THEOLOGY.

725

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saw it necessary to disperse them into distinct colonies, by causingsuch discord among them as rendered it impossible for any onespecies of idolatry to be at once universally established. Afterthis dispersion, there is reason to believe that particular revelationswere vouchsafed wherever men were disposed to regard them.Peleg had his name prophetically given him from the dispersionwhich was to happen in his days ; and not only his father Heher,hut all the heads of families mentioned from Noah to Abraham ,are with much plausibility supposed to have had the spirit of pro-phecy on many occasions. Noah was undoubtedly both priestand prophet; and living till within two years of the birth of Abra-ham , or, according to others, till that patriarch was near 60 yearsold, he would surely be able to keep up a tolerable sense of truereligion among such of his descendants as sojourned within theinfluence of his doctrine and example. IIis religious son. Shem,who lived till alter the birth of Isaac, could not hut preserve intolerable purity the faith and worship of the true God among suchof his own descendants as lived in his neighbourhood. But thoughthe remains of true religion were thus preserved among a fewrighteous men, idolatry, with its inseparable attendants, unnaturallusts and cruel superstition, had in a short time prevailed so faramong the sons of Noah, that God , in his infinite wisdom, saw itexpedient not only to shorten the lives of men, but also to with-draw his presence from the generality, who had thus renderedthemselves unworthy of such communications; and to select aParticular family, in which his worship might be preserved pureamidst the various corruptions that were overspreading the world.^Vith this view Abraham was called ; and after many remarkabletrials of his faith and constancy, admitted to a particular intimacyand friendship with his Maker. Got! entered into a peculiar cove-nant with him, engaging to be his guide, protector, and defender:to bestow all temporal blessings upon him and his seed; and tomake some of those seed the instruments of conveying blessings°f a higher kind to all the nations of the earth . It was doubtlessfor his great faith, that Abraham was fixed upon to be the parent°f that people, who should preserve the knowledge of the unityof God in the midst of an idolatrous and polytheistic world ; butWre are not to imagine that it was for his sake only that all this wasdone, or that his less worthy descendants were by the equal Lordof all treated will) partial fondness for the virtue of their ancestor;

was for the benefit of mankind in general that he was calledfrom his father’s house, that he might preserve the doctrine of thetlivine unity in his own family, and be an instrument in the hand°f Providence lo convey the same faith to the nations around him.Accordingly, we find him distinguished among the neighbouringPrinces, and kings reproved for his sake; who being made ac-quainted with his prophetic character, desired his intercessionwith God . History tells us of his conversing on the subject of'digion with the most learned Egyptians, who appear to havederived from him or some of his descendants the rite of circum-pjsion, and lo have been for a while stopt in their progress toward;d'e lust stage of that degrading idolatry which alterwards ren-dered their national worship the opprobrium of the whole earth,bee Mysteries, Mythology, and Polytheism . The Mosaicdispensation is a remarkable display of the divine communications°f God to his creatures. The Jewish law had two great objects in^ lew ; of which the first was to preserve among them (he know-ledge of the true God , a rational worship springing from thatknowledge and the regular practice of moral virtue; and theSe cond was to fit them for receiving the accomplishment of thepeat promise made to their ancestors. When the true God firstll 'lls them, by their leader Moses , that if they would obey hispfice indi ed and keep his covenant, then they should be a pecu-lal> treasure to him above all people; to prevent them from sup-psing that he shared the earth with the idols of the heathen, andl?d from partial fondness chosen them for his portion, he imme-j.'afoly adds, “ for all the earth is mine.” By this addition he gave,. e m plainly to understand that they were chosen to be bis pecu-J ar treasure for some purpose of general importance; and the veryst article of the covenant which they were to keep was, thatlle y should have no other gods but him. So inveterate, how-}i? r . was the principle which led to an intercommunity of theo J e cts of worship, that they could not have kept this article of* covenant but in a state of separation from the rest of mankind :w'tl t * lat se P aral i° n couhl neither have been effected nor continuedlll 'out the visible providence of the Almighty watching over

