slope, the longed-for shelter! Happy, when, weary and footsore, covered with dust, the portals of the city close him in. A few moments before, had he been overtaken on the mountain-top by his pursuer, he might have been heard to cry out, in the bitterness of despair, "Hast thou found me, O mine enemy?" Now, safe within the secure shelter, he can rejoicingly exclaim, even with the Avenger standing close by, "O thou enemy, destructions are come to a perpetual end."[2] These _Cities of Refuge_ form one of the Old Testament PICTURES of the sinner, and of the coming gospel salvation. This was the way God took to teach the Jewish people great gospel truths. Just as we know that youthful readers like a story-book all the better when it has got pictures in it; so God taught the early church, when it was in a state of "_childhood_," by means of similar _pictures_ or _types_; and the present was one of them. It represented, and still represents, the sinner who has broken the Divine law as pursued by an avenger: JUSTICE following with drawn sword, exclaiming, "_The soul that sinneth it must die._"[3] "_Though hand join in hand, the wicked shall not escape unpunished._"[4] This is a picture, too, which applies to every one without exception, rich and poor, parent and child, master and servant; "for all have sinned, and come short of the glory of God."[5] But a glorious CITY, "_salvation_ its walls and bulwarks," opens its gates. The sinner is exhorted to "escape thither;" to "linger not in all the plain;" to "flee for his life, lest he be consumed."[6] That city is _Jesus_, the sinner's Refuge and the sinner's Friend. Once within its walls, no enemy can touch him,--no sword can terrify him. He can triumphantly exclaim, "Who shall separate me from the love of Christ?"[7]