when he so fearfully, but so faithfully, portrayed our condition, that "from the sole of the foot even unto the head there is no soundness in it; but wounds, and bruises, and putrefying sores." The leprosy was incurable by man; God, who sent the malady, could alone heal. It is altogether taken out of the hands of the ordinary physicians: no remedy is prescribed, no human cure hinted; the priest alone had power to pronounce clean or unclean, but here his power ended: he had no power to make clean. This leper then, thus helpless in himself, and thus hopeless in his fellow-creatures, comes to Jesus. It was in the very beginning of Jesus' ministry; and though his fame was already known, both as a teacher sent from God, and as a worker of miracles-for he had already turned the water into wine-yet this was undoubtedly the first recorded application to him for his healing power over leprosy. It was the belief of the Jews that none but God could heal that disease; and this man, therefore, must have been painfully impressed with the notion, or belief, that his malady was beyond the reach of human aid. Yet he goes to Jesus; as St. Luke tells us, "he fell on his face before him;" and as St. Matthew here adds, "he worshipped him," and addressed him as "Lord." Were these, then, the mere acts of outward reverence and Oriental adoration to mere man, however exalted, accompanied as they were with the undoubted acknowledgment of his power to heal a malady which every Jew

believed that God alone could heal? It may be said that his faith is defective in implying a doubt of Christ's willingness to heal, and that our Lord's taking up his own words convey a rebuke of this doubt. But is not the limitation, "If thou wilt," affixed virtually to every prayer of every child of God? Was it not the limitation affixed to our Lord's own prayer, in his hour of agony, "Father, if it be possible, remove this cup from me; nevertheless, not my will, but thine be done"?

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At any rate, we need ourselves have no fears of Christ's willingness to heal that disease of which leprosy was the type; we need affix no limitations of reserve or doubt to our prayers for the removal of sin. It was the very purpose which Jesus came into the world—" to take away sin; "—it was the very cause for which the name of "Jesus" was given to him, because he should "save his people from their sins;" and however great their number, however deep their dye, however inveterate their stain, they are neither beyond his power, nor his willingness, to blot out and cleanse. He has opened, blessed be his name! a fountain not only for the house of David and the inhabitants of Jerusalem, but for us too, a fountain for sin and uncleanness, in which whosoever washes shall immediately be cleansed, and be healed of whatsoever disease he has. It is not Christ's willingness that we have to doubt, but our own; and the prayer of each one should

be, "Lord, make me willing in the day of thy power."

SECTION XXIV.

(Chapter viii. verses 6-14.)

IN the account given by St. Luke of this incident of the centurion, we find that he did not come himself to Jesus, but sent elders of the Jews to solicit Jesus in behalf of his servant, from the feeling that he himself, as a Gentile, was unworthy to come into His presence. St. Matthew is no doubt narrating the same incident; and as a master is often said to do that which he directs his servants to do, so the evangelist here represents the centurion as doing that which, in reality, he sent the Jewish elders to do for him.

In the healing of the leper, we had a striking instance of that poor man's faith and trust in Jesus under his melancholy condition; and yet our Lord here says of this centurion, that he had not found faith so great as his in all Israel. It may be instructive, therefore, to consider briefly, in what the great faith of this centurion consisted, and wherein it merited the commendation of having exceeded that of every Israelite. This centurion was a heathen, and a Roman officer, neither position peculiarly favourable for growth in grace, for humility, or faith in a Redeemer; yet he appears to have been a man

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of natural kindliness of heart, and of liberality of disposition; his compassion towards his servant in time of sickness evinces the one, and the fact of his having built a synagogue for the Jews, testifies to the other. That he was lowly in his own eyes, his whole conduct shows: he did not deem himself worthy to come, even as a suppliant, into the presence of Jesus, far less did he presume to ask that Jesus should deign to come under his roof. But how, then, was his request to be granted? how was that servant, for whom he was so deeply interested, to be healed of his palsy ? It had long been the belief of the Jews that the personal presence of a messenger or prophet of God was necessary to effect a cure; that in all miraculous agency, the human instrument must employ human and personal means. Thus when the Shunammite's son had died, and the afflicted mother had gone to Elisha to implore his aid, she would not be content with his sending Gehazi with his staff to restore the child, but she declared her purpose not to leave him till he had himself accompanied her to the chamber of death. A similar feeling may perhaps account, in some degree, for Naaman's incredulity and wrath, when his cure was to be effected without the prophet's personal instrumentality. And so now, whatever might be their ideas of Christ's own power, they still believed, that unless he were present he could do nothing. It was probably this same feeling which prompted the earnest cry of an

afflicted father to Jesus, on a somewhat similar occasion, "Sir, come down, ere my child die."

Such was Jewish belief; what was this heathen's belief and avowal? In reply to the gracious and condescending intimation of the Saviour, “I will come and heal him," he at once disclaims the honour as too great for such as he, but at the same time avows his thorough confidence, his undoubting, nay, his sublime conviction, that Jesus had but to speak the word, and disease and sickness, however imminent or however distant, would yield instant obedience to his mandate; and that with a thousandfold greater alacrity and zeal than his own commands were obeyed by the soldiers under himself, or the servant who waited on his will, would the word of Jesus be obeyed, and his servant should be healed. It was the very spirit, the very feeling, the very faith, for the absence of which God himself had reproached his people Israel by the mouth of his prophet, "Am I a God at hand, saith the Lord, and not a God afar off?" The centurion's faith was otherwise: he believed that God was a God equally afar off as nigh, and in this he exceeded the faith of Israel. Jesus is now in heaven, but he is very nigh to We have each of us a sickness to be healed. Oh, let the cry of our hearts be, 'Lord, heal me, and I shall be healed!"

every one of us.