ftians. But those who view this matter fairly and impartially, discern the most beautiful harmony. They perceive that the one illuftrates and confirms the other; that while the Mofaic difpenfation derives its perfection from the Christian, the Chriftian derives its evidence from the Mosaic; and that both hinge on that given to the patriarchs. Thus the Church finds the most abundant reason for this fong; "He is the Rock, his work " is perfect v." "As for God, his way is perfect.

"For who is

God fave JEHOVAH ? and who is

66 a rock fave our God w?"

As there is the most beautiful harmony in all the parts of divine revelation, although written in a great variety of ages; as they have all one great fubject, the redemption of the Church by the Son of God in the nature of man; as one fpirit evidently pervades and animates the whole, uniformly "teftifying the sufferings of Chrift, and "the glory that should follow;" a fimilar harmony is difcernible in the operations of Providence. Of these we have an almost uninterrupted record for more than four thousand years. But they all evidently concentrate in one point. They are all directed to the work of redemption. They all confpire towards its accomplishment; fome of them immediately, and others more remotely. The first gofpel-promife, concerning the feed of the woman bruifing the head of the ferpent, is a key to all the fucceeding history of Providence, in reference to individuals or to nations, to the Church

Deut. xxxii.

wa Sam. xxii. 31, 32.

Church or the world. We fee the earth peopled, and in a little almost entirely ftript of its inhabitants; cities built, and razed; empires founded, and brought to ruin; all in relation to that kingdom which fhall never have an end, and that dominion which fhall not be given to another people. "When the Moft High divided to the na"tions their inheritance, when he feparated the "fons of Adam, he fet the bounds of the people, "according to the number of the children of If"rael." It was for the fake of his Church, and as her Redeemer and Holy One, that he "fent to "Babylon, and brought down all their nobles)." When he warns her not to be "afraid of the Affyrian," her interest in the Meffiah is pointed out as her fecurity and confolation; "It fhall come to pass in that day, that his burden fhall "be taken away from off thy fhoulder, and his "yoke from off thy neck, and the yoke shall be deftroyed because of the anointing 4."

66

66

It was doubtlefs with a defign to imprefs the Ifraelites with a fenfe of the unity, both of his effence, and of his love to the Church, that God fo frequently defigned himfelf from the relation which he bore to their fathers. He was pleased to take fuch names in fucceffion; as if he meant to inform them, that notwithstanding the lapse of time, and the change of perfons, he is ftill the fame. When he appeared to Mofes, and gave him a commiflion to proclaim liberation to his. captives in Egypt, he commanded him to deliver this

x Deut. xxxii. 8.

y Ifa. xliii. 14.

z Ifa. x. 27.

this meffage; " JEHOVAH, the God of your fa"thers, the God of Abraham, the God of Ifaac, "and the God of Jacob, hath fent me unto you : "this is my name for ever, and my memorial un"to all generations a." As he uses this language in the present time, especially in the ftricteft connexion with that wonderful name, I AM THAT I AM; while it proves the unchangeablenefs of his love to thefe patriarchs, as ftill exifting in a feparate state, it proclaims the fame unchangeable love to all their fpiritual feed.

The Redeemer of his Church indeed affumed various defignations of the fame kind, according to her fituation, and the progrefs of his work. When by an awful difplay of his juftice he had feparated the family of Noah from all the other inhabitants of the earth, it appeared proper to his infinite wifdom to separate one branch of this family from the reft. He therefore took the character of "JEHOVAH the God of Shem;" as the promife was to run in the line of his pofterity. After being known by this character for feveral generations, when all the pofterity of Shem were more or lefs corrupted, he feparated one individual, not merely from the other families of this race, but from his father's family, as his true worfhipper, and the ancestor of that illuftrious perfonage in whom all the families of the earth fhould be bleffed. He revealed himfelf as "the God of "Abraham." Only one of all the fons of Abraham being the child of promife; he also called himself

himfelf "the God of Ifaac:" and with these two he conjoined the name of Jacob, as he loved him, while his brother Efau was rejected. In the hiftory of Jacob, we have a ftriking inftance of his zeal for preferving the doctrine of the divine unity. When Laban and he entered into a covenant, Laban used this form of fwearing; "The "God of Abraham, and the God of Nahor, the "God of their Father, judge betwixt us." But Jacob fware by the fear of his father Ifaac " that is, by the object of his fear. Jacob would not swear in the terms ufed by Laban. For he mentioned the God of Abraham," as at the fame time the God of Nahor, and of their father Terah. Now, we are told that Terah the father of Abraham, and the father of Nahor, "ferved "other gods, on the other fide of the flood," or great river Euphrates. Laban fware by "the "God of Abraham," before he was feparated from his father's houfe: Jacob would fwear only by that God of Abraham, who was worshipped by his immediate father Ifaac, who had called Abraham from idolatry, and given him the promife of falvation in the feed of Ifaac *.

* Here the remarks of a very ingenious writer merit our attention. Speaking of the pretenfions made by other nations, allied to the Ifraelites, to the promise of the Meffiah, he says: "It is these jealoufies, and these "pretenfions, that gave rife to the custom of calling God, the God of Abraham, the God of Ifaac, and the God of Jacob: for though he might "as well have been called the God of Adam, the God of Enoch, and the "God of Noah, forafmuch as all these patriarchs were alfo depofitaries of the promife of the Meffiah yet it is probable that God was called fo, be

"caufe

When God had feparated a peculiar people for himself, to exprefs the nearness of their relation, the pleasure he had in them, especially as emblems of his fpiritual feed, and to diftinguish himself from all falfe gods, he took the name of "the "God of Ifrael." He did not borrow a new defignation from any individual among them: for he viewed Ifrael, in their collective capacity, as "his fon, his firft-born." He ftill delighted, however, in recognifing his relation to their pious progenitors; and in affuring them, that he would perform the truth to Jacob, and the mercy to Abraham, which he had fworn from the days of "old e."

Thus was God pleased to link one revelation with another; that he might, in the moft expreffive manner, teach his people the importance of the doctrine of the divine unity, and fhew them the neceffity of being on their guard against impofture; while he at the fame time gave them the most fatisfying evidence that they had nothing of this kind to fear, when addreffed by the God of their fathers. Such care did he manifeft in this refpect, that, in different inftances, he in this manner connected the diftinct revelations that he

"caufe of the particular promifes that had been made to Abraham, secondly to Ifaac, and laftly to Jacob, and in oppofition to the pretenfions "of fome people near neighbours to the Ifraelites, and jealous of their hopes: The God of Abraham, and not of Lot, as the Ammonites and "Moabites, Lot's pofterity, pretended; the God of Ifanc, and not of Ish"mael, as the Ishmaelites pretended; the God of Jacob, and not of Efau, as the Edomites, who were the offspring of Efau, pretended." Allix's Reflections upon the Books of the Holy Scriptures, Vol. i. p. 80.

e Mic. vii. 20.