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 by the whole council, and their wicked ministers publishing aloud as they go, that now all his impostures were laid open, his hypocrisy discovered, and himself. convicted of blasphemy.

See how the giddy mob, who a little while before reverenced him as a prophet, now all on a sudden join with his enemies, following him with opprobrious shouts, insulting him all the way that he goes, and discharging a thousand kind of injuries and affronts upon him.

2. Consider and view the Judge of the living and the dead, standing with his hands bound as a criminal before a petty governor; and behold the process. The chief priests and princes of the people having delivered him up, and Pilate demanding what particulars they had to allege against him, they made no scruple of inventing new calumnies; that he was a factious and seditious man, a traitor and a rebel to the government, who forbad tribute to be paid to Caesar, and set himself up for king of the Jews. Once more take notice of the invincible patience of thy Saviour, in hearing with silence such notorious falsities as they laid to his charge; so that the governor was astonished that a man could hold his peace under such accusations, which aimed at nothing less than procuring his condemnation to the worst of deaths. However, as he plainly saw through all the disguise of the high-priest and scribes, he interpreted his silence in favour of our Saviour, only boggling a little at the word king, and having received full satisfaction upon that head, by being made to understand that the kingdom of our Saviour was not of this world, and therefore not dangerous to Caesar's government, he determined to set him at liberty. Admire the force of innocence, which could even move a heathen, and one of the worst of men, such as Pilate was, and assure thyself,