is very short. Our daylight will soon be gone. Opportunities once lost can never be retrieved.

A second

lease of life is granted to no man. Then let us resist procrastination as we would resist the devil. Whatever our hand findeth to do, let us do it with our might. "The night cometh, when no man can work.”

We should observe, thirdly, in this passage, what different means Christ used in working miracles on different occasions. In healing the blind man He might, if He had thought fit, have merely touched him with His finger, or given command with His tongue. But He did not rest content with doing so. We are told that "He spat on the ground, and made clay of the spittle, and He anointed the eyes of the blind man with the clay." In all these means of course there was no inherent healing virtue. But for wise reasons the Lord was pleased to use them.

It

We need not doubt that in this, as in every other action of our Lord, there is an instructive lesson. teaches us, we may well believe, that the Lord of heaven and earth will not be tied down to the use of any one means or instrumentality. In conferring blessings on man, He will work in His own way, and will allow no one to prescribe to Him. Above all, it should teach those who have received anything at Christ's hands, to be careful how they measure others men's experience by their own. Have we been healed by Christ, and made to see and live? Let us thank God for it, and be humbled. But let us beware of saying that no other man has been healed, except he has been brought to spiritual

life in precisely the same manner. The great question is, -"Are the eyes of our understanding opened? Do we see? Have we spiritual life?"-Enough for us if the cure is effected and health restored. If it is, we must leave it to the great Physician to choose the instrument, the means, and the manner, the clay, the touch, or the command.

We should observe, lastly, in this passage, the almighty power that Christ holds in His hands. We see Him doing that which in itself was impossible. Without medicines He cures an incurable case. He actually gives eyesight to one that was born blind.

power in heaven

Such a miracle as this is meant to teach an old truth, which we can never know too well. It shows us that Jesus the Saviour of sinners " has all and earth." Such mighty works could done by one that was merely man. In the cure of this blind man we see nothing less than the finger of God.

never have been

Such a miracle, above all, is meant to make us hopeful about our own souls and the souls of others. Why should we despair of salvation while we have such a Saviour? Where is the spiritual disease that He cannot take away? He can open the eyes of the most sinful and ignorant, and make them see things they never saw before. He can send light into the darkest heart, and cause blindness and prejudice to pass away. Surely if we are not saved, the fault will be all our There lives at God's right hand One who can heal us if we apply to Him. Let us take heed lest those solemn words are found true of us,-"Light is come into

own.

the world but men loved darkness rather than light, because their deeds were evil." "Ye will not come to Me that ye might have life." (John iii. 19; v. 40.)

NOTES. JOHN IX. 1-12.

1. And as Jesus passed by.] The Greek word rendered "passed by," is the same as the word so rendered in the preceding verse, at the end of the last chapter.-Some think from this repetition, that the miracle recorded here took place immediately after the events of the last chapter, without the least break or interruption; and that it was as our Lord was retiring from the temple, after the attempt of the Jews to stone Him, that He saw the blind man.-Others, however, think that an interval of time must have elapsed, partly because it seems improbable that our Lord and His disciples would all be able to withdraw themselves quietly from an angry mob, and calmly stand still near the scene of attempted violence to attend to a blind man, and partly because it is the manner of St. John's Gospel to pass from one event to another, sometimes without intimating that there is any change of time or place. Thus, John v. 19; vi. 25, 43, 59; vii. 28-33. The point, however, is not one of any practical importance.

Chemnitius holds strongly that an interval of two months comes in here, and that our Lord spent that time in a visitation of the towns and villages of Judæa, as related in Luke xiii. 22. He thinks that He thus occupied the two months after the feast of tabernacles, and that He returned to Jerusalem shortly before the feast of dedication, in winter. The main objection to this theory seems to be, that it is not the natural conclusion we should draw from the text.

Gualter, Ferus, Ecolampadius, and Musculus maintain, on the other hand, that there is a close and intentional connection between this chapter and the preceding one. They think that our Lord desired to show by deed as well as word, that He was "the Light of the world." (John viii. 14.) Bucer says, "This chapter is a sermon in act and deed, on the words, 'I am the Light of the world.""

