admired than the book of Psalms, and no book is perverted more from its original principles. Instead of being applied to Jesus Christ, as it generally is in the New Testament, it is considered as relating only the experience of David, and is quoted principally to illustrate the joys and sorrows under the present dispensation. It is very frequently accommodated to justify the mere reveries of enthusiasts. A great part indeed records joys and sorrows, thanksgivings and complaints; but a greater than David, or any mere man, is most frequently intended.-Balfour.

Add to which a very great number of the prophecies, which plainly point to Christ, referred, in their first application, to eminent persons of the Jewish nation.

3. There are also numerous other passages the evident intention of which lead us from a literal to a spiritual sense. Things relating to our immortal spirits, its operations and change of state, are couched under expressions that belong to our bodies and our natural faculties. Our awful state by nature is represented by the leprosy, Isa. i.; our renewal in conversion by a new heart, Ezek. xxxvi.; the operations of the Spirit to this end, are compared to water that cleanses.

Where a word has several significations, in common use, that must be selected which best suits the passage of Scripture under consideration taken in connexion with its context; and not only so, but which also agrees with parallel passages in which there can be no doubt; and these parallels are of vast importance where the word or phrase under consideration is at all doubtful. For instance, the word blood may be adduced as an illustration of this remark. The great importance of this term, and its frequent use in the Jewish law, suggest a careful inquiry about it. "Almost all things are by the law purged with blood." "And without the shedding of blood there is no remission." The reason of consecrating the blood to God rather than any part of the victim is mentioned Lev. xvii. 11: "For

the life of the flesh is in the blood, and I have given it to you upon the altar to make an atonement for your souls; for it is the blood that maketh an atonement for the soul."

Such is the harmony of the Old and the New Testament upon this subject, that no difficulty occurs in our studies. But still the word has many significations in Scripture. Sometimes it signifies the natural descent from one common ancestor, as Acts xvii. 26: " And hath made of one blood all nations of men," &c. Sometimes it is used figuratively for death: to" resist unto blood," is to resist unto death, Heb. xii. 4. “The voice of thy brother's blood crieth to me from the ground." The term blood frequently refers to the death of Christ considered as an atonement for sinners; as," Being justified by his blood, we shall be saved from wrath through him," Rom. v. 9. These expressions in the New Testament are an allusion to the typical blood under the Old; and we are taught to reason thus: "If the blood of bulls and of goats, and the ashes of an heifer, sprinkling the unclean, sanctifieth to the purifying of the flesh, how much more shall the blood of Christ, who through the eternal Spirit offered himself without spot to God, purge your consciences from dead works to serve the living God," Heb. ix. 13, 14. Again, "God has set forth his Son to be a propitiation, that we may have faith in his blood;" that is, that we may believe in the efficacy of his atoning sacrifice, Rom. iii. 25; Eph. i. 7; 1 Pet. i. 18, 19. The blood of Christ is also represented as the procuring cause of justification: "Being justified by his blood," Rom. v. 9, means the merits of his atonement. In other passages sanctification is imputed to the blood of Christ: " They have washed their robes, and made them white in the blood of the Lamb," Rev. vii. 14. The term used in this sense signifies the consequent blessings of the cross meritoriously obtained thereby. I beg leave to suggest that very great assistance will be obtained

by the student's attention to the various definitions of words in Cruden's Concordance and in Brown's Dictionary of the Bible; and this advantage should never be neglected if the preacher means to preach from texts in which such important words or expressions are found; it will be necessary during his probationary years, and while his library continues to be scanty.

We see, at every step we take, the great importance of a correct judgment in fixing upon the true principles of interpretation, by which alone we can "prove all things, and hold fast that which is good." It is true there are difficulties; yet these may be surmounted by the means which God has put into our hands. We shall not therefore go to Rome to inquire what is the sense of the church upon Scripture; for, though the pope and his priests have assumed the expounding office, yet Luther evidently saw clearer than the pope into the true meaning of Scripture. I have the same hope of you all." I thank thee, O Father, Lord of heaven and earth, that though these things be hid from the 'wise and the prudent, yet thou hast revealed them to babes." A very learned papist says (though falsely), that such is the uncertainty and ambiguity of words and phrases in the original Scriptures, that it is impossible for any man to understand them, and that in this dilemma the only course that could be taken was to refer to the church.

