LORD and SAVIOUR, JESUS CHRIST. 63 The difciples; before this, had feen our Lord perform :many miracles, and had abundant reafon to rely on his power and goodnefs. They had certainly no caufe to be fo much affrighted, or to give way to fuch defpair and terror ; they might have confidered, that the fame divine perfon who had fo often healed the lick, and had lately {hewn fuch power over the watry element, as to bring the fifh to their nets, was equally able to {lay the wild waves, or to have preferved them alive, had the {hip funk beneath them : but they feemed, in the ,hurry ofmind con - fequent on the terrors of the form, to have 'forgot the power of their Mailer ; and therefore he gently rebuked them, Why are ye fo fearful? How is it that ye have no faith? They ought to have remembered- likewife, that the voyage was undertaken at his command, and it was not to be feared, that he would permit them to perifh : but when the terror of the form was over, they wonderedät his power, and, though they frequently had occafion to remark, the effeas of his hea- venly goodnefs, they exclaimed, What manner of man is 'this ! that even the winds and the fia obey him. Soon after the form was filled, the chip arrived in the country of Gadara ; and on their landing, two men poffeffed with devils came to meet our Redeemer. They were both exceeding fierce, turbu- lent, and unruly but one of them was more furious than the other : this perfon had often been bound with chains anti fetters, but all in vain, for his fetters were always broken with the greaten fury, fo that no man attempted any longer to re- frain -him ; being therefore at full liberty be fhunned all human fociety, and wan- dered day and night, in defert and dry places, and amongn the fepúlchres and tombs, filling the filent repofitories of the dead with the mon difmal and horrid bowlings, and fometimes tearing his flefh, and cutting himfelf with Hones. The difciples were very much alarmed and terrified at the approach of thefe horrid and furious beings, but Jeans foon quieted their apprehenfions of danger, by commandingthe devils to come Out of the men, while they were at force difance. The heavenly command had no boner paffed from the lips of our great _ Re- deemer, than the men fell on their faces, crying, What have we to do with thee, Jefus, thou Son of the moll- high God? Art -thou come hither to torment us before the time ? I adjure thee, by God, that thou torment us not. The infernal fpirits were not ignorant of the power of the Son of God, and wire afraid, that he would can them immedi- ately into the torments prepared for them, and fuffer them no longer to wander about the earth, which they feem,to have hoped wóuld be permitted them till the judgment of the great day. Jesus, being .willing that the torment of thefe miferable men fltould be the more underflood, aiked one of the dæ- mons his name, who immediately anfwered, My name -is Legion, for we are many : it the fame time, he humbly requefted, that our Lord would not immediately call them into the ultimate torments prepared for them in-the great deep of bottomlefs per- dition, butwould permit them to enter into an herd of fwine, then feeding ona neigh- bouring mountain: The grand deceiver of mankind, no doubt, beheld with gnawing envy, the effects of our Redeemer's power and goodnefs ; and to abate the opinion which the inhabitants of Gadara might form of him, and make him odious in their view, feems to be the reafon of his petition to enter into the fwine ; for doubtlefs, the Devil knew, that if his legion could gain this permiffion, it would be in their power to deflroy them : but though his fecret deigns could not be hid from the Savi- our ofthe world, yet our Lord was pleafed to grant to the fiend, the permiffion he defired :
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