3. It is the rupture, though but for a moment, and without deliberate intention, of tender, inti- mate, personal ties by the act of tlie disciple, that renders the great denial of the chief Apostle so attecting an incident (Mt 26«^«'-, Mk U"- 66-72^ Lk 22"fl^-, Jn 18>5-i8.25-K). His fall is the more sur- prising by reason of Christ's clear announcement of it beforehand, and Peter's strong protestations of fidelity (Mt 26"'- || Mk 14»'-, Lk 22=»'-", cf. Jn 13'"-). Deep as the fall was, however, care must be taken not to exaggerate its criminality. That the thrice-repeated denial was due to want of faith or devotion on the Apostle's part, there is nothing to show. It was indeed ardent attach- ment to Christ that led him, after his hasty re- treat, to follow at a distance, and seek admission to the house of Annas, ijefore whom the prelimin- ary examination of (Dhrist took place. He was determined to keep near his Master, and it was doubtless this very determination that betrayed him into sin. When challenged in the porch by the maid who kept the door, he gave an evasive reply (Jn 18'', Mk 14«8), fearing that to own his disciple- ship would lead to his e.xclusion from the premises. When taunted later on with being a disciple by the rou^h servants gathered round the fire in the court- yard (Jn 18"-^), he denied it in more categorical fasluon, hoping therebj' to evade further remarks, and avoid the summary ejection which would have followed the detection of his previous falsehood. Having travelled so far on the do%\'nward path, it became well-ni<'h impossible to turn back, and on being charued by one of the kinsmen of Malchus with haviiij 1^. - n ^■. ii a Christ in tlie garden at the moment m , M\ereome by fear that he might be . "Uiit for his rash act, he denied lii^ \la ii 1 i. : ilie tliird time, and backed up his denial with oaths and cur.ses (Jn 18'-«'., cf. ilt 26'''). It has been suggested that his falsehoods would sit lightly on his conscience, on the ground that he felt justified in giving no kind of infor- mation about himself or his Master which might compromise a movement which he imarined was but temporarily arrested. He probably experi- enced no scruples in deceiving his Master's enemies, especially as this seemed the only way of carrying
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ear to Christ as possible witliout risk of detection. But wlien all due allow- ance is made for the excellency of his motives, his conduct is utterly indefensible. When he affirmed so confidently tliat he was ready to go to death, what he thouglit of was a jjublic testimony to Christ, for whom he counted no sacrifice too great. ' A great deed of heroism is often easier than loyalty in small things,' and Peter, ^^■ho had courage enough to defend his JNIustcr at llio cost of his life, displayed lamentable weakness in a minor emergency. The sound of cock-crow, aiin<mncing the approach of dawn, was a painful reminder that he had proved lacking in genuine lidelity, and false to the pledges so recently given. But tliat his love to Clirist still remained the same, was abundantly evidenced by his subsequent act of sincere contrition.
W. S. MONTGOMEEY.
DEPENDENCE.— 1. The feeling which impels men to look up to, and depend upon, a Power higher and other than tliemselves is essentially human, universal, and, in the )insilion wliich it occupies in their lives, most iiromincnt. It supplies them with an intuitive hope, mIucIi is quickened by their sense of need and helplessness, that this Power will supply their ^^•ants, and fill the mysteri- ously void places of their being. This hope finds expression in the universal desire for communion with that Power by prayer, worship, sacrilice, :uiil so on. Some of the most beautiful asiiiialinns which breathe out of the Psalms of the .lc\vi^ll Church are the outcome of men's lon;;in,L; after and dependence upon God (cf. Ps 42. 73-'"-' lOH. 139, etc.) ; and when the Psalmist sings ' My soul cleaveth (nfjai, LXX eKoW^eij) after thee' (Ps 63*), he is putting into words, suited to his own individual experience, the same idea which St. Paul says, in his address to the assembled Athenians, is universally human (ftji-e?;' t6i' dedv, Ac 17"'). A direct relationship, Avliicli is jpcisonal, is every- where in the OT poslnlilid i. f. ..7. (In 5---'-* 6», Mai 2", Am 3') as exiMm;, 1,..|»,.„ .ieliovah and His peo]ile. On the one .-.idi- i-; I In- Supreme Per- sonal Will which prujecls 1|m;1i into a world of created intelligences, either iu tliu furm of law objectively revealed (Dt 5^ cf. tlw; pr<i]ihelic for- mula, 'Thus saith the Lord'), or in that form which, in the words of the writer of the Fourth Gospel, 'coming into the world liglitens everv man' (Jn P, cf. Ro 2'=, Jer 31-). Un the otlier, there is the being made in 'His own image' (Gn l=6t. 51 gG_ pf 1 Qo 117^ j^.^ 3,,_ ^^^. 1^3^ -^vis 2-=), whose life, touching His life at all points, owes its existence to the continued exercise of His will (cf. Ac il^).
We have here, not the antithesis of eternal and temporal, finite and infinite, so much as an em- phatic synthesis eft'ected by a close personal re- lationship, iu which we may say consists all that is essentially true in religion. The error into which Schleiermacher, for example, fell when he made religion consist in a feeling of depend'