only who acknowledged his authority and professed to be apostles and disciples. Peter's denial was through fear of the earthly powers, and the betrayal of Judas was through love of the world and its wealth. The thirty pieces of silver were first in his mind, when, in company with the officers of the chief priests with swords and staves, he approached Jesus, and said, "Hail, Master! and kissed him." This treacherous kiss was a sign previously agreed upon between Judas and his band, that the person so saluted was he whom they sought—"Whomsoever I shall kiss, that same is he: hold him fast." (Matt. xxvi. 48.) O what an impressive lesson is here taught to all professing Christians! for to profess the doctrines of religion, and a faith in them, is to call Jesus Master and Lord: but if such, while truth is on their lips, indulge either secretly or openly in the evils of self-love and the love of the world, they in practice deny the Lord before men, and betray him, the truth, into the hands of sinful men. These evils are the actions that scandalize the truth; which on the one hand say, "I know not the man," and on the other, "Hail, Master!" while the fatal kiss is given to betray the innocent blood. O these prophetic words are indeed true—"The Lord is wounded in the house of his friends." (Zech. xiii. 6.)
To betray, is to commit a breach of trust, to give into the hands of enemies by treachery: and does not the professor of truth, by a love and practice of evil, commit a breach of trust? and are not the lips unclean that can say, "Hail Master!" while the evil act, under a false appearance, gives a betraying kiss? and do not cruelty and falsehood unite in that mind, where mercy and truth ought to meet together, and right-
