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Introduction.

"GOD forbid that I should glory, save in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, by whom the world is crucified unto me, and I unto the world," exclaims the Apostle Paul, as he closes up his epistle to the Galatians. The words awaken a response in every pious heart. Though the saint may have, like Paul, prided himself upon his birth, his self-righteousness, or his zeal against Jesus of Nazareth, yet now he counts all these things but loss for the excellency of the knowledge of Christ Jesus, his Lord; and to gain a still deeper acquaintance with Jesus Christ, and him crucified, is the summit of his desires, and the goal of his efforts. In this acquisition he glories.

The world has her spots of renown, her battle-fields, her moss-covered monuments,

her crumbling piles; and in them the world may glory. But, while the Christian is not indifferent to these points of historic interest, at the events of the crucifixion his soul actually kindles. Here the world becomes crucified unto him, and he unto the world.

In the affecting scenes of Gethsemane and Calvary he beholds the origin and certainty of his hopes of forgiveness; and the longer he lingers among them, the more their soothing influence is felt, allaying his worldly spirit, drawing the sighs of penitence from his heart, and binding his love around Him who here became obedient unto death. And the more clear and vivid ideas he obtains of the last scenes through which the Saviour passed, in working out our redemption, the more truly and deeply does he realize the love of Christ in stooping to such humiliation, and his own guilt that made such humiliation necessary; that God might be just and justify the believer in Jesus.

Every attentive reader of the Scriptures must have been struck with the graphic power and individual distinctness with which every circumstance of our Saviour's death is

portrayed by the spirit of inspiration. While the ministry of Christ is detailed only with that particularity which a clear idea of his teachings and miracles renders necessary, each evangelist watches, and notes down, with the exactness of a reporter, every incident and every word which occurs in the last twenty-four hours of our Lord's abode in the flesh. We are taken to the sacramental table; we hear the Saviour's farewell conversation; we study the features of his sorrowful group of disciples; we are led with him over the brook Cedron to the garden of Gethsemane, and admitted with the chosen three to the privacy of his closet there; we stand by and see the arrest; we follow to the midnight and morning trial, the condemnation, and mock homage; and the closing scene is given with a minuteness and touching simplicity, which the most hardened cannot read without emotion.

Now, why is this? That the legitimate impressions of these events, the most affecting which ever occurred in this world, if not in the universe, may be made upon our

hearts. Let this be kept in mind by the reader throughout the following pages.

And as we attempt to follow the footsteps of the God Man, Christ Jesus, from Gethsemane to Calvary, may both writer and reader, subdued by the contemplation of these deeply affecting and instructive events, and thus crucified unto the world, be prepared eventually to stand with the Lamb that was slain, upon mount Zion, having washed their robes and made them white in his blood.