ancient square tower which stands among the hovels of the modern village may be its representative. The gateway of the city on the east was also the gateway of the palace (2 Kings ix. 34). Whether the vineyard of Naboth was here or at Samaria is a doubtful question. Still in the same eastern direction are two springs, one twelve minutes from the town, the other twenty minutes. The latter, probably both from its size and situation, was known as “The Spring of Jezreel ” (mistranslated "a fountain,” 1 Sam. xxix. 1). With the fall of the house of Ahab the glory of Jezreel departed.-Smith's “ Dictionary of the Bible."

Our readers will observe that our Map will be of service both for this and the preceding article.—ED.

THE PHYSICAL CAUSE OF OUR LORD'S DEATH. That the immediate cause of the death of our blessed Saviour was—speaking medically—laceration or rupture of the heart, is a doctrine in regard to which there can be no absolute certainty; but assuredly in favour of it there is a very high amount of circumstantial probability.

Let me try to state the arguments for this view in the form of a few brief propositions.

I. His death was not the mere result of crucifixion; for, 1st, The period was too short; a person in the prime of life, as Christ was, not dying from this mode of mortal punishment in six hours, as He did, but usually surviving till the second or third day, or even longer. 2ndly, The attendant phenomena, at the time of actual death, were different from those of crucifixion. The crucified died, as is well known, under a lingering process of gradual exhaustion, weakness, and faintness. On the contrary, Christ cried with a loud voice, and spoke once and again,--all apparently within a few minutes of His dissolution.

II. No known injury, lesion, or disease of the brain, lungs, or other vital organs could, I believe, account for such a sudden termination of His sufferings in death, except (1) arrestment of the action of the heart by fatal fainting or syncope; or (2) rupture of the walls of the heart or larger bloodvessels issuing from it.

III. The attendant symptoms-particularly the loud cry and subsequent exclamations--show that death was not the effect of mortal fainting, or mere fatal arrestment of the action of the heart by syncope.

IV. On the other hand, these symptoms were such as have been seen in cases of rupture of the walls of the heart. Thus, in the latest book published in the English language on Diseases

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of the Heart, the eminent author, Dr. Walshe, Professor of Medicine in University College, London, when treating of the symptoms indicating death by rupture of the heart, observes, “The hand is suddenly carried to the front of the chest, a piercing shriek uttered,” &c., &c. The rapidity of the resulting doath is regulated by the size and shape of the ruptured opening. But usually death very speedily ensues in consequence of the blood escaping from the interior of the heart into the cavity of the large surrounding heart-sac or pericardium; which sac has, in cases of rupture of the heart, been found on dissection to contain sometimes two, three, four, or more pounds of blood accumulated within it, and separated into red clot and limpid serum, or “ blood and water,”-as is seen in blood when collected out of the body in a cup or basin in the operation of common blood-letting.

V. No medical jurist would, in a court of law, venture to assert, from the mere symptoms preceding death, that a person had certainly died of rupture of the heart. To obtain positive proof that rupture of the heart was the cause of death, a postmortem examination of the chest would be necessary. In ancient times, such dissections were not practised. But the details left regarding Christ's death are most strikingly peculiarin this respect, that they offer us the result of a very rude dissection, as it were, by the gash* made in His side after death by the thrust of the Roman soldier's spear. The effect of that wounding or piercing of the side was an escape of blood and water," visible to the apostle John standing some distance off; and I do not believe that anything could possibly account for this appearance, as described by that apostle, except a collection of blood effused into the distended sac of the pericardium in consequence of rupture of the heart, and afterwards separated, as is usual with extravasated blood, into those two parts, viz. (1) crassamentum or red clot, and (2) watery serum. The subsequent puncture from below of the distended pericardial sac would most certainly, under such circumstances, lead to the immediate ejection and escape of its sanguineous contents in the form of red clots of blood and a stream of watery serum, exactly corresponding to that description given in the sacred narrative," and forthwith came there out blood and water,”—an appearance which no other natural event or mode of death can explain or account for.

VI. Mental emotions and passions are well known by all to affect the action of the heart in the way of palpitation, fainting, &c.

*Its size may be inferred from the Apostle Thomas being asked to thru: t, not his " finger," but his hand" into it.-JOHN XX, 27.

