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mit my spirit;" and having said this, he gave up the ghost,

And behold the vail of the temple was rent in two, from the top to the bottom, and the earth did quake, and the rocks rent. The graves also were opened, and many bodies of the saints, who slept, arose, and, having gone out of their graves, went, after his resurrection, into the holy city, and were seen by many. Now when the centurion and they that were with him, watching Jesus, saw the earthquake, and those things which took place, they were greatly afraid, and said, “Truly, this was the Son of God."

And many women were there, beholding afar off, who had followed Jesus from Galilee, ministering unto him. Among them were Mary Magdalene, and Mary the mother of James and Joses, and the mother of Zebedee's children.

THE BURIAL OF JESUS.

(Luke xxiii. 50-56; Matt. xxvii. 62—66.) AND there was a man named Joseph, a counsellor of Arimathea, a city of the Jews; he was a good man and a just, who had not consented to the counsel and proceedings of the rest; and he himself was looking for the kingdom of God. This man went to Pilate, and begged the body of Jesus. And he took it down, and wrapped it in linen, and laid it in a sepulchre that was hewn in the rock,* where never before had man been laid. Now that day was the preparation,† and the sabbath drew on.

The sepulchre in which our Lord was laid was not, like our graves, sunk into the ground, but hewn out of the solid rock, in the side of a hill. The entrance was at the side; and the day after the body had been placed in the sepulchre, a large stone was brought, and set so as to close the

entrance.

The day which came before the Jewish sab

And the women also, who had come with him from Galilee, followed Joseph, and beheld the sepulchre, and how the body was laid. Then they returned, and provided spices and ointments, and rested the sabbath-day, according to the commandment.

Now the next day, which followed the day of the preparation, the chief priests and the Pharisees came together unto Pilate, and said, "Sir, we remember that that deceiver said, while he was yet alive, In three days I shall rise again.' Command, therefore, that the sepulchre be made sure till the third day, lest his disciples come by night, and steal him away, and say unto the people, He is raised from the dead;' for then the last imposture would be worse than the first." Pilate said unto them, "Ye have a guard; go your way, make the sepulchre as sure

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bath, and on which they prepared for keeping the sabbath, was called the preparation.

as ye can." So they went and made the sepulchre sure, sealing the stone, and placing a guard.

THE RESURRECTION.

(John xx. 1—18.)

THE first day of the week cometh Mary Magdalene early, when it was yet dark, to the sepulchre, and seeth the stone taken away from the sepulchre. Then she runneth, and cometh to Simon Peter, and to that other disciple whom Jesus loved, and saith to them, "They have taken away the Lord out of the sepulchre, and we know not where they have laid him.”

Peter, therefore, went out, and that other disciple, and came to the sepulchre. They ran both together, but that other disciple did outrun Peter, and came first to the sepulchre; and, stooping down, he saw the linen clothes lying; yet went he

not in. Then cometh Simon Peter following him, and he went into the sepulchre, and seeth the linen clothes lying, and the napkin that was about his head not lying with the linen clothes, but wrapped together in a place by itself. Then went in also that other disciple, who came first to the sepulchre; and he saw and believed, [that the body of Jesus had been taken away,] for as yet they did not understand the scripture that he was to rise from the dead. Then the disciples went away again to their own. home.

But Mary stood without, at the sepulchre, weeping. And as she wept, she stooped down to look into the sepulchre; and there she saw two angels in white, sitting the one at the head, and the other at the feet, where the body of Jesus had lain. They say unto her, "Woman, why weepest thou?" She saith unto them, "Because they have taken away my Lord, and I know not where they have

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