graphically) with the spices and perfumes they had carefully prepared, the sun by this time having begun to rise. But lo! in their confusion and haste and sorrow they have overlooked an important fact; they have not known, or forgotten, the efforts of his enemies to make sure the sepulchre, already secured with a great stone, sealing it with the imperial signet and setting a guard, In their hurry they have forgotten all this— the stone, the seal, the sentry. Soon as the thought occurs to them they look anxiously at each other and sorrowfully inquire, “ Who shall roll us away the stone from the door of the sepulchre?” Of the stone, at least, they were well aware. 2. The rolling away of the stone. Not pausing for an answer, they press forward to the sepulchre. On reaching the spot their fears are disappointed and their expectations exceeded. An earthquake had shaken the place, an angel had descended; and when they looked up (4&vafadpaem, another graphic trait) they see that the stone is rolled away. So is it with many another stone of huge dimensions—with many a stone of difficulty and doubt and danger. So with the stone that barred the entrance of the heavenly world against the sinner; 60 with the stone that closes the grave’s mouth where the dear dead dust of loved ones lies; so with the stone that may be laid on the spot where our own ashes shall one day repose. The rolling away of this stone from the sepulchre of the Saviour involves the rolling away of all these stones. 38. The evening of the same day. In the evening of the same day two lone pilgrims are traversing the pathway between the vineyards. ‘They are journeying to a little village embosomed in vine-clad hills, and seven miles distant from Jerusalem. They are glad to escape from town; for a heavy heart seeks solitude. Their Master had been crucified, their hopes had been dashed, and their fond anticipations disappointed. They were returning home in sadness, for what was there in the capital to interest them now? All that had been dear to them there was now gone, and to all appearance gone for ever, for their Lord and Master was no more. The lovely scene around, the bright sky above, the cheerfulness of the geason, but little harmonized with their sadness of heart and sorrow of spirit.
“The spring in ita beanty on Carmel was seen, And Hermon was dress’d in its mantle of green; While the pathway which led to Emmaus was made All fragrant and cool by the olive trees’ shade ; The dove in Jehoshaphat’s valley was wailing, The eagle round Olivet proudly was sailing: But all was unheeded, for doubt and dismay Were distracting those two lonely men on their way.”
They walked and talked, and talked and walked, beguiling the difficulties of the way, and forgetting the lapse of time. They commune and reason together; they balance probabilities. They comment on the early visit of the women to the sepulchre, on the stone being rolled away, and the vision of the angels, and so for a moment they entertain a faint hope that their Master might have risen, and would now restore the kingdom to Israel. But that hope is like a brief glimpse of sunshine which the dark clouds soon blot again from the sky. Immediately it occurs to them that the words of the women had been treated ag an idle tale, Their wish might have been father to the thought, while hope and love are proverbially quick-sighted. Why had Peter not seen the vision? Why had John not been privileged with the sight? A third traveller overtakes them. He joins their company. He asks the cause of the sadness pictured on their countenance; he inquires the subject of their communings; he converses with them cordially and confidentially ; their heart was burning within them while he spake to them by the way and while he opened to them the Scriptures. These two scenes— one in the morning, the other in the evening of the same day; the former described by St. Mark and St. Matthew, the latter by St. Mark, but more fully by St. Luke (xxiv. 18—35)—occurred on the day of our Lord’s resurrection from the dead. IL A vistr To THE Saviour’s Toms. 1. The place where they laid him. “The place where they laid him,” as St. Mark terms it, or the place where the Lord lay, was the . tomb of Joseph of Arimathexa. We visit the tomb of an earthly friend; we venerate the place of our fathers’ sepulchres; we gaze pensively on the green hillock that over- lays the mortal remains of one we love; with willing hand we plant the shrub—the myrtle or the cypress—which marks the vlaca where the heart’s treasure is enshrined ;
364 THE GOSPEL ACCORDING TO ST. MARK. [cn. xvi. 1—20,
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