Page:Lives of the apostles of Jesus Christ (1836).djvu/88



The distance, in time, from Mount Tabor to Caesarea Philippi, may be conceived from the account given by Ebn Haukal, an Arabian geographer and traveler of the tenth century. He says "from Tibertheh (Tiberias, which is near Tabor) to Sur, (Tyre,) is one day's journey; and from that to Banias, (Paneas,) is two day's easy journey." [Sir W. Ouseley's translation of Ebn Haukal's Geography, pp. 48, 49.]

This was an occasion on which Christ did not choose to display his glories to the eyes of the ignorant and impertinent mobs that usually thronged his path, drawn together as they were, by idle curiosity, by selfish wishes for relief from various diseases, or by the determination to profit by the mischief, which almost always results from such a promiscuous assemblage. It may be fairly considered a moral impossibility, for such disorderly and spontaneous assemblies to meet, without more evils resulting, than can possibly be counterbalanced by the good done to the assembly as a whole, whatever it may be to individuals. So, at least, Jesus Christ seems always to have thought, for he never encouraged such gatherings, and took every desirable opportunity of getting rid of them, without injury to themselves, or of withdrawing himself quietly from them, as the easiest way of dispersing them; knowing how utterly hopeless must be the attempt to do any great good among such a set of idlers, compared with what he might do by private and special intercourse with individuals. It is worthy of note, that Matthew and all whose calls are described, were about their business. Thus, on an occasion already mentioned, when Jesus was walking by the sea of Galilee, with the simple object of doing most good, he did not seek among the multitude that was following him, for the devoted laborers whom he might call to the great work of drawing in men to the knowledge of the truth as revealed in him. No: he turned from all the zealous loungers who had left their business, if they had any, to drag about after the wonderful man who had attracted general attention by his great and good deeds. He dispatched them as fast as possible with a few words of instruction and exhortation; for though he did not seek these undesirable occasions, yet he would have been as much wanting in benevolence as in wisdom, if, when all the evils of such a throng had occurred by the meeting, he had not hastened to offer the speediest antidote to the mischief, and the best compensation for the loss of time to the company, by giving them such words of counsel, reproof, correction or encouragement, as, even when cast like bread upon the waters, or seed by the way side, might yet perchance, or by grace, "be found after many days," returning to the hands of the giver, in gratitude, by