That these emotions and passions, when in overwhelming excess, occasionally, though rarely, produce laceration or rupture of the walls of the heart, is stated by most medical authorities, · who have written on the affections of this organ.

But if ever a human heart was riven and ruptured by the mere amount of mental agony that was endured, it would surelywe might even argue à priori-be that of our Redeemer, when, during these dark and dreadful hours on the cross, He, “ being made a curse for us,” “ bore our griefs and carried our sorrows," and suffered for sin the malediction of God and man, “full of anguish," and now “exceeding sorrowful, even unto death."

VII. Death by mere crucifixion was not a form of death in which there was much, if indeed any, shedding of blood. Punctured wounds do not generally bleed; and the nails, besides being driven through parts that were not provided with large bloodvessels, necessarily remained plugging up the openings made by their passage. The whole language and types of Scripture, however, involve the idea that the atonement for our sins was obtained by the blood of Christ shed for us during His death on the cross. “Without shedding of blood there is no remission.” This shedding, however, was assuredly done in the fullest possible sense, under the view that the immediate cause of His dissolation was rupture of the heart, and the consequent fatal escape of His heart - and life-blood from the central cistern of the circulation.

It has always appeared to my medical mind at least that this view of the mode by which death was produced in the human body of Christ intensifies all our thoughts and ideas regarding the immensity of the astounding sacrifice which He made for our sinful race upon the cross. Nothing can possibly be more striking and startling than the appalling and terrible passiveness with which God as man submitted, for our sakes, His incarnate body to all the horrors and tortures of the crucifixion. But our wonderment at the stupendous sacrifice only increases when we reflect that, whilst thus enduring for our sins the most cruel and agonizing form of corporeal death, He was ultimately “slain,” not by the effects of the anguish of His corporeal frame, but by the effects of the mightier anguish of His mind; the fleshy walls of His heart, like the veil, as it were, in the temple of His human body-becoming rent and riven, as for us “ He poured out His soul unto death;"--"the travail of His soul” in that awful hour thus standing out as unspeakably bitterer and more dreadful than even the travail of His body.—Sir J. Y. SImpson, M.D., in Hanna's " Last Day of our Lord's Passion."

Biblical Criticism.

• THE BARREL OF MEAL THAT WASTED NOT. 1 Kings xvii. 16.—“And the barrel of meal wasted not, neither did the cruse

of oil fail, according to the word of the Lord, which he spake by Elijah.” This is the first recorded miracle of its kind-a supernatural and inexplicable multiplication of food. It has parallels in the miracle of Elisha, related in 2 Kings iv. 42—44, and in the feeding of the multitude on two occasions by our Blessed Lord. (See Matt. xiv. 15-21; XV. 32–38.) These miracles offer peculiar difficulties to modern sceptics, who ask whether the senises and the appetite were cheated, or whether new matter was created, or whether, finally, there was a transformation of previously existing matter into meal, oil, fish, and bread. The sacred record does not enable us to answer these inquiries positively; but we may observe that, if the last of the three explanations above suggested be the true one, the marvel of the thing would not be much greater than that astonishing natural chemistry, by which, in the growth of plants, particles of water, air, and earth are transmuted into fruits and grains of corn, and so fitted to be human food. There would be a difference in the agency employed, and in the time occupied in the transmutation, but the thing done would be almost the same.— Speaker's Commentary.

AHAB'S CHARGE AGAINST ELIJAH AND HIS REJOINDER. 1 Kings xviii. 17, 18.-" And it came to pass, when Ahab saw Elijah, that

Ahab said unto him, Art thou he that troubleth Israel? And he answered, I have not troubled Israel; but thou, and thy father's house, in that ye have forsaken the commandments of the Lord, and thou hast followed

Baalim.” RATHER “ Art thou here, O troubler of Israel P" i.e., “ Can it possibly be that thou dost venture to present thyself before me, thou that troublest Israel by means of this terrible drought?” Ahab hopes to abash the Tishbite, and expects perhaps to have him at his feet, suing for pardon. He is found at last; he is in his power; surely he trembles at the punishment in store for him; and one strong stern speech will bring him on his knees before