However, we must take care to be consistent, and, in fixing upon a principle of interpretation, we must not make Scripture contradict itself, which we should do, in some cases, if we followed the strictly literal sense. If we were so to fix the principle of interpretation, we should abuse the passage, Matt. xviii. 8, 9; for it is contrary to Exod. xx.

* Upon important Scripture words there is an excellent and compressed work by the Rev. T. Wood, that will repay the purchase, published by R. Baynes. See also his Essays on Important Subjects, a valuable little work, printed by the Book Society, price 1s. 6d.

13: nothing must be done to hazard our lives. Again, the sentence, " My Father is greater than I," must not be understood as contradicting another declaration, such as

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I and my Father are one." The context and the nature of the discourse from which both expressions are taken (two main things always to be attended to) render it evident how they ought to be understood, namely, that the first was indicative of himself as man, the second of his proper divinity. Again, John xiv. 24, Christ tells his disciples that his Father had sent him;" that is, in his quality of Messiah he was sent. Now as the sender is greater than he that is sent, so in this sense the Father is greater than the Son; but it certainly requires very little argument, and no sophistry, to reconcile this saying with the most orthodox notion of the deity of Christ, and to show that there is nothing in this and similar passages which may not be understood without opposing the declared intention of Jehovah, as it is expressed by Christ himself,

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That all men should honour the Son even as they honour the Father." It must be obvious to every unprejudiced reader of the New Testament that the passages which speak of the person of Christ may be ranged into two classes, which can admit of no consistent interpretation but as they are considered as exhibiting the Saviour under the two very different aspects just named-the one class being applicable only to his manhood, and the other class containing a great many passages representing him in his true and proper divinity. These statements bring forward the great dispute between us and the Socinians, or, as they choose to be called, Unitarians; and every preacher ought to know the strength of his arguments against those who deny the divinity of Christ. Their ordinary mode of argument on this subject consists in taking up some passage which speaks of Christ in his human nature, and having proved that he was truly man (which of course it is not difficult to do), they very modestly jump to the conclusion

that he is man only, thus contenting themselves with begging the question at issue. I have always thought it a forcible argument in our favour, and I may repeat it again and again, that, by the preaching of our doctrines, God does bless the word and convert souls; but by our adversaries' doctrine no conversions are realized, they merely catch some of our apostates or backsliders, and call them converts. However, we know that many of these are recovered, and become more firm than before; an instance we have in the Rev. Thomas Scott, of Aston Sandford, the commentator.

It is now generally acknowledged that Scripture is the best interpreter of Scripture; and, among other methods in which this principle may be applied, the preacher will derive considerable advantage from comparing the language of his text with some synonymous expression, as Ezek. xx. 38: "I will purge out from among you the rebels and them that transgress against me;" now see Ps. cxix. 119: "Thou puttest away all the wicked of the earth like dross." What is meant in the first passage by purging is in the second explained by putting away-making a separation. This is often done in the present life, but will effectually be done in the day of judgment. And the same thing is meant by Isa. i. 25: "I will purely purge away thy dross, and take away all thy tin." Notice likewise Isa. xliii. 21: "This people have I formed for myself," &c. Now, if we want to know what this formation means, turn to Isa. li. 1-3; there we find Abraham hewed out of a rock —a rude stone, to be squared, and polished, and made fit to be placed in an eminent situation in God's spiritual building.

To the young preacher especially, who, in consequence of a defective education and the want of suitable books, may meet with difficulties which he is unable readily to surmount, I would strongly recommend, in the first place, a most careful perusal of the Scriptures, with these difficulties