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النشر الإلكتروني

DISCOURSE XVII.

Subject. THE MINISTRY OF
JESUS CHRIST.

THE STYLE AND MANNER OF THE EVANGELICAL WRITERS. THE BENEFICENT CHARACTER OF CHRIST'S MIRACLES, DOCTRINES, AND PRECEPTS.

ACTS X. 38.

Who went about doing good.

IT is an observation which has been

often made, that a very satisfactory proof of the truth of the Holy Scriptures is furnished by the plain and simple language in which they are written, by the artless manner in which their narrations are delivered, and by the sober and unstudied terms in which their incidents are related, and the characters connected with them are described.

The remark is a just one; for simplicity

is generally an evidence, and always an accompaniment, of truth. Fiction has need of ornament; for she addresses the imagination, and must court it by something more attractive than common occurrence; whereas truth appeals to the reason, and can satisfy this cold and cautious principle only by plain and unornamented fact.

We cannot read the Bible, more especially the Books of the New Testament, without feeling that they have this claim on our attention and belief. They are full of beauty, but it is beauty unassisted by art, and boasting nothing save its own natural charms. They are highly sublime : but it is the dignity of their subject, and not the labour of their composition, which makes them so. They are deeply interesting and affecting not, however, from the efforts of studied eloquence, but because they relate the most awful events, exactly as they happened; and paint a new class of characters, in their real and living colours.

Of these personages, the most august, extraordinary, and engaging, beyond all conceivable comparison, is the Son of God, and SAVIOUR OF MANKIND. HE, indeed, is the ALPHA and OMEGA, the beginning and end of the book of the New Cove

nant, and shines forth throughout every page of it, both in word and deed, with a lustre which throws every other actor in the wonderful scene into complete shade. But though our blessed Lord's character was so transcendently superior to that of all men who lived either before, or with, or after him; and would have afforded an inexhaustible theme of praise and admiration to the Evangelists who wrote his life, and the Apostles who preached his doctrines; yet such was the simplicity and modesty of these inspired penmen, and promulgators of the Gospel, that they never made an attempt to catch the attention, or excite the wonder, of those to whom they respectively addressed themselves, by any formal description of Christ's innumerable excellences. They told the story of his virtues and his mighty works without ornament or comment; they left his character to be gathered from what he did, and what he said; or, if at any time they spoke of this model of perfection as a pattern or example, they did so in the shortest and simplest manner, in the fewest and most unostentatious terms; they merely described him as "the Holy One and the Just ;" as being full of grace and truth;" leaving us an example that we

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"should follow his steps:" as a spotless being who did no sin; neither was guile "found in his mouth:" and in the words of our text, as the personification of beneficence, "a man approved of God," "who "went about doing good.'

How different from this plain and unassuming style of commendation is that of all human writers which the world has hitherto produced! The characters which they present to us as objects of praise, or wonder, or imitation, are painted in the most glowing colours, and with the most studied minuteness: every virtue is placed in the brightest point of view, and loaded with the choicest ornaments: while all their defects are either concealed or varnished over; and every circumstance that in man's estimation, would lower their dignity, or obscure their splendour, is carefully omitted. Το

The reason of all this is obvious. render a mere man the object of admiration, it is necessary to throw a shade over much of his character; and to withhold from public observation those innumerable infirmities and foibles; those littlenesses and extravagancies; those "fears of the "brave, and follies of the wise;" which are the inseparable accompaniments of our fallen nature; and which, if they do not reduce

us all nearly to a level, prevent the greatest and the best of our race from being objects of unmixed approbation.

On the other hand, the character of our blessed Lord needed none of these assistances or cautions on the part of those who have transmitted to us the history of his life. The plain recital of what he did, and what he said, was sufficient of itself to astonish the imagination, and awe the soul; for he was embodied, absolute perfection; his character needed no praise to exalt its excellence; his actions were too dignified to require concealment; and whether he was contemplated in power or in abasement; as working mighty deeds, or willingly submitting to degradation or suffering; he was always, and equally, the object of unmingled reverence and respect, wonder and love.

The text presents our blessed Lord to us under an aspect every way calculated to awaken these emotions in our souls: for it exhibits him as the living and visible exemplar of divine beneficence: as passing his whole life in the Godlike employment of comforting misery; soothing sorrow; assuaging pain; dispensing mercy; and "doing good" to the bodies and souls of

men.

It cannot be doubted, indeed, that the

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