conducive to His interest; nor would then have, even, that haughty compliment been improper, with which the ruler opened his visit: "Rabbi, we know that Thou art a teacher come from God, for no man can do these miracles that Thou doest, except God be with him." Flattering words these, from the wealthy and the powerful but on the Son of God no such liprighteousness could impose. Interrupting him in his unfinished speech, He discovers at once, the knowledge of what was passing in the mind of His visitant; and reminds him, that he had not yet gone through those previous pledges of sincerity and repentance, which alone could admit men to familiarity with Christ. "Verily, verily, I say unto thee," (observe the earnestness of our Lord, while, reading His visitant's soul, He detects the blended pride, and cowardice, which struggled with his faith, and made him only half a Christian,) "verily, verily, I say unto thee, Except a man be born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God."

The kingdom of God, as I have often told you, is generally used in the New Testament, for the Church, or Kingdom of Christ upon earth and, to see the kingdom of God, means, to be admitted into the privileges of a Christian; to become a child of God; a coheir of glory with Jesus Christ; and a partaker of those helps, and comforts, and graces of the Spirit, which, to

those who seek them truly, are the riches of our faith, our glory, our consolation, our joy! With this meaning of the expression “Kingdom of God," Nicodemus, as a learned Jew, was well acquainted; and he must have been no less so, with the phrase, “being born again;” which was a common expression, both among Jews and Gentiles, to signify that inward and entire change of heart and habits; of which baptism was the outward symbol, or pledge: and which both Jews and Gentiles required from those, who were candidates for admission into the higher privileges and mysteries of their respective forms of worship.

The heathens themselves had the custom of sprinkling with water those, who gave themselves up to the worship of any of their gods: and the person, who submitted to this ceremony, was said to be born again; and to become the child of that deity, to whom he consecrated his after life. The Romans, when they set a slave at liberty, called that ceremony the "regeneration of that slave:" and the same name was given by the Jews to that baptism by which heathens, and idolators, and excommunicated persons, were admitted to the profession of the laws of Moses.

Our Saviour's meaning, then, was (and Nicodemus could not but understand it), to reprove His visitant for thus confessing that faith privately

in which he ought rather to have gloried; and to remind him, that, if he sought to be a disciple of the Messiah, he must first go to His Apostles, and be baptized. But this little suited the ruler's inclination. To make so public a profession of an unpopular faith was discreditable; and might be dangerous-for baptism, by a tradition of the Jews, was always performed in the day-time, and before witnesses. To humble himself, and receive the pledge of adoption from a publican, like Matthew, or from such mean Galileans as John, or James, or Peter, was, to a ruler, shocking; and, in the eyes of a Pharisee, a doctor of the law, an almost impious degradation. And to own himself a sinner and impure, to profess that his whole nature required a change, and to undergo that ceremony, which was the seal of confession, and forgiveness, to repentant idolaters, and publicans, and harlots, appeared to this self-righteous man a strange and unnecessary proposal. A great deal, I think, of surprise and disappointed pride is perceptible in his reply: "How can a man be born again, when he is old? Can he enter a second time into his mother's womb, and be born ?"

He was not, he could not be, I have already proved, he could not be ignorant of our Saviour's meaning; though he thus seeks to evade its application: but he means to urge, in answer to this command of Christ, his age, his high cha

racter, his privileges as a native Israelite, and a descendant of Abraham; and endeavours to persuade Christ, that a man of his age and consequence, and respectability, could have no need of baptism, or of that repentance, and change of life and habits, of which baptism was a sign. "How can a man be born again, when he is old?" "Dost thou suppose that, at my age, a doctor of the laws, and a master in “Israel, I want any change of this sort? What "tedious ceremonies, or probation, can I sub"mit to? Old as I am, how long wilt Thou keep me in the same dependance, and hu

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Imility, which we expect of children, or of "heathen converts? What yet is wanting to a "descendant of Abraham, like myself? Can I "make myself any more a child of promise than "I am already? Can I enter a second time "into my mother's womb," from which former birth I became heir of Israel; and countryman, perhaps, kinsman, of the Messiah?" Verily, verily," our Lord again replies, "I say unto thee, Except a man be born of water, and of the Spirit, he cannot enter into the Kingdom of God." As if he had said, "Alas! old man, many "things are necessary to make thee a child of "God; of which thou hast, as yet, but little "notion. Not only is the outward sacrament of "regeneration by water required; but a great "and inward spiritual change, [altogether dis"tinct from those privileges, on which thou layest

"so great a stress, namely, of the birthright of a "Jew, and thy descent from Abraham,] that "which is born of the flesh is flesh.' From thy "mother's womb, of which thou talkest, thou "hast only derived a fleshly life; those Jewish promises, which thou inheritest, and of which "thou boastest thyself, are all of a worldly "nature; and flesh and blood cannot inherit the "kingdom of God. That which is born of the Spirit is Spirit:' and the birth of the Spirit can

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only introduce us to those spiritual privileges, in "which the kingdom of God consists. Marvel "not, that I said unto you, You must be born "again;' nor dream, that, because thou art born a Jew, thou hast therefore by that natural birth "an exclusive title to the kingdom. The wind "bloweth where it listeth; and thou hearest the "sound thereof; but canst not tell whence it "cometh, nor whither it goeth: so, is every one "that is born of the Spirit."" [As if he had said, Canst thou command its free and blessed breezes to visit the Jews alone?] Yea, thou knowest "not whence it cometh, nor whither it goeth: "but thou hearest the sound thereof; that sound "which is gone forth into all lands; and as far "as the ends of the earth. Can earthly wisdom "find it, or can the works of man produce it? No, it bloweth where it listeth; and Jew and Gentile, Pharisee and Idolater, are born of the "Spirit, they know not how, and purified by its