DISCOURSE XII.

THE LAST ASSAULT AND ISSUE OF THE CONTEST.

"Then was Jesus led up of the Spirit into the wilderness, to be tempted of the devil,” etc.-MATT. iv. 1-11.

IN that very moment when the kingdoms of this world stood before the eyes of Jesus in the magic mirror of that enchanting vision, the devil smote upon his breast, and losing his composure, and, in spite of all his affectation of majesty and dignity, forgetting the part he was acting and betraying himself, exclaims : "All this is mine. I give it to whom I will; to thee will I give it, if thou wilt fall down and worship me."

"All this is mine!" Great God, how shockingly this sounds; and alas! here the father of lies has spoken the truth. By a holy decree of God has it become his; this world, for which, at a subsequent period, the great High Priest would not pray. He is its prince, its head, its god-its liege lord. The vast majority on earth are his-the largest number of souls draw in his yoke most lands pay him tribute, and upon the walls of most cities his black banners are waving. Who can count them -those hundreds of millions, whose souls he keeps fast locked, barred, and imprisoned in the thousand fold fetters and bonds of sin and darkness, and in countless spiritual dungeons and cells, be it of Islam or of heathenism, of the strong delusions of the Talmud, or of the dogmas of the Seven Hills; of heaven-storming rationalism, or of pantheism and atheism? Yes, without

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any vain parade, may he say 'it is all mine;' for that small part which is not his but God's, this cottage in a garden of cucumbers, this worm Jacob, this despised remnant of Israel, becomes lost as it were, in the gigantic domain of this fallen prince of angels, and floats about in the same like a drop in the boundless ocean.

And what is there in the world which the devil has not usurped and prostrated to the expansion and the strengthening of his kingdom, and made subservient to his satanic designs, especially in these our days. To him belong the most of our pulpits and cathedrals; his are the newspapers and daily journals; his the public assemblies and associations; his the sciences and the fine arts—all these things has he had skill gradually to draw into the service of his own cause. Who inspires the poetry in that flood of romances and comedies which is now inundating the world with its thousands of lies, and godless conceptions? Who plays and manages the music in those voluptuous operas and frivolous arias, in which the melody that ought to be praising the name of the Lord, steps forth as a dangerous murderess of souls, and breathes a refined poison into all hearts? Who holds his seat in the pompous institutes of the later philosophies, and from these redoubts and bastions, deals his deadly strokes at the gospel of peace?—and who is it that has concocted and brought into the market this fashionable religion of the present day, this sweet magic potion-a mixture of sentimental atheism and indolent, corrupt, and God-estranged morality, which has lulled the people into a profound slumber, from which the thunders of the judgment alone will awaken them, alas, too late? Is it not the father of lies the old serpent the dragon out of the abyss?

Let no one then be astonished that the devil speaks of a giving which is in his power: "All these things will I give to thee if thou wilt fall down and worship me." There are satanic gifts as well as divine gifts, and the world swarms with men who are indebted to the devil for their enjoyments, their pleasures, honors, titles, and dignities. Yes, and he has his wages and his

premiums for those who follow his banner, and he knows how to reward well their zeal in his service in various ways; and not seldom is it permitted him of God to overwhelm reprobate men so abundantly with the pleasures and the glory of this world, and to lead them about so freely upon the rich meadows of carnal indulgence, that in the end the very last traces of humanity are obliterated from those vessels of wrath, and they go to hell like brutes.

"All these things will I give thee if thou wilt fall down and worship me." Thus the tempter to our Lord. Just imagine the Son of the living God bending the knee worshipfully before the Old Serpent! This is the most wicked, the most monstrous proposal which was ever made to a being in this world. Indeed it appears an entire forgetfulness of the part he was acting, and hardly consistent with the cunning and craft of this greatest of magicians, this prince of sorcerers, and of a genius so gigantic as Satan is.

