most thrillingly interesting manner; they have not lost but gained immensely by their attachment to Him who is known as Jesus of Nazareth.

But if they have done gloriously, have they done right? The company increases. Two personages, invested with a glory like that which beams from the person of their Lord, appear, and enter into harmonious converse with him. They are Moses and Elijah, one the head of the sacrificial, and the other the head of the prophetic dispensation. They converse upon the great event of the world-the death of Christ. Moses had pointed to it with his typical finger, and the prophets had made it a theme of impassioned discourse and wrote its affecting history centuries before, and Christ was to be the passive actor in those scenes which they had portrayed in such striking colors. All was agreement; not a point of difference was raised between the assembled heads of the great dispensations of light to a sin-shaded world. Cheer up, then, ye followers of the Jew-hated Nazarene, for you are no apostates; but, traveling along the illuminated pathway of revelation, you are just immerging into the full beams of gospel day. But see! there comes the Shekinah; the symbol of God's presence, about which you have heard and read so much in connection with the history of your fathers! You may expect now a communication which you may not forget. Hear that voice! This is my beloved son in whom I am well pleased!" There now, you have been led, by his discourses, fraught with the treasures of wisdom, and by the wondrous miracles which he has wrought, to embrace the Messiah; Moses and Elijah have come from the realms of light, and sitting beneath the outbeamings of his glory, reverently fraternize with him; and God, drawing nigh to you in the ancient type of His glorious majesty, has spoken to you distinctly and

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told you to hear him. The way of duty is clear before you, and there is no room for farther doubt.

Peter was quite beside himself, under the contempla. tion of the ravishing glories of his Lord and his two heavenly visitors, and it is no wonder that both he and his brother disciples were entirely overwhelmed with the awful glory of the speaking God. Emotions of fear mingled with the rapturous throbbings of their strangely excited hearts. There they lie amidst the glory that crowns the lofty solitude, made sacred by scenes such as had never transpired on earth before. It requires the familiar touch and voice of their divine Master to raise them up from under the overpowering weight of glory that rested upon them. They had been favored with a view of the splendor and majesty of their Lord, and abundant proof that he was the great Teacher, sent from God, who was to be heard. But this was not all. They were to be teachers like Moses and Elijah, and that the world would oppose them was clear. Very likely they must suffer martyrdom, and, if that does not take place, die they must, and cease to have a visible existence here. Where will then the active thinking spirit be? Shut up in the loathsome grave with the corrupt body? Be dormant? Unconscious? No! They had just seen Moses and Elijah, one of whom had died, and the other disappeared centuries ago. They, certainly, were both living, whether both in heaven, or one in heaven, and the other in paradise we may not know, but perhaps they did; at all events, they were having a conscious and glorious existence at the time of the transfiguration.

Here was something to cheer and animate the disciples in their subsequent struggles with the hosts of hell. And Peter did remember "the excellent glory" in the mount, and the voice that spake to them from it when

he was sturdily doing battle under the eye of the chief shepherd." He could well afford to die in the contest, as it was only exchanging an existence of less glory, for one of unspeakable splendor. It is true, the body must sojourn in the realms of corruption and dishonor for a season, yet the triumphs of death are comparatively short. The disciples saw this on the mount of transfiguration. They were made to understand, undoubtedly, that the transfigured body of Christ, was a full representation of the glorified body of man after the resurrection. It is very probable that they saw a complete parallel between the bodies of Christ and Elijah, and perhaps between those of Moses and Christ. Whether the body of Moses, which could not be found, was raised and taken to heaven, is what the scriptures do not tell us, and hence we can not know with certainty. But proof enough was given, in connection with the transfiguration of Christ, of the glory of the resurrection body to satisfy them that though their bodies might be sown in corruption," they would be "raised in incorruption," if "sown in dishonor," they would be "raised in glory." Hence, with this precious remembrance ever cheering their hopes, they counted not their lives dear unto them, while bearing forward the standard of the cross of Christ. They could well afford to lay down their lives in a good cause, if such a glorious life of body and spirit awaited them beyond the scene of strife.

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Such, we apprehend, were some of the lessons taught by the scenes of the transfiguration to the disciples, and, through them, to the world.

THE AGONY IN THE GARDEN.

BY REV. D. STARKS.

Matthew xxvi, 36-46; Mark xiv, 23-42; Luke xxii, 39–46. The cup from which our Lord prayed to be delivered, if consistent with the will of his Fatherwhat was it? On this point conflicting opinions are entertained. Some have supposed that it was the death he was about to undergo, as the world's Redeemer; the bruising of the Father. There is no view taken on the subject, which, to us, is more inconsistent than this. The atonement was perfectly voluntary on the part of Christ. Hear his language, "I am the good shepherd, and know my sheep, and am known of mine. As the Father knoweth me, even so know I the Father; and I lay down my life for the sheep." "Greater love hath no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends." "Therefore doth my Father love me, because I lay down my life, that I might take it again. No man taketh it from me, but I lay it down of myself. I have power to lay it down, and I have power to take it again." Here is clear evidence that our Lord's death was entirely voluntary on his part. The idea that as he neared the fearful hour, there were any misgivings, is preposterous; it savors of blasphemy. A failure here would have been attended with the most serious consequences. Mercy had marked all the divine dispensations to our world, from the time our first parents were driven from Eden's garden, till Christ stood in the garden of Gethsemane; and every mercy received had been communicated through the merits of him who was yet to suffer. A failure, therefore, would

have involved the divine government in inextricable difficulty. Again, Enoch, Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, with thousands of others, were saved in Heaven, through the blood of atonement, then yet to be shed. Some of them, for centuries, had ranged the plains of undying delight and bliss; and now if the atonement failed, what was to become of this company? Yea more; how was the government of God to be indemnified for what they had already enjoyed? A failure! There could be none. A thought of misgiving, could never have entered the mind of the incarnate Christ, in this lonely spot, at the foot of Olive's mount. All was firm and decided there, on this point.

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Others have imagined this cup to be what they have denominated, The attendant circumstances of his death, the cross of wood, the purple robe, the crown of thorns; the soldier's spear, etc." These exhibit the malice and wickedness of the Jews and Romans, who clamored for his blood, but they were all nothing in comparison to the deep anguish he realized, and endured as the world's Redeemer. "Surely, he hath borne our griefs and carried our sorrows; yet we did esteem him stricken, smitten of God, and afflicted." To suppose that these outward circumstances had so much influence on his mind, when they were nothing compared with what he suffered from the world's guilt, is irrational. Again, the fact that the cup did pass from him, clearly refutes this idea. This was actually the case, whatever that cup was. This is evident from the apostle's language: "Who in the days of his flesh, when he had offered up prayers and supplications with strong crying and tears, unto him that was able to save him from death, and was heard in that he feared." Hence it could neither have been what he suffered, as