Lord, were apparently borrowed by Virgil, and transferred to the supposed heir of the emperor, to whom the poet looked for honour and wealth. "Comes the last age, by Cuma's maid foretold: The Virgin now, now Saturn's sway returns; Thence the great months their radiant course shall run; Shall rid the trembling earth of all her fear. His shall it be a life divine to hold, With heroes mingled, and 'mid gods enroll'd; Till'd by no human band, bright Boy, shall yield; Home their full udders goats, unurged, shall bear ; Flowers of all hues shall round thy cradle vie, The snake and poison's treacherous weed shall die, Notwithstanding that the inconceivable and inexpressible ma jesty, riches, felicity, and purity of the approaching Prince, and his empire, were exhibited in the Old Testament by the sublimest, most beautiful, and expressive imagery which the former empires afforded, the prophets had often employed phraseology, that evidently taught that the new empire differed from all others, as hea ven did from earth, and would consist in a religious and moral renovation rather than in any essential change in the aspect of the material or political world. This peculiar characteristic of the new empire, was not perceived by the Jews; they extended not their views of it beyond their predominant desires, in conformity to which these teachers interpreted their sacred writings. They desired and longed for their promised and predicted Prince to restore the prosperity and extend the dominion and glory of their nation, so that they should obtain universal authority and power over all nations. This conception of the predictions was fatal to their safety, peace, and prosperity, in respect to this life, and occasioned their final rejection by God, their supreme King; for it induced them to welcome every presumptuous individual who stimulated them to aspire to emancipation from the Roman yoke, and to revile, hate, persecute, and kill the Prince of Life, and his first ministers. The civil government of Judea, after its subjugation to a Roman province, was placed successively for more than thirty years, under Coponius, Marcus Ambivius, Annius Rufus, Valerius Gratus, and tius Pilate. These appointed whoeverthey judged proper to exercise the office of high-priest, without any respect to the constitution of Moses; and this exalted office repeatedly and suddenly passed from one to another, as if it were no more sacred than any Roman office. This must have grieved every pious Jew, and mortified all; but the nation was powerless; and seems to have silently endured the iron-sceptre of Rome. Strongly disposed as they were to resist foreign authority, no instance of insurrection is recorded before the time of Pilate, except that produced by Theudas, or Judas, a Galilean, and Sadduc, a Pharisee; the former, Josephus says, was the founder of a religious sect, who, probably, held that the Jews could never be reduced to slavery. This insurrection, alluded to in Acts v. 37, was occasioned by the tax imposed by the Romans, and to be delivered from it, the leaders inflamed the minds of the multitude, by representing to them the disgrace of submission to any foreign power, and assuring them that they had only to rise in defence of their original constitution or covenant, to obtain, like their fathers, miraculous aid and complete victory. Speedily were their hopes dispersed, and the impostors punished. Pilate was appointed procurator of Judea, about A.D. 25, and inflicted great sufferings on its inhabitants for ten years. History presents him as one of the most unprincipled of men, and more tyrannical, unjust, and cruel than any of the Roman governors who had preceded him. He hated the Jews, and seems to have invented schemes to provoke their wrath, that he might have occasion to indulge the violent and relentless revenge which he cherished against them. Their inconquerable zeal for the law he deemed pride and obstinacy, which he burned with fury to subdue. He appears, indeed, to have detested all religious fervour, probably because he may have, from what he witnessed among the Jews, identified it with tumults and insurrections. How resolutely determined he was to overcome and extirpate it, a few of his acts amply show. The Jews indulged utter abhorrence of every symbol of idolatry. Such symbols were exhibited on the Roman standards; and lest the land should be polluted by them, the Jews had successfully persuaded the Roman governor, Varus, from leading his army through Judea, to aid, as we have noticed, Herod Antipas against the Arabians. Despising their prejudices, Pilate ordered his troops to enter Jerusalem in the night, with their standards covered, and to expose them next day to the public gaze. The abhorred object overwhelmed the Jews in sorrow. They immediately sent a number of messengers to Cesarea to implore Pilate to remove the standards from the metropolis. He insisted that this could not be done without dishonouring the emperor. The Jews persevered in urging their request. They remained five nights and