tion of the number of the Apostles to the number of the Tribes is peculiarly exemplified in those words of our Saviour1; Verily I say unto you that, when the Son of Man, in the regeneration, shall sit upon his throne of glory, ye also, who have followed me, shall sit upon twelve thrones, judging the twelve tribes of Israel. The number twelve, then, seems to have been something, from the first, absolutely essential to the integrity of their body, and so understood accordingly. Hence, even before the day of Pentecost-or rather, against that day itself—the reparation of the defect in that number, produced by the apostasy of Judas, when Matthias was appointed in his stead m, was yet but a necessary precaution.

The selection, nomination, and ordination, of the Apostles being expressly attributed to our Lord himself, whatever honour, or privilege, present or to come, was thereby conferred on the Twelve, it was an honour, and a privilege, in obtaining which they themselves were totally uninstrumental. The object proposed by their appointment St. Mark defines as twofold-that they might always be with Christ, and that he might send them to preach in his name -whence it must be as clear that they had not hitherto always been with him, as that they had not hitherto been sent to preach in his name. It is clear also that this definition is intended of the immediate, or proximate, end of the appointment-not of the future, and the more remote. But even the mission in question did not take place until sometime after the appointment—and it is manifest that the gift of miraculous power, alluded to here, was no gift bestowed at present, but merely designed to be bestowed, when the mission also, for the discharge of which it would be necessary, should be ready to commence. In the circumstance, however, of such a mission, and in the communication of thus much of miraculous power, subordinate to it, the Seventy were afterwards put upon a par with the Twelve. The true dignity, therefore, the real authority, or the exclusive prerogatives, of the apostolical office and character do not

fully appear until the day of Pentecost. Their peculiar privilege, during the remainder of our Saviour's ministry, consisted in this one respect, that, henceforward, they were always with him, and about him—as even they had not always been heretofore-and as the rest of the disciples

never were.

If we consider the momentous consequences which, though still in futurity, hung upon this appointment of the Twelve —and, though still in futurity, yet, to the omniscience of Christ, were even then as good as present—we shall confess that, next to the great business of suffering for mankind, this was, and would be regarded by our Lord himself as, the most important act of his lifetime upon earth. Nor does he enter on it without a corresponding degree of preparation-nor proceed in it without an equal gravity and solemnity. The night before he spends on the mountain apart, in earnest prayer"-as soon as it is day, he calls to him the whole of his disciples-out of this number he selects twelve by name, whom he invests with a new, and a peculiar, designation, expressive of the same relation to himself, in which he had appeared and acted with reference to the Father. For Jesus Christ was the Shiloh, or Apostle, of the Father-and the Twelve were the Shilohs, or Apostles, of Jesus Christ. To this relation and this title, it is probable that he consecrated them-either one by one, or two by two-with prayer and the imposition of hands: for by prayer, and the imposition of hands, do the Apostles, now consecrated to their office (and, we may presume, in imitation of what had been done unto themselves) consecrate others to any Christian function hereafter; and as Jesus was parted from them at last, while in the act of lifting up his hands over them, and of blessing them P, so, with the same affectionate solemnity may he be supposed to have ordained them at first. After this, he delivers a sermon, which is a repetition of part of the former on the mount: Matt. vviii. 1. But, as this brings us to the controverted ques

"Luke vi. 12. Luke vi. 13. Mark iii. 13. 14.

P Luke xxiv. 50. 51.

tion itself, whether these sermons are actually the same or distinct, it is now time that we should enter particularly upon it.

We may take it for granted that these two discourses, related, as they are, by two distinct Evangelists, and in two distinct places of the Gospel-history, are either, so far as they go together, totally the same, or totally different: for, as to their being partly the one, and partly the other, (though such an opinion may have been entertained,) it appears to me too absurd a supposition seriously to be refuted. Now, if they are each distinct from the other, then both may be given in their proper time and place. But, if they are to be pronounced the same, the question of a transposition will concern the order of St. Matthew, and not the order of St. Luke. No commentator or harmonist can reasonably suppose that the latter records his sermon out of its place, however many may have thought that St. Matthew has not recorded his in its own. By the proof, therefore, of the distinctness of the discourses-if that can be made out-it must still be understood that we are establishing the accuracy of St. Matthew, and not of St. Luke.

