n"; the Blessed gone before,
the "great cloud," seen now in their other character, as the triumphant
throng of a celestial Passover, or of a Tabernacle-feast of palms, kept
in the better Canaan to commemorate the mercies of the mortal
wilderness. And there, centre and sun of the wonderful scene, is the
glory of the "Judge of all," Vindicator (so we read the meaning of the
word [Greek: krites] here) of His afflicted ones, treading down their
enemies and presiding in majesty over their happy estate. Around Him
rest and rejoice the pure "spirits of the just made perfect," the dear
and holy who have lately passed through death, "perfected" already, even
before their resurrection, in respect of the course finished, the fight
fought, the faith kept, the trial for ever over. Lastly (ver. 24), the
form is seen of the more than Moses of this better Mount of God. Behold
the Mediator, not of the old covenant but of the new, the Covenant of
the Eternal Spirit. Behold the Surety of the promise of the purified
heart, the promise sealed with that sprinkled blood of the Incarnate
Lamb which, in Divine antithesis to the call for vengeance on the
fratricide which went up from Abel's death, claims for the "brethren"
who once slew their Deliverer not remission only but holiness and
heaven.

[P] The word [Greek: orei] is certainly absent from the true text. We
are left as in presence of a mysterious _somewhat_, a mighty mass,
mantled in terror and without form or name.

[Q] A traditional utterance must be referred to. But the whole narrative
in Exodus and in Deuteronomy supports it.

It is a wonderful picture, the hill of the awful Law confronted by the
"hill whence cometh our help." And we ask ourselves why, just here in
the Epistle, it is painted for us and left upon our spirit's eyes for
ever. Surely it is that the Hebrew disciple (and we in our turn to-day)
may be quickened in watching and in walking alike by an immense
encouragement and a warning of corresponding power. The call has just
been made, all through the twelfth chapter up to this point, to endure,
to watch, to warn each other, to pursue to the uttermost the ambition of
holiness. Let this be done as by those whose pilgrim tents are pitched
as it were in a valley between those two mountains of God. Let the true
Israelite turn his eyes sometimes upon Sinai, to learn again from its
shadows and its thunders the infinite importance of the eternal Will,
the awfulness of transgre