days prostrate on the ground, before his palace. On the sixth day he entered the circus, and ascended his tribunal, as if he designed to give them audience; but, instead of summoning them to plead before him, he ordered his soldiers to fall on them, and put all to death, who refused to leave the palace. This treachery and barbarity were insufficient to overcome their fortitude and patience. They nobly braved the danger, and the proud procurator yielded to their en. treaties. Pilate, however, soon put their religious principles and feelings to a severer test. In the royal palace of Jerusalem he set up shields on which, most probably, were fixed emblems of paganism, although no images of idols, in honour of the Roman emperor Tiberius. The Jews again requested him to respect their laws and customs. He declined to hear them, although the tetrarchs of Galilee joined them in their petitions. The shields continued to irritate and vex the people till, after their appeal to Tiberius, Pilate received at once the rebuke of the emperor for his folly and imprudence, and an order to remove from the palace the useless objects of offence. Still greater grief and sufferings to the Jews resulted from the attempt of the unjust governor to procure the treasury of the temple. That they might more willingly deliver it, he pretended to expend it in constructing an aqueduct to convey water, from a considerable distance, into the city. They again appealed to his tribunal, before which they assembled in crowds; some publicly denouncing his acts, and many more calling for vengeance on his person. His soldiers in disguise, and armed with clubs, attacked the multitude indiscriminately; and many were wounded or killed. The deed of Pilate which led to his degradation was as unprovoked as it was base and cruel. Soon after Vitellius was constituted proconsul and president in Syria, as he was the superior of the procurator of Judea, the Samaritans appealed to him against Pilate. Deluded by an impostor, supposed to have been Simon the sorcerer, a great number of them consented to accompany him to their sacred mountain, Gerizim, to procure the sacred vessels, which he asserted had been buried there by Moses. Many assembled in an adjacent village, and waited for others whom they expected to join them. Pilate, on hearing of this event, probably imagined that they had formed some secret plans against the government. He deigned not to investigate the affair, but instantly sent a strong force of infantry and cavalry, with orders to disperse the infatuated people. Many of them were killed, and others were captured; and the most influential either for rank or wealth among the prisoners were, at the tyrant's command, put to death. On Vitellius receiving an account of these barbarous proceedings of Pilate, which he knew was only a specimen of his general conduct, he summoned him to resign his government to Marcellus, and proceed to Rome to answer the accusation of the Samaritans before Tiberius. He, however, reached not the capital of the empire till after the death of that emperor, and nothing certain is known of his future life. Tradition informs us that he was afterwards tried and condemned for the many crimes charged against him, and banished to Vienne in Gaul, where he was reduced to such wretchedness that, in despair, he killed himself. Who can wonder that such a man should, to please the Jews, sentence to death the innocent and beloved Being who stood at his tribunal, without one to plead his cause, or any visible friends, whose power or displeasure the unrighteous judge had any reason to dread? But that he should have hesitated, and resorted to a variety of means to avoid, as we know he did, the pronouncing of the sentence, strongly attests the power of truth and moral excellence over the most demoralised mind and unfeeling conscience. He had no solicitude to discover truth or execute justice; and yet the announcement of the importance of the former, and the denouncement of the guilt of violating the latter, by sentencing to death the most innocent and excellent individual, awakened fearful apprehensions, which made him pause again and again ere he reluctantly yielded to the clamour of the mob, and the threatening demands of the Jewish teachers. No one who has listened to divine truth, or contemplated moral excellence, can persevere in infidelity and wickedness, without experiencing the most agonising of all sufferings, self-condemnation, and the dread of future retri bution. We have no historical facts which would lead any one to believe that the Roman governors were accustomed to report to the imperial court any transactions in their respective provinces, which appeared not in the eyes of a statesman to affect the integrity, peace, or prosperity of the empire; and hence we could not reasonably hope that events of another nature, however interesting in themselves, should be found in the writings of the Romans, especially when these transpired among the Jews, a people whom the principal Roman authors unquestionably