THE CONFERENCE.

THE meeting and conference here unfolded to us with the woman of Samaria, is a graphic representation of what has occurred thousand thousand times since; when the soul is brought into real, though invisible communion with the Saviour. Other moments of our individual histories may be solemn and momentous, and vast worldly issues dependent upon them; but none to compare with this. It is death coming in contact with life-the mortal with the immortal-the finite with the infinite-time with eternity-dust with Deity-the sinner with the great God. What an impressive, mysterious contrast, between those two who now met for the first time by the well of the patriarch! Frowning, lightning-scathed, stormwreathed Ebal was confronting, close by, the smiling groves and sunshine of Gerizim: but what a feeble type and image of these living beings standing face to face impurity confronting spotless purity: a lost and ruined soul confronting its holy, yet forgiving Redeemer. It is the gospel in expressive parable. This prodigal daughter is a striking counterpart of the prodigal son in our Lord's touching discourse.

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Like him, she had wandered from her father's house. In all riotous living she had revelled. She had probably at that moment around her head and neck and arms, what we have seen oft and again adorning the females at the wells of Palestine, strings of coins, or, it may be, jewels, (in her case the mementoes and rewards of sin.) But this glittering outer tinsel screened moral beggary and misery within. She had been feeding on the garbage of the wilderness; and her inarticulate cry was the echo of his wild plaint, "I perish with hunger!" May we not imagine her in her hours of deep remorse, (for who, the most degraded and reprobate, have not these?) brought up as she must have been in the knowledge of the God of Abraham, and Isaac, and Jacob,-may we not imagine her saying at times within herself, "I will arise and go to my Father"? We do not say that any such definite religious longing or aspiration now brought her to the Well: far from it. As we shall afterwards find, though it may have been partly dissembled, she affected rather the contrary,-lightness of heart and levity of speech, to the unknown stranger. But that she had her seasons of deep soul misery and self-reproach cannot be doubted; and coming, as she now did, with a superstitious feeling at least to the fountain of the patriarch, she would be so far tutored and prepared, by her approach to that holy ground, for the unexpected converse which awaited her there. At all

events, if this prodigal had at the moment no thoughts of her Father; her Father-her Saviour-her Brother -her Friend, had gracious thoughts of her. He "saw her afar off and had compassion upon her." He stripped the meretricious jewels off her head, and put the ring of His own adopting love on her ringless finger, and the sandals of a peace she had never known before, on her feet. Ay, and so great was His joy at finding the long lost one, that when the disciples came afterwards from the city to their weary, hunger-stricken Master with the purchased bread, and with the request, Master, eat;" we believe, for very joy, He could not look at the provided earthly refreshment. "I have meat to eat," says He, which the world knows not of " "This my sister, my prodigal child, was dead and is alive again; she was lost and is found!"

In adverting, in the present chapter, to some preliminary features of this conference, we would remark How the Lord Jesus, in His dealings with His people, adapts Himself to their peculiar character and circumstances and necessities.

This is specially illustrated in the narrative of the woman of Samaria, from its juxtaposition in St John's Gospel with another recorded interview of a similar kind-that with Nicodemus. In the one case, Christ had to deal with a proud Pharisee, a member of the Jewish Sanhedrim, one at whose door probably could

be laid no glaring sin;—a man scrupulous in external decencies, "as touching the righteousness which is of the law blameless." Moreover, in the character of this inquirer there was a constitutional timidity which is manifest even in the subsequent avowal of his discipleship. Though he brings costly offerings of his affection and love for the embalming of his Lord's body, he does not share the bolder moral courage of his Arimathean brother, in demanding from Pilate the sacred treasure. Jesus accordingly deals tenderly and sensitively with him, as one who is the prey of that "fear of man which bringeth a snare." He meets his case and its difficulties. He will not wound either his pride or his fears by challenging him to converse in broad day; but He will open for him His silent oratory on Olivet. He will permit him and encourage him to steal thither, night by night, to unburden the doubts and misgivings of his anxious, thoughtful, truth-seeking, candid soul. He who suits the soldier to his place, and the place to the soldier, who "tempers the wind to the shorn lamb," will not break this bruised reed nor quench this smoking flax, until He bring forth judgment unto victory. "The same came

to Jesus by night."

In dealing with the woman of Samaria, again, with her bold spirit and blunted feelings, there were no such tender scruples to consult; there was rather a propriety in holding converse with this impure

child of darkness in the blaze of day. She needed the piercing blast of the north wind, bringing with it sharp convictions of sin; barbed arrow after arrow was sent through the folds of guilt covering her heart, until that heart lay broken and bleeding at the feet of her Divine Restorer;-while the other, requiring rather the south wind of tender consolation and comfort, was led step by step, from the necessity of "the new birth," up to the sublime unfoldings of the love of God in the free gift of His Son and the bestowal of everlasting life. The two form a living comment on the prophet's description of the Almighty's dealings, "In measure, when it shooteth forth, thou wilt debate with it; He stayeth His rough wind in the day of His east wind."

We may gather another affecting and impressive thought from these two conjoined, yet contrasted cases. They together recall the truth, already adverted to in a preceding chapter, but here brought before us under a fresh illustration—the unresting love which, while on earth, Christ had for sinners: that any personal sacrifices He would make, any personal privations He would endure, to save a soul from death, and to hide a multitude of sins.

In the case of Nicodemus, night by night did Jesus willingly surrender or abridge His needed repose, that He might calm the perturbations of one agitated spirit. He would not give sleep to His eyes, nor