"Your lamb shall be without blemish, a male of the first year: ye shall take it out from the sheep, or from the goats and ye shall keep it up until the fourteenth day of the same month: and the whole assembly of the congregation of Israel shall kill it in the evening.

"And they shall take of the blood, and strike it on the two side posts and on the upper door post of the houses, wherein they shall eat it.

"And they shall eat the flesh in that night, roast with fire, and unleavened bread; and with bitter herbs they shall eat it.

"Eat not of it raw, nor sodden at all with water, but roast with fire; his head with his legs, and with the purtenance thereof.

"And ye shall let nothing of it remain until the morning; and that which remaineth of it until the morning ye shall burn with fire.

"And thus shall ye eat it; with your loins girded, your shoes on your feet, and your staff in your hand; and ye shall eat it in haste: it is the Lord's passover.

"For I will pass through the land of Egypt this night, and will smite all the firstborn in the land of Egypt, both man and beast; and against all the gods of Egypt I will execute judgment: I am the Lord.

"And the blood shall be to you for a token upon the houses where ye are; and when I see the blood, I will pass over you, and the plague shall not be upon you to destroy you, when I smite the land of Egypt.”

"The first day of unleavened bread, when they killed the passover, His disciples said unto Him, Where wilt Thou that we go and prepare that Thou mayest eat the passover?

"And He sendeth forth two of His disciples, and saith unto them, Go ye into the city, and there shall meet you a man bearing a pitcher of water: follow him. "And wheresoever he shall go in, say ye to the goodman of the house, The Master saith, Where is the guestchamber, where I shall eat the passover with My disciples?

"And he will shew you a large upper room furnished and prepared: there make ready for us.

"And His disciples went forth, and came into the city, and found as He had said unto them: and they made ready the passover.

"And in the evening He cometh with the twelve.

"And as they did eat, Jesus took bread, and blessed, and brake it, and gave to them, and said, Take, eat; this is My body.

"And He took the cup, and when He had given thanks, He gave it to them: and they all drank of it. "And He said unto them, This is My blood of the New Testament, which is shed for many.

"Verily I say unto you, I will drink no more of the fruit of the vine, until that day that I drink it new in the kingdom of God.

"And when they had sung an hymn, they went out into the mount of Olives."

MEDITATION ON THE LAST SUPPER.

"This Supper seems, indeed, to have been in one sense an anticipation of the Jewish Passover; but not necessarily by partaking of the Jewish lamb, but of the Christian bread and wine; of the true Lamb, for My flesh is meat indeed!' It was by anticipation

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of the Lamb that was to be slain at that Passover. And if this be the case, it must not be supposed that our Lord's thus eating of this Supper out of due time, and by anticipation, implied any unfitness, or any strained accommodation of circumstances to meet events; for of all types which prefigured this Supper, it must be said that they were by Him and for Him. On Him they wait, as shadows on the substance; in Him are they all fulfilled. This very anticipation must have had in it some peculiar propriety. A forced coincidence would be unworthy of things so great, and of Him for whom they are. For it was not accommodated to figures and symbols, but all figures and symbols were accommodated to and formed for it. And it may be observed that a kind of fulfilment, by a sort of anticipation, and yet such as to contain within it a great reality, may be seen in many of the dispensations of God. Thus, for instance, the children of Israel were led on to the land of promise, and that was Canaan. And yet Canaan was not the true land of promise, but only by a sort of anticipation; for there still remained 'a rest for the people of God,' the only true rest; and that was the great Sabbath or Christian rest, the kingdom of heaven upon earth. This was that true rest and land of promise, of which Canaan was but the shadow. And again, the Christian dispensation itself, although called the kingdom of heaven, and the election, and the heavenly Jerusalem, and the new birth, yet in one sense it is not so, not really what these words designate, but only so called by anticipation. Something of this kind may be said of many actions of our Lord. He forgave sins, and took upon Him the leprosies of mankind; and He

baptized by His disciples; and He told them that their ' names' were 'written in heaven;' and He preached the Gospel to the poor; yet all these things we believe to have been only sealed and fully wrought for mankind by the atonement of His Death, and the presence of His Spirit. Would it not appear, therefore, as if when our Lord did these things in His life, He did them really indeed, but yet, humanly speaking, as would appear to us by anticipation? I say as would appear to us, for to Him who dwelleth in eternity, things future may be equally present as things that are. In like manner, this Supper may have been an anticipation not only of the Jewish Paschal sacrifice, but also after some divine fitness; as it was also of the true Paschal sacrifice on the cross: and as the bread and the wine were the body and blood of Christ really indeed, but still by a kind of anticipation of that great sacrifice: as the Jewish Sabbath was the day previous, and by a sort of anticipation of a truer Sabbath, our Lord's day. And the very ambiguity which exists on this subject in the sacred Scriptures may be ordered by divine wisdom, for it arises from this, that three of the evangelists seem to speak of it as if it was the Passover; but the last as if it was not. So, indeed, it is the Passover: the Christian Passover, the great memorial sacrifice; but again it is not,—it is not the Jewish Passover, nor the one and only sacrifice on the cross. In the same way that baptism is the new birth, the regeneration, the kingdom of heaven; and the baptized are the 'elect,' the 'called,' 'the sons of God:' for so are these words applied in Scripture. And yet again they are not so: for these words, in their higher sense, are only applied to the

kingdom hereafter, and to those who shall be found. worthy of that kingdom."

PRAYER.

"O God the King of glory, who hast exalted Thine only Son Jesus Christ with great triumph unto Thy kingdom in heaven; We beseech Thee, leave us not comfortless; but send to us Thine Holy Ghost to comfort us, and exalt us unto the same place whither our Saviour Christ is gone before, who liveth and reigneth with Thee and the Holy Ghost, one God, world without end. Amen."

Good Friday.

THE DOOR OF HEAVEN OPENED.

PASSAGES FROM HOLY SCRIPTURE.

"HE is despised and rejected of men; a Man of sorrows, and acquainted with grief: and we hid as it were our faces from Him; He was despised, and we esteemed Him not.

Surely He hath borne our griefs, and carried our sorrows: yet we did esteem Him stricken, smitten of God, and afflicted.

"But He was wounded for our transgressions, He was bruised for our iniquities: the chastisement of