HANY--"gone to the grave of Lazarus, to weep there."

"The town of Mary and her sister Martha," then, furnishes us alike with
a garnered treasury of Christian solaces, and one of the very loveliest
of the Bible's domestic portraitures. If the story of Joseph and his
brethren is in the Old Testament invested with surpassing interest, here
is a Gospel home-scene in the New, of still deeper and tenderer
pathos--a picture in which the true Joseph appears as the central
figure, without any estrangements to mar its beauty. Often at other
times a drapery of woe hangs over the pathway of the Man of Sorrows.
But _Bethany_ is bathed in sunshine;--a sweet _oasis_ in his toil-worn
pilgrimage. At this quiet abode of congenial spirits he seems to have
had his main "sips at the fountain of human joy," and to have obtained a
temporary respite from unwearied labour and unmerited enmity. The "Lily
among thorns" raised His drooping head in this Eden home! Thither we can
follow Him from the courts of the Temple--the busy crowd--the lengthened
journey--the miracles of mercy--the hours of vain and ineffectual
pleading with obdurate hearts. We can picture Him as the inmate of a
peaceful family, spirit blending with spirit in sanctified communion. We
can mark the tenderness of His holy humanity. We can see how He loved,
and sympathised, and wept, and rejoiced!

As the tremendous events which signalised the close of His pilgrimage
drew on, still it is _Bethany_ with which they are mainly associated. It
was at _Bethany_ the fearful visions of His cross and passion cast their
shadow on his path! From its quiet palm-trees[1] He issued forth on His
last day's journey across Mount Olivet. It was with _Bethany_ in view
He ascended to heaven. Its soil was the last He trod--its homes were the
last on which his eye rested when the cloud received Him up into glory.
The beams of the Sun of Righteousness seemed as if they loved to linger
on this consecrated height.

We cannot doubt that many incidents regarding His oft sojournings there
are left unrecorded. We have more than once, indeed, merely the simple
announcement in the inspired narrative that He retired from Jerusalem
all night to the village where His friend Lazarus resided. We dare not
withdraw more of the veil than the Word of God permits. Let us be
grateful for what we have of the gracious unfoldings here vouchsafed of
His inner life--the comprehensive intermingling of doctrine,
consolation, c