important being that ever appeared in the world.

Christ's birth was a miracle, his death was a miracle (for he that could have commanded twenty legions of angels to his rescue, quietly submitted to a painful. death), and his resurrection was a miracle.

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CHAPTER IV.

CHRIST'S RESURRECTION,—A FOURTH PROOF

OF HIS DIVINITY.

A fourth proof of our Lord's divinity is, his rising again. Death could not hold the Lord of glory; and because God has life in himself, so Christ also has life in himself. He laid down his life for fallen man, and he took it again for man's justification. The resurrection of Christ proves that the atonement is complete; it proves, also, that as he rose again, we shall rise also.

Nothing was ever more clearly or more satisfactorily proved than the resurrection of Christ.

We read in St. Matthew, that immediately after the crucifixion of the Lord, the Jews, with their chief priests, went to Pilate, and said:" Sir, we remember that that deceiver said, while he was yet alive, After three days I will rise again. Command, therefore, that the sepulchre be made sure until the third day, lest his disciples come by night, and steal him away, and say unto the people, He is risen from the dead."

Pilate said unto them: "Ye have a watch go your way, make it as sure as ye can."

"So they went and made the sepulchre sure, sealing the stone, and setting a watch."

In the following chapter we find, that Mary Magdalene, and the other Mary, came to see the sepulchre on the morning of

the third day, and they there saw an angel, in white raiment, whose appearance so frighted the keepers, or watch that had been set over the body, that they became as dead men. And the angel said unto the women :-" Fear not ye; for I know that ye seek Jesus, which was crucified. He is not here, for he is risen, as he said. Come, see the place where the Lord lay: and go quickly, and tell his disciples that he is risen from the dead."

"And as they went to tell his disciples, behold Jesus met them, saying, All hail; and they came and held him by the feet, and worshipped him."

St. Mark tells us, in the sixteenth chapter of his book, that when the disciples heard that the Lord was alive, and had been seen of Mary Magdalene, they believed not.

This plainly shows that they had given up all hope that their Lord would rise again, and this was natural enough; for how could they imagine that he who thought it no robbery to be equal to God, would have submitted to the death of the cross! No doubt they knew not what to think, when they found that Jesus had actually been put to death, and as they supposed, had not risen again: and what puts this beyond a doubt, is the following passage from St. Luke, chap. xxiv: "And it came to pass, that while they communed together and reasoned, Jesus himself drew near, and went with them. But their eyes were holden that they should not know him. And he said unto them, what manner of communications are these that ye have one to another, as ye walk and are sad ?"