the plain, where lay the bleaching bones of former comrades, strewn in disorder or piled _ in heaps as they had fought and fallen. Fragments of weapons, limbs of horses, heads \\ ~ of men stuck on trunks of trees, were to be seen on every hand. In groves hard by dy were the savage altars where tribunes and centurions had been victimized; while those who survived that fatal field pointed out the place where lieutenants were butchered, standards taken, Varus wounded, crosses erected for the captives, and the eagles trampled underfoot. In addition to all, in s night-vision the ill-fated Varus, smeared with blood \~ and emerging from the fens, seemed present to the imagination of his successor, and beckoning him to a like defeat. The description of the whole scene by Tacitus, tha,’ Roman historian, is vivid and terrible in the extreme. Kver after throughout his reign — the Emperor Augustus was heard at times to exclaim, “Varus, Varus, give me back my legions!” So, when we reflect on the ruins of frail humanity—the wreck of generation after generation—we may wel] imagine Mother Earth appealing to Death in pitiful accents, and exclaiming, “ Death, Death, give me back my sons and daughters; restom
to me my children thou hast slain.” That appeal shall be heeded one day, not br Death, but by him who was swallowed of Death—swallowed as a poison, and s*
‘ destroyed the destroyer. Christ, by his resurrection, says to Harth, widowed anr‘ weeping over the graves of her children, “ Weep not! I will ransom them from thy power of the grave; I will redeem them from death.” To Death he says at the samy time, “O Death, I will be thy plagues! O Grave, I will be thy destruction!” Further,
he will not only raise us up, he will fashion the body of our humiliation and make i+ like his cwn glorious body. Plants and animals have their proper habitats; different
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868 THE GOSPEL ACCORDING TO ST, MARK, [on xvi 1—20,
es demand different situations; different vegetable tribes are allotted to different Istitudes and different elevations. The palms of the torrid zone will dwindle and die in the temperate; the trees of the temperate, again, shrink into shrubs in the frigid, Such ise the difference of latitude. That of elevation has a similar effect. A French traveller tells us that, in ascending Mount Ararat, he found at the foot the plants of Asia, further up those of Italy, at a higher elevation those of France, then those of Sweden, and at the top those of Lapland and the northern regions, Just so we shall be adapted to our future dwelling-place. “Flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God ;” therefore the living shall be changed, the dead quickened, and all God’s people, nick and dead, glorified together ; “for this corruptible must put on incorruption, and this mortal must put on immortality.”
V. PracricaL Lessons. 1. Come, “behold the place where they laid him,” and there see the fruits of Christ’s death and the benefits of his resurrection; come, seek the pardon and peace which the justified possess; come, secure the holiness and happiness of the sanctified; come, entertain the “sure and certain hope of the resur- rection to eternal life.” 2. We have considered the lowliness of Christ, and dwelt on his love, and now we may rejoice in the light he has shed on the tomb. We are hastening to that “ bourn whence no traveller returns.” As we advance, desire fails; a little longer, and the grasshopper will be a burden. Once we reach the summit we soon go down the hill, and it is well and wisely so arranged.
“ Heaven gives our years of failing strength Indemnifying fleetness, And those of youth a seeming length Proportion’d to their sweetness.”
3. “ Yo seek Jesus of Nazareth, which was crucified.” So, too, we seek Jesus, though condemned as a Nazarene in the spirit of the contemptuous question, “can any good thing come out of Nazareth?” We seek Christ crucified, though to the Jew a stumbling-block, and to the Greek foolishness. We are not ashamed of the offence of the cross. Nay, like Paul, we glory in that cross. The day was when Paul gloried in his pedigree, for he was an Hebrew of the Hebrews; in his sect, for he belonged to the atraitest sect of the Jews’ religion, being a Pharisee; in his morality, as vouanite the Law blameless; in his learning, brought up at the feet of Gamaliel; in the of the Abrahamic covenant, being circumcised on the eighth day; in hig Roman franchise, born free; in his citizenship, a citizen of no mean city—his native Tarsus, beautifully situated in the plain and on the banks of the Cydnus; in his per- secuting zeal, haling men and women to prison. But once his eyes were opened, once his heart was renewed, once he obtained mercy, then his ground of glorying was altogether changed. “God forbid that I should glory, save in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, by whom the world is crucified unto me, and I unto, the world.” 4. We shall not see his face until either we stand on the sea of glass, or his feet stand again on Olivet ; we cannot hold him as those who “ met him by the way .. . and held him by the feet, and worshipped him;” we cannot minister to him as certain women in the days of his fiesh ; we cannot serve him at food like Martha, nor pour oil on his head like Mary. What, then, remains for us todo? How are we to express our love to him? We are to think of him, believe on him, pray to him, accept him for our King and submit to his laws, call on his name, take the cup of salvation and keep his memory green in our souls, show forth his death, glory in his resurrection, partake of the sacra- ment of the Supper—it is the memorial of his death; and delight in the sabbath—it is the monument of his resurrection. 6. “Come, see the place where the Lord lay,” and let the sight encourage you, Dread not death; you believe in him that conquered it, Dread not the grave; you love him who lay in it. Dread not hell; you believe in him who rescued you from it But dread sin and depart from it; “go and sin no more."—J. J. G.
Vers. 19, 20. Parallel passages: Luke xxiv. 50—53; Acts i. 9—12.— The Ascension, L CracuMsTANCES IMMEDIATELY PRECEDING, Our Lord led the apostles out “as far as to Bethany,” on the eastern slope of the mount of Olives, a mile, or somewhat more than a mile, below the summit of the ridge, whence they afterwards returned by the
OH, xv1. 1—20.] THE GOSPEL ACCORDING TO ST. MARK. 869