near which we had pitched our tent; his feet must frequently have wandered over the adjacent hills; and his eyes, doubtless, have gazed upon the splendid prospect from this very spot. Here the Prince of Peace looked down upon the great plain, where the din of battles so oft had rolled, and the garments of the warrior been dyed in blood; and he looked out too upon that sea, over which the swift ships were to bear the tidings of his salvation to nations and to continents then unknown. How has the moral aspect of this been changed! Battles and bloodshed have indeed not ceased to desolate this unhappy country, and gross darkness now covers the people; but from this region a light went forth which has enlightened the world and unveiled new climes; and now the rays of that light begin to be reflected back from distant isles and continents, to illuminate anew the darkened land, where it first sprang up.-Dr. Robinson's Palestine, vol. iii. p. 191.

CORRECT TRANSCRIPT OF THE SENTENCE

OF DEATH PRONOUNCED AGAINST JESUS CHRIST. THE following is a copy of the most memorable judicial sentence which was ever pronounced in the annals of the world, namely, that of death against the Saviour; with the remarks which the journal Le Droit has collected, the knowledge of which, must be interesting in the highest degree to every Christian. Until now, I am not aware that it has been made public in the German papers. The sentence is word for word as follows:

"Sentence pronounced by Pontius Pilate, Intendant of the Province of Lower Galilee, that Jesus of Nazareth shall suffer death by the cross.

"In the seventeenth year of the reign of the Emperor Tiberias, and on the twenty-fifth day of the month of March, in the most holy city of Jerusalem, during the pontificate of Annas and Caiphas.

66

Pontius Pilate, Intendant of the province of Lower Galilee, sitting in judgment in the presidential chair of the practor,

"Sentences Jesus of Nazareth to death on a cross, between two robbers, as the numerous and notorious testimonies of the people prove:

"1. Jesus is a misleader.

"2. He has excited the people to sedition.

"3. He is an enemy to the laws.

4. He calls himself the Son of God.

"5. He calls himself, falsely, the King of Israel.

"6. He went into the Temple followed by a multitude carrying palms in their hands.

"Orders the first centurion, Quirilius Cornelius, to bring him to the place of execution.

"Forbids all persons, rich or poor, to prevent the sentence of execution of Jesus.

The witnesses who have signed the sentence against Jesus

are:

"1. Daniel Robani, Pharisee.

"2. John Zerobabel,

"3. Raphael Robani.

4. Capet.

"Jesus shall be taken out of Jerusalem through the gate of Irunea."

This sentence is engraven on a plate of brass, in the Hebrew language, and on its side are the following words, "A similar plate

has been sent to each tribe."

It was discovered in the year 1280, in the city of Aquila, in the kingdom of Naples, by a search made for the discovery of Roman antiquities, and remained there until it was found by the commissaries of arts in the French army in Italy. Up to the time of the campaign in South Italy, it was preserved in the sacristy of the Carthusians, near Naples, where it was kept in a box of ebony. Since then this relic is kept in the chapel of Caserta. The Carthusians by their petitions obtained the privilege of keeping the plate, which was an acknowledgement of the sacrifices they made for the French army. The French translation was literally by the members of the commissary of arts. Denon had a fac simile of the plate engraved, which was bought by Lord Howard for 2890 francs. There seems to be no historical doubt as to the authenticity of this. The reasons of the sentence, correspond exactly with those of the Gospels.Translated from the Kolniseche Zeitung.

CHARACTER OF JUDAS ISCARIOT.

IN opposition to the common opinion that Judas sold his Lord for thirty pieces of silver simply on account of his greed to possess such a sum of money, it would rather appear that he had an ulterior object in view, an object of much higher ambition than the mere possession of the sum of money mentioned. This is rendered more probable by the fact that Judas was in a situation to gratify his covetous desires, for we are told that he carried the bag. Now the value of the thirty pieces of silver is not much more than £7 sterling, so that if he had merely wished to consult his own avaricious wishes, he could have purloined from day to day sums much larger than this, and would, to say the least, never have sold his chance of such sums for another sum so small in comparison.

We must, therefore, look for some motive which might induce him

to act in this manner. Now Judas must have been convinced of the Messiahship of Christ as well as the other Apostles, for he saw the miracles he did, and the blamelessness of his life, to which he afterwards referred when he repented, saying, "I have shed the innocent blood." But like the other Apostles at first, he mistook the nature of Christ's kingdom, and as he never really wished it as a spiritual kingdom, his prejudices were allowed to blind him to the last. Thinking then that Christ only wanted a proper time to set up a temporal and splendid authority, he at length became weary of a delay which baulked his dearest hopes. He therefore thought that the only way to accomplish his end was, to put Christ in such a position that he would be compelled to assert his Messiahship. This he accordingly did by giving him up to the Jewish Rulers. And then when his project failed, when he saw Christ crucified, and all his hopes really at an end for ever, then, very unlike a man that cared only for a few pieces of silver, he brought them, and cast them down, and seeing how the Scriptures had been fulfilled, and how he had shed the blood of the Innocent and Holy One, remorse and despair seized upon him, and he went and hanged himself.

NOTE. This account is certainly more philosophical than the common one, and does not, beside, make the sin of Iscariot less, but greater, since it displays a more deeply covetous character than the old view did.-ED.

THE FALL OF JERUSALEM.