Vot « iv. —no. 206,

them as his peculiar treasure. Upon this separation every thingdepended ; and therefore, to render it the more secure, Jehovah,who in compliance with their prejudices had already assumed theappellation of their God , was graciously pleased to become like-wise thejr supreme Magistrate, making them a kingdom of priests,and a holy nation, and delivering to them a digest as well oftheir civil as of their religious laws. See Mosaic Law, Sab-bath, and Sacrifice. The Mosaic law had certainly a spiritualmeaning to be understood when the fulness of time s'hould come.Every Christian sees a striking resemblance between the sacrificeof the paschal lamb, which delivered the Israelites from thedestroying angel in Egypt , and the infinite sacrifice of “ the Lambof God, which taketii away the sin of the world.” Indeed thewhole ritual of sacrifice must have led the more intelligent ofthem lo faith in a future sacrifice ; by which, while the heel of theseed of the woman should be bruised, the head of the serpentshould he completely crushed : anti as the prophets were raised upfrom time to time, to prepare (hem for the Coming of the Messiah ,and lo foretci the nature of his kingdom, there can be no doubtbut that those inspired teachers would lay open to them, as far aswas expedient, the temporary duration of the Mosaic law, andconvince them that it was only the shadow of better things tocome. From the nature of their ritual, and the different prophe-cies vouchsafed them, which became more and more explicit asthe time approached for their accomplishment, they must surelyhave been led to expect redemption from the curse'of the fall bythe sufferings of their Messiah ; but that any one of them knewprecisely the manner in which they were to be redeemed, and thenature of that religion w hich was to supersede their ow n, is whollyincredible. Such knowledge would have made them impatienttinder the yoke of ordinances to which they were subjected ; forafter the Christian faith came into full splendour, mankind couldbe no longer under tbe tuition of such a schoolmaster as the law,which “ had only a shadow of good things, hut so far from theirreality, not even the very image of them.” Through theseshadows, however, the Jews , aided by the clearer light of pro-phecy, might have seen enough of God ’s plan of redemption tohave made them acknowledge Jesus , when he came among themworking miracles of mercy, for the Messiah so long promised.The time fixed by the Jewish prophets for the coming of the Mes-siah being arrived, “ a messenger was sent before his face to prp-pare his way before him by preaching the baptism of repentancefor the remission of sins.” This messenger was John the Raptist,a very extraordinary man, and the greatest of all the prophets.His birth was miraculous, the scene of his ministry the wilderness,his manners austere, and his preaching upright, without respect ofpersons. He frankly told his audience that he was not the Mes-siah, that the Messiah would soon appear among them, that ” hewas mightier than himself, and that he would baptize them withthe Holy Ghost and with fne.” Mightier indeed he was; forthough born of a woman the Messiah was not the son of a humanfather; and though living for the fir.-t 30 years of his life in ob-scurity and poverty, he was the lineal descendant of David, andheir to the throne of Israel . But the dignity of his human de-scent, great as it was, vanishes from consideration when comparedwith the glory which he had with his Father before the worldwas. The Jewish dispensation was given by the ministry of Moses ,and illustrated by subsequent revelations vouchsafed to the pro-phets; the immediate author of the Christian religion is the Aoyo;or Second Person of the blessed Trinity, of whom St. John de-clares, that “ he was in the beginning with God, and was God :that all things were made by him ; and that without him was notany thing made that was made.” We have already proved, thatj in'the one Godhead there is a Trinity of Persons; and that the' Aoyo t is One of the Three, is apparent from these words of thei apctle, and from many other passages of sacred scripture. Thushe is called, the Lord of Hosts himself; the First and .the Last,besides whom there is no God ; the Most High God ; God blessedfor ever; the Mighty God , the Everlasting Father, Jehovah ourRighteousness; and the only wise God our Saviour. This greatBeing, as the same apostle assures us, was made flesh, and dweltamong men ; not that the divine nature was or could be changedinto humanity, for God is immutable, the same Almighty and in-comprehensible Spirit yesterday, to-day, and for ever; but theWord or Second Person in the Godhead, assuming a human souland body into a personal union with himself, dwelt upon earth as8 Y a man.