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the instrument hinders not the ends of the ministration: seeing the efficacy of an ordinance depends not upon the quality of the person, but the divine institution and the blessing which God has entailed upon it. Judas preached Christ, no doubt with zeal and fervency, and for any thing we know, with as much success as the rest of the apostles; and yet he was a bad man, a man actuated by sordid and mean designs, one that had prostituted religion and the honour of his place to covetousness and evil arts. The love of money had so entirely possessed his thoughts, that his resolutions were bound for nothing but interest and advantage. But they that will be rich fall into temptation and a snare.' This covetous temper betrayed him, as in the issue, to the most fatal end, so to the most desperate attempt, ἄγτος τὸ πάντων ἀνοσιώτατον, as Origen calls the putting Christ to death, the most prodigious impiety that the sun ever shone on, the betraying his innocent Lord into the hands of those who he knew would treat him with all the circumstances of insolent scorn and cruelty. How little does kindness work upon a disingenuous mind! It was not the honour of the place, to which, when thousands of others were passed by, our Lord had called him, the admitting him into a free and intimate fellowship with his person, the taking him to be one of his peculiar domestics and attendants, that could divert the wretch from his wicked purpose. He knew how desirous the great men of the nation were to get Christ into their hands, especially at the time of the passover, that he might, with the more public disgrace, be sacri

1 Contr. Cels. lib. iv. p. 175.

ficed before all the people, and therefore bargains with them, and for no greater a sum than under four pounds, to betray the Lamb of God' into the paws of these wolves and lions: in short, he heads the party, conducts the officers, and sees him delivered into their hands.

2. But there is an active principle in man's breast, that seldom suffers daring sinners to pass in quiet to their graves: awakened with the horror of the fact, conscience began to rouse and follow close, and the man was unable to bear up under the furious revenges of his own mind: as indeed, all wilful and deliberate sins, and especially the guilt of blood, are wont more sensibly to alarm the natural notions of our minds, and to excite in us the fears of some present vengeance that will seize And how intolerable are those scourges upon us. that lash us in this vital and tender part? The spirit of the man sinks under him, and all supports snap asunder: as what ease or comfort can he enjoy, that carries a vulture in his bosom, always gnawing and preying upon his heart? which made Plutarch compare an evil conscience to a cancer in the breast, that perpetually gripes and stings the soul with the pains of an intolerable repentance.'

1 Τὸ μεν συνειδὸς οἴεταί ἕλκος ἐν σαρκὶ, τῇ ψυχῇ τὴν μεταμέλειαν αἱμάσσεσαν ἀεὶ καὶ νύσσεσαν ἐναπολείπει.—Plut. de Anim. tranquil. p. 476. ̓Αλλὰ τάδ' ἐκτελέειν, ἅ σε μὴ μετέπειτ' avinon Pythag. in aur. carm. in quem locum hæc inter alia Hierocles, optima prorsus et huic loco satis apposita. Tí opeλoç πορκίαις ἢ φόνοις, ἢ ἄλλαις τισὶ κακοπραγίαις ληΐσασθαι χρήματα, και πλετεῖν τὰ ἔξω; καὶ πρὸς τᾶτο ἢ ἀναισθήτως ἔχειν, και δια τοῦτο μᾶλλον ἐπιτείνειν τὸ κακόν ἢ εἰς αἴσθησιν τῶν εἰρε γασμενων ὑπὸ τῆς συνειδήσεως ἑλκόμενον πρεβλοῦσθαι τὴν ψυχὴν, καὶ δειμαίνειν τὰ ἐν ᾅδε κολοσήρια· καὶ μόνην ἴασιν εὑρίσε κειν τὴν εἰς τὸ μὴ εἶναι καταφυγὴν, ὅθεν αὐτῷ παρίσαται κακῷ τὸ κακὸν ἰᾶσθαι. φθορᾷ τῆς ψυχῆς τὴν κακίαν παραμυθεμένῳ,

