Mark xiv. 31. He spake the more vehemently, If I should die with thee, I will not deny thee in any ivise. Liheivise also said they all.
THE influence of example is exceeding powerful, whether it lead to good or evil. This is well known in armies ; where courage or timidity beget a kindred feeling speedily, and to a great extent. In moral habits, also, the conduct of one will produce a considerable effect on others. When our blessed Lord apprised his Disciples that one of them would betray him, the diffidence of one diffused itself through all ; yea, extended even to the traitor himself, who, if from no better feeling than shame, joined, at last, in that self- diffident inquiry, "Lord, is it I ?a" On the other hand, the dissimulation of Peter drew aside the whole Galatian Church, not excepting even Barnabas him- selfb. In like manner, unhappy Peter, by his charac- teristic self-confidence, betrayed all the other Apostles into the commission of the heinous transgression of protesting an unchangeable fidelity to their Lord, without contemplating the weakness of their own purposes, and the treachery of their own hearts. Our Lord had told them, on the evening before his cruci- fixion, that they would all be offended because of him that night. Peter, confident in the supposed firmness of his own resolutions, replied, "Although all shall be offended, yet will not I." And, on being more par- ticularly warned that he himself would, that very night, no less than thrice deny his Lord, he, so far from relaxing his confidence, only " spake the more vehemently, If I should die with thee, I will not deny thee in any wise." And such was the unhappy effect of his confidence, that every one of the Apostles caught, as it were, the contagion, and expressed themselves in the same vehement language as he : "Likewise, also, thus said they all." Doubtless they all meant well : the resolution itself was good : but it was evil, as being made in dependence on their own strength.
To mark this distinction the more fully, I will shew,
I. The wisdom of the resolution, as conceived in their own minds —
a Matt. xxvi. 21, 22, 25. b Gal. ii. 13.