quests. The world's conversion to Christ must be regarded in both these views. The power of Godliness, we are told, shall one day pervade all ranks of people; but this saving power must be וְהוּא Pers. pron. 3d. pers. sing. mas. with pref. copulative. This n. mas. sing. ab to miss, make a false step; to sin; to offer רב Adj. pl. of רבים ab Kal. pret. 3d. pers. sing. mas. ab to lift or take up; as bear with any one, as bear with me,' Job xxi. 3.; to TT why doth not the מַדְעַ לֹא נָשָׂא הַבֵּן בַּעֲוֹן הָאָב oneself, as בֵּן לֹא יִשָּׂא בַּעֲוֹן הָאָב ! 'son bear the iniquity of the father the son shall not bear the iniquity of וְאָב לֹא יִשָּׂא בַּעֲוֹן 737 TT: take away one's sin, i, e. to expiate, make atonement for sin, as -to atone for the sin of the congrega לָשֵׂאת אֶת־עֲוֹן הָעֵדָה tion,' Lev. x. 17.; to pardon sin as 'and thou forgavest the iniquity of my sin,' Psal. xxxii. 5. ; &c. aby to revolt, &c., see above. T : Hiph. fut. 3d pers. sing mas ab used here in its good sense, a wise man יִשְׁמַע חָכָם וְיוֹסֶף לֶקַח always hold good, e. g : hears, and increases his knowledge,' Prov. i. 5. Nord. Heb. imparted to the sinner, for we cannot make ourselves to differ. Hence, none, whether high or low, learned or unlearned, ever can unfeignedly yield themselves up to Christ, without being given to Him by the Father. Of this gift, Christ thus speaks, odosis dúvasa ἐλθεῖν πρὸς ἐμὲ, ἐάν μή ὁ πατήρ ὁ πέμψας με ἑλκύσῃ αὐτόν, κἀγὼ ἀναστήσω autóv ev sexan hulpa. [Joh. vi, 44.] This Father's gift, Christ, we are told, divides unto Himself as a spoil. Satan, the prince of this world, had usurped a power over mankind, but Christ rov ἀρχηγὸν τῆς σωτηρίας who is stronger than he, both overcame and took from him the armour wherein he trusted; [see Luke, xi, 22,] divided, is now dividing, and will still divide the spoil, till the whole world shall savingly know Him. Accordingly, He 'the 773 leader and commander of the people,' [Is. lv, 4,] engaged with all the powers of darkness, and, by death, destroyed him that had the power of death, that is the devil.' [Heb. ii, 14.] On the cross, we are assured that, He spoiled principalities and powers, and made a show of them openly, triumphing over them in it.' [Col. ii, 15.] And, in His ascension, He 'led captivity captive, received gifts for men: Yea, for the rebellious also, that the Lord God might dwell among them.' [Psal. lxviii, 18.] Thus did Jesus wrest the 'many,' i. e. the church reconciled to Jehovah by faith in himself, from the firm grasp of the Apostate Angel; and, thus must we Christians, like faithful warriors, strive to fight a good warfare-the good fight of faith;' having truth for the girdle of our loins-righteousness for our breastplate-the Gospel of peace for our greaves-faith for our shield-God's word for our helmet and our sword, praying always with all prayer and supplication in the spirit. [see Eph. vi, 10-18.] In the following clause, the prophet, being full of the Messiah's most amazing love, in voluntarily offering Himself as an effecient sacrifice to expiate human guilt, once more recapitulates the ground of the Messiah's most glorious reward: Because He poured out His soul unto death. How beautifully harmonious with these gracious words is the language of our blessed Master! Therefore doth my Father love me, because I lay down my life, that I may take it again. No man taketh it from me, but I lay it down of myself. I have power to lay it down, and I have power to take it again.' [Joh. x, 17, 18.] Yes, Jesus of Nazareth, did indeed cone for the express purpose of laying down His life a ransom for lifeless sinners; and He, in His infinite mercy and love, voluntarily and unreservedly exposed Himself to death in our stead, as the original words of our text forcibly express. This was fulfilled in the shedding or pouring fourth of His most precious blood, when his hands, feet, and side were pierced with the nails and the soldier's spear, when suspended upon the cross. This same reason of Christ's exaltation is also assigned by St. Paul. [Philip. ii, 9.] "And He was numbered with transgressors.' The minute fulfillment of this prophetic record did not fail to strike the Evangelist St. Mark, in a very forcible manner; [Mark xv, 28,] but his specific application does by no means exhaust the whole sense of the prediction. To mark the ignominy that He was to endure for us, Jesus was indeed numbered with transgressors of the most atrocious character, bearing in His own person the load of our iniquities, and enduring the curse and condemnation due to the sinner. "And bare the sin of many. This is a brief but most comprehensive reason, why the Holy and Just One had thus to travail in the greatness of His strength, in submitting to such an ignominious death upon the cross. To this effect the Holy Spirit infallibly testifies that, the immaculate Jesus was indeed Such an High Priest as became us, holy, harmless, undefiled, separate from sinners;' [Heb. vii, 26,] The Lamb without blemish, and without spot;' [1 Peter, i, 19,]; that He was manifested to take away our sins; and in Him is no sin;' [1 John, iii, 5,]; and that He was once offered to bear the sins of many. [Heb. ix, 28.] Hence, the right and Just Gospel demand for faith in, and obedience to him as the Almighty Saviour; for, 'there is none other name under heaven given among men, whereby we must be saved,' but the ever blessed name of the Holy Jesus, who, in order to effect a full expiation for sin, and the entire pardon and complete salvation of the sinner, humbled himself, and became obedient unto death, even the death of the cross.' [Philip ii, 8.] 