I. With a view to this conclusion, and as a kind of presumption in its favour, the order of St. Matthew, we may observe, is regular as far as v. 1. The first transposition which occurs, independent of the sermon itself, occurs at viii. 14.9

II. Those, who contend that he has antedated the sermon in question, are obliged to detach the introductory remark, at v. 1-as premised to the sermon-from the historical circumstances at iv. 24. 25. the close of the preceding chapter: by doing which, for the sake of a harsh and distorted hypothesis, they offer violence to the most simple and natural explanation of the course of events, imaginable. That conclusion represents our Lord as followed, or surrounded, by prodigious multitudes-this introduction, that seeing the multitudes, observing their numbers, and desiring

to teach them, he went up into a mountain accordingly. Who, on perusing these statements, could hesitate to infer whether the discourse, which follows, was produced by the circumstances, which preceded, or no?

. III. I have shewn long since that, before this discourse on the mountain, Jesus had both begun, and been making, his first general circuit of Galilee. I have ventured, also, to define the course of this circuit-shewing in what manner, even from the very route, which it appears to have taken, it would make him known in the regions, specified by St. Matthew as furnishing the attendance in question. At the close, also, of the circuit about the lake, and at the time of the ordination of the Twelve, he was certainly accompanied by multitudess; but it was not exactly by multitudes from the same quarters as before. For among these multitudes people from Idumæa are mentioned by St. Mark-but among those, none such are mentioned by St. Matthew; and it must be self-evident that a circuit towards the south of Galilee, and along that side of the Jordan, was much more likely to make our Lord known in Idumæa, and to attract people after him from thence, than a circuit towards the north, and along the other.

IV. The circuits, which our Lord ever undertook, all began from, and, if we except only the last, all ended at, Capernaum. After making, then, for any length of time soever previously, the progress of Galilee, he would still be returning to Capernaum at last. It is reasonable to presume that the concourse of his followers would become greater, the longer his journeying had continued, and would be greatest when he was nearest to his journey's end. But when do we find him attended by a more than usual resort of people, especially in the early periods of his ministry, and not, at the same time, described as desirous of teaching them? The discourse in St. Matthew, whensoever and wheresoever it was delivered, was delivered on a certain hill-and some hill, even St. Luke shews, there was in the

r Vol. ii. Diss. viii. 278.

• Mark iii. 7. 8. Luke vi. 17.

vicinity of Capernaum. It might have been delivered, then, at the close of the first circuit of Galilee, and from this very hill.

V. The discourse unquestionably contains an illustrious instance of our Lord's teaching—and it is not the less remarkable that, however illustrious, it is a single and a solitary instance of any thing of the kind, to be met with in the same Gospel. Numerous are the occasions, even after this, when it is affirmed that our Saviour taught-but on no occasion, except this, is it recorded what he taught. There is but one exception (the instance of the teaching in parables) which could be produced to the contrary; and that is an exception which would rather confirm, than invalidate, the assertion. On other occasions, the account of our Lord's discourses, even as recorded by St. Matthew, cannot, upon any principle, be said to be accounts of his teaching as such --or of such moral and practical discourses as this upon the mount. Compare with this the Apostolical commission— the denunciation of woes-and the prophecy on Mount Olivet-which are the longest and fullest in the narration of all but this; and it will be acknowledged that they are sui generis, in contradistinction to this. I infer, then, that it did not come within the design of St. Matthew's Gospel, to specify the particulars of our Lord's public teaching more than once, that is, more than once for all-in which case it is morally absurd to suppose he would select any but the first opportunity for the purpose; and equally so, that this first opportunity should not have occurred before the second year of our Saviour's ministry.

VI. The occurrence of the remark on the manner of our Lord's teaching-which is at the end of the whole "—makes in favour of the same conclusion: for this is a remark, which in each Gospel occurs only once for all, but in each after the first instance of teaching, which they record. Our Lord's teaching was begun in the synagogue at Capernaum, and, when he was engaged on this present circuit, he still taught