and thoughts and looks of love and gladness, compel us for a while to lay aside our worldly occupations, and yield to the cheering influence of Christian joy. Chrys. Hom. in Ps. cxlv.

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These are now the signs of Christmas Day, and bring most vividly before us the triumphal entry into Jerusalem. It is then that the Church may be said to gladden the world. Other fasts and festivals may be disregarded by the multitude, just as the Jews disregarded the other marked times and seasons of our Lord's earthly ministry. But there are comparatively few who neglect to rejoice on Christmas Day. It is then, therefore, that it is more especially good for us to meditate on the scene that we have now been considering, and to remember that our feelings of joy and gladness may, like those of the children of Israel, be a cause of sorrow to our Lord.

Still, however, though the image of the day of the excitement is stamped upon Christmas rather than Lent, the warning connected with it is applicable to all times and seasons, and I will conclude with a few practical observations upon it.

1. The events of Monday in Passion Week point out to us the true view that