By cherishing a sharp and bitter malice, do we not give thee vinegar and gall to drink?

By showing no mercy to the poor and afflicted, do we not pass by thy cross as strangers unconcerned?

Thus we again crucify the Lord of glory, and put him afresh to an open shame..

Are these the returns we make to that blessed Redeemer, who came into the world to seek and to save us when we were lost?:

We sought not him, but he came from far to find us out; we looked not towards him, but his mercy called us after him.

He called aloud in words of tenderness, Why will ye perish, O ye children of men?

Return, and I will receive you; repent, and though you have crucified me, I will forgive you.

Behold, O blessed Jesus! to thee we come, and on thy holy cross fasten all our confidence.

Never will we depart from this standard of our hope, till our troubled consciences are comforted by thy mercy. Crucify the world to us, and us to the world; that dead to it, we may live only to thee.

Enter into our hearts, and fill them with thyself; reign in us for ever our Redeemer and Lord.

Glory be to the Father, and to the Son, and to the Holy Ghost.

As it was in the beginning, is now, and ever shall be, world without end. Amen.

THE HYMN.

My God, my God, why leav'st thou me
When I with anguish faint;

O why so far from me remov'd,

And from my loud complaint!'

With laughter all the gazing crowd

My agony survey;

They shoot the lip, they shake the head,

And thus deriding say.........

"In God he trusted, boasting oft

"That he was Heaven's delight;

"Let God come down to save him now,
"And own his favourite."

Like blood-hounds, to surround me, they
In pack'd assemblies meet;
They pierc'd my inoffensive hands,
They pierc'd my harmless feet.

As spoil, my garments they divide,
Lots for my vesture cast,

Therefore approach, O Lord, my strength,
And to my succour haste.

To Father, Son, &c..

O HOLY and immaculate Lamb of God! who, by thy obedience unto death, even the death of the cross, hast made an all-sufficient atonement for the sins of the world; mercifully grant that by thy precious blood we may be cleansed from our guilt, and by the power of thy grace be crucified unto the world; that thus, through thy mercy, we may be prepared for the inheritance of glory which thou hast purchased for us. Grant this, we beseech thee, O blessed Jesus, who having once suffered, dost now reign with the Father, and the Holy Ghost, in glory for ever.

Amen.

Our Father &c..

[Add the Collects for the Day.]

CHAPTER XXIV.

HOLY SATURDAY, or EASTER EVEN.

A FAST.

Q. WHAT is the fast of this day designed to comme

morate?

A. The fast of this day is designed to commemorate the state in which our Saviour was between his

death and his resurrection: for," after he died for us, he was buried, and went down into hell."

Q. In what sense is the descent of Christ into hell to be understood?

A. There would be no impropriety in supposing that in the interval between his death and resurrection, Christ went in the place of condemned spirits, to proclaim, in the kingdom or residence of the great adversary and destroyer of men, the glorious triumphs of his cross.* But Christ's descent into hell is with more propriety thought to mean his descent into the place were the souls of the faithful rest in hope till the resurrection. The word Hell is expressed in the original by two words,† one of which is used to denote the place of torment, and the other the place of departed spirits; and in this latter signification it is supposed to be used in the Creed.

Q. What proof have you from scripture of the existence of a place where the souls of the departed rest till the

resurrection?

A. The scriptures represent the rewards of heaven, and the punishment of hell, as adjudged to the righteous and the wicked at the general judgment after the resurrection. As, therefore, it is contrary to reason and scripture to suppose, that after death, the soul is for any time in a state of insensibility; the souls of the righteous and the wicked must remain till the general judgment, in a state distinct from the proper heaven of happiness and hell of torments; the souls of the righteous, in the joyful expectation of the consummation of their bliss, both in body and soul, in the heavenly kingdom of their Saviour; and the souls of the wicked, in the fearful anticipation of

*Though the Church, by reciting in the Epistle for this day the passage which is commonly applied (doubtless improperly) to prove Christ's descent into the place of torment, may be thought to favour this opinion; yet from the rubric before the Apostle's creed, it appears that she considers Christ's descent into hell as meant of his descent into the place of departed spirits.

† Γέεννα and αδησ

being doomed to that hell of torments, where the worm dieth not, and the fire is not quenched.*

Q. What provision has the Church made for our devotion on this day?

A. The Church on this day directs us to private acts of meditation and abstinence; and calls us in her public service to a consideration of the glorious consequences of our Saviour's death, burial, and resurrection, which are set forth in the Lessons, Epistle, and Gospel for the day.

Q. In what manner was our Saviour buried?

A. According to what was predicted concerning the Messiah, (v) Christ" made his grave with the rich." Joseph of Arimathea, a rich man, and a disciple of Jesus, begged his body from Pilate; and having wrapt it in a linen cloth, put it into his own new tomb; which the Jews rendered secure, by shutting it up with a stone, sealing the stone, and setting a watch.(x) These circumstances tend to establish the reality of our Saviour's death, as well as the certainty of his resurrection, by refuting the story of the Jews, that the body of the Saviour was stolen from the sepulchre.

Q. Since we must all pass through the gate of death, to a state of never-ending happiness or misery, ought it not to be our principal concern to prepare for death?

A. It should be our supreme concern to prepare for death; that we may avoid the everlasting torments, and secure the eternal joys of that unchanging state of existence on which we then enter. The prospect of death must excite terror in all but those faithful servants of God, who can view it as the gate to a joyful resurrection, to never-ending glory and felicity.

Q. What is our only security against the fears of death?

A. The constant exercise of piety and virtue can

* For a more full explanation of Christ's descent into hell,. the reader is referred to an excellent sermon of Bishop SEABURY on this subject.

w Is, liii. 9.

x Matt. xxvii. 57, &c.

alone authorize us to place that reliance on the mercy and grace of the Redeemer, which will be our only security against the fears of death. He who has made his peace with God, by sincere repentance, and through divine grace endeavours to "keep a conscience void of offence towards God and towards man," may look forward to the approach of death, not only with composure, but with lively hope.

Q. Is not repentance a necessary preparation for death?

A. In order to make our death safe and happy, we must reconcile ourselves to God by a sincere and hearty repentance. “The sting of death is sin;” and a soul loaded with guilt is not only incapable of the happiness of heaven, but is excluded from it by the absolute decree of God. To the work of repentance therefore we should immediately apply, lest sickness and death overtake us before we have made our peace with God. For though the approach of death may be a proper season to renew our repentance, it is the most unfit time to begin it; and there can be but little hope that it will then be sincere and effectual.

Q. Is not a degree of indifference to worldly enjoyments, as well as moderation in the pursuit of them, necessary to prepare us for a safe and happy death?

A. To wean our affections from the world is necessary to prepare us to meet death with composure and with hope. Our sorrow and concern at parting with the things of the world, will be in proportion to the love and esteem wherewith we have cherished them; and to be separated from objects on which we have fixed our hearts, must be attended with great pain and uneasiness. We should therefore accustom ourselves to resign freely to God those worldly objects from which death will inevitably snatch us; and gently to loose the ties which bind us to the world, that we may have less pain when they are entirely broken. We should habitually endeavour to moderate our desires for the enjoyments of this world; and