THE fall of our illustrious and happy city was supernatural. The destruction of the conquered was against the first principles of the Roman policy; and to the last hour of our national existence, Rome held out offers of peace, and lamented our frantic disposition to be undone. But the decree was gone forth from a mightier throne. During the latter days of the siege, a hostility to which that of a man was as a grain of sand to the tempest that drives it on, overpowered our strength and senses. Fearful shapes and voices in the air-visions starting us from our short and troublesome sleep-lunacy in its hideous forms-sudden death in the midst of vigour-the fury of the elements let loose upon our heads. We had every terror and evil that could beset human nature, but pestilence, the most probable of all, in a city crowded with the famishing, the diseased, the wounded, and the dead. Yet though the streets were covered with unburied, though every well and trench was teeming, though six hundred thousand corpses lay flung over the ramparts, and lay naked to the sun, pestilence came not-for if it had come, the enemy would have been scared away. But the abomination of desolation," the

Pagan standard, was fixed where it was to remain until the plough had passed over the ruins of Jerusalem.

On this fatal night no man laid his head upon the pillow. Heaven and earth were in conflict. Meteors burned over us--the ground shook under our feet-the volcanoes blazed-the wind burst forth in irresistible blasts, and swept the living and the dead in whirlwinds far into the desert. We heard the bellowing of the distant Mediterranean, as if its waters were at our sides, swelled by the deluge. The lakes and rivers roared and inundated the land. The fiery sword shot out tenfold fire-showers of blood fell-thunder pealed from every quarter of the heavens-lightning, in immense sheets, of an intensity and duration that turned the darkness into more than day, withering eye and soul, burned from the zenith to the ground, and marked its track by forests of flame, and shattered the summits of the hills. Defence was unthought of, for the mortal enemy had passed from the mind. Our hearts quaked for fear; but it was to see the powers of heaven shaken. All cast away the shield and spear, and crouched before the descending judgment.

We were conscience-smitten. Our cries of remorse, anguish, and horror were heard through the uproar of the storm. We howled to caverns to hide us. We plunged into the sepulchres to escape the wrath that consumed the living. We would have buried ourselves under the mountains. I knew the cause-the unspeakable cause, and knew that the last hour of crime was at hand. A few fugitives, astonished to see one man amongst them not sunk into the lowest feebleness of fear, came around me, and besought me to lead them to some place of safety, if such were now to be found on earth. I told them openly that they were to die, and counselled them to die in the hallowed ground of the temple. They followed; and I led through streets encumbered with every shape of human sufferings, to the foot of Mount Moriah; but beyond that, we found advance impossible. Piles of clouds, whose darkness was palpable even in the midnight in which we stood, covered the holy hill. Impatient, and not to be daunted by any thing that man could overcome, I cheered my disheartened band, and attempted to lead the way up the ascents; but I had scarcely entered the cloud when I was swept down by a gust that tore the rocks in a flinty shower around me.

Now came the last and most wonderful sign that marked the fate of rejected Israel. While I lay helpless, I heard the whirlwind roar through the cloudy hill, and vapours began to revolve. A pale light, like that of the rising moon, quivered on the edges of the horizon, and the clouds rose rapidly, shaping themselves into the forms of battlements and towers. The sound of voices was heard within, low and distinct, yet strangely sweet. Still the lustre brightened, and

the airy building rose, tower on tower, and battlement on battlement, in awe that held us mute. We knelt and gazed on this more than mortal architecture, that continued rising and spreading, and glowing with a serener light, still soft and silvery, yet to which the broadest moonlight was dim. A last, it stood forth to earth and heaven, the colossal image of the first temple-of the building raised by the wisest of men, and consecrated by the visible glory.

All Jerusalem saw the image, and the shout that in the midst of their despair ascended from the thousands and tens of thousands, told that proud remembrances were there. But a hymn was heard that might have hushed the world besides. Never fell on my ears, never on the human sense, a sound so majestic, yet so subduing-so full of melancholy, yet of grandeur and command. The vast portal opened, and from it marched a host, such as man had never seen before, such as man shall never see but once again—the guardian angels of the city of David. They came forth gloriously, but woe in all their steps-the stars upon their helmets dim-their robes stained-tears flowing down their celestial beauty. "Let us go hence," was their song of sorrow. "Let us go hence," was answered by sad echoes of the mountains. "Let us go hence," swelled upon the night to the furthermost limits of the land.

The procession lingered long upon the summit of the hill. The thunders pealed, and they rose at the command, diffusing waves of light over the expanse of heaven. The chorus was heard, still magnificent and melancholy, when their splendour was diminished to the brightness of a star. Then the thunder roared again-the cloudy Temple was scattered on the wind-and darkness, the omen of the grave, settled upon Jerusalem.-Croly's Salathiel.

FABIER ON THE PROPHECIES.

"THE 1260 years spoken of by the Prophet Daniel, will expire in the year of our Lord 1866. At the close of the year 1866 will commence the restoration of the Jews, and it is probable it will not be completely effected till a period of thirty additional years shall have passed; then forty years shall intervene; which added to the thirty years just mentioned, gives seventy-five years from the year of our Lord 1866 to the commencement of the Millennium."

Now as the 1260 years will expire in 1866, from which subtract 1850, the present year, leaves sixteen years to balance that period, to which add seventy-five years which the Prophet Daniel teaches us will intervene between the 1260 years and the commencement of the Millennium, it makes altogether ninety-one years from the present