'And made intercession for the transgressors.' This was fulfilled even when suspended upon the cross. 'Father forgive them; for they know not what they do.' [Luke, xxiii, 24.] The Messiah's intercession is here introduced as another ground, on which the increase and aggrandizement of His Kingdom may be expected. The Messiah was not only to offer Himself as a sacrifice for sin, and to enter into Heaven with His own blood, but He was to make intercession for us at the right hand of God. In His mediatorial office; Christ, very effectually pleads the merit of His death to procure the salvation of all who come unto God through Him. Christ being our everlasting High Priest, Sacrifice, Intercessor, and Mediator, we are fully assured, 'is able to save to the uttermost all that come unto God by Him, seeing He ever liveth to make intercession for them.' [Heb. vii, 25.] Since the establishment of Christianity, there was not a day which did not witness the efficacy of the Saviour's intercession. We behold it in the conversion of the thousands on the day of Penticost, [Acts, ii, 41,] and of the thousands who heard and believed the word preached by Peter and John in Solomon's Temple, [Acts, iv, 4,]; in the opening of the doors of faith unto the Gentiles, [Acts, xiv, 27,]; in the conversion of the mightiest, noblest, and most civilized nations, who, with their kings and rulers did, worship, are worshipping, and ever will worship and exalt the name of Jesus as their Saviour and their God; and, in the invincible faith of the Church, who rejoicing in what God had done for the Salvation of thousands of millions of immortal souls, is still knocking at the door of mercy, looking for that blessed period when 'at the name of Jesus every knee shall bow, of things in heaven, and things in earth, and things under the earth; and that every tongue shall confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the Glory of God the Father.' [Phil. ii, 10, 11.] Thus, by the Almighty's help, we have gone minutely into every verse, showing from the Sacred Scriptures and from ancient Jewish tradition, that this most important portion of Holy Writ had none for its most Glorious theme but the person of the Messiah-Jesus of Nazareth whose humilation was and is unequalled and whose glory was, is, and ever will be altogether unparalleled. Let us then earnestly pray, that the condition of the unbelieving Jews who filled up the measure of their sins by crucifying the Lord of Glory, may be a warning to us not to 'crucify to ourselves the Son of God afresh, and put Him to an open shame.' Let us, 'watch, and pray' that the Holy Spirit may enable us to stand fast in our high and glorious calling. Let us not be high minded, but fear. For if God spared not the natural branches, we must take heed lest He spare not us,' and cause the repentant Israelite to turn upon us, and address us in the following beautiful, bnt searching lines of Bishop Heber: And who art thou that mournest me, replied the ruined grey, Our day of Grace is sunk in night, our time of mercy spent, ment. Yet gaze not idly on our fall,-but, sinners, warned be, Who spared not His chosen seed, may send His wrath on thee. Our day of Grace is sunk in night, thy noon is in its prime, THE ALPHABET OF NATURAL THEOLOGY. It has often seemed to us, that in deriving proofs of the existence, character, and attributes of God from the works of nature, many writers on the subject, had at least neglected one important field of argument, where advantages to the cause of Natural Theology might be reaped. We have many able treatises to prove the existence, aud to illustrate the perfections of Deity, by the ordinary cumulative arguments of contrivance and design everywhere apparent, from the pens of such men as Ray, Derham, Butler, Paley, Chalmers, Brougham, and the authors of the splendid Bridgewater Treatises; but to a great degree, they have confined themselves to the organic kingdoms of nature, or to the relations of these to the inorganic; or have ranged through the skies, and discovered wisdom in the arrangement of planets, suns and adamantine. spheres. But we inquire why not begin at the beginning? with that which must be fundamental to all other arguments, and must antedate them all? Why not dig deep and found the argument upon which so much depends, upon the very crystalline rocks that lie at the foundation of the globe? And rise from these to the ordinances of Heaven? There are, it seems to us, many facts, laws, relations, evidences of design, or of rational intuition, scarcely, if at all, less striking, developed by the researches of modern science in the mineral kingdom, and among the ultimate particles of matter, than those which are adduced from higher departments of nature. And chance, or the fortuitous concourse of atoms has little to do in the one case as in the other. But the acute Paley, at the opening of his lucid argument disparages all wisdom in stones, and of course in all minerals, for every thing not animal and vegetable is mineral. So also in the latter part of his work on Natural Theology, he proceeds on the same assumption: "now inert matter is out of the question; and organized substance includes marks of contrivance."* Chalmers also in the introductory chapter of his Bridgewater Treatise speaks in a similar strain. It is not to the creation of the world, and the endowment of matter with certain properties and laws These facts are noticed in Buckland's Bridgewater Treatise, vol. 1, ch. xxiii. Also by Mantell, Wonders of Geology, vol. II. page 898. "The pebble rejected by the divine, as affording no evidence of design, becomes, in the hands of the geologist a striking proof of infinite wisdom." |