In the miracle which occupies the whole of this chapter, the following special circumstances deserve notice :-(1) It is only related by St. John. (2) Like each of the few miracles in St. John, it is described with great minuteness and particularity. (3) It is one

of the four miracles wrought in Judæa, or near Jerusalem, mentioned in St. John. He records eight great miracles altogether: four in Galilee,-turning the water into wine, healing the nobleman's son, feeding the multitude, and walking on the water (chap. ii., iv., and vi.); and four in Judæa,—purifying the temple, healing the impotent man, restoring sight to the blind, and raising Lazarus. (Chap. ii., v., vi., and ix.) (4) It is one of those miracles which the Jews were especially taught to expect in Messiah's time :-"In that day shall the eyes of the blind see out of obscurity." (Isa. xxix. 18.) (5) It is one of those signs of Messiah having come, to which Jesus particularly directed John the Baptist's attention:"The blind receive their sight." (Matt. xi. 5.) (6) It was a miracle worked in so public a place, and on a man so well known, that it was impossible for the Jerusalem Jews to deny it.

It is hardly necessary, perhaps, to bid any well-instructed Christian observe the singularly instructive and typical character of each of the eight miracles which John was inspired to record. Each was a vivid picture of spiritual things.

Hengstenberg observes, that three of the four great miracles wrought by Christ in Judæa, exactly represent the three classes of works referred to in Matt. xi. 5,-"The lame walk, the blind see, the dead are raised up." (John v. ; ix. ; xi.)

[He saw a man...blind from his birth.] The man was probably sitting near the temple gateway, to attract the notice of worshippers going to and fro, like the man described in Acts. (Acts iii. 2.) From blindness, he would naturally be dependent on charity. The Jewish law specifies the blind as peculiarly deserving of attention. (Levit. xix. 14; Deut. xxvii. 18.) To give sight to one who had not lost the use of his eyes by disease or accident, but had never seen at all, was of course a mighty miracle.

Let it be noted, that our Lord "saw" the blind man, and healed him of His own free will, unasked, and unexpectedly. As in the case of the impotent man (John v. 6), He did not wait to be entreated, but was Himself the first to move. Let it however be noted at the same time, that if the man had not been by the wayside, our Lord would not have seen him.

Chrysostom observes, that when the Jews "would not receive our Lord's sayings, and tried to kill Him, He went out of the temple, and healed the blind, mitigating their rage by His absence; and by working a miracle, both softening their hardness, and proving His affections. And it is clear that He proceeded inten

tionally to this work on leaving the temple, for it was He who saw the blind man, and not the blind man who came to Him."

Gualter observes, that this passage shows how the eyes of the Lord are in every place, and how He sees His own people, even when they think not of Him.

Alford thinks it possible that the blind man was constantly proclaiming that he had been born blind, to excite pity.

Burgon observes, "More of our Saviour's miracles are recorded as having been wrought on blindness, than on any other form of human infirmity. One deaf and dumb man is related to have had speech and hearing restored to him; one case of palsy, and one of dropsy, find special record; twice was leprosy, and twice was fever expelled by the Saviour's word; three times were dead persons raised to life; but the records of His cures wrought on blindness, are four in number, at least, if not five." (See Matt. xii. 22.) Isaiah seems to foretell the recovery of sight by the blind, as an act of mercy specially symbolical of Messiah's day.” (Isa. xxix. 18; xxxii. 3; xxxv. 5; xlii. 7.)

2.-[And his disciples asked him.] This expression seems to show

that our Lord was surrounded and accompanied by His usual followers, and favours the idea that there was some break or interval between the beginning of this chapter and the end of the last. Though He by Divine power could hide Himself and go through the midst of His enemies, it is hardly reasonable to suppose that within a few minutes He would be surrounded again by His disciples. Yet it is of course possible.

[Master, who did sin, this man.. parents...blind?] This curious question has given rise to much unprofitable discussion. It is repeatedly asked,—Why did the disciples say this? What put it into their minds to start the inquiry?

(a) Some think that the Jews had imbibed the common oriental notion of the pre-existence and transmigration of souls from one body to another, and that the disciples supposed that in some previous state of existence this blind man must have committed some great sin, for which he was now punished.

(b) Some think that the question refers to a strange notion current among some Jews, that infants might sin before they were born. In support of this view, they quote Gen. xxv. 22, and Gen. Xxxviii. 28, 29.

(c) The most probable view is, that the question arose from a misapplication of such passages of Scripture as the Second Command