But let us only realize the critical and perilous condition in which Satan found himself at this moment, and we shall no longer be surprised at his shameless and accursed demand. The veils are falling off, and the devil suspects with increasing certainty with whom he has to deal. The brilliant triumphs which the Lord has hitherto achieved over him, and his most subtle arts, scarcely leave him the slightest doubt that Jesus is the Christ. Disconcerted beyond measure on account of his unsucessful operations against this great adversary of his kingdom, and no less disturbed at the dangers which threaten his rule, he resolves, with angry impetuosity, upon a last decisive stroke; but already his reflection faltered by passion, his coolness and moderation, have sunk in those fiery waves of despairing rage, which wildly and fearfully surge through his soul.

Indeed now, for the first time, after having ascertained the character of his adversary, he becomes clearly conscious of the intense earnestness and the momentous significance of the struggle in which he is engaged, and he clearly perceives that

"Either Thou," he thinks,

one of them must fall. 66 or I-either I overcome Thee, or I am overcome." But, nevertheless, his last attack, however much of art and energy it displayed, was of all the most unskillful, and resembles the charge of a desperate warrior, who gives up his cause for lost, and daring every extremity, rushes wildly and blindly into the ranks of the foe, and flings himself upon their swords. The last stroke which the devil aimed at Jesus was an act of desperation which was designed, in fact, less to overcome the Son of God and drive Him from the field (of which, indeed, there remained but little hope), than by way of farewell to offer Him yet one grievous insult and affront, and to give him to understand, as with a contemptuous stamp of the foot, that He must not imagine that he had succeeded in bowing the neck of His adversary.

In such desperate mood of mind, and foaming with rage, the devil begins his incantations, passes his magic mirror before the eyes of his adversary, opens to Him one prospect after another into the most fascinating regions of wordly pleasure and glory, and exclaims with grinning scorn, and wild, devilish contempt : "Behold there all this that thou seest, these enjoyments, all these delightful possessions, which cannot but be pleasing to thee, these shalt thou have if thou wilt fall down and worship me-up then, seize the tempting prize-down in the dust and worship thy Lord and monarch." It might also be supposed that, from the circumstance of Jesus having withheld the miraculous proofs desired of Him, the devil had drawn the inference that Jesus was not the God-man, but only some great saint, yet still a man upon whom, as such, he could make still more exorbitant demands, and approach with less disguise and with greater daring and firmness. The above hinted explanation, however, appears to lie nearer the truth. The satanic demand was, as before observed, an act of despair-an outbreak of blasphemous rage and devilish scorn, rather than of proper temptation.

Believers also have often to suffer from the devil precisely

the same which their Master suffered in the wilderness, in that the wicked one persecutes them also with the most horrible and godless demands, and projects thoughts into their souls so wicked and abominable, that they quake before them with horror. But take comfort, and despair not, ye tempted souls. The devil assails you with such buffetings and blows, out of pure vexation and rage, because he cannot succeed in destroying you altogether. Regard these temptations as the ebullitions of a weak enemy, who, because he cannot overcome you with sword and sling, flings at you mire and filth, in order, at least, to fret you, and in this way he would fain wreak his spite, because he can do it in no other.

Let us witness, now, the ISSUE OF THE CONTEST.

Scarcely had Jesus heard the blasphemous request, scarcely had He cast a glance into the magic scene of glory and pleasure which the devil had the boldness to parade before Him, when it became perfectly evident with whom He had to do. "These are thy goods, thy kingdoms," thinks He, "and is it worship thou askest? Thou art betrayed, subtle spirit; the mask is fallen. I know thee." With abhorrence and contempt the holy soul of our spotless High Priest turns away from the images of vanity and delight which Satan had conjured up before Him. He seizes the brazen shield of the word of God, on which all the fiery darts of the devil are quenched, and exclaims with the majesty of the Only-begotten, to whom all power is given in heaven and on earth: "Get thee behind me, Satan, for it is written, 'Thou shalt worship the Lord thy God, and Him only shalt thou serve.""

The devil ventured not to speak a second time concerning worship; he was beaten, and the Lamb of God, pure and without blemish, came forth from the contest in triumph, a victor. In the obedience of faith with the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God, He laid the dragon low in the dust.

The temptation which Jesus so victoriously repelled oc