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Guilt is naturally troublesome and uneasy; it disturbs the peace and serenity of the mind, and fills the soul with storms and thunder. Did 'ever any harden himself against God, and prosper ?' And, indeed, how should he, when God has such a powerful and invisible executioner in his own bosom? Whoever rebels against the laws of his duty, and plainly affronts the dictates of his conscience, does that moment bid adieu to all true repose and quiet, and expose himself to the severe resentments of a self-tormenting mind. And though, by secret arts of wickedness, he may be able possibly to drown and stifle the voice of it for a while, yet every little affliction or petty accident will be apt to awaken it into horror, and to let in terror like an armed man upon him. A torment infinitely beyond what the most ingenious tyrants could ever contrive. Nothing so effectually invades our ease as the reproaches of our own minds. The wrath of man may be endured, but the irruptions of conscience are irresistible; it is r@ σvvadóti άлáуxεooαι, (as Chrysostom very elegantly styles it,) to be choked or strangled with an evil conscience, which oft reduces the man to such distresses, as to make him choose death rather than life. A sad instance of all which we have in this unhappy man; who being wearied with furious and melancholy reflections upon what was past, threw back the wages of iniquity in open court, and dispatched himself

κι τὴν μετὰ θάνατον ἐδένειαν ἑαυτῶ καταψηφίζεσθαι φυγὴν τῶν τῆς κρίσεως πόνων ; ἐ βέλεται γὰρ ὁ κακὸς ἀθάνατον εἶναι τὴν αὑτοῦ ψυχὴν, ἵνα μὴ ὑπομείνῃ τιμωρέμενος. Καὶ φθάνει τὸν ἐκεῖ δικασὴν θάνατον ἑαυτοῦ καταψηφιζόμενος, ὡς πρέπον τὴν πονηρὰν ψυχὴν μηδὲ εἶναι· ἀλλ ̓ ἔτος μεν, ὡς ἀβελία πρὸς κακίαν ὑπενεχθεὶς, εἰκοτως ἀμετρίᾳ τὴν καθ ̓ tavrov ñpov έкpépɛt.—Hier. in Aur. Carm. p. 165.

1 Job. ix. 4.

by a violent death: vainly hoping to take sanctuary in the grave, and that he should meet with that ease in another world which he could not find in this. 'He departed, and went and hanged himself, and falling down burst asunder, and his bowels gushed out:' leaving a memorable warning to all treacherous and ungrateful, to all greedy and covetous persons, not to let the world insinuate itself too far into them; and indeed to all, 'to watch and pray, that they enter not into temptation.' Our present state is slippery and insecure; Let him that thinketh he standeth, take heed lest he fall.' What privileges can be a sufficient fence, a foundation firm enough to rely upon, when the miracles, sermons, favours, and familiar converses of Christ himself could not secure one of the apostles from so fatal an apostacy?

3. A vacancy being thus made in the college of apostles; the first thing they did after their return from Mount Olivet, where our Lord took his leave of them, to St. John's house in Mount Sion, (the place, if we may believe Nicephorus,' where the church met together,) was to fill up their number with a fit, proper person. To which purpose Peter acquainted them, that Judas, according to the prophetical prediction, being fallen from his ministry, it was necessary that another should be substituted in his room; one that had been a constant companion and disciple of the holy Jesus, and consequently capable of bearing witness to his life, death, and resurrection. Two were propounded in order to the choice, Joseph called Barsabas, and Justus, (whom some make the same with Joses, one of the brothers of our Lord,) and Matthias,

1 H. Eccl. lib. ii. c. 1, p. 131.

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both duly qualified for the place. The way of election was by lots, a way frequently used both among Jews and Gentiles for the determination of doubtful and difficult cases, and especially the choosing judges and magistrates; and this way was here taken (says one of the ancients') on purpose to comply with the old custom observed among the Jews, that in the election of an apostle, they might not seem to depart from the way that had been used under the legal state. The pseudo Dionysius, author of the Ecclesiastic Hierarchy, together with his two paraphrasts, expressly says, that it was not a lot that was used in this case, to determine the matter; but θεαρχικόν τι δῶρον, οι σύμβολόν τι ἐξ ἀποκαλύψεως, some immediate and extraordinary sign from heaven, falling upon the candidate, and discovering him to be the person chosen by God. But this is directly contrary to the very words of the sacred story, which say, that they gave forth the lots, and that the lot fell upon Matthias.' And this course the apostles the rather took, because the Holy Ghost was not yet given,* by whose immediate dictates and inspirations they were chiefly guided afterwards. And that the business might proceed with the greater regularity and success, they first solemnly make their address to heaven, that the omniscient Being that governed the world, and perfectly understood the tempers and dispositions of men, would immediately guide and direct the choice, and show which of these

1 Ambros. in Luc. c. 1, p. 11.

2 De Eccles. Hierarch. c. 5, § 5, p. 367.

Maxim. ib. p. 376; Pachym. p. 383.

4 *Εδωκαν κλήρες αὐτῶν· ἐδέπω γὰρ πνεῦμα ἦν.—Chry

sost. in loc.