viewed with supercilious contempt. This sufficiently accounts for their omission to record many great events concerning Jesus the Christ, and his followers, whose doings they doubtless had heard of or witnessed. To these events we shall have occasion to refer in the subsequent pages. It may, however, be expedient to notice here that some of the fathers speak of the "Acts of Pilate," in which he narrates, for the information of the emperor, among other incidents which happened in Judea during his government, the trial, death, and resurrection of Jesus, the Christ. Though many of the learned justly regard the work so denominated as in general the production of after ages, yet it may have originated in an authentic narrative now lost, to which Justin and Tertullian appealed in their apologies for the Christians. They were not men who would present, for the consideration of the Roman emperor and all the learned among the Romans, arguments founded in statements, the fallacy of which could be detected at once, and expose their authors to derision, and their cause to scorn. The epistle to Tiberius, ascribed to Pilate, runs thus: "I have been forced to consent at length to the crucifixion of Jesus Christ, to prevent a tumult from the Jews, though it was very much against my will; for the world never saw, nor probably will, a man of such extraordinary piety and uprightness. But the high priest and sanhedrim fulfilled in it the oracles of their prophets, and of our sibyls. Whilst he hung on the cross, a horrid darkness, which covered the earth, seemed to threaten its total end. His disciples, who pretend to have seen him rise from the dead, and ascend into heaven, and acknowledge him for their God, still subsist; and, by their excellent lives, show themselves the worthy disciples of so extraordinary a Master. I did what I could to save him from the malice of the Jews; but the fear of a total insurrec tion made me sacrifice him to the interest and pire," &c. peace of your em. CHAPTER XXVIII. 2133 OF THE FIFTH EMPIRE, OR KINGDOM OF GOD. THE whole history of man demonstrates the truth uniformly attested in the sacred Scriptures, that he can only enjoy rational happiness in the same proportion as he cultivates and attains to moral excellence. In every age and country, he experiences present misery, and the fearful apprehension of its perpetual increase and eternal duration, to be inseparable from subjection to the malignant and impure passions, and perseverance in such practices as manifestly tend to produce disquietude, destruction, or despair in his own bosom, and distress and wretchedness to his species, and to every living thing. "The wages of sin," he truly finds" to be death." "God is love," and in his good pleasure he purposed in himself to restore his disobedient race to conformity to his own likeness and participation of his favour, which is life or happiness, and of his loving-kindness, which is better than life. This purpose he graciously revealed, when he announced his design to place the human race under the government of the Almighty Deliverer, whom he had chosen to be head or ruler of all who should, in any age, voluntarily confide in him, and humbly obey him. Till he should appear on earth as the sovereign Lord of all, they who looked for him were placed under the government of certain individuals, to whom he committed the authority of deputies, responsible to him for the manner in which they acted for him in the promotion of the interests of all who waited for him, and publicly worshipped the True and Living God. The first order of these deputies were the patriarchs, who were generally prophets, and intercessors with God for his visible worshippers, in things pertaining to this life. They were succeeded by Moses, the great legislator, prophet, deliverer, and intercessor of Israel. His successors were the judges, and the divinely chosen kings of Judah, and the many prophets who were raised up in their age. Their ministry was recommended by God to the confidence of the people by many signal and supernatural interpositions; and those of them who were unfaithful to their trust were publicly punished, often by the most striking expressions of the displeasure and indignation of the Supreme Sovereign, Saviour, and Judge of the whole community, who professed to do him homage. How, and to what an extent this Divine administration failed to accomplish the moral and spiritual deliverance of the great majority of those who enjoyed it, we are fully instructed in the sacred history preserved in the Old Testament. Few comparatively of any generation of Israel were visibly subjects of moral renovation, and by consequence active instruments in the promotion of human happiness. The multitude despised the spiritual blessings of the eternal covenant made with the patriarchs, and thought and acted without reverence for God, or love for man. This failure was foreseen by the Most High, to whom are known all his works from the beginning; and it was more early and frequently predicted, in re |